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With the drastically different perspectives on life that I’ve come to and have been sharing over the past couple of years, people sometimes wonder if I’ve been brainwashed. The answer is yes, I have. And so have you. We’ve all been brainwashed. That’s the name of the game. As long as we have a brain, it’s inevitable that something will wash it.
And with this thought arises an interesting potential: If I have the capacity to be brainwashed, and it’s inevitable that my brain will be washed by something, perhaps I can consciously choose who and what is doing the washing.
A Negative Bias
The word brainwashing doesn’t carry with it very positive associations. We think of cults and religious indoctrination. Mass suicides and people convincing others to do their evil bidding. But what is brainwashing really?
Brain-washing. Sounds like some sort of cleansing process. Perhaps a cleaning out of the old and a making way for the new? But if this is the case, what is it that we’re washing out in the first place?
We’ve all been brainwashed? What does that mean?
Well, it started the moment we entered this world. Slowly at first, as we were still connected with Pure Being in our early youth. But as we spent more time in this world of relativity, we began to feel a growing sense of separation, and our awareness of our sacred connection to everyone and everything began to fade.
If the world had reinforced this connection, we may not have lost it (or perhaps we would have, but to a lesser degree), but this wasn’t the case for many of us. Instead, the world reinforced our illusion of separation. Why? Because that’s the game we came to play!
As our knowing of Oneness faded, we simultaneously began to develop a greater capacity to “learn” from others, and the perfect container was set for brainwashing.
What was the learning/brainwashing that took place, and how did we learn it?
As children, we learned who and what “we are” and who and what we’re “supposed to be” through messages and modeling from our parents, culture, schools, and society (largely through the media). We were taught what’s okay and not okay, what’s right and what’s wrong, what’s true and untrue, according to others.
We learned what will cause us to be liked, included, and accepted, and what will cause us to be judged, excluded, and rejected.
“Be and look this way, and you’ll get what you want. Be and look any other way, and you won’t.”
Black and white. Plain and simple. Stay inside the lines. Conform, or be alone and die alone.
Why would people want to brainwash children with fear rather than allowing them space to learn their own lessons and discover their own truth?
In some cases, we “teach” children through fear in an effort to protect them and guide them toward successful and fulfilling lives. There are certain cautionary lessons we attempt to instill in them so they won’t encounter catastrophic life circumstances or an untimely death. But many times, we brainwash them for our own comfort and our own agendas. And sometimes this is because children can be very high energy (aka fucking exhausting), and we don’t have systems in place to support this.
I was an elementary school teacher for nearly a decade, and no matter what I tried, I felt that I had to create many rules and consequences, and limit many of my students’ freedoms, in order to create an environment that was both conducive for learning and would (mostly) prevent them from hurting themselves or each other. Parents know that even one child can be a handful at times, and my job was to teach about 30 of them a bunch of shit that many of them had no interest in learning, while at the same time “managing” their behavior, almost exclusively by myself. Not exactly a recipe for letting their creativity and self-expression thrive.
Working within the public education system, I began to feel like something wasn’t quite right. I knew that I was shutting my students down and treating them disrespectfully. I was modeling a way of being that I wasn’t proud of. I was sending them the message to sit down, shut up, and do as they’re told. Why? Because I didn’t know what else to do.
I attempted to reason with my students. To communicate authentically and compassionately with the hope that they would understand and empathize with where I was coming from and change their behavior. And this “helped,” but the whole day could be spent on that, and even when they seemed to be trying their best, it felt as if they could only hold it together for so long before the stifling environment would lead to restlessness and “difficult behavior.” It was so much easier and more time efficient to just yell at them at them and scold them into conformity!
I barely raised my voice the first couple of years, but as time went on, I began to feel more and more impatient and frustrated, and like I was an incompetent failure when it came to classroom management, and I projected these frustrations and inadequacies onto the children. And I was surrounded by teachers, administrators, and parents that were modeling the effectiveness of “the tyrant strategy” and normalizing this behavior, so I eventually followed suit.
The system began to change me.
I didn’t like the person I was becoming, or what I was modeling for my students (people learn much more from what we model than what we say), so I attempted to counter these uncomfortable changes in any ways I could think of. I tried all kinds of positive reinforcement techniques and reward systems (aka bribery), and these helped a bit, but they were nowhere near as effective as scare tactics (at least, not in the moment). If I yelled, they got quiet. If I didn’t, it was going to be a much slower process of attempting to appeal to their empathetic side or coerce them into obedience. And we didn’t have time for that shit! Go go go! Learn learn learn! (Brainwash brainwash brainwash!)
I learned and implemented mindfulness practices and brought social-emotional learning into the classroom in an attempt to help students develop more self-love, empathy, and emotional awareness (and to help with my own sanity!), and this created some positive changes that felt wonderful, but there was never enough time to really dive into it. There was so much pressure to keep up with the curriculum (aka God). Emotional education wasn’t seen as a priority.
“Yeah, maybe you can squeeze that in for ten minutes a day, but we need to make sure we’re focusing on what’s really important, like a bunch of math they’re never going to use but will be tested on relentlessly for the next decade. And besides, won’t all that touchy-feely crap help them build self-confidence and encourage them to think for themselves and question authority? We certainly don’t want that. On second thought, why don’t you just scrap the whole idea.”
So I felt forced to continue with the authoritarian dictatorship, and I felt justified in it because I was surrounded by evidence that it was okay to treat children this way. There may as well have been a sign on the wall: “Permission to oppress children and treat them like they aren’t real people.” The teacher and administrator motto felt like: “I’m in charge. Do what I say. Don’t question me. I know what’s best for you.” But at some point, I began to wonder, “Wait, do I know what’s best for them? Do I know what’s best for anyone? I don’t even seem to know what’s best for me most of the time!”
I didn’t know what was best for me because I’d been brainwashed. I wasn’t thinking for myself, I was running off the beliefs and agendas of others (so that I’d be easier to manage and control, like my students). I was in a constant internal battle with myself because what felt best and what I was told was best were often two different things. And as I started becoming aware of this, I began to see that I was doing the same thing to my students that had been done to me, and leading them down the same painfully conflicted road.
My students knew the system and the rules were mostly a bunch of bullshit. They couldn’t necessarily articulate this, but many of them rebelled against it. They were the brave ones. They were the ones that were taking care of themselves by saying, “No! This doesn’t feel right for me!” On some level, they knew they were being oppressed and that it wasn’t okay. They knew they weren’t being respected and given a voice, and that didn’t sit well with them. And they had the courage to speak up, despite the consequences.
Sure, some of the rebels were likely acting out for attention as well, but there was something about them that I always sort of admired, despite the headaches they personally caused me. They weren’t just conforming because they were told to. They were taking a stand for what felt right for them. I imagine many of these rebellious students will one day make the strongest leaders and become powerful voices for change (and many of the more complacent ones will fit into the matrix quite nicely).
It saddens me to think of the ways I contributed to guiding children away from their internal wisdom. And it wasn’t just me, the whole system was in on it! “Control those unruly children! Teach them to bow down to us and do as they’re told!” It began to feel like what I was really teaching them was how to conform. How to stop trusting themselves. How to limit their self-expression. How to prepare themselves to be cogs in the machine.
I was part of a system that was teaching them that if they be themselves and question authority, bad things will happen.
Those on the front lines with children – parents, family members, caregivers, teachers, coaches, etc. – often have the best of intentions, but we’re acting from our own brainwashing. We are the unwitting cogs in the machine that we’re training our children to be a part of. We’re not brainwashing them with harmful intentions, it’s just what we know. Perhaps it’s how our parents did things, and how their parents before them did it. And the institutions reinforce it as well, so it’s simply how the world works, right?
The last thing we want is an “out of control” child. How embarrassing! And so exhausting! “Maybe if I had a community that offered me support rather than harshly judging my kids and I for their behavior, I wouldn’t be so hard on myself and take it out on my children. Maybe if I had a loving army of people to help me raise them I could allow them more freedom, but I can’t handle these little monsters on my own!”
“NO! STOP! DON’T BE YOU! YOU ARE BAD! YOU ARE TOO MUCH!”
And then this becomes our internal recording: “I am bad. I am too much. Don’t be me. Be who they want me to be…or else.”
If raising children in community would help, why aren’t we doing more of this?
This a fairly recent phenomenon. Living in community seemed obvious in the past, but American culture in particular has become very focused on the individual, and the nuclear family. But if this doesn’t serve families, why is this the case?
One thing this society clearly creates is a bunch of stressed-out, overworked parents. A whole lot of desperate people just trying to provide for themselves and their families, while somehow staying sane enough to be good parents and good people. People that live in too much fear and chaos to have much time to do anything but keep up with the daily grind of life. People that are desperate to numb themselves so they can find a little relief within the madness.
You ready to jump on the conspiracy bus with me? Ready or not, here we go!
Whose agenda might it serve to create a society in which we move away from community, causing us to be so weighed down by individual responsibilities that we’re too overwhelmed to think about much of anything outside of our own and our family’s survival needs?
Who might benefit from us being so desperate for relief that we spend most of our lives working ourselves to death at jobs we don’t like so we can purchase whatever consumer products and “medicines” we can to numb ourselves out and feel a bit of peace and joy amidst the pain and struggle?
In whose interest is it to have a population that is so overworked and stressed out that we’re almost constantly sick and in need of medical care?
Who might have something to gain from a system of fear and control that causes us to continue to brainwash our children to conform to the current system rather than think for themselves, awaken to the infinite beauty of who they really are, band together in community, and co-create a revolution of love?
People who awaken to their beauty and power and join a community of others that are doing the same aren’t as susceptible to fear, and are therefore much more difficult to control. Anyone that has any investment in things staying the way they are probably wouldn’t like that so much.
A System of Fear and Control
We’ve been brainwashed to conform to a system in which we are both the prisoners and the guards. No one has to police us when we “step out of line,” because we police one another with our brainwashing-induced judgments and institutionalized systems.
“Sure, you can make that choice if you want, but there will be consequences, and one of them will be the withholding of my love.” To a child, this feels like death, and we’ve all experienced this to varying degrees. (This is the part where we take a break to give love and compassion to our inner child for all the times love was withheld from us. For all the pain we experienced when it felt like the world was against us, that we were bad, and that we were all alone. And we can extend this compassion to the inner children of those that we hold responsible for this as well, because they only did it to us because the same thing was done to them.)
Why create such a system? Because it makes us more manageable. More willing to conform to the beliefs, preferences, and agendas of others. (And we’re even more susceptible to fear and control when we’re not feeling the love and support of community.)
We were essentially dropped into the ocean of life and encouraged to be an individual wave (or an individual nuclear family wave), and to forget that there is an entire ocean that we’re all a part of. But what impacts one wave impacts us all, because we are literally all connected.
Ironically, we were bred to be individual waves and told not to make waves, and that doesn’t feel very good. So we’ve got this intense internal conflict within us that causes us to want to distract and medicate ourselves so we don’t’ have to hear the parts of us that are trying to wake us up to Oneness, and to what’s going on behind the current. (The Wizard of Oz had no real power once his fear tactics were uncovered, and “the system” doesn’t have any real power over us once we see through the illusions of fear.)
Brainwashing is “the name of the game”?
We’re constantly being exposed to new ideas – potential future beliefs and programs for our subconscious mind to run in the background – so brainwashing is possible in every moment, but it’s largely happening unconsciously. But we have the power to bring more consciousness to this process, choose what programs to run, and live an incredible life of peace, joy, inspiration, and love beyond the current capacities of our imagination.
As we wash out the remnants of old programs and clean the place up for new guests to arrive, we make room for new programs to enter and gain agency over what we believe. As we let go of old programs that others chose for us, we get to design the place the way we like it. We can invite ideas to stay that we enjoy, and allow those that we do not to go their separate ways.
Allowing them to go doesn’t mean kicking them out. There’s no bouncer or cover charge at this party in our mind. But those that aren’t resonating with the new vibes we’re creating will either adapt and evolve, self-select themselves to another party, or perhaps just head on back to the light after a job well done (everything within us has helped us on our journey, even if we’re unaware of how, or even of their existence).
In order to attract and greet our honored guests, we must not only spruce the place up (new ideas may not want to visit if the place is a cluttered mess!), but someone must also be home to answer the door. If we’re too busy, distracted, or numb, we may not hear the doorbell or have the energy to answer. (And if we haven’t cleaned up, we may be too embarrassed to let them in!)
Opportunities are always knocking at our doors, but we don’t always see things this way. It may appear as if someone is trying to sell us something, so we pretend we aren’t home (which may be a sign that we don’t trust ourselves to know what is best for us or hold our boundaries). We may get so comfortable in our complacency, so deeply entrenched in our way of being, that we hang a “No Solicitors” sign on the door. “No more opportunities for change wanted here. I’ll ride out life in this cluttered home until my dying days, thank you.”
And if that’s where someone’s at, that’s where they’re at. If they’re ready to change, they will. If not, they won’t. And when we let others be where they are, and find ways to love them just as they are, we both feel better. And who knows, our love and acceptance could be a catalyst that helps them to imagine that life can be much more joyous, peaceful, and abundant than their current perspective suggests.
Trying to force our way of being on others, or even gently encouraging them to see things our way, is more brainwashing. It’s saying, “I’m going to come in and clean up your place for you, whether you like it or not.” It’s not honoring where they’re at. It’s not allowing them to be who they are. Perhaps they would like us to come help them do a little washing, so it can be nice to put offers in the form of our perspectives out there to be witnessed, but if we don’t allow the choice to come from them, we’re doing the same thing to them that those that wish to control us have done to us.
Conscious brainwashing means taking this into consideration. Allowing people the freedom to make their own decisions. And ultimately shifting the focus off of others and onto ourselves.
Over time, as we consciously focus on our own brainwashing process – witnessing the old beliefs and subconscious programs that are running, allowing those that no longer resonate with us to leave, and considering which new programs we’d like to invite to stay – we may arrive at a place in which we no longer feel the urge to brainwash others. We may not need others to think the way we think, because we feel so abundant and secure in who we are that we lose our fierce desire for others to see things our way. Attempting to get others to agree with our perspective often stems from insecurity, and as our inner world evolves into a more secure space of abundance and love, we may naturally begin to offer and share rather than give and project.
When we’re no longer feeling a strong urge to defend our perspectives, we may naturally become more curious about the perspectives of others. Perhaps they have some fun and intriguing beliefs and programs for us to consider that will help us empathize with them and imagine life from their point of view! (“Reality is subjective? We each live in our own parallel universe that we create through our perspective of it? That’s fascinating! Tell me more.”)
Perhaps our greatest act of free will is our ability to choose our perspective. (Maybe it’s our only act of free will from where we currently are.) But in order to exercise this gift, we must first let go of that which argues for impossiblity (or perhaps allow it to let go of us).
The Dance of Liberation
The dance of liberation is opening our minds to possibility, and our hearts to love. This is largely an organic process: The arrival of new insights leading to new understandings and new perspectives on life. But to some degree, it may also be a choice. A choice to surrender our defenses and consider the possibility that nothing we’ve been told is true (at least, not for us). It’s a dance that allows for fear and embraces the unknown.
We all have our own truth, and the way to discover it for ourselves begins with recognizing the autopilot programs we’re running that don’t feel good for us, and what we believe that doesn’t feel true for us. And here’s a little secret: It turns out that what doesn’t feel good and what doesn’t feel true are often the same thing. Truth and feeling good are largely synonymous, because when we feel good, we’re in alignment with love, and love is the greatest truth of all (and perhaps, ultimately, the only truth). Our emotions have been leading us to truth all along. (You don’t have to take my word for it. See if this feels true for you!)
Which ideas and beliefs about how life works don’t feel good when you think about them? Which actions and choices don’t feel good when you consider them? (These questions alone will put the wheels in motion and encourage you to bust out your power washer.)
And which beliefs do feel good? These are the ideas we can invite to stay for a while, until they no longer feel true. Then, perhaps, it will be time for another spring cleaning. And there may even come a time when nothing feels good or true, and we may wish to clean everything out and start anew! To brainwash ourselves with infinite emptiness!
What a gift it is to have the ability to reprogram ourselves with what feels good and true for us. To create new neural pathways that eventually run deeper than the old ones, causing us to feel better and more at peace because we’re living our truth. This is how we consciously brainwash ourselves. We choose what we allow to make itself at home in our minds rather than allowing others to choose for us. We select the perspectives that create our reality, and the programs that are running in the background and controlling what we scan for.
Patience and self-compassion are key players in this dance. It takes time for new neural pathways to form, and for old programs to fade. For a while, these old programs will continue to run parallel to the new ones we’re choosing, and as they do, it’s important that we don’t make them wrong. They are not the enemy (there is no enemy). They have been with us for a reason – served us in some way – and the more we love, welcome, accept, and honor these old programs, just as they are, rather than judge and shame them and require them to change or go away before we are willing to share love with them, the more quickly they will return to the light that we are, allowing our new programs to step forward into the spotlight of the beautiful new world we’re creating.
It’s helpful to approach this dance with an attitude of effortlessness and openness. The more undefended we are, and the less we are efforting, the more easily we’re able to surrender. And what is it we’re surrendering to? Well, love, of course! And as we patiently and compassionately practice this dance of open, effortless surrender to love, something incredible happens. Something that changes everything.
We naturally begin to create a reality in which we more consistently live in gratitude.
How? By brainwashing ourselves to scan for what’s right rather than constantly focusing on what’s wrong (as we were previously conditioned to do). As our new programs and perspectives escort us to a place of abundance and gratitude, what we used to judge as wrong we begin to judge as another form of love. Everything begins to appear to us as a sacred gift in disguise.
Instead of endlessly putting out fires, we fan the flames of love within our hearts. And from this space, we begin to feel less of a need to rely on a system of fear and control to provide access to the (fleeting) feelings of peace, love, and joy that we wish to experience. We don’t need it so much anymore because we’ve found something better.
And what’s that better thing we’ve found? (drumroll please)
…Self-love! (You know, the whole reason we’re here.)
Self-love has made itself at home at the party within us because we’ve learned to honor ourselves by noticing, trusting and pursuing what feels good for us. With fewer fear programs running in the background, space has been created for us to discover that our inspiration is our guidance to our deeper soul purpose, and that one of the greatest acts of self-love is the courageous pursuit of this.
And that’s not all! We’ve also learned that we don’t need anyone to confirm how wonderful we are, because we’ve allowed love to take the wheel and it’s guided us to a knowing of our infinite beauty on a deeper level than any external confirmation could ever provide. The washing out of old beliefs has made space for something sacred to awaken within us – something we weren’t able to hear or feel when we were distracted by old programs – and this internal source of love has “brainwashed” us with more beautiful truths than we ever imagined possible.
A Brave New World
Imagine a world in which self-trust and self-love are being modeled for children, helping them cultivate a sacred connection to the love within them and allow their subconscious minds to be “consciously brainwashed” by it. Some are already doing this, and many will follow, as the revolution of love unfolds.
Allowing brainwashing may sound funny or wrong, especially when it comes to our children, but when we consciously allow ourselves to be brainwashed by our loving inner being, we are practicing a beautiful form of spiritual surrender. We’re surrendering to love and allowing it to wash away all that no longer resonates with it, and through this process, we become aware of the radiant, infinite love that we already are.
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A version of this post was originally posted on TroyCohen.Wordpress.com and is republished here with permission from the author.
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