How Do We Deal With People Who Appear To Treat Us Less Than Kindly?
When people apparently treat us, in one way or another harshly, it can be hard not to fall into the narrow identification of believing to be a separate person under attack. Our body becomes emotional, and our mind fills with defensiveness. Memories of being a child being told off may occur, reminding us of old traumatic moments. We may compound the unpleasant experience with feelings of shame that tries to hide these unpleasant feelings but only serve to close us down. At these times, we have to deal with our basic instinct to survive.
It can help to maintain objectivity in the situation by thinking of our body like an inner child who has become upset. Whilst going her merry way and playing, something accidental and unexpected happens, and she ends up feeling threatened somehow by the activity of another. This may even be more mortifying for some children than others due to some innate sensitivity. To contrast with the bodily feelings of our inner child, we can remember we are always the “Loving Aware Parent”. Aware, in that we are the dispassionate objective observer of her upset feelings, and we do not identify with them and fall into a defensive story that her older sister and our other child, the inner teenager’s mind, wants to tell us about. Loving in that she, the Loving Aware Parent, completely and fearlessly embraces her inner child's bodily feelings forgivingly, non-judgementally and with infinite patience and trust in her inner child's capacity to recover.
The Loving Aware Parent essentially understands life profoundly and objectively. She combines always intelligence with love in a balanced way. She may even understand the most profound view that if an unpleasant incident happens, it could be considered an opportunity to test her strength as the Loving, Aware Parent. Although her teenage daughter's mind and inner child’s body may want to fight or flight, curl up in shame, or even tend and befriend to protect themselves, she can remain firmly and lovingly open to the World, after all being in the World is something that she intuitively knows is a chosen part of her and her inner family's realisation of happiness.
Remaining objective and loving means also she can discern this deeper function and have the objective strength to let go of this situation and move on, not clinging to any stories about a separate self but remaining focussed on the present in complete openness to the World. She can also have the power to listen and attune to the more profound knowledge of her inner teenage daughter's mind her inner child's body once their anxiety has abated. Sometimes, if her inner children are upset, extra calming measures are needed before any inner dialogue can occur, such as breathing love into her inner children for some days and taking time to do this for her inner family.
As the Loving Aware Parent, she can always rely on and trust the ever-present wisdom of her Universally Loving nature, not identified with any specific feelings or thoughts, to resolve all matters. No rush. Just loving awareness. After all, the Loving Aware Parent realises this is all part of the rich tapestry of enjoying a human experience.
Love
Freyja
