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As a child I was tortured by my father because of his lack of being present for me, he who was tortured from birth. So in turn tortured my mother and I stood in line as he tortured me. It was hereditary, passed on through the genes or just reinstalled because of a historical pattern of human behavior called the cycle of human abuse. He only knew how to love by taking control of his fears by attempting to control others because he did not know how to love unless his fears were expressed, taking out his anxieties on the people who were waiting to be loved by him.
Don’t get me wrong, my father was not always an abusive person. He could be warm and loving, yet he had moments where he would fly off the handle and created a drama that illustrated the image of an elephant living in the center of the room. The elephant was always angry and was always looking for home where he was safe. It was never safe beneath the sole of his feet or within his searching reach. I craved his approval and feared his lack of showing me love. He craved being loved.
But after eighteen years of sobriety, he finally learned how to be loving without fear. He learned how to deal with the power of love and the power of fear. The man my father became erased the history of the man my father was. He had evolved to become a man who had gotten rid of the need to snatch power from your lungs and heart. It was a slow evolution, but he stepped into a knowing of internal justice.
Still I lived in a bell jar of lack, fear, abandonment, and anger, not able to digest the evolution until after his death. As I read his personal journals I stopped to read as I was packing his house, days after his death. I did not have the maturity or the will to forgive him long enough to see his evolution. I was caught up in my own personal pain. I sat in silence reading his emotions pouring from the pages of his journal, validating the fact that he was a complicated man of emotions. His own father had forced himself upon his mother and caused his birth. I was another reflection of my father and I did not like what I saw in the mirror. I understood the want to control the world around you in order to feel safe in your quest of looking for love. After he died and after I read his words written in his hand printed diary did I meet his soul and all I could do was cry.
I was angry, but I was sober enough in my spirit to recognize this was an open door for me to finally understand the story, the history of experiencing conflict in how we misuse love and its power. I then recommitted my life to changing my personal habits of living in order to honor my life and the life of others.
I believe this reflection is an expression of awareness which is needed in the lives and actions of our modern men as they work out the needed healing from the historical behavior of abuse, the reactionary behavior of fighting for the love missing in their lives.
I was given a chance to have a conversation with my father, even after his death, a conversation which allowed me to heal as an emotionally damaged man child attempting to be a full-fledged, balanced man.
His eighteen years of sobriety allowed him to do his step work which allowed him to be freed from his internal demons of fear. His new freedom allowed him to know the truth of the acceptance of love. My own personal work allowed me to be prepared to have the needed conversation.
Men are taught from a young age that strong, powerful men are men in complete control of their worlds, even by force. Being in complete control does not allow enough room for love to come in and be present in the room. The fight for control overrides the act of loving. The true art of personal control is one of being love in action and willing to be a facilitator of uplifting change for all people involved, being a person of right actions. With those principles in mind, there is no room in the house of living for human abuse.
I watched my father become a better man and with his history, that in itself is a miracle. It was a miracle that took sweat and tears, working daily to change a habit of living of not just living for yourself, but also including the welfare of others. I know this as the truth because of my own journey of changing my rituals of living to become a better man. Because I have seen and experienced evolutionary behavioral change in my life and my father’s life, I know of the possibilities of change is available for all men to become better men.
I am not saying all men should be in a program of alcohol sobriety, but I do believe in the idea of personal accountability and being of service to your community and your personal self. I am saying the development of a habit of living that nurtures yourself and those around you adds to the quality of life for all concerned.
When we can learn to live outside of our personal demons to evolve into engaged people of support for all others only allows the entire community to heal and operate in reflections of trust and honor.
Not all men are monsters, but when they begin to do monstrous acts they need to be checked and take the time to do a reset for themselves, as we are seeing with the sexual harassment charges running amuck today. If men can recovery from alcohol addiction, they can recovery from enacting physical, mental, and emotional abuse on others. The thing to remember is they who are guilty need to be accountable for their own actions and admit their part in the problem, wean themselves of the unsupportive behavior. This is a time for change to remove the shackles of ignorance that are hidden in the quest for the power of knowing love.
The silent war for love is a cry for the manifestation of true love. We are having a watershed moment in our society where we are seeing behavior that does not honor love or life. This is a calling for a conversation of intimacy which is lacking in our modern world, a calling for the society to move together in unity to heal these historical actions of ignorance. The state of true love is an honoring of all aspects of life. It is no accident these acts are centered around the
sexual act, the act that gives us a possiblity, an attempt to create the fire of life.
It is time to get real, to become evolved in the real truth of love, learn our lessons of ignorant behavior so we can create rituals of living which feed the honor of the fire of life. As men and women of our society, we are all calling for the unity of true love. Let us not allow this to divide us, but allow us to embrace the possibilities of unity.
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