One of the beauties of the Pathwork is that it helps you notice the patterns that occur in your life. When a negative pattern repeats over and over, it means that there is something you need to change in your life.
We attract negative patterns to us because a part of us that is/was wounded cannot tolerate the thought of experiencing the old pain again. When we were young, that pain was intolerable, so we buried it deep in our body and deep in our psyche. But it is still there. It lives in us because we haven’t fully felt it yet. It is a prisoner of our fear of the past repeating itself.
Strange as it may seem, what we do is re-create the painful situation with others over and over again. That is the negative pattern. Why? Because that part of us that was wounded believes that if it can just go through that experience again and win this time, it will never have to fear those feelings again because it will have the solution. So this part attracts people who will help us recreate the situation. We especially do this with our significant others and people in positions of authority over us (bosses, in-laws, etc.).
You have witnessed this and probably experienced it yourself in one way or another: The woman whose father abandoned the family and who always seems to pick men who leave her. The child of an alcoholic who marries an alcoholic. The child of an abusive parent who marries an abuser. The list goes on and on.
In each of these cases, there is a frantic child inside who is trying to find a way to come out on top, to win in this painful situation. The sad part is that we can never win because the pain was not caused by the person we are interacting with now. And the pain we think is caused by this person now has nothing to do with him or her. It is the old pain that has been awakened by our re-creation.
In my own life in the past few years, I got involved with our local neighborhood group. While I didn’t see it at first, I can now look back and see that I made my boss into my father, and I tried very hard to please him, seeking an approval and praise that my father would not give. I worked 55 hours a week, accomplished many good things…and our relationship deteriorated further with every achievement. Finally, my health demanded that I give up the job. I had created a situation that was untenable for me. I couldn’t continue to work those kinds of hours, and my relationship with my boss was a mess. I felt unappreciated and betrayed. The same way I felt with my father.
I was a four-year survivor from Stage IIIc cancer, and cancer was coming back. During the next year, I stayed on the fringes of the neighborhood activities, attending meetings but not getting “involved.” Then, when chemotherapy was nearly done, I re-engaged, attending meetings more and looking seriously at the organization.
A number of residents were concerned about activities the neighborhood organization undertook. Some were merely unethical. Others violated IRS rules. Still others violated contract agreements the organization had signed. The residents asked for an accounting and were denied. Outside help was sought, and this is where the pattern began to emerge for me. A grievance was filed by another resident and sent to the city government, which responded that the organization’s actions were not what they should be but the specific action the grievance addressed was over and done with and it was a “moot point” and not worthy of dealing with. The IRS was asked about the legality of the organization’s practices vis-a-vis their status as a 501(c)(3) charitable organization. The IRS agreed that the actions were not legal under 501(c)(3) rules but that the organization was so small that it wasn’t worth IRS time and effort to deal with it. Finally, the organization filed a grievance against the city for withholding its funding because of these wrongful activities. A grievance committee was established and ultimately decided to provide the organization with its funding despite the unethical and illegal behavior of the organization leadership.
I felt so much rage over all of this! A true emotional reaction, which is the hallmark of a re-created situation. What was the re-creation? When I was a child, I was badly abused by my father. My mother didn’t know (or didn’t want to know), and my father used to threaten me if I should tell her. As a child, I lived for years in the midst of intense injustice and no one would stand up and confront the one who was acting unjustly. And here was the exact same situation: a neighborhood organization breaking the rules and treating others unjustly … and no one would stand up and hold them accountable.
During all of this, my cancer numbers began going up yet again, just a few months after chemotherapy. This time, I got the message. This negative pattern will kill me if I keep re-engaging with it. Even as I write about it here, I can feel the tension of that part of me that hates injustice, that believes with all her heart that people are supposed to act with integrity and follow the rules. But this is the real world, and sometimes people don’t do that. It is a challenging process to let it go, but that is what I am working on now: No more meetings, no more thinking about what has happened. And, to some extent, no more caring so much about the outcomes. Every time I engage with this organization, cancer comes back. There is a very strong message here. This is no longer my fight. I see and understand more fully the pain that I experienced as a child. I accept this pain as the result of my father’s actions. Those actions hurt me badly, but it is a pain that I can bear and survive. I do not need to re-create the situation to find a defense any more.
And the other side of this is that the people I have been railing against are also re-creating their own painful situations with me and the others who object to their behavior. They must carry beliefs that they are not allowed to succeed because of their race or their economic background. And so they act in ways that will bring censure to them…and then they have strong emotional reactions against those who would hold them accountable, threatening them in some cases.
And this is where the Pathwork is so helpful. See the negative pattern. Find where it is recalling something from your history. Acknowledge the painful feelings (they are the feelings you couldn’t stand to feel back then). Know they are from the past and not from the present situation, even though it seems like they are. And then do whatever you have to to let it go. Stop engaging with the group. Stop seeing them as the perpetrators. Stop seeing yourself as the victim. You have been participating in a consensual dance with them. Your soul invited them to dance, and their souls accepted. It has been a mutual co-creation so each of you can learn and grow a little more. Be grateful for the learning. And let go.
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