Maite – Mothers as manifested regret
Date : 27/08/2008
Let’s start with taking a look at what is so typical about mothers in this world. What is it they all have in common? Fears, concerns, worries – and then the way to deal with them: trying to keep control of their children and their children's lives. This is what keeps mothers busy all the time, thoughts as ‘what will happen if this…?’, ‘I hope they are fine’, ‘I must make sure that that doesn’t happen’,… They are constantly occupied with worrying about other beings and making sure that they are fine. Mothers will do anything to protect their children, even if it means deciding what their children must do, deciding how they must live their lives, etc.
Mothers always live in service of others, they have become the servants and slaves of their children. Why?
And what are mothers the manifestation of in this world – what of which exist in each one of us do mothers represent?
I will share with you what I have realized for myself, about myself.
Throughout my life up until now I have gone through several experiences/situations that were quite messy. I would play a ‘major’ role in these situations, where I was a central person to call it like that. Or to put it differently, if I hadn’t been there, the messy situation might not have occurred. There were always several beings involved that all ended up hurt in some way or another.
I’m mostly referring to two situations that were actually very similar, which involved love, the most painful thing I’ve encountered so far. In both these situations I could’ve prevented a fuck up from happening, but I allowed curiosity, desires and hope to direct me instead. And so, two times it ended up in a very messed up way where everyone got hurt.
In seeing these situations play out and in seeing how everyone, including myself was fucked up afterwards, regret, shame and guilt compounded within myself – because I knew, I could have stopped this, but I didn’t. Waah, many reactions still, I’m definitely not through with self-forgiveness on these past events – lol.
I held myself responsible for everyone that got involved and everyone that got hurt and I saw it as my obligation to make sure that they would be fine again to so ‚pay my dues‘. The situation in itself was fucked, but I believed I still could fix the beings that were involved and I believed I had to, because I believed I ‚broke them‘. So, that’s what I ‘promised’ myself I would do, make sure everyone got okay again, and as long as they weren’t, I wouldn’t be either. See, actually, I wanted for them to feel all right again, because their hurt reminded me of what I had done that I could’ve prevented and so, I wanted desperately for them to be fine and tell me they’re okay, so that I could suppress the regret, shame, guilt and sorrow within myself to not have to deal with it directly, instead I would try to ‚fix things‘ and hide within it – because regret, shame, guilt and sorrow is absolutely not cool to experience and it lasted for yeaaaaars.
Those were absolutely the most painful experiences that I’ve had and the most tiring as well. What I actually did is enslave myself to others, to pay my debt, and as long as they didn’t say the magic words of ‘It’s okay, I’m fine’, I had to continue paying my debt.
Not cool, not cool at all.
Now, to prevent this from happening again, I turned into a mother, from the perspective that I constantly wanted to make sure that others in my environment are okay. If not, problem, I must fix them. I would observe my environment all the time and wherever someone is experiencing frictions or whatever, I would try to find out why and try to get the cause of the frictions away for them. Actually, every time someone is feeling sad, depressed or hurt or whatever, I immediately feel the same emotions within myself coming up again. So, I immediately want to comfort and help this being, because as long as this being is experiencing what he/she is experiencing, I experience the shit within myself that I had suppressed within me, again – because in some strange way I believed I'm the cause of this being's experience and then the fear comes up that I did something wrong. Interesting, I within this actually didn’t care for the being that is sad/hurt/depressed/etc at all, I just acted in a way for me to feel okay again within myself by suppressing what came up within me everytime.
The suffering of others brings out the suffering that exist in me and I do not want to experience this. And so I tried to take responsibility for others, help them to deal with their shit, instead of me taking and living self-responsibility and deal with my own shit – trying to fix myself through others.
It didn’t stop just with fixing others, I would go a step further, I would do my best to prevent beings from feeling ‘bad’. I would observe my environment and wherever the possibility exist that someone might get hurt or whatever, I must stop that possibility from existing no matter what, which automatically implies self-compromise. So, I would already think ahead and do what I could to prevent storms of emotions and feelings within and between people from happening. I had to protect everyone from the storm of feelings and emotions that is actually themselves. But my intentions, as I said, was not really to protect others, it was to protect myself. Trying to protect myself from the storm that exist in me, that is me. What a joke. As I am writing this I am seeing what I did for the first time. That I actually went through all this trouble to hide from myself, believing that that is possible, crazy!
Apart from what I just described, what I also did, was to fear making mistakes that I would regret making, especially if my mistake could affect other beings. I extensively feared to again create a fuck up within myself and others, out of fear of having to go through the same experiences of regret, shame, guilt and sorrow. So, I would only do what is ‘safe’ for me to do, meaning, only do that which I could predict the outcome of, which is trying to keep control – by controlling myself, my actions, my expressions of me. If I didn’t know exactly what the outcome would be, I would expect the worst and not go there, no risks, no chances. Everything must be nice all the time, everything must be happy and peaceful all the time. Hush hush, don’t make me hear myself.
So, to come back to my initial questions: What are mothers the manifestation of in this world? Regret.
What of which exist in each one of us do mothers represent? How we allow regret to direct us, where we end up living for other beings, taking responsibility for them, instead of first living self-responsibility.
The mothers in this world show us a part that exist in all of us, that is why they exist as they do.
Interestingly, what my perception of how, who and what mothers are in this world was not of people who desperately try to hide. I perceived them to get quite a lot of respect. Like: Mothers are always here for us, we can always count on them, ‚oh mother, I am so grateful for you, I love you so much‘.
I always perceived myself to want to be a mother, because I believed they are so respected and trusted and thanked and loved. So, what does this say about me? That I do not respect myself, that I do not trust myself, that I am not grateful for myself, that I do not love myself, because apparently I need others to do that for me. Why do I not respect myself, why do I not trust myself, why am I not grateful for myself, why do I not love myself? Because of regret, because I know who and what I have allowed myself to do, be and become – and I did not change, but allowed myself to continue as is – not stopping when I know I should have.
I have to take a look at this perception of a mother I have at the moment. Why do I perceive mothers to get respect? Where does my perception that mothers receive respect come from?
I actually didn't have a straight look at the mothers as how they are in this world, when I perceived mothers to be respected and loved, I looked at the ‚symbol‘ of the mother, the way they are portrayed in paintings and in religion – where mothers sometimes are seen as some kind of saints, like mother Mary for instance.
I must have a look at my relationship with my mom here. Okay, me and my mom. The last couple of years, me and my mom started developping a ‚good relationship‘ as how I perceived it to be. Interestingly, three of my best friends had a very good relationship with their mother as well – in the sense that they would dare to confide in them, had fun with them as with a friend – what obviously supported how I perceived my mom to be. I saw my mom as a ‚good thing‘ in my life, someone who would support what I wanted to do, someone I could talk to. We could have arguments, but in the end she would always be there for me. Okay, I see something here. I just asked myself the question, was she really always here for me, was she really supporting me? I said to myself „yes, like when I said for instance that I wanted to go to a school to become a professional dancer and not go to university – what she had always expected from me. At first she made the statement that that's absolutely not an option, but after a while, she did support me and allowed me to do what I wanted.“ But see, what happened was that I merely convinced her to support me, I made it happen that she'd support me. How? Manipulation – these skills you develop as a child, which you use against your parents so you can get what you want. You know, another example is for instance when I'd go shopping with her and we agreed to only get one pair of shoes. I always ended up liking two pairs and would then know exactly what words to say, how to look at the shoes, how to hold my face and my body, for her to eventually say „okay, well, just take ‚em both then.“ And then I would go „really? are you sure?“ And she „yes, just take them.“ And then me again „oh, thank you mommy, kiss.“ Lol, I‘m shattering the perception about my relationship with my mom of me loving and respecting her and she supporting me within myself, it's fun. Because, what happened in these situations? My mom ‚supported‘ what I wanted, because of fear, because she feared that I would be angry with her if she wouldn't give me what I wanted – and then I wouldn't respect her, love her, thank her or trust her anymore. So, she gave me what I wanted and then I gave her what she wanted: the feeling of being respected and loved and thanked and trusted.
Fascinating, children know exactly what their mother's greatest fear and greatest desire is and use it all the time to get what they want. This entire perception of what my relationship with my mom consisted of, was fake. What we were actually doing was give the other what the other wanted, so that we could both get what we wanted. Have a look, the support from a mother to her child is not the mother actually supporting the child, it is the mother making sure that she will get what she wants and desires, as respect and love and gratefulness and trust. And in the same way, the respect, love, gratefulness and trust the child gives the mother, is to get what the child wants. So, then the question is, is this really respect? Is this really love? Is this really gratefulness? Is this really trust? It is not, it cannot be, it is merely a presentation/ perception of respect, love, gratefulness and trust – it is empty words as a way to manipulate of which the child knows that it will create within their mother the perception and the feeling of being respected, loved, thanked and trusted – but it is not actually so.
And the entire symbolism of mothers as being sacred beings is supporting all of this, is supporting this cover-up – so we can continue what we're doing.
It worked well with me, I never considered really taking a look at this, because… Why? Because I didn't want to see it. It's not that I couldn't conceive this to be possible, because I knew it all along, I just wrote it all out, it was here all the time. So, why didn't I want to see this? Firstly because I wanted my perception of mothers to be real, because I was planning and on my way to becoming a mother myself as a way of hiding behind the respect, love, gratefulness and trust of others. Secondly, because I know that manipulation is self-dishonesty, but because I as a child didn't know how else to operate/ act to get my mother to ‚support me‘ / give me what I want that I couldn't get by myself but for which I needed her in some way (because mothers as a parent have in this world the authority to make decisions for their children that the children are not allowed to make for themselves, for which they require the permission from their parents) – I covered everything up by creating the idea within myself that I love my mother, that my mother loves me, that my mother respects me and supports me, that I respect my mother – to have me feel okay within myself for manipulating my mother all the time.
I forgive myself that I haven't accepted and allowed myself to see what the relationship of me and my mother actually consisted of.
I forgive myself that I haven't accepted and allowed myself to see, because I did not want to see.
I forgive myself that I haven't accepted and allowed myself to see/ want to see, because I wanted to hold onto the perception that I had of my mohter, because I was planning and on my way to becoming a mother myself as a way of hiding behind the respect, love, gratefulness and trust of others.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear to see that becoming a mother is not going to fill any gaps, because mothers aren't really respected, loved, thanked or trusted at all.
I forgive myself that I haven't accepted and allowed myself to see/ want to see, because I didn't want to see how I was self-dishonest in manipulating my mother.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge dishonesty as ‚wrong‘ and ‚bad‘.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge manipulation as being ‚bad‘ and ‚wrong‘. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge myself as having manipulated my mother and father my entire life as being ‚bad‘ and ‚wrong‘.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I am a bad person if I do not love, respect and thank my parents for real and only create a perception of love, respect and gratitude to get what I want.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to within manipulation, have a secret agenda.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that children are supposed to actually love, respect and be grateful for their parents and if not, they are bad children.
I forgve myself that I have accepted and allowed this belief to exist within and as me.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I was and am a bad child/ daughterbecause I never really loved, respected or thanked my parents, I only created a perception thereof to manipulate my parents.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to want to believe that I actually loved my mother, to cover up the fact that I was manipulating her all the time, to make me feel okay with it within myself.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be ashamed for never having actually loved, respected or thanked my parents, because what I actually did was manipulate them by giving them what they want so that I could get what i want.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that there is something ‚wrong‘ with me because i have never actually loved, respected or thanked my parents.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to participate in ‚right‘ and ‚wrong‘ as a polarity ofmind.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that ‚right‘ and ‚wrong‘ actually exist.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to participate in ‚good‘ and ‚bad‘ as a polarity of mind.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that ‚good‘ and ‚bad‘ actually exist.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to define myself as a ‚good daughter‘ as a daughter who loves, respects and thanks her parents.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to define my self-worth and self-value within and as my self-definition and self-image of being a ‚good daughter‘ as a daughter who loves, respects and thanks her parents.I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that in order for me to be valuable, to be worthy, I must love, respect and thank my parents.
I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I am now worthless and valueless because I never actually did love, respect or thank my parents.
Okay, back to where I left off before I started about my perception of mothers in this world.
Let’s recapitulate. All that I have described, started with regret. Once you experienced regret, you try to find ways to not have to experience it again. So, you firstly suppress the regret that you have experienced and then you live in constant fear of experiencing regret again and this is what is controlling and directing us in every single moment. So, one thing is, we fear making mistakes and creating fuck ups that will manifest regret and another thing is, we fear the regret that is already here within us that we have suppressed, to come up again. And so we limit ourselves and our expression constantly, firstly because we must not take any risks, we must not step out of the predictable to not create any fuck ups, secondly, because we may not create any havoc in our environment that might ignite the havoc that we have suppressed within ourselves.
So, in one word, how did we design ourselves to deal with regret? Control. Control of our environment and our expression of ourselves. And to keep control in every single moment is tiring, very tiring.
And why? To not face regret, but hide and suppress. To not face ourselves. And we do not respect ourselves, we do not trust ourselves, we are not grateful for ourselves and we do not love ourselves. We go and fill these gaps by looking for the respect, trust, gratefulness and love of others and through others – so that we can continue hiding from ourselves within that, to just not have to face regret, to just not have to face ourselves. Every single day we do all the possible we can to be able to continue hiding from ourselves. That is how we live, that is why we do the things we do, to hide from who we are. Is this living? Fucking hell, no. Are we really willing to continue living like this?
Are we really willing to put ourselves through all this trouble to hide? We can continue living our life this way, trying to keep control and trying to keep everything in place to be able to hide from who we are and what we have allowed – and we will die doing this.
But then we’ll have to face all of ourselves after death anyways. And I must say, the regret to not have stopped here is something I do not wish to experience. Remember, all that we accept and allow to exist within ourselves is what creates this world. I cannot imagine standing before this world, having to answer the question: „Why did you not stop?“
I suggest we stop running from ourselves.
I suggest we drop our attempts to remain in control of our environment and our expression.
And no, what we will face then is not pretty, it is not beautiful, but it is us.
It is unacceptable to try to help others and make sure others are okay, when we do not dare to take responsibility for ourselves first. And to take responsibility for yourself, you must dare to see you, you must dare to face you.
Look at us, we allowed it to come this far that we are afraid of ourselves, petrified of ourselves.
I suggest we face all of us here and see the truth of us. We know we cannot change our past, we cannot change what we have done. But we can forgive ourselves, and so release ourselves from the grip our past has on us and not continue living the exact same experiences over and over again. We can take back the power we gave away to who we were in the past, we can take back the power we gave away to regret, shame, guilt and sorrow. What we have become and what we have done has already created our future, we cannot change that, but we can change ourselves within it. We can decide who we will be within that which we have already created and thus our experiences as well, as we walk through and face ourselves.
I dare you to see – who are you?