Treat Yourself With Love & Mercy
Wayne Muller, a graduate of the Harvard Divinity School and therapist, accentuates the need to be gentle with ourselves in order to effect healing:
“Mercy is a quality of mind that lovingly accepts ourselves as we are, without judgment or violence. With a merciful heart, we are able to accept our successes and failures, our gifts and imperfections with love and compassion. We can touch our most tender places with kindness, gentleness, and nonviolence. With eyes of mercy, we are free to explore the sadness, the clumsiness, the joy, the playfulness, the confusion, the tightness, the hunger, the laughter, and to touch it all with unconditional love.
“The more we meet ourselves with love instead of violence and judgment, the more available and open we are to being seen, being known, and being intimately cared for by ourselves and others … Before we can heal, before we can learn to love, we must first stop the war within ourselves.”
– Wayne Muller, Legacy of the Heart: The Spiritual Advantages of a Painful Childhood, p. 66
When at war with ourselves, when we judge ourselves harshly and create an inner environment where any kind of healing or recovery is difficult, if not impossible.
Once out of a situation where our thoughts, behaviors and access to information are controlled, there are many things we have to do to regain equilibrium – to take back control – to make our way in a world where we no longer have to hide, fear, and obey.
First we have to make sure we and any family exiting with us are safe. We may have to find a new place to live. We may need to make a concerted effort to educate ourselves. We have to create a new social community. Therefore, demonstrating love and mercy to ourselves may not even appear on our new “To Do” list. It should, however, be at the top of that list.
Once on the list, how exactly does one demonstrate mercy and unconditional love toward one’s self, you may ask.
Ways to demonstrate unconditional love toward one’s self:
- Take care of basic needs for nourishment, rest, exercise, hydration, and human connection.
- Make time for moments of stillness, silence – presence to life as it unfolds around us.
- Be gentle and patient with yourself as you work to reclaim, rebuild, and reorganize your life
- Love and kindness to yourself and others actually changes your body chemistry.
- Reconnect with basic, ordinary things that bring you pleasure.
- Find self-help materials that inspire, encourage and affirm your choices.
- Monitor your self-talk and stop any harsh, self-condemning thinking.
- When you catch yourself thinking unkind or harsh thoughts about yourself, stop and substitute that thought with a new thought that is merciful, gentle and supportive or, at the very least, neutral. Something as simple as “All will be well” or “I refuse to discourage myself with negative thoughts” or “I’m moving ahead one step at a time and must be patient with myself ”.
- As teacher, Stephen Levine suggests “treat yourself as if you are your only child”. Be tender and merciful with yourself. Encourage yourself. Nurture yourself. Soothe yourself.
- Forgive yourself for any failings. Concentrate on what you would do differently in the future.
- Give yourself positive feedback for the effort and courage it took to leave the abusive situation.
- Make an effort to build new, supportive relationships. Reaching out and making connections is a loving act toward the self.
- Spend time in nature. Nature is always available to us. Nature is welcoming. Nature does not judge. Nature does not turn its back on us. Nature’s offerings can be counted on to sooth the weary soul.
A Hierarchy of Needs
The goal, now free of coercive controls, is to make sure you are getting all your human needs met. Abraham Maslow described placed the basic human needs in a pyramid—with those at the bottom requiring attention and fulfilment in order to move to higher level needs at the top.
If you don’t have (1) food, shelter, (2) a sense of safety, and (3) some sense of belonging, it will be near impossible to attend to your (4) self-esteem needs, or your (5) cognitive needs, etc. The levels are building blocks that must be in place to support the attainment of the next one. Make Maslow’s Hierarchy of Basic Needs below, your map to attending to your needs.
Has Your Biography Become Your Biology?
If you have been plagued by physical illnesses since exiting a coercive environment you might benefit by checking out a book by science journalist and writer, Donna Jackson Nakazawa. The book is, “Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal“.
This book is particularly significant for people raised in a cult environment as it demonstrates the link between adverse childhood experiences and chronic childhood stress to illness throughout the lifespan. She says, “… your biography becomes your biology … “
The Amazon description adds, “When we as children encounter sudden or chronic adversity, excessive stress hormones cause powerful changes in the body, altering our body chemistry. The developing immune system and brain react to this chemical barrage by permanently resetting our stress response to “high”, which in turn can have a devastating impact on our mental and physical health.“
With frequent anecdotal reports of illnesses such as chronic fatigue, irritable bowel syndrome, back pain, fibromyalgia, migraines, etc. among former high-control group members, help is desperately needed. Childhood Disrupted not only provides the scientific research showing how a childhood filled with stress and adversity can produce measurable changes in our brain, nervous system, cells and immune system, but also points to easily accessible remedies that can reboot our brains and immune systems after such undue influence and stress. A resource worth exploring.
Inspired by Nakazawa’s book, I read her previous book, “The Last Best Cure: My Quest to Awaken the Healing Parts of My Brain and Get Back My Body, My Joy, and My Life.” In it Nakazawa outlines her personal quest (in concert with a doctor of integrative medicine) to heal a body ravaged by multiple autoimmune diseases. She describes her stress-filled childhood, the physical issues experienced as an adult, and her year long journey embracing simple, healing modalities, and the encouraging results obtained.
