I don’t know what I think till I see what I write.
So I’m just going to start writing and see what comes out.
I’m having a really rough day, just too many things at once catching up with me and I feel so fucking alone with it all. Woke up with the nightmares again like a riddle: who is taking to who in there? There are trapped parts wanting to be seen, but standing at the gates is this incredibly Critical Part that tells me how weak and cowardly and stupid I am. It’s a very familiar voice.
The only way I can unblend from him is to do what I’m doing now: acknowledge him, give him a voice, let him tell his version of the story and figure out together what to do with all that powerful critical energy.
Okay deep breath. The critical voice tell me: the world is a horror show. We’re not prepared for how bad it’s going to get. The monsters are in control and they’re going to kill everyone you love. Your children will be killed in front of you and you’ll be powerless to do anything about it. You’re a fucking coward. Your life is meaningless to the monsters.
I wince. I don’t know what to do about it. I’m scared. I’m so scared and full of shame.
Okay deep breath. Some more deep breaths. That fear and shame, it’s so familiar that it fees like it’s ME, but it’s really just a part that I’m blended with. There is a simple process that involves slow focused breath and releasing the muscles in my shoulders and I unblend from the scared young part.
Tears well up. I’m am the child crying and I am also the parent holding the scared child. I am holding double consciousness. This is what it means to do IFS work.
The child says: i’m so helpless. i’m so scared. I don’t know what to do right now I can’t do anything for anyone. More tears. There is a relief when I realize those thoughts, which I’ve been feeling on and off all day are coming from inside one part, and I can comfort that part. I don’t have to BE that part.
From a place of greater clarity this voice of Compassion rises up in me: I see you both: the angry protector and the young one. We’ve been here before. We know each other well. Protector - what can we do to make this situation better?
I put my head in my hands for a moment and this unexpected flood of images arises in my mind: the critic is unloading a bunch of buried memories to me: I’m in my 2nd grade classroom and there are these kids taunting me calling me stupid, hot shame on my face. I can’t do the math like everyone else. I can’t spell like everyone else. I don’t belong there. I see a boot kicking my face in but I don’t think I ever got kicked like that as a kid, but I must have felt like it. The Protector wants me to see what it feels like. The voice: You’re fucking stupid! You stupid piece of shit! You don’t deserve to live! this voice calls out, I’m saying it to myself, I’m frozen. I don’t fight back. I feel weak and don’t trust my body. I don’t trust myself at all.
*
When I trained with generative somatics all those years ago we learned about four conditioned tendencies: Fight Flight Freeze Appease and I finally learned language for my Freeze response, and later I learned about the overlap with psychosis diagnoses, how Freeze is a kind of disassociation and how it looks really unnerving to people when you do it, especially in situations that might inspire fighting back. I learned a freeze response young in my house with a screaming father. Sometimes I realize I never unlearned it.
*
Okay I’m back here with the scared kid and the critical part. What are we going to do with this situation? The monsters aren’t coming for us today, and they’re probably not coming for us for awhile so we have time to prepare. It’s gonna be okay for now.
I’m sitting here at my desk, looking around my room at the books and the milk crates full of papers and the posters on the walls. It feels like the first time I’ve looked around all day, maybe the first time in awhile. Just by doing this brief unblending exercise I feel more connected to myself. There’s a tenderness I feel in my chest, like I’m taking care of a young child inside me. My protector, the critical part, he feels seen and his anger isn’t directed at the scared child. We are scanning on the horizon together to come up with a plan to keep us safe. There’s a lot more room to remember who I am and what I care about.
**
Okay, well I didn’t know what was going to come out of me when I started writing but now that we’ve gotten that out of the way I want to say out loud what my current dilemma looks like, and maybe I can figure out a way through it. Thanks for caring enough to read this far.
For a really long time now I’ve been facilitating these workshops to help people learn how to communicate better about their inner worlds and therefore build solidarity and community in a deep way with others around them. I got lots of experience doing them in the Icarus Project times, and then a whole lot more experience when I was working inside the mental health system. During the pandemic a did a series of them on zoom that was really positive, and then I had kids and that was 5 years ago and I haven’t been organized enough to run them again.
So recently I had this idea to run a month long, once a week online workshop and that would involve writing, answering a set of questions and developing a written map inspired by IFS principles, doing kind of what I was doing above spontaneously - getting to know protector parts and exile parts, practicing building Self energy, and then writing a document to help communicate with the different parts and the actual people in your life.
I wrote up a number of drafts and came up with some pretty exciting strategies to teach the material. I came up with 4 dates in April, and decided to run 2 cohorts at different times of day.
TODAY was the day I was going to post it publicly, but I woke up with the nightmares and came into my office and was just inextricably struck with terror. And instead of posting the announcement I just sat frozen in front of the screen. It’s like a deep deep form of impostor syndrome where I can’t imagine how I ever got up the idea or courage to ever hold space for a group of people. I’m so full of fear I’m the last person who should be telling anyone anything.
So I think I’m going to put the T-MAPs month long thing on hold until I’m feeling a little more solid about it. Also, this is a much longer subject, but I’ve been using the AI to write so much lately and it’s a real dance with the devil - it flows so quickly but then the thoughts are left unmetabolized. It feels good to set it aside.
We are living in such strange times.
PS There is this 2 hour T-MAPs training I’m doing in a couple weeks which you can learn about here:
