To embrace life : understanding the way inner judgement can affect my life

I can understand more and more why certain family members give me a wide berth.  I have retreated alot and not been a fully active participant in my life since my journey in sobriety deepened.  It was difficult to initiate things, or feel my will to do and be an express was worthwhile and I struggled with finding a  purpose which contrasts with my brother who is super successful in the world.   I need to remember though he didn’t have the early trauma and separation experiences that I did in my very young years and then again in adolscence which my therapist believes really railroaded me for many years.

I became an alcoholic after my older sister’s cerebral bleed and then my Dad’s death which followed a near death accident at 17, and I could not go to study at the place where my brother’s granddaughter is now studying in another town, as I was not strong enough after the car crash.  So I had to opt for other studies which I eventually abandoned under pressure from my father when he forced me to do a secretarial diploma which was so against my sensitive, introverted, creative nature.  So lately when I think of the rage my brother’s behaviour triggers I see how like Dad he is often foisting his will on things and people around him and not wanting to hear another point of view but it may not be as bad as I imagine if I am projecting old pain.  When I notice my image of him as all bad transforms as I try to step into his shoes and see things from his light, I then realise that this does not seem to be something he can do for either my sister or I, at least that is how I experience reality within my mind, who knows how true that reality really is?

The critic can be heard always in my mind giving a voice to an alternative point of view and I can feel myself condemned for not achieving more when really I never felt I had the support to do so and when so much was torn away I struggled and no matter how hard I struggled it was difficult for others to see and not judge me.   But then today reading on the Judge as an inner archetype I realise it can also be projected out onto others, in that I might feel they are judging me when they are not.

This is not an attempt to engage in analysis paralysis just to understand if I am being as fair about my brother considering all his natural defences and the huge age gap between us in years which takes a lot of the soft cozy comfort aspect of our relationship away.  And I see too how in my relationships with men for most of my life I have struggled with not being overpowered and with difficulties with anger and defences and deep, deeply hidden inner longing…. it feels very dangerous to give into and surrender myself to completely.   In my last relationship which ended 7 years ago my artistic deep feeling emotional side was mocked or judged as inadequate in many ways and I was criticised all the time for not meeting my partner’s needs, but what about my own?  In reality I had learned to bury them years ago.

The inner critic or Judge within may try to tear us down but if we learn not to let this force shame and curtail us but turn it around using it in the service of the creative self then we might be able to champion ourselves and even take the risk to let vulnerabilities and creativity (which we may fear or have judged as chaotic) out and express them.

I wish for most of my life I had not judged myself so harshly,  here in my blog I have taken risks over and over to expose my creative and vulnerable side and in life as well and lately when I meet brick walls I am learning that has less to do with me than with the limits of the other person’s capacity to engage in that dimension and move through defences.  I need no longer blame myself for living up to ideals and standards that did not take the full extent of my life experience into consideration and may not have suited me to begin with. But it has taken a lot of therapy to get to this point.