by Tom Tomaszewski | Aug 17, 2024 | Mark Neville
Fire Man (©Mark Neville, 2024)
Claim or proclaim unconditional love and, all of a sudden, love becomes conceptual. When something is conceptual it becomes conditional. Whatever I do or you do we will always love each other. Concepts are the sneak-thieves of truth, coercion performing as profound connection.
Take a look at why someone might want a license to print love money and it will serve you well. Unconditional love K-pops up when devotion is demanded and conflict potentially leading to separation is disallowed. Forms of service (military or civil), religious and criminal organisations, families, all comprise groups of people united by an expectation that they must stick together, whatever happens.
Unconditional love emerged out of a cave called FEAR.
Mark photographs an older man standing beside a fire. Fire man. Let him light up your life. Love him or not, or wonder about who or what he loves enough to keep that fire alight, he seems to love something.
Love is always narcissistic. Who feels the love if I say I feel you? Hopefully, if I am being true to you, me. I don’t know if you love me. If I say I love you to be assured that you love me I should keep my mouth shut. If I say I love you, maybe best I say that in whatever way I can, so we might begin to know where we stand.
by Tom Tomaszewski | Aug 16, 2024 | ALIENATION, HELPLESSNESS
In situations where you believe you will be treated badly look for an ally. Ideally that person will be someone who might be less easy for your abuser to do down. Someone who might be hard for that person to describe and denigrate in terms they would apply to you. If trouble happens, see if they can point it out. Then you can back them up if you like.
by Tom Tomaszewski | Jul 31, 2024 | Be Somebody Else
I haven’t been posting in a while because of other projects that are underway. However, that will soon change and normal service will be resumed. In the meantime here are two thoughts I have been reminded of while working recently.
- If you have been abused begin each new task you have to complete by considering what help is available. If you feel inclined not to ask for help, even if you know that it is available, think again. Old and misleading feelings that you don’t need help or that you don’t deserve it may be affecting your decision.
- While completing tasks try to hold as little in your mind as possible. In stressful situations you might be likely to forget things, confuse things, contradict yourself or say things that are not true. If you have not intended to lie and have no physical injuries or neurological problems resulting from illness your mind is probably ‘overloaded’. It can only deal with so much, so give it as little to deal with as you can. Your capacity to remember things will very likely increase if you receive help with any ongoing symptoms related to what happened to you.
by Tom Tomaszewski | Jun 20, 2024 | ALIENATION
Try changing the signal you put out into the world. If you limit yourself, always making sure you take the minimum of what’s on offer, and this somehow makes you feel safe – take more. People who know you and worry about the way you restrict your life (maybe not friends who do things the same way as you) are unintentionally confirming the feeling you have that something unsafe is going on. Their anxiety suggests uncertainty or risk. Your predicted restrictive behaviour seems like the right one: the way to remain safe when there’s a threat around. Fear surrounds you.
If you ask for more then you might find those same people relax and give you more encouragement, or joy. At first this feels very weird and wrong. After a time, however, you may start to feel safe. The atmosphere around you corroborates this. There’s no threat.
Life is really not this simple. But it’s worth a try.
by Tom Tomaszewski | Jun 12, 2024 | HELPLESSNESS
It’s useful to know why something is troubling. If I feel too hot I might need to move out of the sun. If I have a headache I might need a glass of water. These kinds of problem are different from psychological ones like why do I behave like this? Why did he do that to me? Pandora’s box opens the moment we begin looking for meaning in our motives, or for motives in our actions – especially ones where we don’t intend something to happen. More often than not looking for this kind of meaning is a ticket to Stucksville. (more…)
