what is happening behind the words ? when I feel bad about myself ?

I asked myself the question: when I feel bad about myself, when I beat myself up and regret things, what is really happening ?

I came up with the following thoughts.

Words are just words.

They are symbols on a screen, on paper.

Or they are sounds.

The symbols on paper or the sounds by themselves have no real power.

Once the symbols or the sounds become meaning then they affect me, which is what I call "having power".

What the meaning is depends on the context.

The words "I love you" read on a bumper sticker on the car in front of me in heavy traffic will mean nothing compared to hearing them from a Lady I have admired from afar for years. ;-)

Whatever it is that words as sounds or symbols do to a person they do it on a NON verbal, no word level. They do it on the level of meaning, of feelings.  In the end, the words themselves are just sounds and symbols.

If you speak more than one language you will understand this even more easily: much the same meaning can be told to you in different languages, the languages is just the wrapping for the meaning.

Like chocolates in a box, the box and the wrapping may differ, but the real essence is the chocolate, regardless of the wrapping. Unless you like eating the wrapping of course. :-P

Back to my original question:

"when I feel bad about myself, when I beat myself up and regret things, what is really happening ?"

I don't have a final answer but I have some further thoughts:

When I beat myself up, - I am feeling things. bad feelings. Unpleasant feelings.

Those bad feelings eat away my confidence like acid eating away metal.

 More than that alone, I have a bad intent at myself. ....

 Hmmmm............

this is as far as I have got.....

I wonder: what happens when I worry ? I must be putting 'bad energy' into myself ?

What is 'bad energy' really ? bad feelings ? Yes, but what is it really ? 

I don't know, this is as far as I have got....

Hopefully I can update this one day.... .



I have only looked at words an their effect from the mind perspective, i.e. words that were processed consciously, by the mind of the listener.


There is another way that words work, without going through the mind. That way is pure energy which is aimed at the feeling center of the person. 
Have you ever met someone who uses nice sweet words but really has a totally different intent ?
In that case the nice words are wrapping for an energy that has nothing to do with the meaning of the words. The meaning distracts the listener, it goes to the mind.
"I love you", said with the intent and feeling of 'I hate you' will confuse the listener.
Modern people will listen with the mind and take in the meaning of 'I love you'.
They will not notice immediately that the feeling BEHIND the words is totally different.
Intuitive people will feel and see the intent behind the words and see the reality.
An intuitive person will have trouble explaining to a person who uses only their mind that the intent and the meaning are different.

courage and weight - "you can do anything you like, as long as you pay the price" really ???

I read the phrase "...it takes a lot of courage to hold that weight..."

suddenly  I understood: courage is what is required to hold the weight of responsibility in life. I never really saw that before.

Now I understand why the weight of things to deal with, things to do, things to face, things to accept require courage.

I used to believe that weight was a bad thing and a sign of something being wrong.

I wonder can this be expanded further to include this idea:

"Wrong' as such is a GREAT heavy weight. It is a weight that might crush us. Hence not doing 'wrong' is not for some arbitrary reason, but it is another way of saying: if you do this thing it will be so so so heavy on you, that it may crush you. Therefore we call this thing 'wrong' because it is wrong for you, wrong for the other.

hm.... that is a new perspective indeed.

I used to say to myself and others: "you can do anything you like, as long as you pay the price". Now I see that there are things that we can 'do' that we can never pay the price for, they would crush us.  No, they would not physicallly crush us, but spiritually, psychologically...and I guess that will come to a physical end eventually.

What are those things ?  The big ones are obvious.

But it is the subtle ones that matter most.

The things that i can feel intuitively as "this will cost you dearly" - they may not be 'wrong' in the big obvious sense, but they are 'wrong' for me, in the sense that their price, cost, weight would be VERY heavy.

hm....

I like this perspective. It brings it home to a meaningful yardstick, instead of some arbitrary bureaucratic rule, thought out by someone behind a desk trying to cover his a*** .

---(O)---

There is another part to this of course: the weight I break off from life to carry is the thing I bring with me as my 'learning' and as my 'contribution' to life. It is what I contribute to the leaning-ness of mankind, and my own knowledge. Knowledge not of the mind but the knowledge of experience and wisdom.

If I never carry any weight I do not bring 'home' anything.

The art is to break off the right amount of weight, not too much, not too little.

Sure, it is possible to break off a HUGE chunck and get buried by it for lifetimes.

Or it is possible to break off tiny tiny nibbles and take forever to fill a meaningful amount of wisdom and learning.

Somewhere there is a middle path. I guess I'm best off if I  carry what I can carry  with a bit of effort in a good backpack. Any more and I slow down too much, any less and I waste my 'trip' i.e. my trip into physical life. ...

I've always thought that since weight in great doses is crushing and 'wrong' then ALL weight is bad.  So in my life I avoided the weight of responsibility.

But the truth is that it is like medicine: a little cures, a lot kills. This is true of most medicines, esp heart medicines used by modern doctors.

It is the quantity that decides if something is a poison or a cure, it is the quantity that decides if something is a learning for wisdom or a rock that crushes....

---(O)---

Since we are all connected, we can break off weights for self, but also for others.

And what if we break off too much weight ? this is bound to happen sooner or later. We are here to learn, how  will we learn if we don't go too far ? or too little ?

We are not alone.

Help is there, but I need to ask... (I tend to forget that part)...

And then there is group learning.... another topic... 

Gitta Malasz in the book "talking with Angels" writes how the angels see weight as a positive thing. It is the raw material that we transform and bring to the table of life .... something like that anyway....

So the art lies in getting the 'amount' right... :-) hm....

hmm.... this is my understanding at THIS time of the mystery of being alive on this planet....

how people control other people -

A follow on thought on the writings of a previous blog here   xylantheum.blogspot.com/2010/02/nameless-fear-boogey-man-is-alive-and.html

People control other people by  somehow getting that nameless horror, that nameless fear attached to their authority. 

They are in effect saying: "disobey me and .........{ nameless horror of fear here }    .... will happen to you. 

It is in effect a variation of the "do as I tell you or the boogey man will get you", which is has been used on many children by their parents. 

Of course as adults, we dress it up a bit more, but in the end all power and force boils down to: "Do this or else.... " The "or else ...." part is more frightening and powerful if it is NOT explained in great detail, if it can latch into that nameless fear cloud (as per previous blog)

From the outside all that one sees is one human being, yielding power over another. The controlling human may be tiny and small and physically no match for the one being controlled. But they have the authority. 

Taking one extreme viewpoint: This kind of control violates the being of the people is controls, it is a force approach.

An authority that controls others through fear like this, has special powers over its subjects.  What they tend to forget is that this kind of control breeds hatred and revolt and rebellion. 

This approach also has  a fatal weakness ( :-) )... can you guess what it is ? 

Answer: The fatal weakness is this: once a person works out how this control through fear works, they see that the control is INSIDE them, and they can remove that control from within themselves and be free of it !

Example: for years I felt fearful and guilty  about a certain issue. Religious authorities had their control claws into me well and truly. 

Then eventually I tossed out that fear. I saw it for what it was: a paper tiger. 

"Ah master, would you say that this is the reason such things are allowed to exist ?"

"What things do you mean Grasshopper ?" 

"Control through fear"

"I don't know why things are allowed to exist or not. But I do see that there is a lesson in this for us."

"You mean the lesson of recognizing how we are being controlled through fear ?" 

"Yes, exactly, it is a realization and consciousness change that releases you from that control through fear. And that to me seems like something that life would want us to learn."

 -------- off cuts and other stuff below ----------

As a small kid, I was totally afraid of my parents. 

Parents were all powerful. 

I suspect that some of that fear lodged as part of the nameless cloud of fear discussed in blog xylantheum.blogspot.com/2010/02/nameless-fear-boogey-man-is-alive-and.html

nameless fear - the boogey man is alive and well hidden....

there is a thing,

it is nameless and shapeless
and cannot be seen

It has no smell and not colour
and yet it exists.
It has not mouth,
no words
no sound it makes
and yet everyone listens to it.

what is it ?

Let me give you a clue:

I have a report to write, don't interrupt me. It's GOT to be finished by close of
biz today....

I've GOT  to get to this meeting on time ....

I've GOT to get that house and investment purchase....

I've GOT to make Mary think I'm......

If s/he leaves me I'll be.....   I have to do everything to prevent prevent that, no price is too high to prevent that... I'll bend myself double and turn myself inside out to prevent that... arggahhha.............

All those things above have one thing in common: FEAR. 
Nameless fear. A fear that I'll do ANYTHING (well almost) to stop it happening. 

It works like this: Some scenario pops into one's head:
"if he/she leave me then.... "
"if I don't get the promotion then.... "
the effect of what will happen is not put into clear words  but the feeling and the unspoken implication is that I can't cope, it would be the end of world for me.
It remains a nameless horror.
And that is where it's strength is, in being nameless.
Because as long as it is nameless it is HUGE and all engulfing and all Encompassing. I'll feel like (not that I will) pay ANY price to prevent it.
AT this point it is still not articulated. It is still nameless.

but as soon as I put that horror into words it sounds ridiculous and silly.
Then the conscious mind steps in and says:
"What I was afraid of THAT ? ha ha ha !"

But in reality it was the FEELING that is the active component.
putting it into words helps to get a grip.
But behind the words was a feeling.
If I do not deal with the feeling as a feeling then the cloud of fear will simply attach itself to something else.
Then I can again put it into words and again gain a degree of control.
But the nameless fear still lurks.

I find it best to deal with that fear cloud, the feeling of fear and anxiety on the level of FEELING. There are ways to do this, e.g. Chi Gong, energy transformation exercises.


"the secret of life is to have no fear" - Nkwame Nkruma
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwame_Nkrumah

So I find that FEELING is the active core behind words and mind.

The same thing applies to other emotions such as discontent, which masquerades as a search for  happiness.
If I only have THIS, or THAT I'll be happy.
I get both THIS and THAT and I'm still not happy...

Welcome to the quest of life... :-)


COMMENTS:


ooooo i LIKE this one. really excellent point. move things into the conscious, and they lose their hidden power.

interesting point, now i think about it - move anything into the conscious, and it loses its magic. wonder if that's why religious fanatics hate science?

METAPHYSICAL MUSER: yes, good point, move anything into the conscious and it loses it's magic.
it gives the illusion of control, and it does give some measure of control, i.e. fear loses it's power, but in the end consciousness itself is not the answer either. It is both the conscious and the feeling together. Consciousness  can see and understand, but to effect change it needs feelings as well.


--------------- below: earlier drafts ------------------------------------
You ask me if I'm afraid ? 

I'm not afraid ! 

I really am not. 

What is there to be afraid of ? 

But when I'm really honest I see that when I type a report, and I feel I absolutely HAVE to get it finished or else.... 

what is the "or else" all about ? 

When I'm late for a meeting, I rush and hurry. I don't want to be late or else... so I rush and run and puff and pant and push people out of the way and feel impatient with everything and everyone...

another  "or else"....

I worry about not having enough money when I'm old and infirm. 

Better to have enough money or else.... 

Damn these constant interruptions, I gotta get this report typed, by today or else....

if you only believe in what you can see, measure and prove, are you safe ? 

Am I safe if I only believe in what I can measure, prove and see ? 

Well maybe. 

I might convince myself that I am. 

Anything I cannot put a name on does not exist for me. 

What about things that have no name. ?

"the secret of life is to have no fear" - Nkwame Nkruma
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwame_Nkrumah

two types of committees, - two types of bureaucracies...

Type 1) 

"You need this approval  to teach your students ? "

"yes, they have to program the computers themselves."

"Ok we can set that up. We've restricted them a bit but you should be able to do the work."

This type of committee gets stuff done. 

They exist to make stuff happen. The rules are simple and clear, transparent and commonsense." 

The focus is on getting stuff done: whatever the committee is for, they want to get it done and out there and into the community. 

If it's sport, then they get sport out there, 

if it's an awareness campaign they get the message out.. 

if it's a new public transport ticket system, they get that out there.... 

The photo above: is it for type 1 or 2 committee ? 

A: neither. It simply shows clear simple instructions. 

The fine is not so hight it cannot be implemented.

It's clear, no doubts, no if's no but's.

Efficient.
 

Type 2)

This type does not need much explanation.

"Oh...Uhm.... not sure, we can allow that. Please fill out this form in triplicate, attach copies of your great grandfathers' wife's family tree and get the following 500 point police check. Then take your paperwork to the department ABC, they will give you instructions." 

"Sorry, wrong department, you need to get a Y type stamp from Department ABC, then if you fall into category  Q, or R you need to go to another deparment". 

This kind of committee exists to perpetuate itself. It love the power and it loves making people bow and scrape before their authority before graciously and magnanimously granting the request (for a parking space outside your own house). 

Fortunately: all committees fall somewhere in between these two extremes.