Category: Ted Talks

• Are you sure you are right?

   

  Do you think that most people believe that the way they were raised, the religion they were assimilated into and the beliefs they were taught, are Right.  

  How do we even know how we know we are right?

   

  I lived with right knowing for many years.

  It never occurred to me to explore the other side.

  The beliefs of my childhood – were part of being Me.

  I never ever questioned the ones who gave me the beliefs or the religion and its rules.

  They just were.

   

  The things implanted as a child and my own childhood interpretation became a file in my mind. It's pathway unquestioned – I just believed it was right.

  It is very telling that often religions are implanted into children;  an empty malleable mind.

   

  What is implanted in childhood is often hard to unwind – for it absconds with body and mind before the child gets a chance to define itself.

   

  These ideas are actually replacing the self.  A child in strict religions are made to meld into the ways of the church – but without a fully formed self – the child becomes the religion. 

   

  I don't recall having freewill – I moved as the religion would have moved. 

   

  I lived on rote.

   

  I had to look up the definition – "mechanical or unthinking routine or repetition. a joyless sense of order, rote, and commercial hustle."

   

  I had to chuckle at the joyless sense of order….in how aptly it described my early years… sadly.

   

  The rightness of the religion in my mind was partnered with sexual abuse.

  But, the sexual abuse wasn't recorded in the files.

  My body held these truths.

   

  When the sexual abuse wasn't recorded – my mind didn't see the abuse or act in accordance with it. It never existed – yet it did happen.

   

  As a child downloading the religion and at the same time experiencing childhood sexual assault by my father – my mind files were *&%$ – to put it gently.  So not right -not even close.

   

  I truly feel for my younger self living life with a messed up filing system and no real separate self.

  She believed she was right and there was no one there to challenge her thoughts or beliefs.

  In the religion, we were taught the sinful nature of our bodies.  I was never taught to honor my feelings, emotions and instincts.  

  I separated from my body in sexual abuse as well.

  I truly lived disconnected from my body and all its wisdom.

   

  I am not certain I can articulate this.

   

  Just because you believe something to be right, it doesn't mean it is.

  "A lie doesn't become truth, wrong doesn't become right, and evil doesn't become good, just because it's accepted by a majority."

   

  Knowing the cost of religion and sexual abuse upon my life and how it impacted the files in my mind, I can understand how others live this way as well.  It would be nice if we were all free thinkers and open to curiosity and wonder – but too many of us are locked behind a corrupt mind.

  I wondered if corrupt was accurate – here is one definition. "made unreliable by errors or alterations."  This is very accurate. 

  I also understand how scary it would be to know your mind is unreliable when the mind is you.  You don't want to know you are unreliable.

   

  I truly was lost when the files in my mind were discovered to be lies.  I didn't have a self standing in the wings. I was 46 years old married with 4 kids and I didn't have a clue who I was – outside of the mind's files.

   

  Yet it was the first time I was free to think and ponder and wonder and learn. 

  It was an exhilarating process to go through the files I called right – to discover the lies and see the world completely different. 

   

  I am willing to wager that there are folks on both ends of the spectrum with wrong right files.  And, they would be aghast at what they are proclaiming to be right.

   

  Mostly what I know – is that I would not have been convinced otherwise. 

  Here is a quote I love – "A man convinced against his will – is of the same opinion still " which came from the quote below.

   

  “He that complies against his will, Is of his own opinion still” from Hudibras by Samuel Butler 

  What is interesting – is that I misquoted this for years – I thought it was a MIND convinced against its will is of the same opinion still.  

   

  Any one of them works.  

   

  Knowing this and experiencing life with a closed not right mind – I don't believe we will change minds from the outside in.

  I also know the strength of some minds and the steel grip it has on them.  My voice and my convincing will fall on deaf ears. 

  "forgive them, they know not what they do" is one sentiment I can agree upon.

   

  I wrote all that to say, are you sure you are right?

  

  Another quote I love is by Dr. Jill Bolte-Taylor – "that the left brain takes the least amount of information and weaves the most plausible story."

  Here is her talk – and she has a book "My Stroke of Insight".  She explains the parts of our brain and its differences. 

   

   

  February 7, 2025

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•  "Welcome out of the cave, my friend. It's a bit colder out here, but the stars are just beautiful."  Plato

   I love how she was able to articulate the over arching energy of living in a cult for women and children.

  How she was only motivated when those she loved were mistreated.  And, how she had to learn to become  a leader for her own six year old self; as an adult.

  I know, there will be many who will try and defend the First Apostolic Lutheran Church, how it isn't 'as bad as this'. But, the outcome is the same.

  When a young child's self-worth is reduced, and they are made to feel shameful, there can be no redeeming quality to hold onto. 

  I love that more and more are speaking up and finding their own self-worth, along with understanding the lies and control system they were born into.

  And, she wasn't talking about sexual abuse… just, if you will, Religious Abuse. And that was enough for her to lose herself-worth and love.

  Without those two qualities, we see life completely different and we interact in the world in ways without setting boundaries.

  When you have nothing to protect or stand up for, there is no need for boundaries.

  (Hence we make the perfect targets for sexual abuse – we have no ownership of our bodies and minds.)

  I was 46, when I discovered that I did not know me or love me.  And I hadn't even been aware of this.  

  Does it not seem insane that you wouldn't know your own worth? Or, that you didn't love yourself?  How is it possible to be so blind, that you can't see you?

  What I know to be true, coming from whence I came, is that they bit by bit turned me away from me.  

  And, I gladly followed for acceptance and approval.

  I sold my self to be a good christian, daughter etc.  

  It totally matters where your self-worth and love comes from.

  If someone carries your love or a church your value, you are empty of it yourself.

  Even IF it is a negative value, theirs wins over no value inside of yourself.

  The reason, many of these churches and cults reduce the value of a person, is it makes them easier to control. Period.

  The power of the church, is not its teachings and spiritual beliefs etc. The true power comes from leading the unworthy and keeping them empty.

  And, most of these cults and strict religions, use their women and children to be powerful over. Keeping them without a voice and choice.

  The one two punch of many in these cults is to first lose their sense of self and then to be abused.  It is a double blind as I have read in different literature about the affects of abuse.

  And, given these two twists, it is no wonder we can't get them to act as individuals against the machine. There simply isn't a Self to be enraged, to question or have doubts etc. 

  For those who continue to feel that the First Apostolic Church is benign, you are a spoke in the wheel of the religious abuse machine.

  Many who have talked to me about their abuse, while being still in the church, do not want to talk about the church; only the abuse.  Like you can separate the two. What they fail to appreciate is how intertwined it all is.

  I just do not believe you can as easily abuse a fully aware self-loving child.

  Number one, they are not seeking approval and value.

  They own it.

  Pedophiles can sniff out the child who needs attention.

  Sadly, they get the wrong attention. Yet, negative attention is better than nothing. To be seen as something someone desires, is better than being neglected.

  Oh, this blog could go on and on.

  I will end with this, the only way we can heal ourselves after being a member of this church and being a victim of abuse, is to find your self.

  What is so damn hard, is that we have to go find ourselves, we don't know who we are or what we are looking for, and further still, that we are missing.

  The good news, is that if you don't know who you are, it means you have been controlled, and you can now find ways to become you.

  Little by little, choice by choice, question by question.

  Become the person you were born to be.

  If only these religions/churches were benign.  

  Yet, they are gutting us of our inner lights and unique selves… and leaving hollow beings easily controlled.

  When I seen this with my newly opened eyes, it was quite horrifying. No wonder most want to remain asleep under the tree; believing in the lies.

  We really can't wake anyone up, but we can speak about what our experiences are, and those who have one eye open may see or hear something that will get them to exit Plato's cave.

  "Those who are able to see beyond the shadows and lies of their culture will never be understood by the masses." Plato

   

   

  December 3, 2017

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• My Superpower!

   

   

   

  I watched Tim Ferriss on the Ted Talks this morning as I pedaled along… and the part that struck me was the question of "The Cost of Inaction."  

  Every now and again, I have doubts about my journey, whether I am on the right path for me or not. 

  And, this phrase, "The cost of inaction" is very helpful in laying aside my fears.

  There is a greater cost of doing nothing in dysfunctional homes, especially where abuse has become the norm, than the cost of making new choices.  

  What I have gained is much greater than what I have lost.

  Another part that gave me back my confidence is

  "Easy choices, hard life. Hard choices, easy life." and,

  "The hard choices — what we most fear doing, asking, saying — these are very often exactly what we most need to do. And the biggest challenges and problems we face will never be solved with comfortable conversations, whether it's in your own head or with other people."

  "So I encourage you to ask yourselves: Where in your lives right now might defining your fears be more important than defining your goals? Keeping in mind all the while, the words of Seneca: "We suffer more often in imagination than in reality."

  I totally agree.

  And, one more that is true in my experience.

  "So around 300 BC in Athens, someone named Zeno of Citium taught many lectures walking around a painted porch, a "stoa." That later became "stoicism." And in the Greco-Roman world, people used stoicism as a comprehensive system for doing many, many things. But for our purposes, chief among them was training yourself to separate what you can control from what you cannot control,and then doing exercises to focus exclusively on the former. This decreases emotional reactivity,which can be a superpower." 

  This has brought me much peace – "training yourself to separate what you can control from what you cannot control."

  Working on what I can control has brought inner tranquility and self-empowerment and kindness.  

  I have given others back that which they control and only held what is mine to change.

  Each time I stumble or halt along my way, when I direct myself back to that which is within my power to control, I am calm. 

  Even when the choices are hard, I know that they will truly lead to a much easier, more authentic life.

  I love that I am living the life of a stoic, which is my superpower. 

   

   

   

   

   

  November 26, 2017

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