Setting Boundaries and Meaning them.

(“Sailing Away”, watercolor, 2005  Jane Kohut-Bartels, an actual sailer used as a coal barge in 1958, England)

 

 

This short piece might sound weird, strange or downright mean to some. Frankly, it’s been a long time coming. I’m still learning here so this is certainly not a complete answer, far from it. It’s an issue like an onion, with many layers.  It can be stinky, too. And, it can make us uncomfortable in the doing.

I grew up with a parent who was an extreme narcissist by any score.  I never learned, or actually, I was never allowed to set boundaries as a child or teen.  Since a narcissistic parent doesn’t see their child as anything except an extension of their own person, the offspring setting boundaries is something not tolerated. Hence, it was something I didn’t really know the value of until much later in adulthood and after quite a bit of therapy.

Boundaries mean choices and choices should reflect a healthy sense of oneself. In life we meet all sorts of people, appropriate to our existence and those inappropriate.  When we haven’t an understanding of boundaries, (and this doesn’t just fall out of the sky, we have to learn this) when we are uncomfortable with the behavior of others towards us but don’t know why, we can dismiss these feelings and we can choose inappropriate or unhealthy relationships.  Many times we are afraid of offending, so we open ourselves to what comes down as actual abuse. When we have serious deficiencies in self-worth and don’t value ourselves in healthy and positive ways, we fall to the relationships that are obstacles and become, ultimately, terrible and/or destructive burdens.

Recently, I have been taking stock of this issue.  It has loomed large in my life over the past few years.  Perhaps this is because I have become more conscious of this, and the ties to narcissistic behavior, but also because I have begun to develop a long needed and necessary sense of self-worth. And it isn’t something that is easy. Abuse, emotional and otherwise, comes from not valuing yourself and setting boundaries. There are many people in this world who look for what they perceive as vulnerable people and they latch on for their own benefit.  We call them opportunists.

I remember working at a local university in the early 90’s.  I grew to hate it.  I had a female supervisor who demanded that I give her neck/back rubs. This was not in my job description, but she was a woman who had a lot of issues. She was just a low-class bully, with little to redeem her. I remember complaining to HR and then I realized clerical workers were just seen as shit, expendable.   I was told any employee who went up against a supervisor was sure to lose. The “University would win all the time.”  That was the way it was then.  I don’t know if things have changed at this university, but I had to realize boundaries weren’t encouraged to clerical workers, even though the HR rep knew well my complaint.   I was told “This University isn’t a place to work for everyone. If you can’t take it, quit.”   Amazingly arrogant, but a reflection of the reality of the situation.   I also remember having to cover (and in one case clean up) for the stupid and (at times) drunk designers in the department. These were two girls (they didn’t deserve the title ’women’) who had been there a long time, and they abused their jobs.  On occasion I ended up doing their work in different departments of the University.  I left after five years.  I started to write a book, just a historic novel, but it gave me feet to get away from a situation that was debilitating. This situation was so bad I had nightmares. I was in despair.  A few weeks away from this mess and those feelings passed.  I hadn’t set  boundaries and I was afraid IF I did, I would lose my job and probably in that highly dysfunctional department, would. We had just adopted our only child, and it would have been much better to leave.  My priorities were much screwed.  I was beyond ‘uncomfortable’ but didn’t understand what to do to end this situation. Quitting was a relief, but the basic problem (setting boundaries and meaning them) wasn’t addressed then. Many women are caught in such positions, afraid of the ‘authority’ above them, even if it is a stupid Methodist University.

Again, no boundaries, no resolve.  I didn’t honor or protect myself. I was too fearful about things that others who had better self-worth would have  walked out with little problem.

It’s been a long struggle to come to terms with this issue of boundaries.  Many women just don’t see this as possible or important.  It has everything to do with either the way we are raised, especially when there are psychological issues with parents and also within society’s concepts and expectations of women in general.  Marriage can have a lot to do with this lag.  I am very fortunate in my second marriage.  My first was full of abuse, some physical but mostly emotional.  I had left a narcissistic parent to marry a man who was a carbon copy of my childhood parent.   I didn’t set boundaries, I didn’t know how.  I prolonged my own misery.

A few years ago  I was involved in an online squabble with a bunch of women here in Atlanta calling themselves “Smart Asses”.  As a dear friend pointed out….”They were not so smart, but they definitely are asses.”

I knew a few of them, and some I knew as probable sociopaths.  Possibly more than a few.  Why be involved with these kind of people?  Stupidity on my part and thinking I could make a difference.  One needs to realize that you can’t correct crazy.  Again, I failed to set boundaries, thwarting myself further.  What in Hell was I trying to do with these people? I had nothing really in common with these women (and men) so what was I there for?

(There was a lot of drug use with some of these folk, and it was also in the midst of a heroin usage uptick amongst the middle classes in Atlanta.  I got ‘shamed’ for even mentioning this. )

You can’t change the world; you can only attempt to change yourself.

Recently, a sister in law said (when I asked about her youngest (24 years old) drug addicted son) that “we will not have this conversation”.  Sounds rude?  Perhaps it is, but she was setting a boundary, and I think this healthy.  Setting boundaries isn’t easy.  It takes work, but more so, it takes perseverance.  You have to mean them.

What I have learned about boundaries needs a lot more thought and practice.  However, I have learned some things and these I hope are helpful.

First, know who you are. Know your limits.  Don’t make excuses for them, look at them closely and consider if they are something you can defend.   If you feel uncomfortable with a person or a flock of people, you probably need a boundary of some sort. Maybe several. Go with your gut.

Center yourself in who you are and what you love. In those things you have accomplished. This takes time and a lot of energy and probably some therapy for many of us.  Our wires get twisted in life, but down there, somewhere, if we are honest with ourselves….are the things that make us glow and blossom.  Don’t get caught up in the energy sucking drama of other people.  That’s just a waste of your precious life.  They don’t want any advice, they just want an audience. (I’ve done this myself to some of my friends, and for some reason they are still my friends. My apologies all around…I’m learning.)

When our boundaries are weak, when we are not clear about our value and self-worth, or the value of actually having boundaries we will lean towards all sorts of chaos and drama that isn’t ours. When our boundaries are weak we are also uncomfortable.  We self-doubt most of the time.  Recently I wrote an article titled “Nihilism, Smart Asses, etc.” on the blog and this was because I was trying to ‘fit in’ with people I should have run from like the raging plague.  These people had nothing going in their lives except creating negativity and bitchin’ to the Heavens, but I stepped into it with both feet.  Again, you can’t fix crazy.  If some people have given you the willies before by their past behavior, trust your gut.  They probably haven’t changed much.  Set boundaries and don’t try to climb over the retaining wall because you think you can change a situation.  You probably can’t.  See your boundaries as protection that accompanies you through life.  Respect the need for them and you will begin to respect yourself.

Base yourself in something you love and in something you have pride in accomplishing.  When I feel swayed by other people that I know mean me ‘no good’, are insulting or belittling, that I can see are violating my boundaries, I look at the bindings of my six books sitting in my library.  I look at all these paintings on the walls. These are accomplishments I should honor. They meant I tore myself away long enough to do something positive.  I set boundaries here where I used an enormous amount of energy to do these things.  They were made ‘real’ because I set boundaries on my time and energy and what I would give to the rest of the world.   However, I also know I didn’t do these things all by myself.  Bill Penrose formatted and ‘made real’ the first three books on Lulu.com, and Nick Nicholson did the next three on Amazon.  I’ve known both of these guys for ten years and they are the best friends a person could have. They gave of their time and energies and experience, mostly their enormous hearts and friendship and I am still amazed by their generosity.  The writing was the easy part for me.  I couldn’t have done what they did.  Of course, there are friends along the way, especially in the last five years, other writers, poets and some just wonderful women.  Especially these women, on websites concerning the issues of narcissism, were beacons for me.  They guided me through the maze of abuse and into the light of knowledge.  First, they helped me understand boundaries and then they helped me put them in place.  I owe so much to other people in my life.  They saw someone floundering around in the water, and dragged me to shore.

And that’s the point of life. We can start deficient in these issues, like boundaries, but if we remain so, we impoverish ourselves.  We impoverish our creativity.  Learn from those who can help on these weighty issues, and avoid the negative folk.    Setting boundaries are possible, and also necessary in this fugue of life.

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2017

And….by setting boundaries, I was able to publish these books:

 “A Seasoning of Lust”, Amazon.com, second edition, 2016

   “Song of the Nightingale”, Amazon.com, 2015

   “Pitcher of Moon”, Amazon.com 2014

   “White Cranes of Heaven”, Lulu.com 2012

   “The Zar Tales“, Lulu.com 2010

  “A Seasoning of Lust”, first edition, Lulu.com, 2009

 

“The Courage to Create”, a reading of Dr. Rollo May’s book.

 

(Watercolor, Jane Kohut-Bartels, “Italian Dawn” 2007)

 

Recently I have come to believe  it takes courage to continue on in our interests:  people are challenged because others want to pigeon-hole an artist.  Perhaps this is human nature.  Labeling  artists makes them easier to grasp, and we can be kind of slippery.  But overall, it is rather uncomfortable to have to feel that you need defend your talent or interests. Having to explain yourself to people who just don’t get it….the creative impulse, is exhausting.  Further, it takes time and energy that should be used in creating things.  And anyway, what is this creative impulse?

Recently I have been reading Rollo May’s “Courage to Create”.  This book is an eye opener.   It’s  a little dated, having been written in 1975, and points to cultural issues, political issues of that era. However, the issues of creativity are timeless.

I am going to pose some of his arguments and also some of my own conclusions.  I do this because I believe the issue that is so many times pressed, that creativity is all about will-power, is wrong and limited.  Actually, defeating.

I am struggling to understand the deeper issues around creativity and Dr. May has produced one of the best books that breaks through to new territory.

Rollo May (a world distinguished psychologist) wrote lucidly about creativity.  Besides being in a medical field, he was also a gifted watercolorist.  Actually, he was many things and embraced for his humanistic writings by people all over the world. In his “The Courage to Create”, May parcels out his theories of courage in six parts which I will cover in only a small way.  Very crucial to this issue of courage is what he defines as not the absence of despair, fear, insecurity but the capacity to move ahead in spite of all these things.  I think many creative people do this without thinking: However,  I think we are deeply mired in these negative obstacles but we move ahead anyway, full of doubt, haltingly.  We do it because of our personal, emotional involvement with creativity.  It’s the issue of acknowledging courage that throws a new and confusing concept in the mix. Perhaps we create more by instinct, or that we can’t not create. Something to do with the ‘pounding in the blood’, the intense concentration that erases all else in front of us….for good or bad.

May made the observation that a chief characteristic of this courage was that it required a centeredness within our own being, without which we would feel ourselves to be a vacuum.  The ‘emptiness’ within corresponds to an apathy without and apathy adds up, in the long run, in my belief,  to cowardice.

For me apathy extends to an inability to move, to think.  Just giving up on life. And creativity.  I have known people who end up forever apathetic. (I also have come to understand the relationship between apathy and violence.  Apathy ultimately becomes a ‘black hole’ in the psyche….a disconnect from humanity, and this becomes ripe for violence.)  People might be very talented, but they hit a roadblock in their pursuit of creativity and they give up. They don’t pursue because they don’t feel this centeredness.  They just give up.  They may have talents, but they flail around and in the end, they abandon the process.  I would suggest that they feel ‘outside’ to all attempts of creativity, and this certainly goes against this required “centeredness” that Rollo May speaks of.

We must base our commitment to the center of our own being, or else no commitment will be authentic.  And real courage isn’t bravado or rashness.

This issue of centeredness is interesting.   It accounts for many years of feeling alien, different, out of sync with the people either you meet or know from family ties. It basically is a denial of ‘difference’ in order to feel ‘connected’ to people.  I have found that it also means that I ‘dumb down’ myself just to ‘fit in’.  (This phenomena is seen in women, first in girls, where we deny our strength, our speed, our intellectual prowess because we think boys will be rattled by what we can do) . In the end (and beginning, middle) it’s just not worth it: this behavior delays, denies any creativity that might be brewing. This behavior denies the courage to create. And that creativity is the center of self.

 

In humans, courage is necessary to make being and becoming possible.  In nature, this isn’t exactly so, as an acorn becomes an oak by automatic growth, but a man or woman becomes fully human only by his or her choices and the exhibited commitment to them. Our self-worth is predicated on our choices. (I can’t say this enough!) This is a hard lesson to learn because it doesn’t come fast or easy.  It’s something that comes only with an understanding of what choices lead to clarity, against choices that derail us.  And it’s time consuming and something we have to do over and over.   It is also key to avoid the people who more than doubt, but would rather see us fail.  There is jealousy in such people, and even a closeness of relationship, as in family, can bring this ‘quality’ out into the open and allow destructiveness to blossom.

 

May describes the physical, moral, social courage and finally, what he sites as the most important courage of all….creative courage.  Whereas moral courage is the righting of wrongs, creative courage is the discovering of new forms, new symbols, new patterns on which, in part…. a better society can be built.

Why is creativity so difficult?  Why does it require so much courage?

George Bernard Shaw put forth something that has a profound truth to it:  “Creativity provokes the jealousy of the gods”.  And a creative person, IF she or he is authentic to their art, is always in some sort of turmoil.  Either internally, because of doubt and fear, or externally because the gods:  those in authority, or something like this, the status quo…are never accepting of something new and strange to them.  I remember a gallery owner who challenged me as to whether I was a painter or manufactured sculpture.  I was both, but this rather narrow woman could not accept this. My painting was fine, and my sculpture was fine, but she demanded that I choose between one medium or the other.  I couldn’t and was very confused by her mentality.  Now I can understand her limitations.  For a while her perspective deeply affected my thoughts about my own creativity, and then I came to my senses.  Who was she to limit my creativity, regardless of medium? (Her gallery closed soon after because what she carried was rather boring and stilted ‘art’.)

 

I faced this mentality for decades with a close family member who tried to diminish my own attempts in being creative.  She was no paragon of creativity, preferring to produce ‘safe’ poetry that was pretty dull, trite, sentimental  stuff. IF she had applied herself to the study of poetry, perhaps she could have written better verse.  However, she skimmed the surface, preferring it to be a product of her ego, and for her, that was enough.

We need to get out of the way of our creativity at times!  Regardless of emotional ties, we need to see what boxes people attempt to stuff us into.  If we are truly committed to the center of our own being (and we know what that entails) we will break free of this enforced dullness, this oppression.  It leads only to a depressing state of affairs.  Some people can try to enforce this dullness because they aren’t the people who create.  And some are just envious of another’s creativity. My mother ‘suffers’ (or actually others suffer from her) from narcissism.  And narcissists deny anything of creativity that they can’t claim…especially if it is produced by a family member.  This came home to me in a real way when the last letter I received from her in 2012 stated this after the publication of my third book:  “I can never be truly proud of you because you haven’t allowed me into your artistry.”  Well, hell mother…had I done so, there wouldn’t BE any ‘artistry’ as you call it.  But further, this statement from her, a functioning narcissist, is the leitmotiv of a true narcissist.  It is always about them, regardless who holds the pen or paintbrush. This isn’t a fertile ground for true creativity: it’s just a reflection of shallow ego.

 

How Religion Also Screws With Creativity

 

In Judaism and Christianity, the second commandment states:  “You shall not make yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in the heavens, earth or sea”.  But this commandment holds the fear that every society has about its artists, poets, writers, those that express their authentic creativity:  These are the people who threaten the status quo.  In Russia for generations, and in many countries today, the struggle to control speech, art, dance, writings, poetry, etc. is continuous.  We see this in our own country in many ways.  And we certainly see this in Muslim/ Middle East countries (and India and Pakistan) where women especially are denied access to their creativity. To do so will upset the status quo and get you in a world of trouble. And probably stoned to death.

Mythology’s Impact

Our human psychology and social evolution is also seriously impacted with mythology. The Greek myth of Prometheus, who was chained to a rock on Mount Caucasus, (because he gave humankind fire) where a vulture would eat away his liver, only to have it grow again at night.  Zeus was outraged, the gods were angry, and it is very common for artists to be exhausted at the end of the day, to despair of ever completing their vision, to have their ‘liver’ grow back at night, and for them to have a fresh perspective the next day. Artists strive with renewed hope and vigor in the smithy of their soul. (Funny, in my studies of the Berber culture, the liver is the seat of the soul, and the soul is destroyed if the liver destroyed.)

It is obvious to most artists that the creative artist and poet, etc. must fight the actual gods of our society- the gods of conformity, apathy, material success and exploitative power.  These are the usual ‘idols’ that are worshiped by the multitude.  And it is across the board regardless of culture.

The Nature of Creativity

There is no general agreed upon definition of this nature, especially amongst psychologists and the therapeutic field.  Some hold that creativity is reductive: in other words, they reduce creativity to some other process.  Also, it’s an expression of neurotic patterns, or “regression in the service of the ego.”  This last immediately smacks of a reductive theory.

No wonder artists, creative people, have a hard time of it!  When your attempt at creativity is seen as neurotic you lose confidence.  You seriously doubt your sanity. And the general public isn’t at all helpful.

But there is a consideration (of which I won’t belabor here….) that when we define creativity, we must make the distinction between its pseudo forms and its authentic forms. Superficial creativity (art forms) that deal with only appearances or decoration, but not with reality is part of this collection of pseudo forms.  True artists give birth to some new reality….and it is usually fought against by the multitude because of its alien-ness. Picasso was a good example of this, (and his creativity took so many forms and not all of them embraced) and it can take generations for acceptance by the status quo.  And then the artist probably is dead and only the super wealthy can afford the genuine art. 

The Encounter.

 Dr. May is big on this issue of encounter. He states that escapist creativity is that which lacks encounter. (the reality of encountering life, etc. and it’s impact upon creativity. In escapist, exhibitionistic forms of creativity there is no real encounter, no engagement with reality).   We all know people who have great, elaborate ideas:  they can talk about them forever, but they never actualize them.  They are all fantasy and in the end….they lack the encounter with reality. I have found, (being a poet) that poets are some of the worst offenders of this encounter.  Recently, I left a prestigious poetry and literary journal because the vast majority of poets and writers wrote abstract, academic work that had no reflection of the myriad problems of their respective countries. (unfortunately, these were all male poets.) They refused to.  In fact, I was told basically ‘not to rock the boat’.  How much more interesting and informative it would have been to read essays on the social issues of India, Pakistan, Africa, etc. and some solutions to the troubling issues of these countries…especially  concerning the oppression of women.  I have little patience with what I feel is an ingrained misogyny of many writers who just “aren’t interested” in these social issues, and consider them beneath the level of ‘true’ creativity.  I put these writers and poets on the level of escapist creativity that lacks true encounter.  I try to avoid them like the plague.

The Difference between Talent and Creativity.

And that brings up the question of the difference between talent and creativity.  A few years ago, a woman who was a writer and artist was a house guest.  She said she was writing a novel, and as she elaborated on it, I could see that she hadn’t put down a word.  She was making it up as she talked. It was all fantasy, all in her head, and not in a very collected state. I shouldn’t have been surprised.  As I knew her from five years on different writing sites, she had exhibited a lot of emotional issues:  she couldn’t face them, but they certainly directed her life and her ‘creativity’.  She refused any consideration of therapy and continued to stroke her wounds. (and cut herself for psychological reasons..)   At that time, I tolerated her behavior.  Now?  I avoid her.  We are all responsible for the choices we make in our lives. She certainly had talent, but her creativity (the act) was truncated. She refused the encounter with reality in her own life and her creativity suffered because of it.  She stuck to unicorns, dragons and flowers.

I’ve had this struggle of encounter with a therapist for a number of years.  The concept of encounter also allows us to make clear the important distinction between talent and creativity.  Talent might well have its neurological parts and can be studied as ‘given’ to a person.  But creativity can only be seen in the act.  Picasso is again a great example of this: great talent, great encounter with life and this produces great creativity.  He is great because of his intensity of encounter.  It is not necessarily pretty or polite, but it should be intense on a fundamental level.

This is the second part of the creative act:  the intensity of the encounter. Genuine creativity is known by this force or power.

Many readers of this essay will recognize the altered state that comes when one is deeply involved in their creative process:  time disappears, sound doesn’t impinge upon the project, hunger is ignored, a single mindedness becomes absolute until the creative person comes to a stopping point, either through exhaustion or something that intrudes too hard to ignore.  The creative spell is broken.  But it definitely is an altered state.

I have written only a few words about this intensity of encounter, but I intend to write more as I figure it out.  I also want to get to what in my own life has been a propellant in my creativity.  And that is that Creativity is born in the Encounter with Opposition.  True creativity needs this frisson to birth or reveal itself.

 

The Courage to Create, Part II

 

I came across a part of Rollo May’s book, “The Courage to Create” that had a particular interest to a number of readers who were raised by narcissistic parents.  I am posting Dr. May’s words here just for further contemplation and discussion.  I find this idea of May to be intriguing and thoughtful. 

It is a particular discovery concerning a class difference in the behavior or the result of narcissistic parents on their daughters.  In my opinion, it is true and reveals the basis for the misery of many young women from the early teen years but with an interesting class difference.  Readers can draw their own conclusions.  I think Dr. May revealed something very powerful, true. 

Dr. May was studying the issue of rejection and anxiety of young women by narcissistic parents, mainly the maternal rejection. (This made it into the book under the section: “Creativity and the Unconscious”) What was surprising to him was what he and other psychologists had assumed to be true, that they would be hardened, apathetic so that they didn’t feel the rejection?

“Where they sociopathetic or psychopathetic types who didn’t feel rejection? (these were young women who were unwed, pregnant and basically thrown out of their birth families, some the victims of incest) No, they weren’t.

As one, named Mary said: “We have troubles but we don’t worry.”

One day I was walking down the street,  I was tired, and out of the blue, it struck me that all these women were from the proletarian class.  And as quickly as that idea struck me, other ideas poured out.   A whole new hypothesis broke loose in my mind.  I realized my entire theory would have to be changed.  I saw at that instant that it is not rejection by the mother that is the original trauma which is the source of anxiety (in the daughters…);  it is rather rejection that is lied about.

The proletarian mothers rejected their children, but they never made any bones about it.  The children knew they were rejected; they went out on the streets and found other companions, (and I believe mother substitutes…JKB) There was never any subterfuge about their situation.  They knew their world—bad or good—and they could orient themselves to it.  But the middle-class young women were always lied to in their families.   They were rejected by mothers who pretended they loved them.  This really the source of their anxiety, not the sheer rejection.  I saw in that instantaneous way that characteristics, insights from these deeper sources, that anxiety comes from not being able to know the world you’re in, not being able to orient yourself in your own existence. “

Above From “The Courage to Create”, Rollo May, 1975

Though Dr. May is talking about how concepts can be overturned, how the unconscious holding to something that might not be true in theory (what he was taught by his professors) there comes a point hopefully, where a radical rupture with what is ‘known’ is overturned and something new, a new development in theory …is formed.

I will just put forth my own speculation, and this is because of my own experience with a narcissistic family member and also from my own class position, or that of my mother.  Middle class parents, or upper class parents have a social position to ‘protect’.  They would be ‘shamed’ for outright rejection of their children, be ostracized by their peers, social class, IF they were open about their hatred, dislike, contempt, etc. of their children, and especially when the mother is the narcissist and a daughter is her scapegoat.  They are protecting themselves, and hence the extended lies about their pretended love of their children.  They will talk in ‘glowing terms’ (to outsiders) about the very children they dismiss, demean, abuse privately, but they don’t want to get ‘caught’ doing this by their social ‘club’.  That would mean that they failed in some important way as a parent.  Within dysfunctional families of a particular class, it’s all about protecting the ‘image’ of the family.  Further, it’s all about protecting the narcissist. (However, the longer this behavior of the narcissist continues…say decades, they lose the impulse to cover their behavior:  they rewrite history to say the victim, the scapegoat has left the narcissist, caused the ‘riff’,  thereby pulling sympathy for themselves from anyone who doesn’t know the actual history of the narcissist.)

I remember an incident in an ex family.  The adult children were heavily involved in drugs.  They were a prominent upper class family, with much social connections to protect.  One of the sons wrapped his sports car around a telephone pole, and his mother said that “they had enough money to make anything disappear.”  Again, it’s all about protecting image.

So, we have discussed this issue before of rejection by narcissistic parents, and our anxiety is never really knowing where we are in the family.  We are kept unbalanced, anxious, by the (sometimes sociopathic) behavior of narcissistic parents.  Our anxiety comes from not being able to know the world we are in, not being able to orient ourselves in our own existence. “ 

And the narcissists in our lives take great sadistic pleasure in doing this, in increasing our confusion, our inability to know our place in the family.  They depend upon this.

For me, this above relates to what I wrote in the first part of this essay, that our creativity comes from our core, our centeredness, knowing ourselves and believing, taking courage in our abilities regardless what and who are trying to throw us off our mark. When we attain clarity as to the functions of a dysfunctional family, or family member (and there usually isn’t just one….other members are impacted and take on the behavior of the Chief Narcissist) we can put these destructive people behind us and go on to developing our creativity and living a better and fuller life.  They are only boulders in the road, though seemingly solid ones,  and we have to go around  or over them.

 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2015

 

 

Has the World Gone Batshit Crazy?

Chris Christie …..

–

 

I’m not going to make any friends with this blog entry, but I am past that concern.

I’ll say it:  Trump is Crazy, Clinton I don’t trust, Cruz wraps himself in the Bible and I can’t find one person to vote for with confidence.  I liked Ben Carson, but he’s asleep, and probably our nation needs a  good neurosurgeon more than  another crazy politician.

Trump is a scoundrel, a misogynist, a pathological narcissist and I know my extreme narcissists when I see them.  God Almighty.  This guy’s platform is nothing but brio and insults.  Can you imagine Trump at an international conference in Europe, yelling, thumping the table with his shoe, acting like an ass?

Someone ‘important’ called Trump an ‘unstable narcissist’.  Well, that wouldn’t be so offensive IF he didn’t have a mighty military at his command.  But he would and then the fun begins.  Look out world.

I am as concerned about the Muslim invasion of Europe as much as anyone. People constantly ask where are the ‘moderate’ Muslims when terror happens by Islamic extremists?  Hiding under their beds, or claiming they are the real victims.  Bullshit.  These Muslims are as afraid of what would be in store for them IF they peeked out from their closets, etc.  They know that the sword of Islamic terrorists would take their heads as fast as any other person or group of people.

Hungary has been slammed for being right wing, putting up fences against the masses of Syrians, et al, but Hungary has long experience with Muslims.  Over the centuries, they have been invaded by Muslims many times. My Aunt Jean, who died in 2014 at the age of 102, and was Hungarian, said that our family were ‘pure’ Magyars…lovely, but I think we should remember all those invasions.

And about Turkey?  3 billion dollars were promised to Turkey to ‘try’ to keep these Syrian, etc. people in the settlement camps of Turkey, but now the head honcho of Turkey says it’s going to cost Europe 10 billion.  Of course it will.

Germany seems to be stuck in the guilt of Nazism and WWII.  So Merkel’s plan is to repopulate Germany with Muslims who in the main, have no interest in assimilating into German culture.  Merkel has fallen to the myth that 500,000 or 1 million Muslims is going to ‘repair’ what is wrong with Germany.  Fat chance.  What we see all over Europe today is truly troubling.  The rapes of women and children by young (and not so young)  Muslim men is beyond troubling.  Civil war is looming in Europe, and this is the root of WWIII.

I spent three years reading “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich”.  Just finished it this last fall.  The lessons in this remarkable book should be taken seriously.  Especially about the Brown Shirts.  I feel that Trump is possibly the ‘new” Hitler and the vicious, violent Brown Shirts can be either from the Left or Right.

So what is there to vote for?  Hillary scares me, she’s just a typical Washington politician,  and fat-ass Chris Christie looks like an expectant gopher ….expecting crumbs as a faithful servant of Trump.

I’ve had my rounds with ‘devote’ Christians.  I have two brothers who consider themselves Christians, but I wouldn’t.  Misogyny, arrogance and a lack of real humility is more to their methods, or brand of Christianity.  So Cruz and Rubio wrapping themselves in the Bible doesn’t get much from me.  I trust certain Christians as much as I trust Islamic terrorists. That goes for certain Jews of my knowledge.   Have I missed some group to insult?  Let me think…..The Buddhists in Indonesia aren’t so peaceful  lately.

Thirty years ago I would have voted for Bernie Sanders.  But now?  What the hell has he been doing?  Sitting amongst Vermont cheese rounds?

The real question  to me is this:  When will our country pull out of all these damn wars?  Trump and Clinton will continue these wars wherever there a foothold and we will not be free of this blight.

A thought on our southern migrants.  Trump wants to create a wall and Mexico is supposed to pay for it…Hah!  The money sent back to Mexico by illegals tops 30 billion a year) to stop this migration,  but almost all the farm workers that pick the crops, plant the crops, and are the only farm labor in this country…come from Mexico and lower on the map.  Farmers are very much against Trump because they see this policy as ruining American agriculture.  Certainly the middle level farms.  And further, farmers say that they can’t get Americans to do these jobs.  They just won’t do them.

Huh.

Last night I tuned in, by accident, to a Congresswoman from Hawaii.  She put it thus:  Sanders seems to be the only candidate who wants to break this war cycle.  I don’t know how he is going to do this, and his other proposals make me  queasy, but in the end….it seems that we are no closer to peace in our lifetimes than our parents were with WWII.

I don’t know.  Right now, I feel the only thing I can do is to plan the garden and read as much as my eyes will allow.  To be grateful to Nature surrounding me and to try to live my life in a more Peaceful way, avoiding human irritants, family or not,  ignoring the chaos that courses around me.  There is such confusion and corruption in life today. It makes it necessary to detach and fine values again.  This world is crazy and crazy-making.

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2016

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Family Narcissism Doesn’t Fall Far From the Tree…..and “Seasons Change”, poetry

–

Family Narcissism Doesn’t Fall Far From the Tree

People who know me know that my mother  and I have never been close.   This goes way back, for about 4 or 5 decades. It took me a couple of therapists to figure out her behavior. She’s a narcissist: whether pathological or ‘just’ destructive, or malignant  it doesn’t matter. It’s all bad.  Regardless the title, it causes extreme pain and suffering in  victims which is the reason for this behavior. Narcissists love to create pain…as long as it is in others.  They are great wimps when someone gives it back.  My mother goes ballistic.

In 1990 when I started writing a novel, she wrote to me that “no one would ever read you, and you would never be published.”

Surprise, you ol’ bat!

With the publication of “Song of the Nightingale”, I have just published my 5^th book. Five books in six years is a lot of work. I don’t recommend it. But I am proud of the books…and this last one is so beautiful in the hand that it shimmers. It’s been out less than a week and people are already buying it.

This book is about the life of a 17^th century Japanese couple, both of samurai and once powerful families. The dynamics of this are sharp in the book, and I have relied upon the beautiful 8^th century Man’yoshu, a document of over 4,500 poems to draw upon for the 13 part saga. I studied Japanese for 4 years to get deeper into the traditions and customs of Japan. Only the Japanese sushi workers at Whole Foods encourage me in this, and I know now I can order sushi in the language, but little more.

The cover is especially interesting. Ten years ago I gave this painting (cover now) to mother and apparently she didn’t like it, or couldn’t find a place in her house for it, so she hung it on a closet door. It fell, and I found it under a bed. The glazing was broken, as was the frame so I took it home for my sweet husband to fix. Then I decided that she wasn’t going to get it back. She didn’t deserve it.

You should have heard her yowls!

In the same vein, 3 years ago I published “White Cranes of Heaven”, a selection of seasonal poems. The first phone call from her was full of praise (I sent her a copy) and then the second phone call was this: “Too many Winter poems, and I’ve seen all your sketches before.” (no sketches in this book…full on watercolors and oils….of which she has never seen because she has not been in our house for over 15 years. My husband has forbidden her here. I agree. First time she met our 3 year old son she slapped him across the face, leaving her handprint there. “He spit at me!”. I should have thrown her out a window.)

She read the dedication and she wasn’t in it. Nope, she wasn’t. After her years of cutting down my abilities (except when she wanted something) she didn’t deserve a dedication. Then in 2012, a short, scribbled over card: “I can never be truly proud of you because you haven’t let me into your artistry.”

Nope ‘mother’, I haven’t. And your words are the leitmotiv of a real Narcissist. It’s always about them.

It’s crazy making but when I sent her a poem, she immediately thought (and said) it was about her. It wasn’t. Ever. But Narcissists grab at everything they can to inflate their faltering ego.

For the last ten years I have been seriously involved in the study of psychology. I majored in it in the mid ‘80s. It took me a long time to understand what and why she was behaving like she does. Well, I believe that narcissism starts with one or more parents and some are seriously stung with the narcissism disease. Her sainted mother was a concert singer and her daughter had little voice. She also had two sisters younger who her mother described as ‘beautiful, pretty….and you’ll do.” This is a direct quote from mother. I think she really was hurt by her mother and it fed into her psychological problems. Many things did, and perhaps her narcissism (from the age of 5 according to a dead sister) was a defense mechanism. Most youths grow out of that stage by 17 or so, but mother never did. Pity.

Very recently I received a ‘note’ from her after I sent a poem. “Seasons Change”. It’s been published on this blog before, and in “Pitcher of Moon” and it certainly isn’t about her. Her reaction? “I’ve never been terrified by water, but you were, and I never asked you to save me.” (There is an old photo of my beloved father holding me in his arms on a bridge over a gorge in New Jersey. I’m yelling my head off. I was all of 9 months old. )

What kind of woman throws that up to make her argument? Not even a “good-enough mother.”

I had enough. I have never confronted her for her crazy narcissism. I wrote a short note to her, saying her behavior came from her narcissism, and she was mired in her hatred, anger and jealously.

I felt  I had finally found the nuts to tell her this. Or, as my family says about her: “Shut up, sit down , put a filter in your mouth.”

Today I got  emails from my brother. Hateful, demeaning emails. Pompous shit, and not very original. Just throwing crap like a little boy.  Good God!  He sounded just like his old mother! And yes, the apple doesn’t fall far from the Narcissist Tree.

I thought it was funny was he tried to form it into a haiku.  I should have responded this way:  “Yawn, another bad attempt at haiku.  Stay on the porch, boy, you are  no poet.”  I made the mistake of taking this pompous ass seriously.  Won’t do that again.

This is the family who when my husband had a stroke….no one said a word. Not the Narcissist, not the wives, not the other brother….total silence. ( this brother did in a way, but we wondered IF he had even mentioned this stroke to anyone else.) His wife said two years beyond the stroke: “Oh, I thought you were over that by now.”  But we never heard from her when it happened. Total silence.  We just thought this is their “Christian” way. They had no reason to hate my husband.

Years ago, when our son was small, this same brother had a stroke, was blind for a while (rampant and uncontrolled diabetes) and we were deeply concerned.  Enough to send money we could have used on our son, but I loved my brother deeply, and he was a priority.  I used to respect him, thought he was wise, compassionate, but now?  He’s a carbon copy of his mother, just throwing around abuse and contempt.  A born again Narcissist….forget about Christian.

.

The pollution of narcissism must be only on this side of the family. My father’s side were all wonderfully supportive. Fred received advice from my cousins, aunts, etc.. Quite a difference from my side of the family. But then again…narcissism wasn’t the ruling disease from my father’s side.

Amazing. I could put all this crap aside, but they claim to be Christians. I have to say that I kept away from Christianity because (in part) I saw how they behaved, and I really didn’t know Christians then. I do now, and I can see that these troublesome folk are nothing of that nature.

Our son said this recently: “Mom, you don’t want anything to remember her by, you want to forget her. Her abuse of you and others is your personal PTSD. You will have it for life.”

He’s right. He went on: “Remember the women in our family, Aunt Jean, Aunt Pauline, etc. who WERE your real mothers. Remember them. They loved you like  she never could.”

Ah, God. To top it all off, I get a final email from Facebook from this brother wanting to be  ‘friends.’

Are you kidding? The Devil looks kinder than this sibling. But it’s this: After decades being the narcissistic supply and sacrificing his  family to the will of this mean old woman, (95 and still venomous) he has become exactly like her: Another Narcissist.

His ‘friend request’ had nothing to do with being friends. It was just more of his deception.  It did startle me until a friend explained his real purpose in this. Jesus Christ.  How low can he drop?

Remember  your own howls at the behavior of your mother? How you wanted to drop her into a swamp for the alligators? Do you remember saying there would be a rush on her coffin to tighten down the screws?  Do you remember your mother stomping her feet her driveway, insisting that you choose between her and your wife?  You have probably blocked all of this to survive. You have had to develop a defense mechanism to withstand her  behavior, but you’ve lost your humanity in the process.  I guess that’s called a coping process.

I love my brothers, (they don’t understand or follow un conditional love so they wouldn’t understand this sentiment….they are too much under another influence) but I also  pity them.  They have always been under the influence of this narcissist and frankly? They are rather ….sad.  It’s sad to see men in their 60’s who remain emotionally  children.  But that is the fate of people who rely on the ‘benefits’ of the central narcissist.  Only by understanding the pitfalls in doing can one be able to move away and grow.  Narcissism is a black hole for them. Tied to the apron strings of a master manipulator, they will never escape , and even when the narcissist is dead, they will  be impacted heavily by her history and the independence they have given up in life.  Heinz Kohut and Rollo May, along with many others have emphasized the importance of escaping the vortex of the Narcissist.  Real growth isn’t possible without  leaving this influence.  But that takes work, and both are too entrenched (and lazy) to do so.

When we are raised by a narcissist, we will always have fleas. Some of us know and are mindful of this. Others? Well, they could care less. And a further thought. Narcissism and Misogyny go hand in hand.

But the world is FULL of good people.  I have met many, and some have become friends.  And when you come from such a family as mine, you don’t realize that everyone doesn’t function in such destructive ways..  When you get away from the abuse, you can think straight and grow.  You can actualize your talents and you breathe better.  There are so many good and supportive people in the world you come to realize that this is the ‘norm’ not what you have known. There is grace in this, there is redemption. The others will disappear in the fog.

And perhaps the real question is this:  What price our humanity, compassion and empathy?

For some, it’s not even on the agenda.

And, since this is mostly a poetry blog, I will post the ‘offending’ poem.

SEASONS CHANGE

– 

I took a walk this morning.

The seasons have changed here

though where you are they don’t.

The dried, brittle grass beneath my feet

made a consistent crackle,

echoed by the gossip of sparrows above.

The leaves are stripped from the birches and maples.

They fell like rain on a fallow ground one day

and I didn’t see them go.

–

I think of your rounded arms when I see the shedding birches,

the smooth bark like white skin with a faint pulse of the river beneath.

Do you remember that river, when it scared you to stand close to the bank?

You thought the earth would slip inward,

take you on a wild ride downstream where

I couldn’t retrieve you,

and I saw for an instant your raised arms imploring me silently to save you—

though it never happened and you never slipped down the bank and I never could save you.

But imagination plays with your mind when it’s all that is left.

–

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2015……definitely NOT about ‘mother’.

I came across this article from the Irish journal “Inside Out”: issue 66, Spring 2012:  “Narcissism: Humanity’s Secret Weapon of Mass Destruction“.  I haven’t read it thoroughly, but it is fascinating.  It presents the development of narcissism before birth, and the child impacted by arguments, violence, trauma while in the uterus. It’s on the web.  It poses some good research.

“The Courage to Create”: Part III

Painting, Watercolor, “Irish Bay”, Jane Kohut-Bartels, 2007

The Courage to Create: Part III

 

The Scapegoats and the Golden Children: All Damaged In the End.

I’ve been thinking of the dynamics in dysfunctional families, especially those people who come from Narcissistic parents. There are many personality disorders, but Narcissism gives enough pain to trump most. Over the course of six years, I have written about narcissism on this blog, but still, after eight years of therapy, and with a good and compassionate therapist, I feel that I am just scratching the surface.

The learning curve is steep. Other bloggers do it better. For that I am grateful.

Recently, I have been reflecting on my childhood. And, what I have been told, my suffering from depression. I have been writing (seems like forever…) a book, titled “Memories of a Rotten Childhood”. In part it details, or at least reflects my parent’s behavior, and it seems they were always in turmoil.   That’s what it looked like then, but now I know it was much more. It took many years to understand the dynamic between not only my parents (my father has been dead for 25 years) but also the impact of their dynamic on my two brothers and myself. I was the oldest and the only girl in the family.

And about depression. When you are suffering depression, you think you are the only person in the world that has this condition. You are closed down, in a fog. But actually it’s pretty universal. Samuel Johnson described his depression as “that black dog that barks from morning to night.” Many of my friends have suffered depression and at times, this has stopped them in their tracks: they feel lost, empty, alienated, without the ability to pull themselves out of a deep hole. For those who have never suffered depression (and I don’t know these people…) this is what it feels like. Mostly. What is interesting and is the ‘connective tissue’ of these friends is they all have suffered from the narcissism of either parents in childhood (some with extreme physical abuse….most of us with emotional abuse) or with being trapped with partners as adults who are narcissists. Many times our paths cross with narcissists in the work place and this gives added anxiety to the mix. The abuse continues (and at times might be subtle and then escalate) and it is very hard to know what to do in these work related situations. Our jobs are at the core of this abuse, and the potential of loss of job aggravates the anxiety and depression. ( I remember at Emory University being asked (more than asked) to give   backrubs to my boss (female) and by the head of the department? When his designers came in drunk, if they threw up, I was to attend to them and frankly, do their work on a couple of occasions. With no acknowledgement. Basically I was to cover up their (well-known throughout the university) incompetency. Protect the department’s collective ass. This was crazy making to the max, and escaping that toxic environment was more than a blessing. But it took me five years to do so. I had just adopted a young child and I depended upon the slight salary to help.)

To many who read this blog, I will be preaching to the choir. To others, perhaps what I write here will strike a personal chord and they will find some things speaking to their condition. This is what I hope for.

I have been thinking of this dynamic between the scapegoat and the golden children in families. I have tons of experience, as I was the scapegoat. Early on, it was confusing but constant that my mother preferred her boys to me. I couldn’t understand this. Only many decades later did I start to understand this behavior on the part of her. It took a lot of convincing by my therapist who was an older woman and one who became a ‘mother-substitute’ over the years. Her steadfast kindness and ability to listen and to comfort, her belief in my potential was something I clung to. I had not experienced this with my own mother and only in the last ten years or so did I understand why. She was and is a classic Narcissist. I can see why now. Her behavior is convincing. And grows worse with age.

(Funny enough, I feel some compassion for her. Some. Whatever was the root cause of her narcissism, (nurture or nature issues…and I have my opinions…) she suffered from it: insecurities, jealousies, unbalance, isolation, etc. This is the real underpinnings of a narcissist. They just look ‘happy’ on the surface. They are generally a whirlpool of insecurities. However, they go on to make others really suffer)

The scapegoat is the child who is dumped upon in the family, the one who is blamed for the trouble that others make or feel, can be the whistle blower, or outspoken, but generally is the child who is pushed aside or ignored. Perhaps it is the child who is shy or quiet. It varies in families but the abuse that the scapegoat gets is pretty constant. Unending. It’s akin to the bullies in a school yard but these you can’t escape from. These are the entrenched bullies in the family. Any confronting the abusers, either the parents or the other siblings only makes the situation worse in many cases. These others, the dominant ones in the family don’t ‘hear’ the scapegoat: they have a lessened status, if they have any status at all. The family is ‘deaf’ to the plight of the scapegoat. Hence the suffering is unabated.

As far as the golden children, they are prized, they are rewarded, even if their talents are minor, they are the ones listened to. They also become real prats. They become in many cases abusers of the scapegoat, feeling that they are carrying out the rightful role of the parents, and they have a license to do this. If they are males, they also can become misogynistic. I have seen this where siblings have misogynistic attitudes towards women.   This comes from the atmosphere of the parental narcissist: narcissists are steeped in contempt, hated and disdain for others, and in many cases, for women. If the narcissist is a woman, she will feel competition with other random women, even women she doesn’t know…perhaps celebrities. The ‘flights of fancy’ that narcissists have would account of this. This is a form of grandiosity.

Narcissism as we learn is something common and worldwide, but when we escape these dysfunctional families we also learn that it’s not everyone, or every family that treats people in such toxic ways.

How do these people, the scapegoat and the golden children end up in life? Well, with distance and therapy perhaps, the scapegoat ends up more independent and also has a clearer understanding of these personality disorders that have affected their childhoods. Not to say that there isn’t a long run of terrible choices in spouses, friends, dangerous behaviors, etc. because a scapegoat acts upon their inferior status (they believe themselves inferior). It takes a long time to overcome self-abuse and doubt. They were never valued so they don’t value themselves. It’s parental, family abuse that segues into self-hatred.

As for the golden children? They are emotionally chained to the parent-narcissist and their ability to mature and normalize relationships are stunted in most cases. They don’t understand this, but they don’t really achieve independence emotionally and in some cases, intellectually. They are narcissistic supply to the narcissistic parent (this is the main role of them to the Narcissist). Only when this parent dies can they reconsider the damage that has been done to their lives. Actually, many refuse ever to consider the damage and go on to become what the narcissist has bred. Another narcissist.

Empathy is basically destroyed in these golden children because they take on so many of the characteristics of the parent narcissist. An example of this became clear a year ago when our remaining uncle at 86 years old made a very inappropriate comment to me over the phone. I had not seen this uncle in 50 years. He had been divorced from my mother’s sister (now dead) for many years, remarried three times, and when I wrote to my brother, (a fundamentalist Christian) in shock about this uncle, the only thing this brother wrote back in email was this: “……disturbing”. This was as shocking as the original comment of this predator uncle! I had expectations this brother would at least show outrage. He was supposed to be a Christian minister and I expected something better than this. But why? His compassion was truncated because he still saw me as our mother did: a lesser human being and therefore not worthy of his outrage. However, other male friends and cousins expressed their disgust at the behavior of this ‘uncle’. One cousin asked if I needed him to go beat up this sadly perverted uncle. He was outraged. These men were not puffed up Christians; they were normal, compassion and moral men. What a difference. This brother can wax elegant on religious issues, but his humanity smacks of misogyny. And I am not surprised.  There are some newish studies on the relationship between narcissism and misogyny.  There are also some interesting studies on the fear and intolerance of Christian men and male homosexuals.   They might hide behind ‘gospel’ but the fear and insecurity is real in these men.

The golden boys seem confident, outspoken, not cowed by doubt or self-esteem issues, but this is a façade. In some very important ways, the golden children never grow up. And, sadly, and predictably, they take on the role of punishing the scapegoat as they see with their narcissistic parents. They are the twisted minions of the parents. They think it is their ‘right’ to do so.  The parents, either one of them, call on their adult children to carry out their abuse, and the golden children do this for the parents. It is part of the eternal triangulation of these dysfunctional families.  They might also be attacked at one time or the other by a narcissistic parent, but they rush to not have the ire and abuse turned upon them so they readily carry out the abuse of the parent.  This behavior is fear based.

They are perpetually basking in the approval and ‘love’ of the Chief Narcissist. But this is not love, it’s the relentless search on the narcissist’s part for narcissistic supply. Their support and approval and, yes, submission must be constant for the narcissist to exist comfortably. Otherwise they are useless to the narcissist.
For narcissists on this level truly don’t know how to love. They only know how to use others because of their own ego-needs: these come first and everyone around them are sacrificed….even the Golden Children. They are, after all, just servants to the will of the Narcissist. Less than servants, they are slaves.

The scapegoats, once they make their escape from this dysfunctional family have much more freedom and growth. The growth is painful, there is no escaping this. Years of shame, doubt, self-abuse, etc. must be confronted, and the shame and abuse finally put back where it belongs: on the abusers. Then there is growth and freedom. But there must be distance, and most probably, some serious therapy to achieve this.

Finally, the scapegoat is in control of their life. Hopefully, at some point when they become adults, they have escaped a horrible slavery, though the opinions of the abusive family don’t change. They are left wounded, and maimed in many ways, but they have a chance to live a normal life, where the golden children are still chained to something that denies them growth, independence and maturity.

They remain Adult Children but nothing much more. And when the chief Narcissist finally dies, they are thrown into a tizzy. They have a serious addiction to the narcissist and little ability for critical thought. Their slavery to a toxic situation comes around and bites them in the ass. The chief narcissist is still controlling them from the grave because he/she has imprinted something so destructive to the personalities of the Golden Children left behind. In this way, a narcissist never dies. (She or he also continues to triangulate from the grave: “Glad I won’t be here to hear the howling when the will is read.” This is a prime example how the narcissistic parent continues their control on their adult children. And continues the conflict amongst siblings, which is what the narcissist did in life to continue her narcissistic supply. Alive or dead, the narcissist still has one hand around the necks of her children.)

Regaining the ‘self’ doesn’t happen for the scapegoat until there is a radical rupture with the birth family. Either a period of Low Contact or No Contact helps institute this regained self on the part of the scapegoat. It varies for each individual, but the worse the abuse and the more wounded the scapegoat, the more the necessity for this radical rupture.

It can be an issue of life or death.

Back to the issue of depression. What I am reading and sensing in my friends is that they haven’t been able to put these narcissistic people in the place they belong…which is BEHIND them. And this is damn hard to do. I can testify to that, because I held out ‘hope’ that things would change. We are connected by that twisted family umbilical cord. We have deluded expectations because they are our family. Any peace, joy, creativity, etc. is just about impossible because narcissists, and especially families who have a collection (they grow like algae) of narcissists will always pick at the one who either is the scapegoat or a scapegoat who has escaped. Every person I know who has escaped has gone on to a remarkable and well deserved independence, and over the years I have been privileged to know quite a few who have done this.  But the tentacles of the narcissists will stretch out and attempt to continue to injure, to pull them back. They need the supply like the vampires they are. And it is hard for us to keep these devils behind us. Hence, the depression. They sap our energies, and even thinking of them, rehashing ‘what should have been’ is exhausting. And, ultimately…pointless.

And more about that old depression. That depression comes from various sources: the rejection, the anxiety as to where we belong in these ‘families’ and the lies we were told and hold on to. The lies from the narcissistic parents to try to control us. This is the basis of our anxiety. This is the basis of our confusion, depression and despair. It takes a long time and distance to understand that what we have been fed is just….lies. These lies are the probably basis of our alienation and insecurities.

Each one of us has to come to a place where we have worked it out for ourselves. Each person is different and the abuse is different but in general, we have great commonalities in this sphere. For me, I have gone No Contact with my birth family. At one time, I thought when the Chief Narcissist was dead, ‘normal’ relationships could be resumed, but I seriously doubt this. And I have grown enough to know that these people are not the folk I would seek out for spiritual, intellectual and emotional comfort. They are no standard for me. Regardless of my accomplishments, I would still be inferior in their eyes. They don’t have the abilities to change their behavior. They are stunted by life with the narcissistic parent.

Right after I wrote this above, a sister in law emailed me pix of my two brothers and ‘the mother’. She wrote: “Call me soon”. I am left scratching my head.   I haven’t heard from these people in over 4 years….why would I call? My husband thinks she’s a moron, but I think she is just insensitive and since she isn’t related by blood, genetics, to the chief narcissist, she might feel a bit of guilt. She has been (forever, 40 years) hearing toxic crap. Perhaps she has a conscience. That would be nice. However, it is exhausting to try to understand toxic situations and people.

And it obstructs our creativity and our very lives because of the constant energy these things take.

What possible ‘good’ would it do to ‘reconnect’ with people who have been abusive and aloof to my family? Two years ago my husband had what was suspected to be a small stroke. One brother (who had a stroke 10 years ago) emailed me with some information about regaining balance, but the ‘mother’ and everyone else on this side of the family just ignored what happened to my husband. And this sister in law? I did speak to her in a short phone conversation seven months ago, when she was coming through the Atlanta airport and wanted me to meet her, which I declined. When I mentioned my husband’s stroke, her response: “Oh, I thought you were over that by now.”

Amazing. Of course, a glimmer of interest as to his condition, or understanding how offensive her insensitive (and cruel) words hadn’t crossed her mind. That is what the milieu of narcissism breeds. Arrogance. A lessening of humanity. Sad. At one time I thought she was a good person, but her environment has made a difference in her. Or perhaps narcissism has been too great to resist and she’s joined the monkeys. A dear friend who also has a narcissist as a mother said something I think is really true: “Your sister in law had to learn to play the game (with the narcissist) in order to survive.” This probably is the situation. Narcissism perverts and corrupts good people when they can’t escape or make continuing excuses for the narcissist.

The point is this: when we settle for people who are toxic, who refuse to apologize for their actions, who do no critical thinking, who continue to support the main narcissist in the family unconditionally (and for opportunistic reasons actually…one brother has full knowledge about the viciousness of his mother…and has threatened to feed her to the ‘gators where she lives…but only to me, certainly not to his mother!) when they continue to be a part of the Silent Majority and take a stand with the toxic narcissist, with continued contact we perpetuate our self-abuse. We allow the narcissists on all levels to continue to harm and maim. We perpetuate our self-hatred. Narcissists do it well enough without our help.

Recently I read something that spoke to this situation and to my decision to not go back to this toxic family. “Insight comes at that moment of transition between work and relaxation.” I was bound up in writing and research for a few essays, and trying to complete a book, when I walked away, disturbed by this conundrum of ‘how’ to answer this sister in law. I closed my books, turned off my computer and just stopped all activity. The answer appeared in the ‘space’ between activity and no activity. I don’t know what happened but it was no struggle at all. Einstein asked a friend this: “How come my best ideas come when I am shaving in the morning?” LOL!

It’s that space between our laborious thoughts and when our mind is off the problem. Probably that small space between the conscious struggling mind and the unconscious mind. That small space where new ideas are born. I believe this is where most of our creativity is formed.

Gone were all my concerns about ‘how to answer’, how to proceed. It was clear to me that the answer was already made: Since I had gone No Contact with this family, or more so with the chief narcissist, my life was different: productive, peaceful, with energy and a renewed creativity in a number of areas. Not perfect, but so damn different. The drama/trauma of this family that had me seriously doubting my value, my worth and even the reason for my continued living….it didn’t figure in my life anymore. These toxic people were like a deep and dark well, and I knew that any going back to that well would drown me. My life was too good and creative to do that, and my husband deserved peace and no more narcissistic/abusive drama. He had endured thirty years of this.

And their behavior wouldn’t change. But mine could. There was no ‘pull’ of ‘family’ anymore. I had moved on to something that wasn’t scarred with the trauma of the past. I had to. It was imperative that I do so, and that others were to be considered. Fine, non-toxic loving people deserved better.

There was no contest. I knew in a flash that going back to this family would mean I had once again put myself in a dangerous and toxic place. Under their power and control. And the invitation to ‘call’ came from only one. The rest? They couldn’t be less interested. However, the holidays are approaching and within narcissistic families, it’s always the ‘appearance’ of normalcy, even when it is not. It’s a shell game at best.

The four years where I was in control of contact has given me space to get away and in that distance I have realized how damn happy I have become. Depression was not major, was conditional and not chronic anymore. (Where it developed I believe it was the remains of ‘guilt’…of not making enough closure with the past.) I had found the roots of my malaise and I had the power to walk away. And walking away and meaning it was just the first step. (There’s more steps, but for each it’s different.)

My energy and creativity came flooding back. I published another book with more to come. I went back to those joyful things I loved: painting and dancing, research and poetry. Some of these interests I had put on the shelf because I was exhausted. I had the freedom from conflict for four years and I had regained energy. Why would I consider destroying this with more conflict? It would be another drop into a Hell I had finally escaped. It would be another round of self-abuse and self-hatred.

When we recognize abusers for what and who they are, then depression starts to lift and we start to live. Sure, we will make many mistakes, and for a time, do like the Russian army: One step forward, two steps back. But soon we can come out into the light of sanity and self-respect and we gain speed.

The alternative is pretty dire. When we honestly begin to put these unnatural devils behind us, we can heal and prosper. Our creativity is restored with time and effort. But only we can put this in motion. I believe there is a critical mass of something, abuse, etc…that builds to a point that continuing to reside in toxicity is nothing more than death. And it’s not so slow.

Choosing Boundaries and Meaning Them.

 

http://goo.gl/cOh8Ww ” PITCHER OF MOON” IS NOW ON KINDLE.

Sailboat, watercolor, Jane kohut-bartels, 2006

 

This short essay is new. I wondered whether to post this now, but others are also struggling with this same theme in their lives.  I buck up my courage and post it with an eye toward revisions for the future.

Lady Nyo

CHOOSING TO HONOR OURSELVES WITH SETTING BOUNDARIES

 

This short essay is going to sound weird, strange or downright mean to some people. Frankly, it’s been a long time coming. I’m still learning here so this is certainly not a complete answer, far from it. It’s an issue like an onion, with many layers. It can be stinky, too. And, it can make us uncomfortable in the doing.

I grew up with a parent who was an extreme narcissist by any score. I never learned, or actually, I was never allowed to set boundaries as a child or teen. Since a narcissistic parent doesn’t see their child as anything except an extension of their own person, the offspring setting boundaries is something not tolerated. Hence, it was something I didn’t really know the value of until much later in adulthood and after quite a bit of therapy.

Boundaries mean choices for by a person and choices should reflect a healthy sense of oneself. In life we meet all sorts of people, appropriate to our existence and those inappropriate. When we haven’t an understanding of boundaries, (and this doesn’t just fall out of the sky, we have to learn this) when we are uncomfortable with the behavior of others towards us but don’t know why, we can dismiss these feelings and we can choose inappropriate or unhealthy relationships. Many times we are afraid of offending, so we open ourselves to what comes down as actual abuse. When we have serious deficiencies in self-worth and don’t value ourselves in healthy and positive ways, we fall to the relationships that are obstacles and become, ultimately, terrible and/or destructive burdens.

Recently, I have been taking stock of this issue. It has loomed large in my life over the past few years. Perhaps this is because I have become more conscious of this, and the ties to narcissistic behavior, but also because I began to develop a long needed and necessary sense of self-worth. And it isn’t something that is easy. Abuse, emotional and otherwise, comes from not valuing yourself and setting boundaries. There are many people in this world who look for what they perceive as vulnerable people and they latch on for their own benefit. We call them opportunists.

I remember working at a local university in the early 90’s. I grew to hate it. I had a female supervisor who demanded that I give her neck/back rubs. This was not in my job description, but she was a woman who had a lot of issues. She was just a low-class bully, with little to redeem her. I remember complaining to HR and then I realized clerical workers were just seen as shit, expendable.  I was told any employee who went up against a supervisor was sure to lose. The “University would win all the time.” That was the way it was then. I don’t know if things have changed at this university, but I had to realize boundaries weren’t encouraged to clerical workers, even though the HR rep knew well my complaint.   I was told “This University isn’t a place to work for everyone. If you can’t take it, quit.”   Amazingly arrogant, but a reflection of the reality of the situation.   I also remember having to cover (and in one case clean up) for the stupid and (at times) drunk designers in the department. These were two girls (they didn’t deserve the title ’women’) who had been there a long time, and they abused their jobs. On occasion I ended up doing their work in different departments of the University. Not that I had qualifications and I certainly did not receive any pay or credit for this. I also remember having to constantly apologize for their behavior and this became ridiculous. It was humiliating. I felt like I was in a crazed universe, not university. A ship of damn fools. I got an earful from different departments about these two girls. People were fed up with their behavior over the years and they made complaints to our department head who ducked the issues. Their behavior was known all over. There was no excuse. They were being protected by the head of the department. He wasn’t going to make any changes here, though his reputation suffered because of his ego. He was a huge narcissist and inappropriately, in front of employees berated the female supervisor. Most of us hated her, and I had particular reason to dislike this woman, but I remember feeling shocked at his behavior. I left after five years. I started to write a book, just a historic novel, but it gave me feet to get away from a situation that was debilitating. This situation was so bad I had nightmares. I was in despair. A few weeks away from this mess and those feelings passed. I didn’t set any boundaries and I was afraid IF I did, I would lose my job and probably in that highly dysfunctional department, would. We had just adopted our only child, and it would have been much better to leave. My priorities were very screwed. I was beyond ‘uncomfortable’ but didn’t understand what to do to end this situation. Quitting was a relief, but the basic problem (setting boundaries and meaning them) wasn’t addressed.

Again, no boundaries, no resolve. I didn’t honor or protect myself. I was too fearful about things that others who had better self-worth would have walked out of with little problem.

It’s been a long struggle to come to terms with this issue of boundaries. Many women just don’t see this as possible or important. It has everything to do with either the way we are raised, especially when there are psychological issues with parents and also within society’s concepts and expectations of women in general. Marriage can have a lot to do with this lag. I am very fortunate in my second marriage. My first was full of abuse, some physical but mostly emotional. I had left a narcissistic parent to marry a man who was my mother with a dick. I didn’t set boundaries, I didn’t know how. I prolonged my own misery.

Recently I was involved in an online squabble with a bunch of women here in Atlanta calling themselves “Smart Asses”. As a dear friend pointed out….”They were not so smart, but they definitely were asses.” I knew a few of them, and some I knew as probable sociopaths. Possibly more than a few. Why be involved with these kind of people? Stupidity on my part and thinking I could make a difference. One needs to realize that you can’t correct crazy. Again, I failed to set boundaries, this time internally. What in Hell was I trying to do with these people? I had nothing really in common with these women (and men) so what was I there for?

You can’t change the world; you can only attempt to change yourself.

Recently, a sister in law said (when I asked about her youngest (24 years old) son that “we will not have this conversation”. Sounds rude? Perhaps it is, but she was setting a boundary, and I think this healthy. Setting boundaries isn’t easy. It takes work, but more so, it takes perseverance. You have to mean them.

What I have learned about boundaries needs a lot more thought and practice. However, I have learned some things and these I hope are helpful.

First, know who you are. Know your limits. Don’t make excuses for them, look at them closely and consider if they are something you can defend.  If you feel uncomfortable with a person or a flock of people, you probably need a boundary of some sort. Maybe several. Go with your gut.

Center yourself in who you are and what you love. In those things you have accomplished. This takes time and a lot of energy and probably some therapy for many of us. Our wires get twisted in life, but down there, somewhere, if we are honest with ourselves….are the things that make us glow and blossom. Don’t get caught up in the energy sucking drama of other people. That’s just a waste of your precious life. They don’t want any advice, they just want an audience. (I’ve done this myself to some of my friends, and for some reason they are still my friends. My apologies all around…I’m learning.)

When our boundaries are weak, when we are not clear about our value and self-worth, or the value of actually having boundaries we will lean towards all sorts of chaos and drama that isn’t ours. When our boundaries are weak we are also uncomfortable. We self-doubt most of the time. Recently I wrote an article titled “Nihilism, Smart Asses, etc.” on the blog and this was because I was trying to ‘fit in’ with people I should have run from like the raging plague. These people had nothing going in their lives except creating negativity and bitchin’ to the Heavens, but I stepped into it with both feet. Again, you can’t fix crazy. If some people have given you the willies before by their past behavior, trust your gut. They probably haven’t changed much. Set boundaries and don’t try to climb over the retaining wall because you think you can change a situation. You probably can’t. See your boundaries as protection that accompanies you through life. Respect the need for them and you will begin to respect yourself.

Base yourself in something you love and in something you have pride in accomplishing. When I feel swayed by other people that I know mean me ‘no good’, are insulting or belittling, that I can see are violating my boundaries, I look at the bindings of my four books sitting in my library. I look at all these paintings on the walls. These are accomplishments I should honor. They meant I tore myself away long enough to do something positive. I set boundaries here where I used an enormous amount of energy to do these things. They were made ‘real’ because I set boundaries on my time and energy and what I would give to the rest of the world.  However, I also know I didn’t do these things all by myself. Bill Penrose formatted and ‘made real’ the first three books on Lulu.com, and Nick Nicholson did “Pitcher of Moon”. I’ve known both of these guys for eight years and they are great friends. They gave of their time and energies and experience, mostly their enormous hearts and friendship and I am still amazed by their generosity. The writing was the easy part for me. I couldn’t have done what they did. Of course, there are friends along the way, especially in the last five years, other writers, poets and some just wonderful women. Especially these women, on websites concerning the issues of narcissism, were beacons for me. They guided me through the maze of abuse and into the light of knowledge. First, they helped me understand boundaries and then they helped me put them in place. I owe so much to other people in my life. They saw someone floundering around in the water, and dragged me to shore.

And that’s the point of life. We can start deficient in these issues, like boundaries, but if we remain so, we impoverish ourselves. We impoverish our creativity. Learn from those who can help on these weighty issues, and avoid the negative folk.   Setting boundaries are possible, and also necessary in this fugue of life.

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2014

 

“The Demise of a Marriage”…..a poem.

Sea Eagle, Janekohutbartels, wc, 2006

–

For the last eight years, I have been locked in a relationship with a wonderful woman, my therapist, Liz.  I went to her back then because I realized something was wrong, and I didn’t have any answers.  It was immediately obvious to Liz what was wrong, but it would take years to convince me what it was.  I was an ACON,  an adult child of a narcissist.  This person was just the first in my life.  I went from my parent’s home into marriage with another narcissist, though I didn’t have a name for him, or understand what had happened for many years.  But Narcissists run on a continuum, and when you are unlearned as to the behaviors, you really can’t understand what is happening.  But the fallout comes sooner than later.

Narcissism is a modern evil.  You  trip over narcississts in daily life. They are prominant in tv shows, in the work place, in churches and temples,in schools, where they make up the basis of bully groups and budding sociopaths,  in families, in communities and community groups, on the internet, in politics  and amongst ‘friends’. They are abusers of others, and litter most paths of our lives.  Today there is more information as to where and what they are, but still we are taken by suprise at the prominance of these people. We watch tv and the narcissistic behavior there runs from subtle to outrageous.  We begin to think this is ‘normal’.  It is not. In many cases, as in ‘real’ life, it is pathological. Learning about Narcissism gives us some understanding and abilities to avoid them.  But not always. 

Liz encouraged me to write about my childhood, and surprisingly, I started to write poetry. I had never written poetry and for some reason, this clicked. Sonnets, freeverse, cinquains, quatrains, and later tanka, choka, haiku just tumbled out.  What was happening was therapy through verse.  I found my voice in poetry. But  I almost never  wrote about myself.  Nature, spiritual issues, politics, history, influences from Japanese medieval literature, all these formed the basis for my verse.  Except for this one document.  “Memories of a Rotten Childhood.”  Something I have been struggling to write for eight years.  There is a lot of humor in this one, but of course, there is also pain.  Life.

My dear friends who are also ACONs know I find there is no  mystery to writing poetry.  To me it is the distillation of life, of our experiences, and when we write close to the bone, it is raw, jagged, with little polish and perhaps it is then we are the most truthful.   Perhaps then the healing begins.   I find  it isn’t the ‘best’ of poetry, but healing is always messy, never in a straight line.  Just like therapy.  Our poems of  healing  reflect that liberty.

Lady Nyo

–

 

THE DEMISE OF A MARRIAGE

 

I knew the marriage was in trouble

when your mother dived under the table

to retrieve your fork.

You were 34.

 –

I knew the marriage started off

badly

when 3 months along a packed suitcase

stood in the closet

I never sure what to do, where to go.

 –

That suitcase remained there

for 12 years.

 –

You told me I was a piece of shit,

only good for bringing in money

paying the bills,

even your parents thought me dumb

in spite of maintaining a 4.0 in college

and working full time,

but that didn’t count because it was only

a community college.  I was still stupid.

 –

I remember when you threw a kitten

off the balcony

and I told you I called the police,

and the look on your face told me

that I had you, that you were afraid.

–

I remember struggling with sheets of plywood

to stop a leaky roof on the second story

with high winds buffering me and the wood around,

high off the ground, my heart in my mouth

as you sat in a rocking chair in the back yard

surrounded by books,

shocking the neighbors

with your  shiftlessness.

They were glad to see the south end of you go.

– 

But I didn’t follow the leads

and stupidly suffered while

you never worked  for the next 9 years.

You were the revolutionary,

I guess I was to be the dumb, grateful peasant.

 –

But you left (when I had been hit by a car)

the month you graduated

(after trying to date my nurse in the hospital,

oh, what morals you had!)

and I was told by your parents

to put my education on hold

so you, as the “man” of the family, could get yours.

Of course they greased your leaving with

a sports car,

a Club Med vacation

a condo they paid for.

At middle age, you were still a boy,

had not become a man.  Have you ever?

 –

You left me crippled, the heat turned off.

I almost starved,

neighbors put plates of food on the window ledge

and I wrapped myself in blankets with a stray puppy

that cold spring and we survived. Barely.

– 

That was years ago, but I still remember the bad old days,

where I was nothing but disposable garbage,

something to be left behind with the bribes of your parents

and you were a ball of regrets to me.

– 

Tomorrow my husband and I leave for Paris.

He insists I come, though it is a work trip,

for he wants me to see the Eiffel tower

see how straight it stands and how tall I’ve  grown.

He wants me to see Versailles

because I am his Queen.

– 

Of course he is my King,

and you just a tattered memory

fading into the mists where you  always belonged.

–

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2014

“Mother”, poem by Nagase Kiyoko

March is International Women’s Month.  I can’t think of anything better to post here than what I do below. Nagase Kiyoko probably is the best woman I can think of to celebrate this month with.  (In fact, she is also a great woman to celebrate Mother’s Day, this day that is painful for many ACONs).   Politics come and go, but a poet speaks through the centuries.  Certainly Nagase Kiyoko goes deep and rattles my bones like nothing else I have read lately. She opens my heart to what is true and fundamental in being a woman.

Rollo May a 20th century psychotherapist has written about creativity.  In his “Courage to Create”, he writes that creativity is generated by our encounter with opposition.  Certainly Nagase Kiyoko, who wrote poetry at her kitchen table while her children and husband were asleep, and suffered the issues of older Japanese women faced this head on.  Her poetry inspires and she is a prime example of this courage to create.  She is a good grandmother for all of us women poets.  Actually, for all women, poets or not.

Lady Nyo 

 

MOTHER

 

I am always aware of my mother,

Ominous, threatening,

A pain in the depths of my consciousness.

My mother is like a shell,

So easily broken.

Yet the fact that I was born

Bearing my mother’s shadow

Cannot be changed.

She is like a cherished, bitter dream

My nerves cannot forget

Even after I am awake.

She prevents all freedom of movement.

If I move she quickly breaks

And the splinters stab me.

—Nagase Kiyoko  (1906- 1995)

Nagase Kiyoko wrote poetry for 65 years.  She never called herself a ‘professional poet’, but referred to herself as ‘a useless woman’.  She was a farmer, and wrote her poetry at the kitchen table before dawn, while her children and husband were asleep upstairs.  Because of her sensual and cosmic verse, Nagase Kiyoko is considered by many Japanese women poets to be the “Grandmother” of modern poetry.  Just a short reading of her verse goes deeply into the heart of the reader.  She is ageless in her verse.  She died on her 89th birthday.

–

“Winter Comes Too Soon”, a poem

 

 

This logo above is the Narcissists Slayer Award.  I am honored to receive from CZBZ’s blog (to the right side listed).  CZ is a phen. writer and especially on narcissism and what it does in our lives and in general society. At first I thought the logo was a nose, or perhaps garlic (I think it is…..But I am honored, I tell ya.)  I don’t write too much anymore on Narcissism, but damn If I haven’t got them in my FOO (Family Of Origin).  It’s like walking in a cow pasture around narcissists.  Thank you, CZ!

 

Merry Christmas!

 

WINTER COMES TOO SOON

Autumn,

That too-fickle season

Has thrown off Joseph’s coat

And turned to winter.

–

Gone the leaves

Brilliant matinees of airborne jewels

Illuminated in prismatic splendor

By the sun piercing a brittle blue sky–

Replaced with blackened limbs

Stretching naked arms towards a glowering sky.

–

The season of alms and hunger has begun.

Gone the pelting rains

Which poured down window panes

Like crinkled crepe paper

Distorting the view of the shearing outside.

–

Gone too, are the golden sunsets

Where a beam of light transposes

Distant trees, paints the belly of clouds.

–

The leaves and color are gone

And that is as it should be.

What is now outside

Hints at what is beginning inside–

A long passage through a muted season.

–

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2013

Witches, Warlocks and other Narcissistic beings….Plus a poem.

“Viriditas”, wc, janekohut-bartels, 2000

–

 

ODE TO A COOPERS HAWK

 

Come to me.

Come to me,

Winged celestial beauty.

Come to me with your notched

Mermaid tail,

Your silken roll of feathers.

Fly down into my hollowed-out soul,

Fill me with your sun-warmed glory

Nestle in my arms

And bring the curve of the horizon

Embraced in your outstretched wings.

 

I need no white bearded prophet,

No mumbled prayer, no gospel song

No witchy woman, no charms or spells,

No hard church bench, no fast or

Festival to feel close to the Divine.

 

 

The glory of the universe,

Is embodied in your flight

As you tumble through heavens,

Ride the invisible thermals

Screech with joy at freedom

Fill your lungs with thin air

And play bumper car with an Eagle.

 

I, earthbound,

No hollowed bones to launch me,

Just tired soul to weigh down,

No soft plumage to feel the course

Of wind through glossy feathers

No hunting call to herald my presence.

 

Still my soul takes flight

The breeze lifts my spirit,

My eyes follow you,

And we will find that glory

Transcend a sullen earth,

Transcend a mean humanity

And soar together into the blue eye of God.

–

‘Ode To A Cooper’s Hawk’ is from “Pitcher of Moon” Poems of Gratitude and Blessings, to be published soon. 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2012-13 

 

Witches, Warlocks and Other Narcissistic Beings…

Recently  we were sitting around talking, a few women of an advanced  age and with lots of life experience.  We were talking about some experiences that didn’t sit well with us, generally of the religious or spiritual kind. 

Some felt battered by experiences earlier on in Christianity. One woman was a Jew and had left that faith.  One woman had considered herself a witch when she was younger and  was part of a well-known coven here.  She also left that after a decade, and we settled upon this discussion. 

Readers of this blog know that I have fled the religious fundamentalism of part of my family.  It has shown itself to be a punitive religion in the hands of people I now consider to be part of this narcissistic ball of wax.   Nothing good here, except a continuation of the power and control and contempt of the chief narcissist.  The apples don’t fall far from the tree, and there is comfort for them in this.  Ignorance and cruelty of minds, too.   I was looking for something a bit kinder, something that didn’t batter over the head.

The good news is I have found a spiritual ‘place’, not a religious place, in the writings of Caitlin Matthews, and especially her book “Celtic Devotional”, which is an approach to the spiritual through a combination of animistic spirituality of earlier times and from the Celtic  Christianity that developed out of this foundation. I have grown to understand this more, and it has become a great inspiration (or conduit) into my own nature and spiritual poetry.  A more recent beginning study of Shintoism has added to this. One must feel open and relaxed and welcomed in any spiritual study. I certainly didn’t find that in a Calvinist fundamental religion.  I felt what was intended: diminished and a particular battering.  But perhaps that is all one can expect from certain Bible wielders.

However, years ago, I did attend some Wicca meetings, travelling far out and returning in the black of night. It was weird.  Most of the witches and warlocks were garbed in strange costumes, like at some festival.  They frowned a lot.   And, they were not taking questions.

A few short years ago, my husband and I attended a Beltane festival.  We sent in our $120.00 and got our admittance vouchers by mail.  When we got there they had no record that we had applied.  This was not a great beginning, but was mostly just something to work out. It would get worse.

As we drove down the road, on our right we saw what appeared to be pale boulders.  It was a woman, probably over 500 pounds sitting naked in a field.  In a way, it was intriguing, not for her nakedness, but because just of the sheer mass of human flesh.  I hoped she was sitting on a blanket because later we found that red ants were prominent in these fields.  But this was also disturbing because it was clear she was on display.  It wasn’t her nakedness on display, it was the sheer mass of her.  But why?

The issues with this Beltane festival were to come.  I was a belly dancer and one who, along with a tribe of Urban/Rom dancers, was to dance that night. Although we have different forms of dance and very different costumes, I was excited to work with other bellydancers.  This was the positive part.

What wasn’t positive was the attitude of the Witches officiating.  There was a big area for the firepit  that night, and we were directed to walk this large circle and clean out any stones or pebbles so people would not injure their feet.  I was game, and talked with people by my side.  Immediately a witch (let me call her a bitch here) yelled at me to ‘be quiet’.  This was to be done in silence.  I thought about this and decided:  No.  It was a boring task, one I did not have to do, so I would get to know some of the other people there.  And people also felt that this witch was oppressive.  It got worse.

Obviously the witches decided that they would not mingle with us mortals…and had their own roped off showers and bathrooms.  The other bathrooms were outhouses that hadn’t been cleaned in years.  They were unusable. Disgusting.  The smell would kill you.  These witches also saw fit that they would not eat with us attendees.  They segregated themselves off somewhere else.

It became rather laughable.  They might have organized this festival, but they were clearly lifting themselves above and beyond the rest of us…and there were about 200 people there.  There were programs, for lack of anything else to call them…where the witches would choose who would attend.  They stood outside  the large tents and IF you approached, and found not on their lists, you would be rejected.  It got to be a game and we had to make a decision whether to leave or not.  It just didn’t make any damn sense.  It was all an issue of power and control of these women, and it smacked of narcissism.  We guessed this was their time to feel powerful. Ugh.  And where did they get their authority???  It was damned oppressive and just ….well, silly.

However, we didn’t leave. It was a long 2 hour trip back to our home, and we decided that the evening would have to be better.  It was, but not because of any witchy presence.  The drummers, about 15, sat up on a hill over the fire pit and were marvelous.  Pipers, tambourines,  some Spanish sounding guitarists with a lot of amplification just made the music great.  The fire in the pit was huge…we dancers danced around the fire for quite a while, but it is hard to walk constantly and dance the belly dance moves we are taught. Plus, the fire was HOT!  But we stayed, enchanted by the musicians and the nicer Warlocks.  These men were not so pompous as the witches.  They were rather sweet, interested in our dance forms, our costumes (and with some of the dancers…their LACK of costumes….).  I danced for around 8 hours, falling easily into Hyper arousal Trance.  My husband finally had to lead me out of the trance and back to where we had pitched our tent.  He saw the signs. 

We slept in our opened up sleeping bags, under a night time sky with so many stars above that I couldn’t sleep.  No moon, but I hadn’t seen so many stars before.  City lights take their numbers away, dull their brilliance, but here they were filling the bowl of night above us.  It was something I will never forget.

During that night, we heard some screams and a lot of shouting from down in the valley.  In the morning we found out  one of the main witches had a meltdown and attacked another witch.  We decided it was time to leave.  The police had been called. Rather a sorry ending for this hallowed festival of Beltane.

Even though we were now over any interest in Wicca, and we knew this  Beltane celebration was a farce,We were still uplifted by the music and stars from the night before.  We had to pull something positive out of the hat.

Lady Nyo