written 8 June 2021
Purpose statement
There is nothing to fear here.
Or, there is everything to fear.
Bringing hidden things out of darkness into light is not FUN. It's terrifying.
But it's worth it.
My journey of discovery and healing was born out of fear and in spite of fear. I couldn't shake a tiny, niggling idea deep in my brain that I didn't really have as much of a handle on this adult life-thing as I liked to think I did. That wiggle-worm of a thought grew into a full-blown cognitive dissonance that everything was not as it seemed and there was something very wrong going on – both within me and within the culture which was my life's foundation. I was strongly in denial, but I knew this much: I had to be sure. Whatever upheaval it meant, I wanted to know whether everything I based my life on could hold me up. It had to all be tested and questioned.
Boy, has there been some upheaval.
Still worth it.
That testing involves what I call “bringing things to light”. Examining and questioning and shaking everything to see if it's still standing once the “storm” is over. If it isn't, I sure don't want it as my foundation.
I hope to use this blog as a practice of continued discovery and healing. Muscles get stronger as they are repeatedly put to use and their limits challenged. It seems to be the same with my mind and heart. Healthy thought- and behavior-patterns need practice, too. It is incredibly empowering and healing to truthfully, openly acknowledging the facts of my experience, without apology. I want to practice that authenticity as much as possible in my life, and here is one place to do it. It is time.
I want to know whether my thought patterns and behaviors have any basis in GOD's truth about me or are instead a made-up construct of modern society or somebody's opinion. I want to know. For sure.
While I don't write to change anyone else, I do hope this blog has some side effects. I hope people wake up to the actual effects their culture's doctrines are having on children, instead of focusing on how good their motives and intentions are. “By their fruits you shall know them”, and if what a culture is producing in children (which they usually then take to adulthood) is traumatized brains, then mightn't there be reason to question personal involvement in such a culture?
I write openly for anybody who's wondering why their brains work the way they do. I write to let you know you are not alone; you are not making your struggles up. There is a very real reason for your day-to-day challenges. I write to say to you: “There is a better way to live.” I write to tell you the good news that we have more choice and power than we've been taught, and it is possible to claim it and wield it. I write for all of you who are on the inside looking out, considering the contradictions of your existence and troubled by the niggling notion in you that everything is not as it seems or working the way it's supposed to be.
I hope that more people realize we're not born living in fear and guilt and shame. We're taught it. We learn it from somewhere. And there is a way to unlearn it.
I hope the concepts presented here will challenge peoples' perceptions and ideas and traditional thinking. I hope people will question what they're doing and the effect it's having on others, regardless of how noble and good their intentions are. I hope people will seriously consider their participation in practices and ideologies which have detrimental effects on children's minds.
I try to be realistic about these hopes. I know the upheaval and terror of even thinking about questioning deeply held beliefs, of probing concepts to see if they really, truly do hold up. I have lived that fear.
I am living proof that pushing aside darkness in favor of light holds no true terror.