Family - the acid test

[Thomas_Pynchon]

I believe it was Ram Das who said, "if you think you are enlightened, go spend a couple weeks with your family."

I didn't really find related threads here, but if there are some (I would have expected this to have been discussed ad nausea), please post a link (or to links outside of this site). And I should say, this is part rant, my apologies in advance for that, there are a lot of genuinely toxic emotions at play here, as would maybe be expected from any family related issues, of which I am not immune. And that's why I am writing this, I need some help with a few things, maybe it's a small issue, but in 15 years I haven't managed to get beyond many of them. Mellower perhaps, but certainly not 'free'.

I don't live in my home country, and am just planning a trip 'home' next summer. I have been doing my best to keep on good terms with everyone, but yesterday on chat with my mother, once again she has to suggest that I should be thinking about moving back 'permanently.' With all do respect, I wanted to say that her idea of what is 'good for me' denies that we dont share the same values, it puts her 'above' me, and essentially denies what is present.

I wanted to ask her (but I didn't) to maybe just write all that up a little proposal outlining what exactly she would expect me to do once I moved back 'permanently'? Aside, of course, from live with her 'rent free' and keep her company. Then, when finished writing that up, set it a light, and go f*ck yourself. Not helpful.

While at the same time, I do realize that my anger over this denies that we dont share the same values, it puts me 'above' her, and essentially denies what is present. This may in fact be the crux of the matter, certainly I am the one with the 'problem'. I don't know, this is sort of where I get confused by the whole issue.

So there are no values, there is no 'above', and there is only a present (if that). I didn't say any of these things, it just doesn't help to try and think my way out of the bad feelings I have. I did try to politely remind her of the previous visit, which was something I did not want to repeat. She didn't reply to me, over skype, and appears to have either blocked me or gone offline.

Unfortunately any sort of rationalization just never really seems to help me to break free of the bad feelings, the sadness, anger, all the mixed, frustrated, emotions that well up in response to the idea of having to spend a month or two with my mother, while occasionally meeting my siblings. I really just want to hang out and chill, enjoy the silence, have some laughs, and reconnect with everyone the best I can.

The last time I was there, two years ago, my sister smashed her wine glass on her birthday because her kids weren't behaving the way she expected them to, broke down crying, ruining the whole event; on another occasion my brother had a huge sissy fit because my mother suggested that we should bury my father's ashes (I hadn't been back for 9 years at the time, 17 years since my dad passed on); another time I had a yelling argument with my mother who then told me to pack my bags and get out of her house; another time a big whole family and relatives fiasco that I won't go into; and so on. Some quality time mixed in there, but when I went home back to where I live now, I was shaking my head in disbelief. A nice trip down misery lane.

I want to go back, but I am really seriously debating whether the cost will really be worth it. And I mean the emotional cost, the unpredictability of that, as well as some loss of time from work, travel/spending expenses, the rent that I still have to pay here, etc.

Have others found ways to over come these sort of anxiety related concerns?

[Russell]

Sounds all to familiar to me! You apply everything you have learned, and it works in a ratio of about 1 result per 10000 effort put in, then after about 5 years maybe you make some real progress somehow and feel a bit better about it all at a fundamental level, then after 10 years maybe you even make some progress in helping your parents feel a little better about things or they see real changes in you and stop worrying so much, then if you really persist you can finally let each other go and be with they being no demands or guilt about you visiting or not, with the children accepting that their parents really have already done and continue to do the best they can, and the parents being happy to let their children go and no longer needing to see them often at all.

[Thomas_Pynchon]

Well maybe it's just a myth that there is something to be gained by going through this very stressful process of reuniting with the family, when the truth of the matter is that you wouldn't give them the time of day let alone spend a month with any of them if it wasn't for the myth that we grow up believing in like Santa Clause. It's never going to be what you imagine, which is a denial of what is anyways. It is what it is, definitely the problem is with me. Oh but there is no me, and there is no them. So what is the problem?

[Ayu]

....
Have others found ways to over come these sort of anxiety related concerns?

The relation to the own family, especially to the mother, is something essential for ones own life. Everybody has to work on this - and I think it is a rewarding task to do so. The myth of a family in a idyllic world is something that makes us sick, because we can not work with the things as they are then.
For this work I found some meditation techniques helpfull: metta-meditation, or tonglen, or demon-feeding (Tsultrim Allione). First of all it was astonishing to realize that - if there is any victim at all - they all are victims of the circumstances of their life. There was no ill will intended. Everybody is a prisoner of his own mind and perception.

My oldest son is 27 now. He broke off all contact to me for six years. On the surface it was because he suffered from depression. But I had much time to think about the reasons. It took me four years to understand it all. After six years he called me on the phone and told me everything - then I knew the reasons already.
So, this story has two sides: my son will never have the faintest idea what he means to me and what it means to take care of a child. But on the other hand he HAS to cut the cord for to become autonomous. This answers the purpose to become adult. The baby is gone. That's natural.

There are more aspects I'd like to mention, but I have to stopp just now. Maybe later.

[oushi]

Try to be as honest as possible, until you are able to be totally honest. I assume that your honesty will not be accepted, or welcomed, and that's what you are afraid of.
Be honest and ask for the same. There is nothing to gain from pretending that you are someone else then you really are.

[Russell]

....
Have others found ways to over come these sort of anxiety related concerns?

The relation to the own family, especially to the mother, is something essential for ones own life. Everybody has to work on this - and I think it is a rewarding task to do so. The myth of a family in a idyllic world is something that makes us sick, because we can not work with the things as they are then.
For this work I found some meditation techniques helpfull: metta-meditation, or tonglen, or demon-feeding (Tsultrim Allione). First of all it was astonishing to realize that - if there is any victim at all - they all are victims of the circumstances of their life. There was no ill will intended. Everybody is a prisoner of his own mind and perception.

My oldest son is 27 now. He broke off all contact to me for six years. On the surface it was because he suffered from depression. But I had much time to think about the reasons. It took me four years to understand it all. After six years he called me on the phone and told me everything - then I knew the reasons already.
So, this story has two sides: my son will never have the faintest idea what he means to me and what it means to take care of a child. But on the other hand he HAS to cut the cord for to become autonomous. This answers the purpose to become adult. The baby is gone. That's natural.

There are more aspects I'd like to mention, but I have to stopp just now. Maybe later.

Perfect.

[Russell]

Well maybe it's just a myth that there is something to be gained by going through this very stressful process of reuniting with the family, when the truth of the matter is that you wouldn't give them the time of day let alone spend a month with any of them if it wasn't for the myth that we grow up believing in like Santa Clause. It's never going to be what you imagine, which is a denial of what is anyways. It is what it is, definitely the problem is with me. Oh but there is no me, and there is no them. So what is the problem?

No maybes about it, reuniting with the family is in the crucial sense the exact opposite of what is needed. The goal of mother and son, is the same, for the mother to bring up a healthy happy independent adult, and for the son to be that. So reuniting is where you have come from (mother and child being one), and the challenge for both is to somehow transition from that, but biology and the needs of the psyche are strongly on our side with this, yet it takes a lot of something from us to align with this (I'm not sure how much effort is needed but it sure takes a lot of wisdom and courageous choices that may feel like a lot of hard work).

[Thomas_Pynchon]

....
Have others found ways to over come these sort of anxiety related concerns?

The relation to the own family, especially to the mother, is something essential for ones own life. Everybody has to work on this - and I think it is a rewarding task to do so. The myth of a family in a idyllic world is something that makes us sick, because we can not work with the things as they are then.
For this work I found some meditation techniques helpfull: metta-meditation, or tonglen, or demon-feeding (Tsultrim Allione). First of all it was astonishing to realize that - if there is any victim at all - they all are victims of the circumstances of their life. There was no ill will intended. Everybody is a prisoner of his own mind and perception.

My oldest son is 27 now. He broke off all contact to me for six years. On the surface it was because he suffered from depression. But I had much time to think about the reasons. It took me four years to understand it all. After six years he called me on the phone and told me everything - then I knew the reasons already.
So, this story has two sides: my son will never have the faintest idea what he means to me and what it means to take care of a child. But on the other hand he HAS to cut the cord for to become autonomous. This answers the purpose to become adult. The baby is gone. That's natural.

There are more aspects I'd like to mention, but I have to stopp just now. Maybe later.

Thank you, yes those are very good points. I reflect on that idea sometimes of 'have I really left the nest', perhaps I have not gained the kind of independence that would normally be expected of someone my age. I haven't lived at home for the last 15 years, but yes I see how there is often a clear conflict of expectations and values from my M and what often seems like an imposition on my choice of life style, coupled with a seeming inability to entertain alternative perspectives. But I may be beginning to see through my own fabricated point of view (thanks to Oushi for that!), and all the vested neurotic anxiety laden worries that that story entails.

I suppose even what motivated this thread was my own 'blindness' to how this point of view is exactly what keeps me where I am now. Divided. Between the emotional content of a past/present story/identity, and the love which 'i' can't seem to find, or that 'i' am still searching for. Feels like a kind of frustrated love. I don't know, can't figure this out right now.

Strangely though I felt very peaceful today, a kind of equanimity that I haven't felt since the last time I entered 3rd Jhana. I think just talking/writing about these things is enormously helpful, and I am very grateful for all of those reply's.

[Thomas_Pynchon]

Try to be as honest as possible, until you are able to be totally honest. I assume that your honesty will not be accepted, or welcomed, and that's what you are afraid of.
Be honest and ask for the same. There is nothing to gain from pretending that you are someone else then you really are.

Yes that's right, fear and anger are arising here from the appearance of indifference/trivialization to values held to be important. I'm beginning to feel a sense of this 'i' dropping away here, along with holding, and importance. This must be honesty?

That feels about right.

[Thomas_Pynchon]

No maybes about it, reuniting with the family is in the crucial sense the exact opposite of what is needed. The goal of mother and son, is the same, for the mother to bring up a healthy happy independent adult, and for the son to be that. So reuniting is where you have come from (mother and child being one), and the challenge for both is to somehow transition from that

Brilliant Soar! Thanks, I had never thought of it like that. But of course, that makes perfect sense, it's not about 're-uniting', it's about becoming whole, and re-visiting, with love, our maker (so to speak). What a gift.

[Ayu]

It is astonishing how long time a human being needs to become nearly adult.
I considered myself to be adult when I was 14 . But I really came to adulthood with 32...
It is a very, very slow process.

If there are real clashes in your familiy, I recommend warmly the technique of demon-feeding as described in the book of Tsultrim Allione "Feeding Your Demons". It is translated in several languages also.

[Thomas_Pynchon]

Thanks for that. I faced a few demons tonight, and after muddling around trying to write out my worries here, I broke down in tears and felt I needed to just write to my mother (she's 75), didn't think about it at all, anyways here it is for what it's worth, felt like a clamp released off my brain:

"-im not sure why you have not replied
-but im sorry mum, I was not feeling so good that day, and I see that you might have been upset by that
- it made me angry that you keep saying that I should 'come back permanently' because I just don't know what I would do there that is any different from what I am doing here. It strikes me as self serving and a kind of 'denial' of what is. Maybe it is hard for you to imagine that there is life beyond our home town, and a whole world and universe of possibilities out there for living and exploring, we can celebrate those possibilities, and I would be happy to share my insights and experiences, if anyone cares to ask me about them
-i love you so much, I feel myself getting older, and I worry about you, and what will come of the family when you decide to move on, and I would like to see the family become more unified, for there to be more open honest dialogue, peace, and support in our differences
-we're all going to die, so what is there to lose?
-let's live while we're still alive, and have no regrets about it"

[Ayu]

It would be good for you to discuss this with people of your family. Noone else is really able to understand.

Sientists found out that the contact with the own family is good for health - people who are able to meet relatives even for small-talk regularly don't suffer from so many deseases... Sorry, I can not document this.

I would amplify this assertion to "old friends" also. My husband and i moved to another city, so grandma, brothers, cousins and old friends are far away. If someone comes for a visit and reminds me of forgotten things by telling and laughing about old stories - it feels like a balm put on my heart. Then I realise how tense my behaviour is unconciously, when I only deal with foreign people who don't know me well.
This was the further aspect I wanted to mention.

[Thomas_Pynchon]

Yes I agree, it becomes somewhat meaningless to discuss these sort of issues on a public forum, I seem to go through phases like this every few years, and afterwards wonder 'what the hell was wrong with me!' It's another kind of 'trance' state, a becoming overly serious about life and relationships, trying to figure it out rather than living it. what happened last night has never happened quite like this before. I mentioned that it was like a clamp being released off of my mind, there was some kind of moment of surrender to my inability to understand the family mess, emotions welled up and I began to cry, at that moment I knew what I needed to do, and something let go. I had a tremendous release of energy, more like in the back of the neck, like a blockage had been released. I felt high with an incredible kundalini-like energy, I could not sleep, I still feel it now, a channel feels like it has opened in the back of my neck allowing energy to flow. I felt amazingly lucid and clear, grounded, it is similar to what I have experienced while in 3rd jhana, a state of nonperception, non reactivity, emptiness. But it's different somehow, my mother replied and apologized, we're all getting older, it was positive, but I don't think it would be wise to pursue this any further, the problem is with me to a large extent, there has to be a time of going beyond all the misery that families inflict on one another, finding peace with ourselves, our own demons, and realizing that there most likely will never be any kind of resolution to the sadness of loss, life, and all that.

[Thomas_Pynchon]

I can see how I am falling into 'old' unconscious patterns of behavior here, ways of responding that I am taking very seriously, as though they were real. And they certainly seem real! Old binding patterns that, while seeming to resurface just now and then, are in fact still largely determining much of my behavior whether I am aware of it or not. (That's the hypothesis).

Once it has passed, there is usually a sense of a cathartic release that happens, but what I am wondering, is if I can't get rid of the story all together, thus eliminating the source of the problem once and for all. But what is the problem?

Or is the source in fact the solution? Not the problem! The problem is believing that there is a problem, and not seeing that ALL the stories that we get caught up in are just illusions, things that happen which we interpret as having meaning, creating continuity around, turning them into stories, within larger stories, meta-stories, but which have nothing to do with 'reality' itself.

So is this just a case of right view? I haven't really applied this with any depth, or success, to family issues, perhaps because the emotional baggage always seems to remain. It's hard to get to the deeper levels of that emotional investment, pain, suffering, via an intellectual application of ideas. Of course, it will never work. I find that I have to go through it, feel it, experience it, as though pulling out a deep festering sliver of some sort. That seems more like a problem, because pain itself is not a story, it's just pain, held in whatever way it is, through concepts, beliefs, stories, families that remind us of those stories, society which reinforces those stories, and an imaginary 'self' which applies the consequences of those stories. The conscience! That fabrication of lies and deceit that cause no end to suffering.

I was watching Eckart Tolle last night and I suppose what I am addressing here could also be called the 'pain body'? I was also just reading from Peter Brown's book, 'Dirty Enlightenment', where seems to hit the nail on the head when he says:

We each have accumulated a complex story about what we are and what our lives are, that incorporate many assumptions and conclusions that were arrived at when we were immature and did not have the discriminative capacities to critically examine them. These assumptions may have been learned from the teaching or example of those we perceived around us, our families and immediate culture; and we accepted them as truth, and incorporated them into the edifice of our belief system, using them as the basis for further ideas about ourselves and our situation. We have tended to be seduced by the emotional investment that arises from some beliefs we may have arrived at; for example “I am separate from the universe”, “I am vulnerable and potentially in danger”, “I am needy and might not be able to get what I need”, and so on. Building on these and similar basic beliefs and their elaborations, most of us concoct an elaborate soap-opera with ourselves as the star, full of imaginary hopes and fears, dangers and rewards, energized by self-importance and heightened emotionality. Thus most of us find ourselves living in a fantasy, a dream-world, ignoring any actual experience that doesn’t fit in with our oversimplified and self referential beliefs; we are sleepwalkers. So what can we do to “wake up” from this internally consistent dream of self-importance based on fantasies? The fortunate truth is that we ALL have intimate access to Reality; in fact we have never experienced anything ELSE, and ARE nothing but Reality ourselves, inherently. So all we need to do is take stock of the actuality of out situation. The rub is that to do this, we have to be able and willing to at least partially suspend our belief in our accumulated “story”, in order to see through it, to perceive the actual facts of our experience. Once we have done this once, it can be easier to follow through with further investigation of the truth of our situation; but we ultimately need luck (good OR bad!) to motivate that first peek out from under the numbing blanket of our concepts. So generally only people who have already become somewhat disenchanted with their story have any interest in this investigation (with the exception of those many people who try to use the investigation, “being spiritual”, as an element IN their story, for status or prestige, etc.).

So I will attempt to take stock of some of the baggage I have written out above, and see what can be discovered. It feels a bit like life becoming meta-fiction (pace John Barth, Italo Calvino, my name sake Thomas Pynchon, etc), where the emotional stories we get caught up in, suddenly take a turn to reveal how they are just surfaces of some kind, playing their way out in a larger holographic-like maze of illusory narratives. The point (and not the point) being to become aware of the source, the place from where all the stories arise.

[Thomas_Pynchon]

I edited the above post but could not submit it! So here is the edited version, mostly the same:

I can see how I am falling into 'old' unconscious patterns of behavior here, ways of responding that I am taking very seriously, as though they were real. And they certainly seem real! Old binding patterns that, while seeming to resurface just now and then, are in fact still largely determining much of my behavior whether I am aware of it or not. (That's the hypothesis).

Once it has passed, there is usually a sense of a cathartic release that happens, but what I am wondering, is if I can't get rid of the story all together, thus eliminating the source of the problem once and for all. But what is the problem?

Or is the source in fact the solution? Not the problem! The problem is believing that there is a problem, and not seeing that ALL the stories that we get caught up in are just illusions, things that happen which we interpret as having meaning, with continuity, turning them into stories, within larger stories, meta-stories, but which have nothing to do with 'reality' itself.

Once we realize that overwhelming fact, we are free to get caught up in any story we like, it makes no difference then, because we see them for what they are - fabrications, inventions, 'co-creations' - nothing more, nothing less.

So is this just a case of right view? I haven't really applied this with any depth, or success, to family issues, perhaps because the emotional baggage always seems to remain. It's hard to get to the deeper levels of that emotional investment, pain, suffering, via an intellectual application of ideas. Of course, it will never work. I find that I have to go through it, feel it, experience it, as though pulling out a deep festering sliver of some sort. That seems more like a problem, because pain itself is not a story, it's just pain, held in whatever way it is, through concepts, beliefs, stories, families who remind us of those stories, society which reinforces those stories, and an imaginary 'self' which applies the consequences of those stories. The conscience! That fabrication of lies and deceit that cause no end to suffering.

And here I am 'pointing' to these things as though they were real, as though we could find them, isolate them, and finally get rid of them just like that. But what are they?

I was watching Eckart Tolle last night and I suppose what I am addressing here could also be called the 'pain body'? And I was reading from Peter Brown's book, 'Dirty Enlightenment', where he seems to really hit the nail on the head when he says:

We each have accumulated a complex story about what we are and what our lives are, that incorporate many assumptions and conclusions that were arrived at when we were immature and did not have the discriminative capacities to critically examine them. These assumptions may have been learned from the teaching or example of those we perceived around us, our families and immediate culture; and we accepted them as truth, and incorporated them into the edifice of our belief system, using them as the basis for further ideas about ourselves and our situation. We have tended to be seduced by the emotional investment that arises from some beliefs we may have arrived at; for example “I am separate from the universe”, “I am vulnerable and potentially in danger”, “I am needy and might not be able to get what I need”, and so on. Building on these and similar basic beliefs and their elaborations, most of us concoct an elaborate soap-opera with ourselves as the star, full of imaginary hopes and fears, dangers and rewards, energized by self-importance and heightened emotionality. Thus most of us find ourselves living in a fantasy, a dream-world, ignoring any actual experience that doesn’t fit in with our oversimplified and self referential beliefs; we are sleepwalkers. So what can we do to “wake up” from this internally consistent dream of self-importance based on fantasies? The fortunate truth is that we ALL have intimate access to Reality; in fact we have never experienced anything ELSE, and ARE nothing but Reality ourselves, inherently. So all we need to do is take stock of the actuality of out situation. The rub is that to do this, we have to be able and willing to at least partially suspend our belief in our accumulated “story”, in order to see through it, to perceive the actual facts of our experience. Once we have done this once, it can be easier to follow through with further investigation of the truth of our situation; but we ultimately need luck (good OR bad!) to motivate that first peek out from under the numbing blanket of our concepts. So generally only people who have already become somewhat disenchanted with their story have any interest in this investigation (with the exception of those many people who try to use the investigation, “being spiritual”, as an element IN their story, for status or prestige, etc.).

So I will attempt to take stock of some of the baggage I have written out above, and see what can be discovered. It feels a bit like life becoming meta-fiction (pace John Barth, Italo Calvino, my name sake Thomas Pynchon, etc), where the emotional stories we get caught up in, suddenly take a turn to reveal how they are just surfaces of some kind, playing their way out in a larger holographic-like maze of illusory narratives the meaning and continuity of which we create ourseves. The point (and not the point) being to become aware of the source, the place from where all the stories and meanings arise.