Put the Glass Down By Dr.Claude Shema-Rutagengwa, Pr.Dr.Udaya Kumar and Pr.Dr.Dietrich http://www.author-me.com/fict07/puttheglass.htm Once a professor began his class by holding up a glass with some water in it. He held it up for all to see and asked the students, “how much do you think this glass weighs? ’50gms!’?…’100gms…’125gms’…. The students answered, “I really don’t [...]

Put the Glass Down

By Dr.Claude Shema-Rutagengwa, Pr.Dr.Udaya Kumar and Pr.Dr.Dietrich

http://www.author-me.com/fict07/puttheglass.htm

Once a professor began his class by holding up a glass with some water in it. He held it up for all to see and asked the students, “how much do you think this glass weighs? ’50gms!’?…’100gms…’125gms’….

The students answered, “I really don’t know unless I weigh it.”

The professor said, ‘now, my question is: What would happen if I held it up like this for a few minutes?’

‘Nothing’ the students said.

“OK what would happen if I held it up like this for an hour?” the professor asked.

“Your arm would begin to ache” said one of the students.

“You’re right, now what would happen if I held it for a day?”

“Your arm could go numb; you might have severe muscle stress & paralysis; have to go to hospital for sure! Ventured another student”, all the students laughed.

“Very good. But during all this, did the weight of the glass change?” Asked the professor.

“No” was the reply of all the students.

“Then what caused the arm to ache; the muscle to stress?” After a pause the professor asked “Before my arm ache, what should I do?”

The students were puzzled.

“Put the glass down!” said one of the students.

“Exactly!” said the professor, “Life’s problems are exactly like this. Hold it for a few minutes in your head; they seem OK. Think of them for a long time; they begin to ache. Hold it even longer; they begin to paralyze you. You will not be able to do anything.”

It’s important to think of the challenges (problems) in your life, but EVEN MORE IMPORTANT to ‘put them down’ at the end of every day before you go to sleep. That way, you are not stressed, you wake up every day fresh; strong; can handle any issue, any challenge that comes your way!

Remember to put the glass down everyday!

 

Recently someone asked me:  how did you unblock your memories? I would like to do that. I think I am ready. This is a great question! It was totally through the grace of God.  Every year of my son’s life, brought back everything that happened to me at the same age.  I don’t recommend it [...]

Recently someone asked me:  how did you unblock your memories? I would like to do that. I think I am ready.

This is a great question!

It was totally through the grace of God.  Every year of my son’s life, brought back everything that happened to me at the same age.  I don’t recommend it as an approach, since I had to live through it twice, at the expense of his childhood!

At the time, I had a very gifted therapist, who explained that memories come back 4 ways.  It’s called the BASK model.  It looks something like this:

Behaviour:  Sometimes you react to things in a way which is out of proportion to the situation – the classic one is a Vietnam vet diving for cover when a car backfires.  Tonight, for me, I reacted in a way that was over the top when I saw a child at the dinner table point a smoking pistol on his Blackberry towards his Dad.  It looked all the world like a real gun shooting his Dad.  It sent me into a full blown panic attack.  If I didn’t know  about my own childhood gun trauma, I wouldn’t understand why I react a certain way when I’m triggered.  Another example is that I wouldn’t wear a white wedding dress, because I had been defiled by the sexual abuse.  I didn’t understand it at the time, but once I got the memories back, it all made sense.

Affect:  Is when you feel feelings and you have no idea why.  For example, you might be filled with sadness or rage for no apparent reason.  You might cry easily, again for no apparent reason.  As a result of what happened to me tonight, I am feeling tremendous sadness and powerlessness; and rage at the father whose response was “boys will be boys”.  I’m feeling the feelings associated with my own childhood gun trauma; not the feelings of what happened tonight.  If I didn’t know what happened to me, I wouldn’t have a framework for dealing with the emotions.

Senses:  You might be triggered by something you see, hear, taste, touch or smell.  For example, my family used Ivory bar soap when I was growing up, so I associate the smell with them.  I can’t have it in my house, or use it if I’m at someone else’s house (well I can now, I just choose not to!).  For example, there’s been a lot of it at the food bank lately and I get it for my son, but I don’t use any of it.  Other people have told me they can’t eat anything white and creamy (rice pudding, tapioca pudding, ice cream . . . ) because of its obvious associations with semen.  For a long time I couldn’t give or receive a hug from a man or a woman because I believed “if you touch me, I have to have sex with you.”  I always avoided situations where people were hugging (and even now, when I have a context to put it in, I’m still often uncomfortable being touched).

Knowledge:  is the conscious knowledge of the memories.  For me, this was the last thing to come back and when it did, it explained so much, because I’d already had the experience with behaviour, affect and senses.  It helped me believe my story.

So if you’re experiencing behaviour, affect or sensory triggers, you’re already well on your way to recovering your memories!

Finally, even though I had all of that, I still had trouble believing what I know to be true.  I kept coming back to “maybe it didn’t happen”, because denial was a much easier place to be!  I found this quote from the Bahá’í Writings really helpful in keeping me grounded in my truth:

Consequently, it has become evident that the four criteria stan­dards of judgment by which the human mind reaches its conclusions (senses, intellect, traditional or scriptural and inspiration) are faulty and inaccurate. All of them are liable to mistake and error in conclu­sions. But a statement presented to the mind, accompanied by proofs which the senses can perceive to be correct, which the faculty of rea­son can accept, which is in accord with traditional authority and sanc­tioned by the promptings of the heart, can be adjudged and relied upon as perfectly correct, for it has been proved and tested by all the standards of judgment and found to be complete. When we apply but one test, there are possibilities of mistake. This is self-evident and manifest.  (‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 255)

For me this is similar to the BASK model – it just goes a little further.

How have you unblocked your memories?  Post your comments here:

 

 

I was talking to someone the other day, about a problem she was having with her husband.  She felt that she was married to 2 different men, who she called Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.  You could tell that she loved Mr. Hyde very much, but when he switched into Dr. Jekyll she was afraid [...]

I was talking to someone the other day, about a problem she was having with her husband.  She felt that she was married to 2 different men, who she called Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.  You could tell that she loved Mr. Hyde very much, but when he switched into Dr. Jekyll she was afraid of him, and didn’t know what to do.

Her therapist was explaining the “cycle of abuse”, characterized by a predictable repetitious pattern of abuse, whether emotional, psychological or physical, with psychological abuse nearly always preceding and accompanying physical abuse.   We know that sustained periods of living in such a cycle may lead to learned helplessness and battered person syndrome.  So far, her marriage hadn’t reached this stage, and she had taken very creative steps to keep herself safe.  She was reaching the end of her resources, though, and wondered what she could do.

The abuse recovery model and the Bahá’í model can look very different.  On the one hand, both models agree that this is intolerable.  The Bahá’í Writings say:

Bahá’í men have the opportunity to demonstrate to the world around them a new approach to the relationship between the sexes, where aggression and the use of force are eliminated and replaced by cooperation and consultation. The Universal House of Justice has pointed out in response to questions addressed to it that, in a marriage relationship, neither husband nor wife should ever unjustly dominate the other, and that there are times when the husband and the wife should defer to the wishes of the other, if agreement cannot be reached through consultation; each couple should determine exactly under what circumstances such deference is to take place.  (From a letter written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to an individual believer, 24 January, 1993)

Where the Bahá’í Faith differs, relates to transformation:

As you know, the principle of the oneness of mankind is de­scribed in the Bahá’í Writings as the pivot round which all the Teach­ings of Bahá’u'lláh revolve. It has widespread implications which affect and remold all dimensions of human activity. It calls for a fundamental change in the manner in which people relate to each other, and the eradication of those age old practices which deny the intrinsic hu­man right of every individual to be treated with consideration and respect.  (From a letter written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to an individual, 24 January, 1993)

But what is the “fundamental change in the manner in which people relate to each other”?  It’s easy to identify virtues such as love and forgiveness, but the more difficult ones of patience, resignation and long-suffering are not on most therapists’ radar.

On the one hand, the Bahá’í Writings clearly say:

Hold thy husband dear and always show forth an amiable temper towards him, no matter how ill tempered he may be. Even if thy kindness maketh him more bitter, manifest thou more kindliness, more tenderness, be more loving and tolerate his cruel actions and ill-treatment.  (‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Lights of Guidance, p. 226)

Now that you realize that your husband is ill, you should be able to reconcile yourself to the difficulties you have faced with him emotionally, and not take an unforgiving attitude, however much you may suffer.  (Shoghi Effendi, Lights of Guidance, p. 227)

We also know that when there is spousal abuse in the marriage, the feelings of one partner – maybe both – break. Those broken feelings destroy the trust and eat away at the foundations of the fortress.  If we look at abuse as a beast, this quote shows us what it does:

It is said, “The beast made war against these two witnesses” — that is to say, a spiritual war, meaning that the beast would act in entire opposition to the teachings, customs and institutions of these two witnesses, to such an extent that the virtues and perfections which were diffused by the power of those two witnesses among the peoples and tribes would be entirely dispelled, and the animal nature and carnal desires would conquer. Therefore, this beast making war against them would gain the victory — meaning that the darkness of error coming from this beast was to have ascendency over the horizons of the world, and kill those two witnesses — in other words, that it would destroy the spiritual life which they spread abroad in the midst of the nation, and entirely remove the divine laws and teachings, treading under foot the Religion of God. Nothing would thereafter remain but a lifeless body without spirit.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, Some Answered Questions, p. 51)

This may be a rather confusing passage, but I think what ‘Abdu’l-Bahá is saying is that when one partner acts in ways that are against the Bahá’í laws, the virtues possible in the marriage are dispelled, and the abuser’s lower nature kills the marriage and destroys the spiritual life of both, causing nothing to remain of the marriage but a “lifeless body without spirit”.

Can a marriage be saved if it’s a “lifeless body without spirit”?  Here is where the abuse model and the Bahá’í Faith differ.  The abuse model would say “no” and “get out now for your own sanity.”  And it would be right.

The Bahá’í Faith would say that when the emotional abuse in a marriage gets to be intolerable, you have 2 choices:  start a year of patience, during which time your spouse can work on his/her anger issues so that you can trust him/her again (or vice versa); or stay in the marriage and work on developing the virtues which will help you in the next world.

Obviously this decision will be between the individual and God and between the two partners, but here are some quotes to consider for both decisions.

On the one hand, the Bahá’í Writings say:

It is a great pity that two believers, united in this glorious Cause, and blessed with a family, should not be able to live together really harmoniously, and he feels you should take constructive action and not allow the situation to get worse. When the shadow of separation hangs over a husband and wife they should leave no stone unturned in their effort to avert its becoming a reality.  He urges you both to devote more of your time to teaching the Cause and to pray together that Bahá’u'lláh may give you a real and lasting love for each other.  (Shoghi Effendi, The Compilation of Compilations vol II, p. 451)

But what if one partner wants to obey the spirit of this injunction and the other one doesn’t?  Is it possible for the marriage to continue?  The answer is yes.  The only grounds for divorce in the Bahá’í Faith is irreconcilable antipathy, so as long as that point hasn’t been reached, there is still hope.

I was in that situation in my own marriage – I was willing to do everything in my power to avoid divorce, and my husband didn’t see anything wrong in the marriage.  I tried everything in my power to save it.  At the end, I knew that there was one thing I needed to hear, to help me stay, and when every therapist I consulted recommended divorce, I slipped into hopelessness and despair, and called it irreconcilable antipathy.  I carefully studied the meanings of antipathy:

1.  a natural, basic, or habitual repugnance; aversion.

2. an instinctive contrariety or opposition in feeling.

3. an object of natural aversion or habitual dislike.

The situation certainly felt irreconcilable to me, and I certainly had an aversion in his presence.  When a Bahá’í I trusted suggested that it might be God’s will for me to divorce, I finally consulted the Local Spiritual Assembly for a year of patience, and the marriage ultimately ended in divorce.  Years later, I heard the one thing that might have kept me in my marriage.  It was the idea that marriage is like the seasons.  ‘Abdu’l-Bahá describes it well:

At one time it is the season of spring; at another it is the season of autumn; and again it is the season of summer or the season of winter.  In the spring there are the clouds which send down the precious rain, the musk-scented breezes and life-giving zephyrs; the air is perfectly temperate, the rain falls, the sun shines, the fecundating wind wafts the clouds, the world is renewed, and the breath of life appears in plants, in animals and in men. Earthly beings pass from one condition to another. All things are clothed in new garments, and the black earth is covered with herbage; mountains and plains are adorned with verdure; trees bear leaves and blossoms; gardens bring forth flowers and fragrant herbs. The world becomes another world, and it attains to a life-giving spirit. The earth was a lifeless body; it finds a new spirit, and produces endless beauty, grace and freshness. Thus the spring is the cause of new life and infuses a new spirit.  Afterward comes the summer, when the heat increases, and growth and development attain their greatest power. The energy of life in the vegetable kingdom reaches to the degree of perfection, the fruit appears, and the time of harvest ripens; a seed has become a sheaf, and the food is stored for winter. Afterward comes tumultuous autumn when unwholesome and sterile winds blow; it is the season of sickness, when all things are withered, and the balmy air is vitiated. The breezes of spring are changed to autumn winds; the fertile green trees have become withered and bare; flowers and fragrant herbs fade away; the beautiful garden becomes a dustheap. Following this comes the season of winter, with cold and tempests. It snows, rains, hails, storms, thunders and lightens, freezes and congeals; all plants die, and animals languish and are wretched.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, Some Answered Questions, p. 73-74)

This is where my marriage ended.  It was clearly winter and everything was dead and lifeless.  I don’t think I’m alone here!  Who wants to stay in such a cold and bleak environment, when it looks like there is no hope?  Most of us (myself included), forget that:

When this state is reached, again a new life-giving spring returns, and the cycle is renewed. The season of spring with its hosts of freshness and beauty spreads its tent on the plains and mountains with great pomp and magnificence. A second time the form of the creatures is renewed, and the creation of beings begins afresh; bodies grow and develop, the plains and wildernesses become green and fertile, trees bring forth blossoms, and the spring of last year returns in the utmost fullness and glory. Such is, and such ought to be, the cycle and succession of existence. Such is the cycle and revolution of the material world.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, Some Answered Questions, p. 73-74)

Another thing to remember is that the transition from winter to spring is also very ugly – as the snow melts and everything becomes muddy, it’s hard to remember that new life is soon to come.

I think that staying in a marriage through this time helps us develop many virtues, including:

Patience:

Were it not for calamity, how would the sun of Thy patience shine, O Light of the worlds?  Lament not because of the wicked. Thou wert created to bear and endure, O Patience of the worlds.  (Bahá’u'lláh, Fire Tablet, Baha’i Prayers, p. 217)

He, verily, rewardeth beyond measure them that endure with patience.  (Baha’u'llah, Gems of Divine Mysteries, p. 71)

I think what Baha’u'llah is telling us here is that he created us to “bear and endure” and when we endure whatever life throws at us with patience, our rewards will be immense.  Short-term pain for long-term gain!

‘Abdu’l-Bahá understands how difficult it might be for some of us to have patience, particularly when we’ve been raised with poor role models ourselves:

For example, you see that children born from a weak and feeble father and mother will naturally have a feeble constitution and weak nerves; they will be afflicted, and will have neither patience, nor endurance, nor resolution, nor perseverance, and will be hasty; for the children inherit the weakness and debility of their parents.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, Baha’i World Faith, p. 319)

This isn’t a justification for not having patience, but a way to be patient with ourselves when we haven’t been patient in the past, and something to overcome now that we know it.

Long Suffering:

The concept of “long suffering” is not one that is currently popular in our society, or in the abuse recovery field, so here are some quotes you might not have seen:

Bahá’u'lláh has clearly said in His Tablets that if you have an enemy, consider him not as an enemy. Do not simply be long-suffering; nay, rather, love him. Your treatment of him should be that which is becoming to lovers. Do not even say that he is your enemy. Do not see any enemies. Though he be your murderer, see no enemy. Look upon him with the eye of friendship.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 267)

If you’re looking for a role model of long-suffering you might want to read about the life of Bahiyyih Khanum.  The Universal House of Justice tells us:

Her meekness, her unassuming nature, the purity of her soul, the sensitivity of her heart, the calmness of her demeanour, her patience and long-suffering in trials, and above all, her unshakeable faith, her tenderness and love, and the spirit of self-renunciation which she evinced throughout her blessed life, are outstanding characteristics that we can well emulate.  (Universal House of Justice, Messages 1963 to 1986, p. 557)

Here’s a prayer you can say to help acquire the virtues of patience and long-suffering:

I beseech Thee, O my Lord, by the sighs of Thy lovers throughout the world, and by their lamentation in their remoteness from the court of Thy presence, and by the blood that hath been shed for love of Thee, and by the hearts that have melted in Thy path, to protect Thy loved ones from the cruelty of such as have remained unaware of the mysteries of Thy Name, the Unconstrained. Assist them, O my Lord, by Thy power that hath prevailed over all things, and aid them to be patient and long-suffering.   Thou art the All-Powerful, the Almighty, the All-Bountiful. No God is there but Thee, the Generous, the Lord of grace abounding.  (Baha’u'llah, Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, p. 35-36)

Tolerance:

Be mindful that you do not consider him as an enemy and simply tolerate him, for that is but stratagem and hypocrisy. To consider a man your enemy and love him is hypocrisy. This is not becoming of any soul. You must behold him as a friend. You must treat him well. This is right.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 267)

Resignation:

Resignation is another virtue which is not very popular in today’s society but helps strengthen marriages.  Here are some quotes you may not have seen:

Such hath been the patience, the calm, the resignation and contentment of this people that they have become the exponents of justice, and so great hath been their forbearance, that they have suffered themselves to be killed rather than kill, and this notwithstanding that these whom the world hath wronged have endured tribulations the like of which the history of the world hath never recorded, nor the eyes of any nation witnessed. What is it that could have induced them to reconcile themselves to these grievous trials, and to refuse to put forth a hand to repel them? What could have caused such resignation and serenity? The true cause is to be found in the ban which the Pen of Glory hath, day and night, chosen to impose, and in Our assumption of the reins of authority, through the power and might of Him Who is the Lord of all mankind.  (Baha’u'llah, Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, p. 74-75)

They that yearn for the abode of the Beloved, they that circle round the sanctuary of the Desired One, are not apprehensive of trials and adversities, nor do they flee away from that which is ordained by God. They receive their portion from the ocean of resignation and drink their fill from the soft-flowing stream of His mercy. They would not surrender the good-pleasure of the Friend in exchange for the kingdom of both worlds, nor would they barter that which the Well-Beloved hath decreed in return for dominion over the realms of the infinite. They would eagerly drink the venom of woe as if it were the water of life and would drain deadly poison to its bitter dregs just as a sweet and life-giving draught. In the arid wastes of desolation they are stirred with enthusiasm through the remembrance of the Friend, and in the dreary wilds of adversity they are eager and impatient to offer themselves as a sacrifice. Unhesitatingly have they renounced their lives and directed their steps towards the abode of the Best Beloved. They have closed their eyes to the world and fixed their gaze upon the beauteous countenance of the Friend, cherishing no desire but the presence of the loved One and seeking no attainment save reunion with Him. They fly with the feathers of trust in God and soar with the wings of adherence unto His Will. In their estimation a blood-shedding blade is more desirable than finest silk and a piercing dart more acceptable than mother’s milk.  (Baha’u'llah, Fire and Light, p. 11)

The abuse recovery model suggests that there is something wrong with spouses who fall back into love, forgiveness and mercy, after every one of their husband’s outbursts, as though it was part of the problem.  Unfortunately this is where they differ from the standards of the Faith.  Here are some quotes which might help you think of it differently:

All these purified hearts and sanctified souls hastened with perfect resignation to the call of destiny. During occasions of complaint, nothing proceeded from them except thanksgiving, and in time of affliction, only submission was visible. It is an evident fact how much hatred, animosity and enmity the people of the earth entertained toward these companions, for they considered tormenting and oppressing these holy ideal countenances conducive to prosperity, salvation and everlasting success and gain . . . Notwithstanding all their sufferings and injuries, they became the objects of the curses of the people and the subject of censure by all the servants. It seemed as if patience originated in the world of existence from their self-restraint, and faithfulness appeared in the regions of the earth from their actions.  (Compilations, Baha’i Scriptures, p. 61)

This suggests that no matter what happens to us, we need to be resigned and not complain; we need to thank God and submit to His decree; we need to realize that if we can acquire these virtues, it will lead to prosperity, salvation and everlasting gain.

The following quote gives us some practical tools we can use:

Those, however, who have been trained and educated in the school of God, even when coming to such a pass, are resignation itself, and to the brutal aggressor they are as the living waters of Heaven. They are rivers of pure mercy and peace. Though powerful and well able to defend themselves, they never raise a hand to strike, nor do they open their lips to protest. They confront the others’ taunts and curses with prayers that God will forgive them, and their reply to the wounds of bullet and sword is to offer milk and honey. They kiss the murderer’s hand; as intoxicated lovers, they drain the martyr’s cup.  (Compilations, Bahiyyih Khanum, p. 165)

They give us a standard to work towards:

They that yearn for the abode of the Beloved, they that circle round the sanctuary of the Desired One, are not apprehensive of trials and adversities, nor do they flee away from that which is ordained by God. They receive their portion from the ocean of resignation and drink their fill from the soft-flowing stream of His mercy. They would not surrender the good-pleasure of the Friend in exchange for the kingdom of both worlds, nor would they barter that which the Well-Beloved hath decreed in return for dominion over the realms of the infinite. They would eagerly drink the venom of woe as if it were the water of life and would drain deadly poison to its bitter dregs just as a sweet and life-giving draught. In the arid wastes of desolation they are stirred with enthusiasm through the remembrance of the Friend, and in the dreary wilds of adversity they are eager and impatient to offer themselves as a sacrifice. Unhesitatingly have they renounced their lives and directed their steps towards the abode of the Best Beloved. They have closed their eyes to the world and fixed their gaze upon the beauteous countenance of the Friend, cherishing no desire but the presence of the loved One and seeking no attainment save reunion with Him. They fly with the feathers of trust in God, and soar with the wings of adherence unto His Will. In their estimation a blood-shedding blade is more desirable than finest silk and a piercing dart more acceptable than mother’s milk.  (Baha’u'llah, Fire and Light, p. 11)

This is a tough standard, indeed!  It suggests even if your life is being poisoned by someone’s behaviour; even if your marriage is desolate; even if the abuse hurts as much as a piercing dart, God still wants us to change our attitude to one of resignation, offering up our pain as a sacrifice, and looking to God for mercy.

Even in moments of catastrophe, we are to attain patience, resignation and submission:

O ye Cohorts of God! In the moment of catastrophe, find ye patience, resignation and submission.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, Tablets of Abdu’l-Bahá v1, p. 45)

God wants us to be patient, and to not complain about our suffering.

Blessed are the steadfastly enduring, they that are patient under ills and hardships, who lament not over anything that befalleth them, and who tread the path of resignation.  (Baha’u'llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u'llah, p. 129)

We are to submit ourselves without complaining, so that others won’t even know that anything is wrong:

However, relying upon God, we conducted ourselves with the utmost patience and submission, resignation and calmness; so much that if one did not know anything about these matters, he would have thought that we were in perfect ease of soul, enjoying the tranquility of heart mind, and were engaged in happiness and felicity.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, Tablets of Abdu’l-Bahá v1, p. 45)

He wants us to detach ourselves from others, to resign ourselves to whatever happens without talking about our pain; without exalting ourselves over the person who is hurting us.

That seeker must, at all times, put his trust in God, must renounce the peoples of the earth, must detach himself from the world of dust, and cleave unto Him Who is the Lord of Lords. He must never seek to exalt himself above any one, must wash away from the tablet of his heart every trace of pride and vain-glory, must cling unto patience and resignation, observe silence and refrain from idle talk.  (Baha’u'llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u'llah, p. 264-265)

He wants us to thank Him for our tests, and submit ourselves to them.

All these stainless hearts and sanctified souls have, with absolute resignation, responded to the summons of His decree. Instead of complaining, they rendered thanks unto God, and amidst the darkness of their anguish they revealed naught but radiant acquiescence to His will.  (Baha’u'llah, The Kitab-i-Iqan, p. 234)

His purpose in all of this is for us to acquire a saintly character, adorned with holy and goodly deeds.

The purpose of the one true God in manifesting Himself is to summon all mankind to . . . resignation and submissiveness to the Will of God, to forbearance and kindliness . . . His object is to array every man with the mantle of a saintly character, and to adorn him with the ornament of holy and goodly deeds.  (Baha’u'llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u'llah, p. 298)

He promises that if we learn how to trust His decrees, no one’s bad behaviour will ever depress his spirits, his inner life will be revived and the pain will entirely subside.

In truth were man to attain the stage of certitude in his spiritual development, no affliction could ever depress his spirits, though he would undoubtedly be influenced by reason of his human susceptibilities. Nevertheless, man’s inner being will be so revived by the breeze of divinely-ordained woes and trials that the dust of wailing and lamentation will entirely subside and the light of submissive resignation unto His Will shall shine forth like unto a radiant morn.  (‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Fire and Light, p. 25)

Look at the lives of the martyrs for inspiration.  Many of them died at the hands of their oppressors, and accepted death willingly.  That’s the spirit we are called to attain:

In physical strength and fortitude one of these Bahá’ís could have withstood many of their enemies, but they accepted martyrdom in the spirit of complete resignation and nonresistance. Many of them died, crying out, “O Lord! Forgive them; they know not what they do. If they knew, they would not commit this wrong.” In the throes of martyrdom they willingly offered all they possessed in this life.  (Abdu’l-Bahá, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 384)

Again we see Bahiyyih Khanum as a role model for resignation:

That heavenly being [Bahiyyih Khanum] displayed throughout her life such evidence of glory and dignity, such manifestations of majesty and greatness, such a degree of patience and resignation as bewildered the minds and souls. In the midst of trials her radiant face bore the likeness of a sweet rose and in moments of sore tribulation she was resplendent as a brilliant candle.  (Compilations, Bahiyyih Khanum, p. 84)

Here’s an affirmation you can use to help strengthen your resignation:

Thine is the command at all times, O Thou Who art the Lord of all names; and mine is resignation and willing submission to Thy will, O Creator of the heavens!  (Baha’u'llah, The Kitab-i-Aqdas, p. 95)

The standards set by the Faith are very high, but so are the rewards:

They that yearn for the abode of the Beloved, they that circle round the sanctuary of the Desired One, are not apprehensive of trials and adversities, nor do they flee away from that which is ordained by God. They receive their portion from the ocean of resignation and drink their fill from the soft-flowing stream of His mercy. They would not surrender the good-pleasure of the Friend in exchange for the kingdom of both worlds, nor would they barter that which the Well-Beloved hath decreed in return for dominion over the realms of the infinite. They would eagerly drink the venom of woe as if it were the water of life and would drain deadly poison to its bitter dregs just as a sweet and life-giving draught. In the arid wastes of desolation they are stirred with enthusiasm through the remembrance of the Friend, and in the dreary wilds of adversity they are eager and impatient to offer themselves as a sacrifice. Unhesitatingly have they renounced their lives and directed their steps towards the abode of the Best Beloved. They have closed their eyes to the world and fixed their gaze upon the beauteous countenance of the Friend, cherishing no desire but the presence of the loved One and seeking no attainment save reunion with Him. They fly with the feathers of trust in God. and soar with the wings of adherence unto His Will. In their estimation a blood-shedding blade is more desirable than finest silk and a piercing dart more acceptable than mother’s milk.  (Baha’u'llah, Fire and Light, p. 11)

In order to preserve a marriage to Dr. Jekyll, so that it lasts through all the worlds of God, the virtues needed the most (in addition to love and forgiveness) might include patience, resignation and long-suffering.

On the other hand, the Bahá’í Writings also say:

If a Bahá’í woman suffers abuse or is subjected to rape by her husband, she has the right to turn to the assembly for assistance and counsel, or to seek legal protection.  Such an abuse would gravely jeopardize the continuation of the marriage, and could well lead to a condition of irreconcilable antipathy.  (From a letter written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to an individual believer, 24 January, 1993)

At present the prevailing method, within the Australian community, of treating domestic violence, is to advise the couple to sepa­rate and to seek treatment from professional counseling services. It is suggested that Assemblies follow this method of treating domestic violence also. If, alternatively, the couple is counseled to remain to­gether to try and reconcile their differences, there can be no guarantee that the violence will not recur, in which case the Assembly could appear, inadvertently, to be condoning it. If the couple separate, how­ever, the role of the Assembly can then become that of providing an independent forum within which the couple can come together and try to resolve their differences.  (National Spiritual Assembly of Australia’s Policy Regarding Domestic Violence, From Australian Bahá’í Bulletin, July 1990.)

Perhaps it’s time for a year of patience.  The purpose of it is to:

During the year the couple have the responsibility of attempting to reconcile their difference, and the Assembly has the duty to help them and encourage them. (Universal House of Justice, Lights of Guidance, p. 390)

Unfortunately most couples enter into it too late – when they have no intention of working on the marriage or the issues which led up to it falling apart.

Conclusion:

As we know, there are many seeming contradictions in the Writings. Examining them can lead to greater depth of insight and the understanding that reality is complex; some of these statements refer to different kinds of situations, or must be applied in combination. The juxtaposition of these seeming contradictions prevents us from turning the Writings into a “cookbook” with a simple recipe for every situation. These contradictions force us to engage our own minds and exercise judgment.

This quote says it nicely:

The personal transformation required for true equality will undoubtedly be difficult for men and women alike. Both must relinquish all attachment to guilt and blame and courageously assume responsibility for their own part in transforming the societies in which they live.  (Baha’i International Community, 1995 Sept 13, Role of Religion in Promoting Advancement of Women)

I’m not sure it’s the individual’s job to look for justice in a marriage, as these quotes suggest:

It should be realized that there is a distinction drawn in the Faith between the attitudes which should characterize individuals in their relationship to other people, namely, loving forgiveness, forbearance, and concern with one’s own sins, not the sins of others, and those attitudes which should be shown by the Spiritual Assemblies, whose duty is to administer the law of God with Justice.  (Universal House of Justice, Messages from the Universal House of Justice 1968-1973, p. 110)

Love is the standard which must govern the conduct of one believer towards another. The administrative order does not change this, but unfortunately sometimes the friends confuse the two, and try to be a whole spiritual assembly,  –  with the discipline and justice and impartiality that body must show,  –  to each other, instead of being forgiving, loving and patient to each other as individuals.  (Shoghi Effendi, Lights of Guidance, p. 403)

The greatest need it seems everywhere inside the Cause is to impress upon the friends the need for love among them. There is a tendency to mix up the functions of the Administration and try to apply it in individual relationships, which is abortive, because the Assembly is a nascent House of Justice and is supposed to administer, according to the Teachings, the affairs of the Community. But individuals towards each other are governed by love, unity, forgiveness and a sin-covering eye. Once the friends grasp this they will get along much better, but they keep playing Spiritual Assembly to each other and expect the Assembly to behave like an individual.  (Shoghi Effendi, Directives from the Guardian, p. 41-42)

Is there hope for this marriage?  I think there is.  As Shoghi Effendi said:

Marriage problems are often very involved and subtle, and we Bahá’ís, being enlightened and progressive people, should not hesitate, if it seems necessary or desirable, to turn to science for help in such matters. If you and your husband talked over your problems — together or separately — with a good physician you might find that you can cure your own husband, or at least try to do so. (Shoghi Effendi, The Compilation of Compilations vol II, p. 451)

By studying, understanding and applying the guidance in this posting, I think there’s hope!  What do you think?  Post your comments here:

 

 

 

 

 

  Those of us who’ve experienced abuse as children often learn to expect that bad things are likely to happen in the future and that there is nothing that can be done to prevent or avoid them from happening.  This can lead to a lifetime of anxiety (waiting for it to happen) and depression (arising [...]

 

Those of us who’ve experienced abuse as children often learn to expect that bad things are likely to happen in the future and that there is nothing that can be done to prevent or avoid them from happening.  This can lead to a lifetime of anxiety (waiting for it to happen) and depression (arising from learned helplessness).

For many years the Bahá’í Faith was both my rescuer and my tormenter.  I totally believed that Baha’u'llah was who He said He was, and that He had a blueprint for humanity, (including me), so that we could get ourselves out of the mess we were in.  This is my primary reason for becoming a Bahá’í.

Over the years, I strove to put into practice the teachings, to the best of my ability, believing that if I did so, I would be transforming myself and contributing to the betterment of the world.  Doing this gave me my life back, for which I am grateful!

But the longer I was a Bahá’í, and the more I studied the Writings morning and night; and the more study circles I tutored and the more people I coached, the more the Writings became a giant “to do” list, and I eventually collapsed under the weight of trying to do it all.  It contributed to my deepening anxiety and depression and worsened my mental health.

I knew that this wasn’t the fault of the Teachings, but that somehow there was something I had failed to understand.  Recently I came across the term “akrasia” which means “weakness of will; acting in a way contrary to one’s sincerely held moral values”.  This described me perfectly!

My mental health problems had less to do with anxiety and depression and post traumatic stress disorder (most of which had been laid to rest years ago); but the failure to live up to my expectations of what I thought God wanted of me.  The judgements and torments with which I inflicted myself were beyond any of the abuse which had been perpetrated on me as a child; and worse, I was doing it to myself!  So I was delighted to find the right “diagnosis”!

I recently came across the work of Michael Penn, a Bahá’í professor and clinical psychologist, who conducted a study called “Akrasia and Mental Health”.  In it, he sought to explore the mental health problems that may be associated with akrasia in a cross-cultural sample.

He was interested in akrasia as defined by “an agent’s will is said to be weak if he or she acts, and acts intentionally, in ways that are contrary to his or her own best judgment. Under such circumstances it is sometimes said that the actor lacks “self-mastery” or the willpower to do what he or she knows or believes would be best, all things considered”;   and in the moral self-assessments and self-reflective judgments that centred upon what one has done or failed to do, resulting in guilt, shame, regret and remorse leading to anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and vulnerability to suicide.

His findings were as follows:

1)      When individuals act in ways that are contrary to their own values they may awaken moral emotions that are experienced as a form of self-induced trauma;

2)      as it is with other-induced trauma, the self-induced trauma associated with acts of akrasia should be correlated with mental distress and various states of psychopathology;

3)      the deleterious impact of akrasia is not culture specific but is universal.

Michael began to hypothesize that the only lasting remedy was for akratic patients to begin acting in ways that were more congruent with their own implicit or explicit values.

I turned to the world of nature and looked at the human body.  I came to realize that the big toenail (for example) has an important function and when it’s bent or broken, the whole body suffers.  It’s function is to protect the big toe and the surrounding soft tissues from injuries.  It doesn’t feel guilty for not being able to see, or taste.  It just does its job the best it knows how.

This was a revelation!  The Bahá’í Writings were written for all of humanity for the next 500,000 years; and not just for Susan Gammage on October 10 in any given year!  I didn’t have to do it all; and I didn’t have to do it all today.  I just had to make today better than yesterday.

If you want to read the whole study, email me at:  susan@susangammage.com

Post Traumatic Stress By Barbara McLellan   For the past seven years I have been privileged to work with a young woman who is a trauma survivor. I have watched as she courageously met each new day knowing that it would be filled with nightmares.  Simple chores like going shopping were filled with terror. Radio [...]

Post Traumatic Stress

By Barbara McLellan

 

For the past seven years I have been privileged to work with a young woman who is a trauma survivor. I have watched as she courageously met each new day knowing that it would be filled with nightmares.  Simple chores like going shopping were filled with terror. Radio and television had to be closely monitored to ensure that nothing would trigger her and put her into a traumatised state.

I can also remember clearly the day I gazed out my office window and with absolute certainty and conviction believed that the human race was not a fit species to inhabit the earth. I would not have been at all surprised if God suddenly decided to destroy the earth.

That moment which took place a few years ago was a turning point in my belief system and led me on a search for meaning. I knew that my old ways of understanding adversity were no longer valid. I was not interested in “how could an all-loving God allow these things to happen” because I believe that man not God causes suffering. The process I became interested in is what I call a chasm of belief.

A chasm is a great divide, usually a deep long running pit gashed into a mountain. The mountain symbolises one’s faith and the chasm can be formed by great suffering. Suddenly one’s world is cleft asunder. One does not lose faith, but there is a deep wound which requires healing.

Part of the healing process, I believe is finding meaning when one has endured dire adversity and trauma. This paper will explore the elements of trauma, belief, truth, and some possible difficulties being in community.

Is there a place in the Bahá’í community for people who have experienced great trauma?

If a person’s view of the world is one of extreme pessimism, does that person have a real place in community, or must they hide what they know to be true?

After the war in Viet Nam, many soldiers were eventually diagnosed with a disorder known as post traumatic stress syndrome. It is not a mental illness.  Dr Matthew Friedman of the National Center for PTSD says that the etiological agent or the traumatic event was outside the individual rather than an inherent individual weakness or a traumatic neurosis. The traumatic event is something outside the range of usual human experience for instance the Holocaust war, severe abuse, torture and genocide. Not all people exposed to these events will have post traumatic stress disorder. It has been recognised that trauma, like pain, is “not an external phenomena that can be completely objectified”. Like pain, the traumatic experience is filtered through cognitive and emotional processes before it can be appraised as an extreme threat”. (Friedman 1996)

Some aspects of the traumatic event seem to get fixed in the mind, unaltered by the passage of time or by the intervention of subsequent experiences.(Ibid) People with post traumatic stress disorder have difficulty sleeping, are extraordinarily concerned with issues of safety and freedom, and can suffer physical illness. In addition people with post traumatic
stress disorder can be easily triggered by visual and or audio input.

How does someone with post traumatic stress disorder cope in community? To understand this, we must first know the nature of post traumatic stress disorder. This disorder confines people to the past, not through any inherent weakness they might have, but by the traumatic event itself. So for instance, someone who was involved in a bombing might be thrown into the past when a car backfires or she hears a loud bang. All the memories are reborn once again and all the feelings of horror and confusion return.

The Holocaust is the name given to the systematic execution of six million Jews in Europe during the Second World War. Since the Holocaust, there have been many, many other traumatic events and many more survivors. Ritual abuse is a terror endured by children and adults alike. This is a particularly brutal form of sexual, physical and mental abuse and takes place in a group setting. It renders the survivors very wary of group activities. The survivor can not trust the group and feels vulnerable, unsafe and at times terrified.

One of the differences between the Holocaust survivor and a ritual abuse survivor is that while there is almost no denial about the former, there is still an absence of belief about ritual abuse.  This denial makes it much more difficult for survivors to recover. We have people in our community who have experienced war, ritual abuse, torture and have witnessed genocide. How do they see the world?

A woman who survived the Holocaust was asked how, after all the terrible things that happened to her, she found the strength to live each day. She replied, “It’s more a view of the world, a total worldwide view of extreme pessimism … [a sense] of really knowing the truth in a way that other people don’t know it. And all the truth is harsh and impossible to really accept, and yet you have to go on and function. So it’s a complete lack of faith in human beings, in all areas you know, whether it’s politics or whatever, you hear one thing and you believe something else. I mean you say, ‘Oh, well, I know the truth’. (Jay 1991: 19,20)

I found this to be a most enlightening statement. The survivor sees the world with extreme pessimism, sees it as no one else sees it, does not have faith in human beings, and does not believe in what they say. Can you imagine how it must feel to live a life which has these elements in it? What can be said to the survivor? The survivor of ritual abuse also knows the truth. She knows that her teacher, or her doctor, or her lawyer or the next door neighbour is capable of great evil and sadism, while at the same time presenting a public face which would deny any accusations against them.

Refugees from terror and persecution also know the twin faces. They remember that one day they were sending their children off to school, going to work, thinking about painting their roof and before the day was over, they were fleeing for their lives. They absolutely know that life is unpredictable and unsafe.

And there is another aspect. I met a Baha’i refugee from Iran who is no longer in New Zealand. He was filled with guilt. He asked was not his blood the same as those being martyred? And yet he was safe and sound in a free country with his wife and children. He had enormous guilt because he was able to leave Iran.

Shoghi Effendi wrote that a tempest, unprecedented in its violence is sweeping the face of the earth, that it is a cleansing force and it is disrupting the homes of its peoples and harrowing up the souls of its inhabitants. The promised day is come, the day when tormenting trials will have surged above your heads, and beneath your feet, saying: “Taste ye what your hands have wrought!” (Shoghi Effendi 1967: 1)

This is the day that we are living in. It is a day fraught with danger, both spiritual and physical and we know as Baha’is, that it’s going to get worse in the short term.

Having said that, however, I am concerned with process: how do we as a community respond to the sufferings of others? How do we help people make sense of their suffering?

This suffering is real and at times paralyzing. Extreme trauma destroys one’s ability to trust the world. The person actually lives in two worlds – the one around us and a world which is like a deep well of sadness. The traumatic event seems to violate the integrity of the essence of the person. One of the ways for a survivor to live with post traumatic stress disorder is for other people to listen to them. Survivors need to have a hearing in community. In other words, they need people to listen to what has happened to them and not make judgements.

However, this process is fraught with difficulties. In working with Viet Nam veterans, Jeffrey Jay of the Center for Post-Traumatic Stress Studies and Treatment in Washington D.C found that despite all the different therapies they tried, the young men were not recovering from their night and day mares. He writes With our therapeutic weapons of catharsis and confrontation in group therapy, we marched resolutely through the desolate landscape of the veterans’ alienation and isolation. Slowly, we began to understand the depths of the problem and the meager impact of our methods, which centred on the private, inner experience of the survivor. Only when we started to understand that the veterans, like most trauma victims, cannot fully recover until they can find meaning for their experience did we begin to realise the intimate connection between public acceptance and private resolution of the trauma.

Jeffrey Jay and his colleagues decided to have gather people together to listen to the veterans’ experiences. This was at a time in America when being a Vietnam vet was very unpopular. A young man told his story of how he threw a Vietcong family out of a helicopter to their deaths and wondered how he can now take up a normal life. At that meeting was an older man who had fought during World War II and his response was I want you to know that I was in the Pacific in the WW2. I landed on Corregidor. What happened to us was much worse than what happened to you, but I have never talked about it, I have never spoken of it, and I never will. (Jay 1991: 24)

To the older man, the young Vietnam veteran had violated a fundamental code of privacy that rigidly forbade the public revelation of terrible truths. However, the younger man had decided it was better to tell the truth to whom ever wanted to hear than to go to a pub and drink it off.

The older man could be replaced by an older woman admonishing a young woman that rape is part of a woman’s life, or religious refugees who say, we did it for God do not complain I do not think the trauma victims are saying oh woe is me, look at how hard life is, I believe they are trying to share what has happened to them to widen the human experience and speak their terrible truth.

We have all had the experience of being with someone who sounds like a broken record. All they can talk about is this terrible thing that happened and we can’t seem to get them off the subject. We can’t seem to get them to look at the bright side of life. These people are so negative we say. We should start to avoid them and let them get on with their own lives.

This is a very predictable pattern for human beings. At first we will reassure and offer cheering homilies. But the person keeps on talking in fact feels driven to a howling, self-centered outrage that exactly corresponds in ferocity to the pain and terror of the trauma itself. (Ibid.) So we, the community begin to give subtle warnings, but the person who experienced the trauma can not take heed. The ultimate trump card is shame. Only shame is powerful enough to squelch the victim’s desperate need to be heard. The power of shame is known and sanctioned in the Bible: In the story of Job, neither God nor the community would tolerate even a good and innocent man’s crying out against the most outrageous betrayal and unjust violence. The Greek root of the word shame is scham, which refers to a skin that is used to cover the exposed, vulnerable parts of a person, specially what is seen as shameful. The shamed person feels both exposed and condemned, uncovered and seen through – in a sense, flayed by the community’s disgust and contempt.

The trauma survivor already wishes, on some level, to disappear, to withdraw, to die.  Therefore, the best technique for silencing the trauma victim, whose outraged and betrayed sense of self cries out for expression, is shame, which alienates the private, violated self from the social self. Shame causes the private self to retreat into numbness, to repress feelings and dampen personal engagement with others. (Ibid.: 24, 25)

Now you might be saying to yourself, how very cruel of community to silence these people who have suffered so much. But the other side of the coin is this reality: To discuss in public the lasting effects of trauma would defy the assumption of acceptable, safe relations between consenting citizens of a decent society. Basically, the victim who will not remain silent is challenging society’s vision of itself, bearing witness to uncomfortable moral truths and demanding from everyone … a kind of moral accounting: ‘And where do you stand’, the victim asks ‘not on abstract issues of truth and justice, but on this war and this violence and this brutality, this terrible thing that happens every day in our world, yours as well as mine?’” (Ibid.:26, 27)

Ah, we respond to the trauma victim: but tests are a healing medicine, my calamity is my providence, God must really love you, no one is given a test beyond her own capacity, don’t be so negative, the world is not like that, forgive the people who hurt you and you’ll get over it.

And why do we say those things?

Because we cannot bear to live without hope. We believe that the world cannot be as bad as we are being told. But this is what the post traumatic stress disorder survivor does not have – hope. Many survivors have a great well of sorrow within them which cannot be filled.

Robyn Morgan writes about a Cambodian woman who saw her family and friends tortured and executed by the Khmer Rouge. The woman said that one day they picked out one woman and one man and hit them again and again. She began crying again, and couldn’t stop. She recalls that ‘it felt like there was a big needle pushing through my head.’ When she stopped crying, days later, she could no longer see. (Morgan 1993: 283, 284) The woman was blinded by sorrow. Can you imagine what that must be like? To be so sad, you decide that you no longer want to look out at the world.

Some people advise the person to forgive and forget. In other words, forgive the people who hurt you so you can get over it. I am not saying that we should not forgive, but I think we need to know what kind of forgiveness we are talking about when such advice is given and by forgiving the individual, will the event really be forgotten?

First of all, when we advise someone to forgive, what kind of forgiveness is it? Is it forgiveness based on the reversal of moral judgement, or as a remission of punishment, or is it to overcome resentment? (Haber 1991: 12-22)

I do not think any of these are appropriate when a person or persons have inflicted great harm on another. In a letter written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice regarding the forgiveness of a father who has abused his daughter, it states:

To forgive him will not be easy, and this is not something to which either you or the members of your family can force yourselves. Nevertheless, you should know that forgiveness is the standard which individual Baha’is are called upon to attain. It is an essential part of the spiritual growth of a person who has been wronged. To nurse a grievance or hatred against another soul is spiritually poisonous to the soul which nurses it, but to strive to see another person as a child of God and, however heinous his deeds, to attempt to overlook his sins for the sake of God, removes bitterness from the soul and both ennobles and strengthens it.” (The Universal House of Justice 1992: #10)

This is the kind of forgiveness we are called upon to deliver: it is not in a soul’s best interest to harbour hatred. I think one of the hardest things about forgiving is if the wrongdoers have not been punished by society. However the above quote indicates that forgiveness is an individual act, rather than a community act, so it is possible for a wronged one to forgive, whether or not the wrongdoer is repentant.  And it is up to the community to punish the wrongdoer as ‘Abdu’l-Baha revealed:

But if criminals were entirely forgiven, the order of the world would be upset. So punishment is one of the essential necessities for the safety of communities, but he who is oppressed by a transgressor has not the right to take vengeance. On the contrary, he should forgive and pardon, for this is worthy of the world of man.” (‘Abdu’l-Baha 1982: 268)

I read a wonderful book entitled Why Bad Things Happen to Good People by Harold Kushner.  His son had a degenerative disease and his book explores not why bad things happen to good people per se but the human response to pain, our own and others. I found his book to be a great eye opener because it distances God from the evil that humans inflict on each other, and puts disease and accidents in their rightful place in the scheme of things.

In examining the life of the Prophet Job, he comes up with three statements he says we would all like to believe and they are: that God is all-powerful and causes everything that happens in the world. Nothing happens without His willing it; that God is just and fair, and stands for people getting what they deserve, so that the good prosper and the wicked are punished; that Job is a good person.

These three statements do not contradict themselves as long as nothing goes wrong. As we know, everything went wrong for Job, one of God’s most devoted followers, therefore since God is all powerful and God gives people what they deserve, then Job must have been a sinner. But we know that Job was not a sinner, therefore was God testing him? But why kill his children to see if Job could pass a test? Would you want to believe in a God that murders innocent children? How do you pray to such a God?

We may not say these things out loud to ourselves, especially being Baha’is and believing that we know God’s Plan for humankind. However, I believe in the collective memory of humanity and I believe that we have all kinds of unchallenged assumptions about God and life on this planet. So even if we are Baha’is we are liable to have a belief system which dates back to the time of Job. This is not a criticism, but rather an acknowledgement that it takes many generations to discard outworn beliefs.

So in endeavouring to make meaning out of suffering, and knowing that God is good, and wants only the best for us, it must have been on some level, we think, that Job – or the questioned God, when he tried to find meaning in his suffering, God neither gave him a reason nor call him a sinner. God replied, in part: Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?  Gird up now thy loins like a man; for I will demand of thee and answer thou me. Where wast thou when I laid the foundations for the earth?  Declare if thou has understanding. …. Hast thou commanded the morning since thy days; and caused the dayspring to know his place? (Job 38, 3, 4, 12)

Or as Baha’u’llah revealed: From His retreat of glory His Voice is ever proclaiming: ‘Verily, I am God; there is none other God besides Me, the All-Knowing, the All-Wise”. (Baha’u’llah 1963: 49)

According to Kushner, there is an old Iranian folk proverb about God and suffering and our response to one another’s suffering:  If you see a blind man, kick him; why should you be kinder than God ?  He explains: In other words, if you see someone who is suffering, you must believe that he deserves his fate and that God wants him to suffer. Therefore, put yourself on God’s side by shunning him or humiliating him further. If you try to help him, you will be going against God’s justice”. (Kushner: 94)

I don’t know if this is an Iranian folk proverb. Perhaps it’s just a human folk proverb because some part of me immediately understood the proverb. If God is an all-loving parent, then He would never hurt us, so therefore the blind man must have done something to deserve his blindness. This is one way of trying to understand suffering, but upon close scrutiny, it does not stand up to reason. Does God really make people disabled so that the person will know and love God more? I think not.

I think sickness occurs because there is disease. There is something out of order in the body. God is there so that one can find strength and comfort. How can one pray to the One that caused the illness? It’s like being nice to a thief that robbed you of a precious jewel. God does not cause evil. Humans inflict evil on each other.

Baha’u’llah revealed:

“Indeed the actions of man himself breed a profusion of satanic power. For were men to abide by and observe the divine teachings, every trace of evil would be banished from the face of the earth. However, the widespread differences that exist among mankind  and the prevalence of sedition, contention, conflict and the like are the primary factors which provoke the appearance of the satanic spirit. Yet the Holy Spirit hath ever shunned such matters. A world in which naught can be perceived save strife, quarrels and corruption is bound to became the seat of the throne, the very metropolis, of Satan.” (Baha’u’llah 1982: 176-177)

I would now like to talk about the soul. I am conscious of the fact that Baha’u’llah revealed that the soul is a mystery no mind, however acute, can ever hope to unravel.  (Baha’u’llah 1963: 158, 159) The Bab revealed “As this physical frame is the throne of the inner temple, whatever occurs to the former is felt by the latter. In reality that which takes delight in joy or is saddened by pain is the inner temple of the body, not the body itself…” (The Bab 1976: 95)

Abdu’l-Baha writes

“But when sadness visits us we become weak, our strength leaves us, our comprehension is dim, and our intelligence veiled. The actualities of life seem to elude our grasp, the eyes of our spirits fail to discover the secret mysteries, and we become even as dead beings. ( ‘Abdu’l-Baha 1962: 15, 16)

John Bradshaw, the author of Creating Love: the next great stage of growth believes that the soul is what recognises that we are being degraded in an act of abuse. (1992: 116)

This is what I believe happens when traumatic events occur and people develop post traumatic stress disorder: I believe that when people suffer a traumatic event, it’s like someone has heaped a lot of garbage on them – invisible garbage. And they have to find their way out of this labyrinth of awfulness and it is their soul which knows something terrible has happened and it seeks relief.

It is imperative that the community prays for the soul to assist it in its long journey out of the invisible garbage heap.  Remember, for post traumatic stress disorder survivors, their world has been turned into a nightmare. At any time, due to some outside influence they can return to the place of the trauma. Sometimes the sadness and grief is so great that even listening to music can be the cause of great pain.

 I do not believe it is useful to mouth the platitudes I mentioned above to people who suffer from post traumatic stress disorder. To say to someone that because this traumatic event happened to them proves that God must really love them places both God and the survivor in a very precarious position. Where does the survivor now go for love and succour? Is this really what God is all about – personally visiting chaos on unsuspecting people?

Trust is a most crucial element in a human being’s life. It’s a firm belief in the reliability or truth or strength of a person or thing; it’s a confident expectation. We trust gravity will work every time we put our feet on the ground. We trust when the traffic light is green, it’s safe to proceed.

Now I want you to picture for a moment what it would be like for you not to trust anything around you. What would it be like not to be able to rely on anything? This is what it is to varying degrees for people with post traumatic stress disorder.

For instance, for people who have been ritually abused this overhead shows the world they might inhabit. (Available from author). Words take on different meanings, the young woman is thrown back to the experiences of the past and can not trust the psychiatrist because he has now become in her mind “one of them”.

So how is trust regained? It is my experience that there are some very important elements in rebuilding trust and they are love, listen, and believe. Love: Baha’u’llah revealed O ye rich ones of the earth! The poor in your midst are My trust; guard ye My trust, and be not intent only on your own ease. (Baha’u’llah 1966: 41)

‘Amatu’l-Baha Ruhiiyih Khanum said that there is so little love in the world that those of us who have an abundance of it should share it. And this is what this Hidden Word means to me. If we are rich in love, then we must share it with those who have known abuse and degradation.

Listen: Sometimes all it takes is for someone to extend a hand and reach in the invisible garbage heap and help the survivor find her way. This means listening to the person.  It can take hours and hours, sometimes years, but eventually the person is finally able to stop talking and resume some sort of life.

Brenda Ueland says listening is a great and powerful thing, a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. She writes Think how the friends that really listen to us are the ones we move toward, and we want to sit in their radius as though it did us good, like ultraviolet rays.  She says that when we are listened to, really listened to as if what we have to say means something, ideas actually begin to grow within us and come to life. When we have problems, who is it that we go to? She asks. Not to the hard, bossy practical ones who can tell you exactly what to do, but to the listeners: that is, the kindest, least censorious, least bossy people that you know. It is because by pouring out your problem to them, you then know what to do about it yourself. (Ueland 1992: 104)

I think people with post traumatic stress disorder are always trying to make sense of what has happened. The are trying to find the meaning of their experience. Belief: Often the traumatic event is unbelievable and to take the step towards belief is to go against what one might have thought previously about the goodness of human beings. But belief is essential because as more and more people believe that human beings can become lower than animals, the person with post traumatic stress disorder is not living in an isolated world of terror. They are able to talk about it knowing that people won’t think they are crazy.

How does all this relate to community? I would like to share with you a recent incident, although none of the people involved have post traumatic stress disorder. It was at a study class, and there were two people who arrived late. One of them was very upset because a friend of hers had just committed suicide. She asked that in our round of prayers we remember her friend. The study class continued after the prayers and there was some tension. When I was driving home, I realised that what we should have done, had we been true community, was to listen to the woman tell us how she felt about this terrible news, and ask if there was anything we could do, perhaps pray, or let her cry, or let her tell us about the dead woman.

Now I know some may be thinking about justice and how it would not have been just to all the friends who came for the study class. Well I have thought about it, and I think if it had been Feast or an LSA meeting, perhaps that’s correct because these are institutional meetings. But this was a study class where a great big white elephant walked in and everyone ignored it.

Shoghi Effendi wrote to an individual believer in 1935 that Baha’i community life provides you with an indispensable laboratory where you can translate into living and constructive action, the principles which you imbibe from the teachings….” (Shoghi Effendi 1935)

One of the outstanding writers of our time is M Scott Peck, author of books like The Different Drum, The Road Less Travelled, and A World Waiting to be Born, who writes at length about the laboratory or community. I think he has some wonderful insights about the nature of community. Peck writes: Community is and must be inclusive. The great enemy of community is exclusivity. (Peck 19 : 61)

Community: a group that has learned to transcend its individual differences. Community is contemplative. The members are thoughtful about themselves, and become thoughtful about the group. (Ibid.: 62)

Community is a safe place. As soon as it is safe to speak one’s heart, as soon as most people in the group know they will be listened to and accepted for themselves, vulnerability snowballs and community members find themselves being valued and appreciated. They become more vulnerable. Love and acceptance escalates. They become intimate friends, and true healing begins. (Ibid: 68)

Community requires the ability to expose our wounds and weakness to our fellow creatures. It also requires the capacity to be affected by the wounds of others, to be wounded by their wounds. (Ibid: 69,70)

He also writes about the stages community goes through, over and over again. The stage of pretence. The communication in pseudocommunity is filled with generalisations. It is polite, inauthentic, boring, sterile and unproductive. The stage of chaos: the attempt to obliterate the differences which have escalated during pseudocommunity. The stage of emptiness: I call this the suffering stage because it is the time that members of the community are striving to become community and must relinquish prejudices, snap judgements, fixed expectations, the desire to convert, heal or fix, the urge to win, the fear of looking like a fool, the need to control.

Peck writes Other things may be exquisitely personal: hidden griefs, hatreds or terrors that must be confessed, made public, before the individual can be fully ‘present’ to the group. This is the time of risk taking and requires great individual courage. Peck believes that community must become empty for a kind of miracle to occur. Is this not what Baha’u’llah tells us about teaching either ourselves or others? – that we cannot fill an overflowing cup. It must be emptied first. Only after these three stages can there be true community, which then must go through the stages again and again as it advances towards perfection. (Peck 1993: 275-276)

If we have people in the Baha’i community who have terrible stories to tell and they have no one who will listen to them,

how then will we become true community?

How will we be enriched by their courage and their will to live in the face of denial, if we do not hear their stories?

I believe we have a lot to learn from people who have suffered trauma because we will learn how to be truly human as God has intended us to be. And the community also has a an important part to play in the healing process. In a letter to an individual believer, the Department of the Secretariat wrote on behalf of the Universal House of Justice:

Your letter refers to experiences in the Baha’i community such as group activity, chanting, embracing, and referring to ‘Abdu’l-Baha as the Master, which have the effect of triggering in your daughters the revival of the painful memories they are seeking to overcome. While this is unfortunate, it might also be viewed as an important part of the healing process that they learn to clearly distinguish between people motivated by a corrupt inclination to abuse and manipulate others, and a community which has as its watchword the protection of the rights of each individual, and which is striving to strengthen the bond of mutual love and respect which binds it together. (The Universal House of Justice 1992: 2)

When people share it also brings about incalculable public good. Jeffrey Jay writes that the effects of trauma cannot disappear from the history of the victim so there are two choices for the victim:  introspection or extrospection. The latter allows the victim to understand not only how the traumatic state is maintained by public ostracism, but how they can transform their personal shame into effective public witness. Even though the community resists what trauma victims have to say, it needs their knowledge in order to understand that trauma begins in the community and belongs in the community. (Jay: 27)

The Baha’i community has an awesome responsibility. As world conditions worsen, there will be more and more traumatised souls coming into the Baha’i community. Unless the community is able to listen and believe what has happened, and unless the community allows these people to speak their pain, then they will come in and go out again. Because remember many of them have a complete lack of faith in human beings, in all areas you know, whether it’s politics or whatever, you hear one thing and you believe something else. (Jay: 18,19)

I have attempted in this paper to address the issues that accompany post traumatic stress disorder, its challenge to the community, and steps which may assist the community to face this issue.

These are the references:

‘Abdu’l-Baha (1982) The Promulgation of Universal Peace. Discourses by Abdul Baha Abbas during His visit to the United States and Canada in 1912, Baha’i Publishing Trust, Wilmette.

‘Abdu’l-Baha (1962) “Joy and Pain”. In The Reality of Man Excerpts from Writings of Baha’u’llah (1963)

Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u’llah, Baha’i Publishing Trust, Wilmette. Baha’u’llah (1966)

The Hidden Words, Baha’i Publishing Trust, London. Baha’u’llah (1982),

Tablets of Baha’u'llah Revealed after the Kitab-i-Aqdas, Baha’i World Centre, Haifa.

Bradshaw, John (1992), Creating Love: the next great stage of growth, Bantam Books, New York.

Department of the Secretariat of the Universal House of Justice. A letter to an individual Baha’i: 5 January 1992.

Department of the Secretariat of the Universal House of Justice. Some issues relating to child abuse. An attachment to a letter to an individual Baha’i: 5 January 1992 5 #10.

Effendi, Shoghi (1961) The Promised Day is Come, Bahá’í Publishing Trust, Wilmette.

Effendi, Shoghi (1935) Letter to Allen Tichener.

Friedman, Matthew J (1996) ‘Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: An Overview’ in WWW email ptsd@dartmouth.edu.

Haber,Joram Graf (1991) Forgiveness, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Maryland.

Jay, J. Terrible Knowledge, Networker, Nov/Dec 1991 Job 38, 3, 4, 12:

The Holy Bible authorized King James Version, Nashville Kushner,Harold S. (1982),

When bad things happen to good people, Pan Books, London. Morgan, Robyn (1993)

The Words of a Woman: Selected Prose 1968 – 1992, Virago Press Limited, London.

Peck, Morgan Scott (1987) The Different Drum, Simon &Schuster, New York.

Peck, Morgan Scott (1993) A World Waiting To Be Born, Civility Rediscovered, Bantam Books, New York.

The Bab (1976), Selections from the Writings of the Bab. Haifa: Baha’i World Centre.

Ueland, Brenda (1992) ‘Tell me more’ In Utne Reader, Nov/Dec 1992.

 

  If I was to summarize the Baha’i quotes on mental illness, and try to put the ideas into my own words, this is what I’ve learned: Although God alone knows the reason for disease, mental illness can be caused by being without the love of God in our hearts or by trying to attack [...]

 

If I was to summarize the Baha’i quotes on mental illness, and try to put the ideas into my own words, this is what I’ve learned:

Although God alone knows the reason for disease, mental illness can be caused by being without the love of God in our hearts or by trying to attack the Cause of God.  It can be part of the polish God uses to draw us closer to Him.

Although emotionally and physically painful to be burdened with it at times, mental illness only affects our minds, and not our spirits or our soul.  Though its effects might hinder us or be a burden in striving towards spiritual progress, still we know that our spirits are healthy and close to God, and that in the next world we’ll be free to enjoy a happy and normal state.

Treatment for mental illness, as for all diseases, consists of seeking the best medical advice you can find, even if it means travelling to a bigger city to find it, and then following it.

Psychiatric treatment is still a growing rather than a perfected science, and psychiatrists are not always wise or right, but even so, we need to avail ourselves of the best they have to offer.  The science of the mind, of normality and of the disabilities from which it may suffer, is in its relative infancy, but much may be possible to aid us to minimize our suffering and make it possible to live an active life.

Your discovery of the Faith, of its healing Writings and its great purposes for the individual and for all mankind, have indeed brought to you a powerful force toward a healthy life which will sustain you on a higher level, whatever your ailment may be.

The best results for the healing process are to combine the spiritual with the physical, for it should be possible for you to overcome your illness through the combined and sustained power of prayer and of determined effort.

That effort can include the counsel of wise and experienced physicians, including psychiatrists. Working for the Faith, serving others who may need you, and giving of yourself can aid you in your struggle to overcome your sufferings. One helpful activity is, of course, striving to teach the Cause in spite of personal feelings of shortcomings, thus allowing the healing words of the Cause flood your mind with their grace and positive power.

The Writings promise us that madness, incurable otherwise, can be cured through prayer; that spiritual feelings have a surprising effect on healing nervous ailments and that as the world becomes more spiritually minded and scientists understand the true nature of man, more humane and permanent cures for mental diseases will be found.

There are a great many as you know mental diseases and troubles at present, and the one thing Bahá’ís must not do is take a defeatist attitude toward them. The power in the Faith is such that it can sustain us on a much higher level in spite of whatever our ailments might be, than other people who are denied it.