To Prasadini about change, learning & unlearning (was Nonviolent Communication)

[Guest guest]

Prasadini wrote:

 

....I've known people who never changed in their whole lives. I would

venture to guess that as souls plodding on the spiritual path we are

trying to change, and not become exaggerated caricatures of ourselves.

I think Mother is trying to be sure that doesn't happen.

 

 

Dear Prasadini ~ I, of course, second all that you wrote in your entire

post. It is very hard learning to believe and feel we are loveable when we have

been taught during our most impressionable years the exact opposite. I still

struggle with this, as I know you are aware. I'm trying to imagine what an

exaggerated caricature of myself would look like, and I'm having a bit of

difficulty, but I think in some ways it would be heart wrenching and in other

ways

it would be hilarious.

 

I never thought my father could ever change, and in my sister's experience,

he never did. He even slapped her while on his deathbed. Of course, he had

just said, "Well, I guess this is it, isn't it?" And she said, "Yes."

Undoubtedly true on the mere physical level, but my sister knows better, and it

astounded me that she didn't give him that perspective. I wish I had been there

to

respond to his question because I would have handled it very differently. For

one thing, I would have told him that that wasn't it for him ... that it is

just a change, the being continues. He knows that now, but he didn't then,

so her response hurt and scared him, and he responded according to an old

pattern.

 

On the other hand, in my experience, somehow I came to forgive my father,

and the forgiveness was total because it was a realization that there was really

nothing to forgive. Somehow I was able to make a separation in my mind

between the man my father had been most of my life and the man my father was at

that time. Because he was very ill, his doctor had told him he had to stop

drinking. Since he was an alcoholic, this changed his behavior somewhat. In his

case, it changed for the better ... I had a very good relationship with him

for several years that I will treasure for the rest of my life.

 

So, to my sister, my father had only become a caricature of who she already

believed he was. For me he became a person with whom I could have mutual

respect, a person I could take walks with and talk with, a person I could hang

out with, a person who called me just to say hello (this alone was huge).

Sometimes change is perception, our perception of ourselves (are we correctly

perceiving changes we have made, or are we ignoring them), or our perception of

others. Hugs ~ Linda