Self-Awareness Shines Light On Motivations For Behavior
`There is no cure and no improving of the world that does not begin with the individual. Unconscious contents (memories or beliefs) are the cause of blinding illusions which falsify ourselves and our relations with our fellow men, making both unreal.” - Carl Jung
Dear Jennifer: You suggested we should tell our schools what is important.
After many years as an educator, I have had the time to evaluate what education really is. I have concluded that it is two things: what is important and what is beautiful.
We should each ask ourselves, what is important to me? I started writing things down. I began to wonder how and from whom I learned these things.
The common thread among all these people (men I had worked with in construction, teachers, coaches) was they loved their fellow man. Whenever I get a chance, I tell my school district to seek out these kinds of people and the “curriculum” will take care of itself. - Love, Glen
Dear Glen: Let’s challenge all our readers
to make their own list. What is important? What should we be teaching? I wish I could have printed the stories of the men you listed who worked hard and cared about those they worked with.
Recently I was in Spokane and I asked the question. Many said that “just being civil” was important.
They didn’t understand why people tolerated the rudeness and unfairness of some Spokane talk radio programs. They thought it was a bad public discourse model for children.
The Kent School District is considering the question and has answered it with the development of a “zero tolerance” policy on racism. When I spoke recently to a group of California school superintendents, they added “zero tolerance for violence or harassment in any form.”
My own answer to the question was the same as that of Carl Jung, a psychiatrist whose comments head this column.
Jung believed that consciousness was crucial to morality. Most people are unaware of what they are doing, whether it is truly moral or not or why they are doing it. He called it our “shadow side.”
People feel truly “right” about killing, stealing, lying, slandering and hurting others because they do not have selfknowledge. The more conscious you are of your own motivations, the harder it is to sustain beliefs that allow you to hurt other living things. - Jennifer
Dear Jennifer: I want to thank you for the
improvements your advice has made in my life. Since discovering your column, I personally have depleted my bookstore’s supply of “Women and the Blues,” giving every friend I have a copy.
I have a question for you about forgiveness.
I am a graduate student married to a warm, loving, kind man. Everything should be perfect, but I can’t seem to let go of past hurts. I have flashbacks involving the violence and rage in my childhood. I retreated as a child, and I am still retreating when there is conflict between myself and others.
How do people stop having flashbacks of earlier experiences? - Susan
Dear Susan: Thank you for buying my book.
Last week I received the Chinese edition. I was thrilled. That book has now been translated into eight languages.
You ask one of the most important questions any of us ever asks.
It is very hard to erase the memories and visceral responses in our mind. It is as if the emotions have become a part of each cell in our body.
With awareness, memories can be brought into the light, examined, understood and then controlled. The memories, the pain and the automatic reactions fade over time, and new responses and memories take their place.
But, in times of fear, they will return and take your breath and reason away again.
Get to know these feelings well so when one comes around, you can say, “I know you.” Get help to release the emotional content or teach yourself to go deeper and deeper so there are fewer surprises in your unconscious.
Take an assertiveness course. Decide how you want to be, even in conflict situations, and choose to be that. “I know you, but I am an adult now, not a frightened child.”
Two good books on forgiveness are “Love is Letting Go of Fear” by Gerry Jampolsky and “The Dance of Anger” by Harriet Lerner.
It is very important that you take this path to becoming your own person. I did years ago and, since you have read my book, you know how far I have come. My “demons” virtually never catch me by surprise now, and they long ago lost their power. - Jennifer
xxxx