Conversation with a friend ~ 8 ~ TRUST

~ Complied… from 31st December 2015 ~ (e-mails edited to shorten – Used with permission)
 
A new friend, Amanda sent me a Christmas and New Year greeting and our conversation followed on from there...
 
Pana:  ...I’ve always struggled around Christmas time ever since I was a child growing up with abuse... special times were always turned into nightmares so it’s hard for me to keep my emotions in perspective at this time, but the Christmas experience seems to be getting better with every passing year for which I am grateful. 
 
I always did my best to make sure the Christmas experience was as wonderful as I could for my own children and it was easier for me to get through my own struggle when I had them to focus on and share the magical experience with, but I must say it’s a very lonely time now leading up to Christmas day and then the days afterwards when all that’s left is “the Nothing”... just long-lonely-empty days where I try to keep busy behind my computer again... (back in my bubble).  The day itself was super-lovely though with some of my family and special friends and I will keep those memories alive in order to help keep my emotional perspective in check.
 
What I am grateful for, is that yesterday (30th December 15), I wrote about my current feelings on my blog, but really struggled to decide if I should post it or not... knowing that there are probably more people out there who won’t understand and will think negatively about my post than those who would identify with what I’d shared.  Today I received a call from a special friend who read the post... she opened up about how much she had identified and how she was feeling suicidal at the time.  She expressed how she felt that she was living a meaningless life and finds herself at the bottom of the pit (existential vacuum) so often.   I reassured her that I will be there for her through her struggle any time she needs to chat, so she no longer needs to feel so alone. 
 
I also received two messages... one from an older lady who had experienced a huge amount of rejection over Christmas and therefore did not have “the Christmas day” she had been longing for.  We we chatted back and forth until I felt she was feeling a little better about her painful experience. 
 
The second letter was from another lady who identified greatly with what I had shared. 
 
I am now so grateful that I found the courage to share what I did, instead of worrying about what everyone else would think about me... fear of being judged, etc. 
 
My blog gives my life meaning... so it’s not about everyone else in the world... it’s about those who know what I know... who identify... people who need to know that they are not alone.  It helps me also to know I am helping others and this is what my life was all about... the wonderful purpose and meaning of my life. 
 
Friend:  Hi Pana, Thank you for sharing your journey with me.  I also feel that I sometimes have to hide the bad feelings that I experience.  I think what we do not realise is that many people feel the same kind of feelings, and that we tend to wear masks because we fear the judgement and rejection of others.  Even writing this to you I feel the nag of "fear of exposure".  Sometimes this fear (in my case) is because of the bad experiences involving people that I should have been able to trust.
 
2015 has been a year in which l came to understand myself better.  Although there is much work ahead.  While training to do victim support I started to remember (nicely packed away) the traumas that I had experienced as a child and then also as an adult.  I also began to see how it shaped me and caused me not to trust.  Although these traumas do not compare in the least to what others have experience, they do shape us into who we are.
 
The lady who heads the victim support in my area is an elderly doctor who I admire very much and through her belief in me and her trust, she has taught me a lot.  I also came to realise that I can never be happy unless I am helping someone in some way.  Even if it is only to make the sad, unhappy looking girl behind the till at Pick n Pay, smile.
 
Every revelation about ourselves helps us to understand our actions, motives and emotions.  I wish I could say that this resolves all.  But....
 
I think you and I could have long talks about this.
 
Keep well dear Pana and remember that you are not alone.
Amanda

Continued… 1st January
 
Pana:  What a lovely sharing letter dear Amanda, thank you! 
 
You will do so well when answering your task questions, to be as open and honest about your life and self as you have been in this letter.  That’s what the Introductory course in Logotherapy is all about... really facing who you are and in the process seeing a new and greater light of possibilities for your life.  It seems to me that you have already begun this journey and that Logotherapy has “picked you out” to reinforce and refine what you already know... you are truly going to love this course and know in the end that it did “find you”, because of how special you are and how far you have come and mostly... to help you find and/or refine your true purpose in life in the service of others... helping others with all that is uniquely “you”. 
 
I too am never fully myself unless I am helping others (accepting and loving others)... this is the calling of our lives... yours (as you have already shared), and mine.
 
Oh the things I could do if I could trust fully again... if only... so I identify with how destructive and debilitating “losing trust” is... Like a huge fortress that life built around us that we now need to find a way to chisel away at in a desperate attempt to regain what once was when we were children (or what was supposed to be)... carefree and full of trust in our world... Although I do believe that I knew well, before I was even born that I was not wanted... even hated... mother tried to abort me and I have somehow retained a subconscious memory even of that time that keeps my “no trust” wall quite firmly in place.  And with one blow after another all through my life, “involving people that I should have been able to trust”... even my one therapist... there are more walls up around each of the others that are already there creating an almost impenetrable fortress to keep what’s left of me safe inside...
 
To be quite honest... “Teria Shantall and my Logotherapy journey” is all that has stood between me and exiting this world since what happened with my therapist... They have literally saved my life on many occasions when the memories of that terrible time surfaced again.  
 
My work still connected to the LogoWorld gives my life meaning and a huge sense of responsibility, and keeps me too busy and fulfilled to fall back into that dark place of frightening and exquisitely painful memories.  I still have the LogoBook I wrote during my studies which needs to be completed... etc... These “blessings of hope and belonging” give my life true purpose and therefore keeps me going.  Meeting people like you, restores my hope in “the honest and true goodness” that still exists in this, “my world” and gradually gives me back some semblance of trust too...
 
I am grateful for all the reasons that Life still brings to me over and again, even against all the odds, to keep taking my chances on believing in the goodness of this world... even after the fact of all the times that trust has been cruelly stripped and broken in my life... My therapist was the last straw... I live in a state of constant mourning over the loss of my trust in my therapist... and I have never received any therapy for what happened... the sense of LOSS is sometimes enormous... there is no relief from “that trauma” in this world... but... I do believe in... “TRUTH will prevail”... it always does in the end.  I believe in that.
 
We have to keep on believing in something and be authentic and true to ourselves if we are ever to be stripped of those suffocating masks.  For me, this is the only way.  Like I say to people today... it’s “ALL OR NOTHING”... you either love me or leave me... there’s no more in-betweens for me... I’ve been hurt far too many times already and I am at last standing up for myself... NO MORE!
 
I love that you shared the words... “Even writing this to you I feel the nag of "fear of exposure"”... this shows to me your authenticity... so I know that I don’t have to guess who you are through a mask... I can believe in your genuineness right up front. 
 
You speak about the elderly doctor who helped you by believing in you... (Teria, in my case)... unconditional love and belief in us... and as Teria taught me and I know it to be true now more than ever... “Life never abandons us”... we are never alone... no matter how terrible our situation might seem or be... a little bird might come and sit on our window and stare into our eyes... a friend might arrive when we least expected it but most needed it, etc. 
 
When we start to see the signs and experience the ever-present blessings in our lives, we are able to live more gratefully and hopefully...  more authentically... to live “MORE”...
I could have written this line of yours myself... “I also came to realise that I can never be happy unless I am helping someone in some way. Even if it is only to make the sad, unhappy looking girl behind the till at pick n pay, smile.”
Learning to understand and see clearly how we “tic” as a result of our past traumas is truly a revelation to embrace as you suggest... we might never be fully “healed” from child abuse... who, ever is... but, through my studies of Logotherapy, I have learned to recognise and to take responsibility for my actions, behaviour, emotional states, etc.  I have learned to make better/right choices for not only my own sake, growth, healing, etc., but also for the sake of others...
 
Yes... I think we could have some wonderful talks and we should get together sometime...
 
And I can’t believe I am actually able to say that these days, because my trust has been so broken so many times, that I generally remain very isolated and have ways of keeping people “OUT” as opposed to “letting them in” to my world... Logotherapy has been an incredible “AWAKENING” in my life... for which I know I will be Eternally grateful!
 
Friend:  I have read and reread your letter many times.  I find it profound.  It brought tears to my eyes.  We (us and the human race) are so similar in the way that we suffer and the things that cause us to suffer.  I find myself often asking why other people cause us to suffer.  One of my conclusions is that they probably do not know any better.  The unloved have become the unloving the hurt have become the ones that cause pain.  I have read Viktor Frankl's account of when he left the concentration camp and fellow prisoners were wilfully damaging someone’s plants, he reprimanded them and their reaction was that it was their turn to basically get back at others.  (This is not the correct wording of what he wrote but... in a nutshell).  
 
This is what I think of when I think of past and present hurts.  I try to remind myself that I am not the cause of this behavior and that I have not and do not deserve this kind of treatment.  Not that it lessens the pain that much, but it helps me to understand and also realize that I am in a position (of understanding) not to perpetuate this kind of behavior onto others.
 
I feel at ease chatting to you and find your words very enlightening.  Through your words I have come to learn some more about myself. I will share at a later time.  I started typing about the experience and then realized that I actually want to mull it over some more before sharing.
 
When I look back at my life it feels like one of those small "maze ball games" that came in lucky packets.  We used to tilt them to make the ball negotiate the maze and reach the goal.  My "little ball" at least to my mind, has taken many wrong turns in my life.  I am hesitant to believe the adage that "everything that happens, happens for a reason".   So as you can deduct I feel many regrets.  I do believe however that I can learn through my mistakes and that I can learn to tilt my ball to follow a more correct path to self-fulfilment and meaningfulness.
 
Before I started back on the "service to others" journey, I became increasingly aware of feelings of meaningless and emptiness. I still some days fight the cycle between meaningfulness and meaninglessness (sheesh does that make sense). I must say that lately, I feel the scales tipping towards meaning more often than before.
 
Thank you for the link to your blog, I have not looked yet. I felt that I had to reply to you before I opened your blog. I sense through your writing that you are a kind and good person. I feel that I can trust you. I love the encouragement that you weave into your wording. It is very empowering for me to read. 
 
Pana:  Hello dear Amanda,  You are too lovely for words!  I’m so grateful that our paths have crossed. 
 
I agree with you and have found peace in knowing that others who have not walked in our shoes can’t understand... and those who cause us to suffer are at a different place in their journeys (spiritual development), and their struggles is therefore one that is still in progress as far as their journey goes, while we might be further along the path or our own journeys and in a completely different place of perceiving, coping, knowing, longing, behaving, thinking, loving, etc. to them. 
 
This is why unconditional love is the most powerful force of all... I feel that it is the only way for us to survive in this often very cruel world.
 
We cannot know better, until we have learned better... and what helps us to learn best is LOVE. 
 
Now I’m not saying that we need to be loving towards someone who is being cruel to us, because then we may as well be doormats and expect and invite troubles to come our way... but we can at least not be cruel back to them, which would destroy us in the process and keep them in a perpetual cycle of cruelty.  I even get upset when people send me political jokes for instance, because as far as I am concerned, that’s behaving just like the very one they are laughing about and thus creating further darkness for not only themselves but all.  I do not see any “joke” in “laughing at the darkness”.
 
We are what we think... we create our own destiny through our thought processes and actions...
 
We each have the power to change the world for good.
 
I love what a dear Jewish friend, Ephraim, said to me once... “With every good deed one person does, no matter how small, he/she changes the whole world for good”... How beautiful is that? 
 
Your words are profound: “The unloved have become the unloving the hurt have become the ones that cause pain”
I look forward to meeting you also... how wonderful... and I look forward to hearing what it is that touched you in our sharing... maybe you will decide to share it in your study tasks rather.
 
I LOVED those maze ball games and was pretty good at them... I love your example.  I was just telling my family this Christmas to save me their little trinkets out of their crackers for me... There’s still an inner child inside of me who loves to collect those... I was delighted with what I got this year that were left around after our Christmas lunch.  Things I once enjoyed when I was younger... a mini pack of cards... a fish that curls its head and tail on your hand... spinning tops... rings, etc.  Those were the only little blessings I was ever really able to hold onto as a child, that would remind me of those rare sweet moments that Christmas held for me back then.
 
So... I’m 59 years old, but still have joy in recapturing those small moments of real happiness (magic and hope) that I experienced as a child... too beautiful and fun!
 
I personally do very much believe that “everything happens for a reason”... looking back on my life, I have been able to put all the puzzle pieces together and have found so many answers to validate this for me.
 
Your words... “I still some days fight the cycle between meaningfulness and meaninglessness (sheesh does that make sense)”... make perfect sense to me... I do the same... the struggle is always there, but it gets easier and easier to deal with as time passes... as you are discovering.
 
Thank you so much also for your kind and beautiful words which encourage me too... bless you. 
 
I believe that if you can gain the complete trust of another person, it is one of the greatest achievements ever... so to be a person that others can trust... a person of integrity, is extremely important to me... I strive for that all the time.  I always said to my family... if I die, I want to be worthy to have “Woman of Integrity” written on my gravestone...
 
I’m a work in progress, so... I am grateful that for now, you feel you can trust me... I pray I never disappoint you or others who have put their trust in me.
 
~ Pana