Do No Harm: Reflections on Healing Ourselves, Healing Our World

 The Need for Our Human Evolution

Yes, let us rise by lifting others. Again and again I am moved to return to variations of this theme. And I am drawn to identifying and addressing the obstacles to our caring and to working together in ways which help rather than harm. A core question: What does a commitment to Do No Harm look like in our thoughts, actions, beliefs, values, and the ways we live our lives? Related to that is another question: What does our Circle of Caring look like? Who do we include and who do we exclude, and why? And under these questions is one more: How much does self inquiry and more deeply understanding ourselves and others matter?

It was 35 years ago in 1984 when I was first told by an early therapist that I was going to need to engage in "shadow work" and making "the long journey from my head to my heart." I had no idea what he was talking about. I remember that fear and "no way" were my knee jerk reactions. And I remember this faint knowing that I was going to need to do this, whatever "this" was. My therapist spoke these words to me shortly before I got sober and before I had any true awareness of how disassociated I had been throughout my young lifetime. Unknown to me when I was turning 33 was that I was starting on a journey into new territory which would ultimately break my heart wide open and completely transform my life. Talk about radical change. I am among the countless others who have lived it.

I share this because it is my belief that humankind is in deep need of engaging in ever deeper levels of "shadow work" — of uncovering our blind spots and making the unconscious conscious, of owning our reactivity and triggers and becoming accountable, of shedding the walls we build around our hearts which keep us stuck in polarizing belief systems of us versus a them, of emerging again and again out of any obscuring fog that we may have been unknowingly been living in, of healing our woundedness and opening our hearts and minds, and of lifting the veils of our illusions, ignorance, and indoctrination into a process which has cost us dearly, whether we know it or not. This takes great courage. And humility, intention, strength, support, curiosity, compassion, commitment, resilience, Grace and Love. Without these qualities growing and expanding within ourselves and our lives, we are at risk of not getting started or of turning around and going backwards when we hit a wall, not recognizing that this wall holds a new doorway inviting us into the next layer of work that is part of this journey of becoming who we are and growing in our capacity to be a strong, kind, and compassionate presence in the world. We simply need to want to seek that doorway and have the willingness, courage, consciousness, and support to enter.

Pink Floyd may have once sung about being comfortably numb, but I believe that that is an oxymoron. There may be the illusion of comfort that comes with numbness, but it is only that — an illusion. I look back upon my many years before I began my own Great Thaw, and to the early years of my sobriety and awakening, and to this day experience both sadness and compassion for all the harm and hurt I unknowingly caused for myself and others, including my own children. Today, my whole life is committed to living my amends and to being a presence of kindness in the world by dedicating my life to walking a path of No Harm and — deeply interconnected — by doing the work of growing ever more inclusive in who and what I consciously care about. This is not an easy journey because there is no end point where I can brush my hands off and think, well done, mission accomplished. That is not the way this works because there is always more to learn, to see, to open to beyond what I am conscious of right now. Again and again, because of my intention and passion for opening my heart and mind, I am thrown out of the nest of what I had thought to be true and into a whole new depth of awareness. In this process, I experience both the breaking open of my heart and mind and an ever expanding capacity for understanding, compassion, connection, joy, and love. 

So, if we are alive and breathing, there is more work that can be done to shed the obstacles to our innate capacity to care, to be kind, and to grow in consciousness. At least this has certainly been my experience. How humbling! And what a gift! And, even though there is certainly deep sorrow that comes with the intention to bear witness to the pain in our world — for we cannot act to alleviate the suffering we do not see — there is also this growing freedom to love. This is no small matter. The truth of the larger picture that I have experienced is that every time we allow our hearts to break open, more space is cleared for love. And, a wonderful paradox, as I grow in my capacity to see and bear witness to my own suffering and that of others, my capacity for joy also grows and grows. Kahlil Gibran speaks beautifully of this intimate relationship between joy and sorrow here: http://www.katsandogz.com/onjoy.html. This journey, for me, at its core is the experience of Amazing Grace. It is my belief that Grace floods our lives and ripples out into the world as we work to heal ourselves and awaken.

Each and every one of us are on own our paths and we are all doing the best we can do. I truly believe that. And there is more. I continue to share about my own journey because it is my belief that we can inspire and support and encourage others through sharing our experience, strength, and hope — a phrase I first heard in 12 Step meetings over three decades ago. I cannot even begin to name all those who have made a profound difference in my life. So many! Wow! And one of the lessons I have absorbed on my journey is that with each passing year, we humans are growing more or less conscious — we are growing increasingly expansive and open, or we are in a process of contracting and gradually narrowing and closing our hearts and minds. Depending on the choices we are making, consciously or otherwise, our circles of caring are shrinking or stagnant, or we are experiencing ever greater connectedness and inclusivity in who and what we are able to see and understand, experience compassion and empathy with, and truly care about. In essence, we are consciously finding our own ways to contribute to alleviating the suffering in the world, or we are unconsciously adding to that suffering. I personally know what it is like to live in both worlds, which is why I am able today to experience less judgment and far greater compassion for us all.

I also absolutely believe in the need and the potential for each of us, and in our own unique ways, to participate in our human evolution. 

*****

 "There is something in me that I am taking out on you."
— Nancy Strong (my mother), spring of 2014

It was initially the above photograph and related videos, articles, and reactions which inspired me to share what my heart and soul is moved to write today. There was certainly a wide range of reactions that I observed. Again and again I witnessed adults referring to these kids as "thugs," "MAGA punks," "privileged white assholes," and other name calling. I am also aware that after this incident these teenagers received threats, including death threats. On the other end, I am aware of those who referred to the Native American elder as "a liar," "a total fraud," "an ex-drunk, homeless, race baiter," someone with a criminal record. And the list goes on. 

What is needed here, I believe, is to take a step back from who did what where and all the resulting triggers and unskilled reactions and justifications for hurling insults and names and subtle and not subtle threats of violence. We humans can so easily be swept up in our side against your side, us versus the Other, and all the ways that we engage in dehumanizing one another. This narrow lens of seeing other human beings as _________ (fill in the blank: left/right, Republican/Democrat, liberal/conservative, Trump supporter/Trump hater) and all the ways that we divide ourselves up by our politics, religion, race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, socioeconomic class, etc., etc., etc. is NOT helpful.

There is another way. This other way takes courage. And I have found that it takes curiosity, humility, a willingness to not believe everything we think, a deep commitment to truth, and a true desire to explore and evolve and grow. We need to want to do better, to be more skillful and mindful, to be accountable to ourselves and others, and to embrace values rooted in the desire to contribute to the well-being of us all. It takes a lot to let go to our attachments to being right and to do the work of expanding our circles of caring. I know this deeply out of my own incredibly humbling and empowering healing journey. And, of course, this is a tall order, and especially if we are deep in the trenches of polarizing belief systems which utterly cut us off from our greater capacity for understanding, kindness, and compassion. This quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. is relevant: "Men often hate each other because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don't know each other; they don't know each other because they can not communicate; they can not communicate because they are separated."

Thích Nhất Hạnh has also wisely stated something very profound, "We are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness." Just imagine a world where we humans have taken the radical steps to peel back all that gives us the illusions that are at the root of our sense of separateness and our name calling and empathic failures and all the many faces of violence. Just imagine that you and I and humankind are engaged in an active process of evolving into living by a New Story, one which values and honors and blesses and protects life. Among the many vital steps to our human growth and evolution that I have experienced is lowering my tolerance for violence, a term I first heard many years ago from a friend in recovery. I have never forgotten this quote and the transformative power it has held for me over the years — and potentially for us all. To transform my thinking and perceptions, I have first needed to learn to identify and know what violence is, something I had not really understood or recognized before. And it certainly was not possible for me to lower my tolerance for violence as long as I minimized or denied the many faces of what deep harm and violence look like. 

And, of course, there are all the justifications which can numb or blind any of us to the ways that we are adding to the pain in our world, even when we are well meaning and want to do the opposite. I recently observed a friend on Facebook stating that "he couldn't help it" when referring to the hatred, name calling, judging and blaming he was engaging in. Yes, he cares deeply about the destruction of the Earth and the suffering that is caused to so many. So he believes he can't help but express his rage and hatred. I believe that is the motto for a lot of us — "I can't help it," or "They deserve it." That used to also be my belief system, such as decades ago when I thought my first husband was going to turn me into an alcoholic. It was going to be his fault. Well, I was already an alcoholic and Jim certainly didn't cause me to have the disease of addiction. Today, when I become mindful of hatred rising in my heart, I know that I need to be mindful of and own whatever it is that I am feeling and do the work of going under these unhelpful and unhealthy emotions to the true experience that I was distracting myself from by hating, blaming, name calling, etc. Again, and again, today I know that I need to return to the deeper sorrow, fear and grief that hatred, rage, and blame can all mask. And I know that I need to feel through what is arising and refuse to stay stuck in any reactions which mirror the harm that so deeply disturbs me and hurts my heart. I can work to transform my heartbreak and outrage into something useful, something which sends out ripples of healing rather than harm.

Joanna Macy speaks wisely to the truth of these times: "We are capable of suffering with our world, and that is the true meaning of compassion. It enables us to recognize our profound interconnectedness with all beings. Don't ever apologize for crying for the trees burning in the Amazon or over the waters polluted from mines in the Rockies. Don't apologize for the sorrow, grief, and rage you feel. It is a measure of your humanity and your maturity. It is a measure of your open heart, and as your heart breaks open there will be room for the world to heal. That is what is happening as we see people honestly confronting the sorrows of our time." (For more Joanna Macy quotes, please go here: http://mollystrongheart.blogspot.com/2019/01/joanna-macy-grace-happens-when-we-act.html.)

Anne Lamott is another wise, brave, and beautiful soul who asks us to please "not let them get you to hate them." Anne goes on to ask, "How did we become so filled with hate? This is not who we are. Hate is the worse emotion of all, second only to acute jealousy." (For more of Anne Lamott, please go here: http://mollystrongheart.blogspot.com/2018/11/anne-lamott-dont-let-them-get-you-to.html.)

It is also true that it is not too late for most of us to take a compassionate and deep look into ourselves and explore what we may want to try to do differently, and/or what might be the next layer of healing and awakening that is calling to us to birth in our lives and what it is that we bring to this beautiful hurting world we share. Change and transformation is possible, and even in the most unlikely places. Many of us already know this through our own courageous personal experiences and journeys. Also, and as I've written about before, among the greatest teachers for me in this regard is my own mother. She had suffered throughout nearly her whole lifetime from an incredibly severe narcissistic illness, very similar to that of Mr. Trump. Yet, after a few months of miraculous successful treatment for her mental illness, and coupled with immersion in the love of family, my then 87 year old mother began to wake up from the tortured prison which kept her tragically and completely isolated from love. And she began to ask more questions of me as she struggled to make sense of this completely different world that she was awakening to. My mother also would not let go of asking why it was that we hadn't seen each other in 14 years prior to her breakdown at age 86. I tread lightly, responding simply that she had been pretty critical of me — my hair, my clothes, my politics. Mom was silent. Then she looked right into my eyes and said, "There must have been something in me that I was taking out on you." ... I still weep when I remember this profound experience with my once severely personality disordered, alcoholic, brutal mom who I had believed was incapable of ever opening her heart. I was wrong.

If my once incredibly cruel mother can experience a partial awakening and touch into her capacity for kindness and love for the first time so late in her life, then anything is possible. Anything. We need to continue to not write anyone off. And I believe it likely true that most of us can benefit from exploring in an ongoing way what it is in ourselves that we may be taking out on others? So many questions. So many doorways. So much potential...

The more we love, the more real we become. 

— Stephen Levine

I've had a variety of responses to the path I try to walk in life. Many express gratitude, affirmation, and support. Some are not able to see me and just think I'm one of those "Trump-haters." And there are others who tell me that flowers and roses and singing kumbaya and all this peace and love stuff is not going to stop the madness and utter destruction and threats to life on Earth that we are now witness to. The implication is that nonviolence is a weak response to violence. Martin Luther King, Jr. would certainly disagree, as would many others. I resonate with the wisdom of Pema Chödrön: "When we hold on to our opinions with aggression, no matter how valid our cause, we are simply adding more aggression to the planet, and violence and pain increase. Cultivating nonaggression is cultivating peace." Normalizing violence and adding more violence to the world will certainly not ameliorate the incredible amount of suffering in our nation and beyond. Already we have normalized so much violence. And, as Gandhi has stated, "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind."

The recent incident involving teenage boys and Indigenous Peoples in Washington DC, and many of the reactions that followed, are but symptoms of what I believe to be something much greater. I imagine a very different scenario if other changes and experiences had first been in place. And perhaps we could all imagine together what might have happened or not happened if a New Story had emerged some time ago to replace the Old Story. 

I imagine how different our history books would look, and how different we all would be, if we were taught the truth, for instance, about what happened to the Indigenous Peoples of this land — the genocide and all that has followed in its wake, the crushing of a culture and its children and its spirituality, the addictions and suicides and poverty and utter despair that has plagued the First Peoples for generations. What if we who are not Native had come to learn about all of this and experienced these horrors and atrocities in our minds and hearts? Perhaps we then would feel compelled to insist on having a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (with Native and Black peoples), much like what Archbishop Desmond Tutu facilitated in South Africa. Truly, how would we all be different and profoundly changed if we could have heard and witnessed the excruciating stories of inter-generational suffering, trauma, and loss of the First Americans? What if we sat and bore witness to their horrors and allowed our hearts to break wide open, much as my heart did when I went to Winter Soldier conferences and heard the unbearable stories of trauma of veterans? 

How might we non-natives be different in our relations with Native Americans if we were taught about their spirituality and what it is to "walk the Red Road?" How might we be different if we came to understand and respect Indigenous wisdom related to how we are all connected and the teaching that Mother Earth is Sacred and to be respected? What if we came to understand Native drumming and singing as a form of sacred prayer through which the heart beat of the Mother is heard and honored? How would we be different if we had finally come to a place of doing right by those our white ancestors nearly obliterated? Would there have been a need today for an Indigenous People's March in Washington, DC today? Would there have been a battle over the Dakota Access Pipeline or any other pipeline? Would a young teenage boy be cheered on by a group of his peers who were all surrounding a Native Elder and other Natives mocking them? Would any of us be simply saying that boys will be boys, or would we adults be hurling blame on these teenagers by calling them punks and other names? Would any of this have even happened if we white people had come to terms with our history and the level of atrocity and suffering it has caused to the First Peoples and how that suffering endures today?

One of my longtime teachers, Michael Meade, has worked with an enormous diversity of people over the decades, including veterans, refugees, young and older men, gang kids and imprisoned youth and adults, and the list goes on. But the only time I ever saw Michael cry was when he spoke of his work on Indian Reservations. Never had he seen such despair, hopelessness, and unbearable suffering. Michael spoke of how going to the reservations was the hardest and most painful experience he's had, and he's seen and experienced so much! If we all had this experience of seeing and feeling and understanding this suffering, we would not disparage any Native person much less an Elder. We would no more call him things like an "ex-alcoholic" any more than any of my friends would look at me today and disparagingly call me an "ex-alcoholic."

Violence is only perpetuated to the degree that we justify it and to the degree that we have not yet opened our hearts. We can only be perpetrators of subtle and blatant forms of violence to the degree that we engage in the dehumanization of other humans and the objectification of other beings. Emma Goldman wisely states, "The most violent element in society is ignorance." And this ignorance includes being oblivious to the reality of others — the felt experience and needs of humans and other life on Earth.

For years I had a quote up on my refrigerator that read Do Not Judge Another Until You Have First Walked a Mile in His Moccasins. This was among my many reminders and affirmations of the New Story that I was in gradual process of birthing within myself and my life. I was learning to become mindful of my judging mind and intervene. This as not an easy process!  Over the years I had developed a raging inner critic and learning to recognize and intervene on my judging mind has been a long, difficult, and gradual process. There was also in my family of origin and in our culture a lack of role modeling of understanding, compassion, and empathy — of "walking in anyone else's moccasins." Consequently, and although I grew up in a wealthy suburb of Detroit, the deeper truth of the shadow side of Grosse Pointe was that I was immersed in an impoverished environment related to knowing, understanding, and respecting diversity and those who were different from myself. During the 60s, the one black family who had tried to move into Grosse Pointe had their home egged and were ultimately driven out. And the truth is also that Martin Luther King, Jr. needed to have the major of Grosse Pointe sit in his lap for protection on the car ride to speak at my high school just weeks prior to his assassination. These are some of the normalized faces of violence that were part of my younger years. Racism and fear of those who were different was in my DNA. It's taken me many years to embrace these parts of myself and do the inner work of healing and transforming the many ways that I had introjected and projected outward the ignorance, prejudice, and deep sense of separation that I was taught. My journey of shedding this deeply sad Old Story continues today. My experience also, of course, was not unique.

To heal, I have needed to bring a great deal of tenderness and compassion to myself. We cannot judge in someone else what we have embraced and healed within ourselves. The fiercely kind and wise people whose paths have crossed mine have also made all the difference. And through all that I have experienced, my commitment to being a healing force in the world has only grown. This intention to Do No Harm and to expand who and what I care about is not for the weak-hearted. Strange how there are those who mistake a passion for nonviolence and cultivating peace with weakness. My experience is that it takes tremendous strength to learn how to not return violence with more violence. It is hard work to not bite the hook! 

And what doesn't kill us can absolutely make us stronger. It is also true that not everyone is able to do the work of healing and opening our hearts. Our severely narcissistic mother's self-loathing projected outward was at the root of my twin brother's collapse into giving up on life and committing suicide on January 30th, 1978, 41 years ago today. John was not able to get or receive the support he needed to heal and open his heart and learn that he is lovable. The last time I spoke with my brother just two months before his death, he told me that his latest plan was to hold out and be himself until our mother finally loved him. But, at that time, our mother was not able to love herself much less anyone else. We starve to death without love. And sometimes there are those who take others down with them. This is certainly true of those who suffer from the tortured illness of malignant narcissism.

The self loathing of our president which is projected outward onto humans, other beings, and the Earth sets a dangerous precedence for a terrifying and heart-wrenching array of violence. Let me be clear, however, it is NOT Mr. Trump who has brought us to this place of incredible peril. He is but a symptom. So many — including Henry Giroux, Jeremy Scahill, Michael Moore in his latest film, and countless others — illuminate the larger picture and the long road that has brought us to the precipice. Learning about neoliberalism provides us with a deeper glimpse. (Please go here: https://mollystrongheart.blogspot.com/2018/12/we-live-in-world-that-has-been.html?fbclid=IwAR0c8dlte662gVTTChE8AinP6DswqCC__CyGgoqXF8mwPRA3fHrNCSPusLU.) And there is more, much more.

Any of us can be vulnerable to sending ripples out into the world that add to the suffering and harm. It is also true that we can only judge and dehumanize that which we do not understand. This can include:
- Those who are addicted, mentally ill, homeless, hungry, impoverished.
- Those who are of a different race, sexual orientation, gender, ethnicity than ourselves.
- Immigrants, Mexicans, Muslims, refugees.
- Those who watch FOX or those who watch MSNBC.
- Those who are or have been incarcerated.
- Those who openly hate.
- Those who wear pussy hats or those who wear MAGA hats.
- Teenage boys who stand staring into the face of a Native American Elder — who is drumming and singing a sacred song — with disrespect and those who cheer him on.
- The Native American elder who is drumming and singing a sacred song.

The list can go on and on. It is also true that to dehumanize anyone is to engage in an act of violence.

So how do we wake up? How do we learn to love and practice kindness? How do we become more our Selves, the sacred being we are under all our illusions of separateness? How do we stand up to the dehumanization of anyone and say NO MORE and that this is NOT OKAY? The Dalai Lama is spot on when he says that Compassion is the Radicalism of our Time. And it is time, I believe, for us all to become radicals in our commitment to rooting ever more deeply into our paths of lovingkindness. This entails learning to suffer with those who are suffering rather than reacting to suffering by adding more to the mix with our own human tendency to judge rather than feel the pain of those who are hurting.

I no more want to see those teenagers who perpetrated harm met with more harm than I would want anyone to be the victim of violence. And we completely deprive these kids and all of us with the deeper lessons here about respect, understanding, and amending a wrong any time that we minimize or deny that harm that is occurring and the bigger picture it reflects. We also become perpetrators of causing greater harm when we justify blind siding anyone with our anger, name calling, and any form of dehumanization. I even had one friend send me a video where a young woman felt justified in grabbing a young man with a MAGA hat by his genitals. Heartbreaking! Oh, what have we become? We can do better!

But we won't do better until we individually and collectively learn to identify and lower our tolerance for violence wherever we find it — including in ourselves. And, of course, we cannot lessen anything until we are mindfully working toward replacing our harmful actions, beliefs, and values with ones with ones that reflect a commitment to Do No Harm and to an ever inclusive Circle of Caring. And my journey has taught me that I cannot lessen, heal, and transform the hurt in my heart without learning to first be tender, compassionate, and kind to myself. I believe it is a Hero's Journey to proceed to intentionally shed the layers upon layers which any of us have absorbed in learned cruelty, indifference, apathy, judgment, and turning any living being into something that is objectified and demonized as Other.

Making America Great Again is an incredibly small, divisive, and exclusive vision. Its roots are in a belief system that we are to be great "again," as though there weren't always those who suffered profoundly because they were intentionally left out of the American Dream. Certainly there is a long list of those who are left out of this dream today and since the earliest times of genocide and slavery, very much including the First Peoples of this nation. What would it be like for us if we were Native American and saw anyone wearing a hat that reads "Make America Great Again"? If we look deeply, we can recognize the subtle to us as non-natives, but not subtle to Indigenous Peoples, level of violence that these words evoke. There is great power and transformation that grows out of the courage to recognize, heal, and transform the belief systems which any of us can hold that are rooted in the Old Story of Domination rather than the New Story of Partnership. Riane Eisler writes powerfully of this in The Chalice and the Blade. (Please go here for more information about this book and its international impact: https://rianeeisler.com/the-chalice-the-blade-highlights-of-international-impact/.)

We need a new dream, a new and much larger vision, a New Story to live by — one that is inclusive and recognizes our interrelationship with all of life. It is my belief that there is an urgent need for humankind to evolve beyond its adolescence. We can do this! And, please, let us vow to not throw anyone under the bus in this process of birthing a new world, one that is much kinder, stronger, and more deeply caring. As we open our hearts and minds, we come to see with new eyes and an ever expanding heart. And we recognize that we are all brothers and sisters, all related, all family — including with those who do not yet our understand our deep interrelatedness and that the joy and suffering of anyone is also ours. 

As we bring down the walls around our own hearts and minds, the need to build outer walls evaporates. We come to understand that there is another way, one which is grounded in integrity and courage and excludes no one from our compassion and caring.

We can each grow in our capacity to recognize that which causes harm to ourselves and others. And as we do we are able to intervene on ourselves when the old triggers and Old Story arises yet again. It is then that we are better able to refuse to allow that which is toxic and hurtful to invade and find a home in our hearts and minds. Let us all, please, do the ongoing work of learning to see and understand one another. As we do, we will scale the empathy wall and choose to increasingly not exclude anyone from our Circle of Caring. And as we grow and evolve, we humans will be contributing our part to the healing of ourselves and our world. And we then are able to be aligned with the New Story and truly walk a path of No Harm.

"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it." ― Rumi

"We don’t set out to save the world; we set out to wonder how other people are doing and to reflect on how our actions affect other people’s hearts." ― Pema Chödrön

"We often think of peace as the absence of war, that if powerful countries would reduce their weapon arsenals, we could have peace. But if we look deeply into the weapons, we see our own minds- our own prejudices, fears and ignorance. Even if we transport all the bombs to the moon, the roots of war and the roots of bombs are still there, in our hearts and minds, and sooner or later we will make new bombs. To work for peace is to uproot war from ourselves and from the hearts of men and women. To prepare for war, to give millions of men and women the opportunity to practice killing day and night in their hearts, is to plant millions of seeds of violence, anger, frustration, and fear that will be passed on for generations to come." ― Thich Nhat Hanh, from Living Buddha, Living Christ

"Spiritual practice involves, on the one hand, acting out of concern for others' well-being. On the other, it entails transforming ourselves so that we become more readily disposed to do so." ― Dalai Lama  

"Our greatest strength lies in the gentleness and tenderness of our heart." ― Rumi

Bless us all,

Molly