The New Age Mind Fuck and the Illusion of Absolute Power
Sun, 04/12/2009 - 9:39pm | 
stephanie
It's kind of cool that you can write something and stir up an article in response to you. My blog post about the New Age Mind Fuck hit a nerve. So here is my response to:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/13442748/Just-do-it-When-youre-ready-that-is
Interesting article. I'm glad you still like me, but I think you missed the point of the New Age Mind Fuck completely. The issue at hand is that some new agers cynically use the idea of "empowerment" to deflect responsibility from themselves and make you doubt your own perceptions and intuitions. In the case of the cheating spouse, the spouse, when confronted by the other spouse, will use new age terminology to deny their responsibility or pretend that the cheating never happened in the first place.
E.g., let's say you confront a cheating partner when your intuition is screaming at you that there's something not quite right...the “New Age Mind Fuck” response is designed to make you deny your own intuitive feelings and blame yourself instead of acknowledging the truth – your partner is a cheat (and now a liar). IF you give into the Mind Fuck, you'll start to dismiss and doubt your intuition, at worst starting to feel crazy or bad for feeling this way about your partner.
I'll never forget the time I knew intuitively my partner was at another woman's house having dinner and lying to me about it. He lied to my face when I confronted him, and because I had no "proof" I went through a lengthy period of self-doubt until I found out from him months later that I was 100% right. I've learned since that when push comes to shove, I'll always trust my gut over what anyone else tells me. That's called having self-esteem and confidence in your spiritual connection.
I also don't buy into this idea that every bad thing that happened to you is some sort of lesson from your soul, chosen before birth, and therefore that makes it OK for someone else to treat you badly. I've heard new agers dismiss rape (especially of children) by saying that the soul asked for it or “agreed to it” before being born. I think this is hogwash. No-one can possibly convince me that a 4-year-old girl in Africa with her insides torn apart due to gang rape asked for it spiritually or otherwise. Sometimes bad people do bad things.
People who use the New Age Mind Fuck on others do so to deny their own culpability and responsibility. There just happens to be enough of an almost desperate interest in personal power and control among the new age to make such crazymaking behavior especially easy to sell: "I didn't just embezzle $10,000 from your business – I'm just here to teach you to be less attached to your money." "I may be your teacher, but I didn't take advantage of you sexually, you needed to learn the lesson of surrender." Etc. etc.
Then the victim, desparate to find meaning in the betrayal, will try to make an excuse for the perpetrator. "You're right, I manifested that embezzlement over my fear of losing money!" "Of course, I created this sexual relationship with my teacher, I hit on him, because I needed to resolve my resistence to vulnerablity!"
I think one of the biggest problems a lot of new agers have is that they seem to have an almost pathological need for control of EVERYTHING in their lives. Not just in terms of manifesting parking spaces, but in terms of controlling the uncontrollable – other people's behavior as well as the weather.
For some people, this illusion of absolute control for some reason seems comforting. They feel that if they are responsible for other people's behavior, if they “fix” themselves enough, someday they'll be able to control other people's behavior to the point of never getting hurt ever again.
Sorry, that's just not realistic. Nor is it the path to peace. Trying to control everything is born out of one thing and one thing only: Fear. Fear that something might happen that we have no control over that brings us pain. But true peace is to learn how to accept the bad stuff without blaming ourselves for every little thing. Forgive. Allow. And yes, sometimes set boundaries and move on when you need to.
So my bottom line is: If my partner cheats on me, it is not my fault. It was my partner's choice to engage in the cheating. Now, I can certainly take responsibility for my part in the relationship falling apart, and I can certainly also ask myself why I might get involved with someone who is prone to cheat, but the bottom line is – I did not engage in the cheating. My partner did. At the moment of temptation, they chose to cheat. That was their decision and theirs alone. At the point of finding out about it, it does you no good to sit there and screw yourself over even more via mental convolutions as to why you needed to “create” this event to learn such and such lesson...I'd say you'd better use your time by either forgiving your partner if you choose to stay, or simply leaving and getting a more faithful partner.
(And no, my belief in this does not mean I have blocked chakras! In fact, people can have varying beliefs and they don't necessarily have any relevance to chakra blockages whatsoever.)
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I couldn't agree more with
I couldn't agree more with you, Stephanie. And this:
"I think one of the biggest problems a lot of new agers have is that they seem to have an almost pathological need for control of EVERYTHING in their lives. Not just in terms of manifesting parking spaces, but in terms of controlling the uncontrollable – other people's behavior as well as the weather."
COMPLETELY true in all my experiences. Thanks for this incisive blog post. I believe that we can choose to learn from any of the experiences that life brings us, but to say that we have "chosen" the most traumatic things that can possibly happen to a person is beyond ludicrous--it's cruel and inhumane.
So, about ten minutes I
So, about ten minutes I logged into my Scrib account and realized there was a response to my article. Not to beat a dead horse, but it deserves a response (I think anyway) and with the latest eclipse bringing to light a lot of beginnings and endings, particularly in the house of relationships I think it’s a good time.
Here's my twitch. You’re taking the negative aspect of a great movement and lumping it together like it’s the entire movement. That would be like me saying every Evangelist is a money grubbing fake. Or every Catholic priest will molest a child. It’s not true. There are some beautiful, genuine, and I think important concepts of the New Age movement but they need to be well understood, with a balance of mind and heart. And with all the dis-information out there it’s very important the right message gets spread.
Lookit, here's what we can agree on. If your spouse cheats on you, it is absolutely not your fault. When my spouse cheated on me it was not my fault. However, in every situation there presents an opportunity to learn, to expand, to rise above. I fully believe that there are some situations that will be presented to us so that we can clear up things within us that need clearing up. How else would we know they needed clearing? That doesn't excuse the perpetrator if it’s a transgression through no fault of our own. For example, a drunk driver runs a red light and hits my car. Obviously this is not my fault. It’s this guys fault, for choosing to get drunk and doing something so incredibly stupid and dangerous. But on my end I have a choice. Forgive him, but damn sure call the police and let him deal with the consequences. But I still forgave him. And maybe that day is a catalyst for him to fix some of the things imabalanced in his life. We're all in this together. It does not excuse the bad things we do, but how we react to the “Bad” things are just as important if not more so, than the bad things themselves.
Let me address your embezzler example; perhaps you did need to learn to not be so attached to material things. That doesn't excuse the man who embezzled the money from you. It doesn't make him innocent or even what he did to you okay, not even close. But, there is still a lesson you can take from that, WITHOUT making yourself a victim. In fact I think this empowers you. Yes, without question sometimes unbalanced people do unbalanced things. It doesn’t make them okay. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try and stop them from happening. But for every negative thing that happens to us, (and no not all of it is pre-planned) offers us an opportunity to step out of the role of victim and into a role of empowerment. If we can look at those situations from larger eyes, and take higher lessons from them, then we don't give them so much power over us. This doesn’t have to be easy, a child who was molested should have never been is not in any way shape or form okay. That’s just sad and makes me twitch harder that someone could use new age logic to try and justify that, because that’s simply incorrect. No true seeker on this path would ever do that, no true teacher would sprout that logic and if you’ve ever seen one, then you need to lump them in the group of molesting catholic priest, or con man, or that guy on TV reading the gospel then asking you for money, where they belong. If a man murders my husband it doesn’t make taking a life okay. But maybe that allows me to learn that nothing really dies, which is true. Death is not an ending, it’s a transformation. You see my point? At the end of the day if there is something that we can take from those negative situations that opens us up, that allows us not to approve, or condone but forgive then we have just raised ourselves a little higher, and thereby made the world a little better.
Those of us in the new age movement are not control freaks. (I also think the term New Age doesn’t cut it. I think what we the people are experiencing right now is a shift in consciousness but back on point) I was a control freak. (Scorpio, heelllooo). And letting go was one of the hardest things for me to learn how to do. Stepping onto this path has taught me to do that, and I practice it every day. It is only by surrendering that you open yourself to all the possibilities life has to offer. We have to let go, it’s all about letting go. How else can we let other things in? And if every now and then I'm feeling a little lazy and want to manifest a parking space nearby, why not. But it’s really not going to be a big deal if I don't find one and usually that sort of energy can be put into something a little more productive. (And when making a point like this it’s so important you’ve got the full picture, and you really understand it because surrendering doesn’t mean you don’t speak your truth – throat chakra – or stand up for yourself – stomach chakra- etc).
Look, you’re completely right. Some people will completely take the beliefs of the new age movement and use them THE WRONG WAY. But that is not the ENTIRE movement. That is not what it is about, that is not what it represents. I always, always, always, always advise that you use your own discernment and any other true teacher on this path will too. You take what feels right to you and you discard the rest. It’s all about you not being a victim and taking your power back. You have too. You want to change the world? You change you.
Look, I love everybody. Truly. I love you, and your readers and I mean that. And we should have different views. No one will see the world the way I do or love the way I do. No one will love, or see the world the way the way you do, but we're still connected. We still have choice and control over our lives and we will still on occasion crash into each other as we try to figure this all out.
And never, ever, ever, ever, do you have power over another human being. You may uplift others with your presence and we’ve all been around people like that. They have this energy about them and just being around them puts you in a good mood. But we are never responsible for you, nor do we want to be. That's completely dis-respectful of your journey. You responsible for your life. Period. Let go and you’ll have complete control. Let that hurt your brain for a little while :D
Lastly, I would never would say that just because you disagree with me you’re blocked. That’s silly. You speak out as you should and defend your point of view as you should. And I really don't think we're disagreeing to be honest, we're just focusing on two different sides of the same coin.
Look, I love everybody.
Look, I love everybody. Truly. I love you, and your readers and I mean that. And we should have different views. No one will see the world the way I do or love the way I do. No one will love, or see the world the way the way you do, but we're still connected. We still have choice and control over our lives and we will still on occasion crash into each other as we try to figure this all out. 70-553 | 70-554 | 70-555 | 70-556 | 70-557 | 70-558 | 70-559 | 70-561 | 70-562 | 70-563 | 70-564
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