Relationships

Just because someone loves you doesn't mean that they are also good for you.

As teenagers, many of us feel that 'unconditional love' is the answer to all our problems. Some never outgrow this and continue to hold on to this unhealthy fantasy that fun and companionship from a loving relationship can cure all their problems in life. The truth is that although relationships can contibute to a persons happiness they can also have a negative impact on a persons well being.

What happens to children living with violence in the home

One of the most important elements of understanding the child living in the Vortex of Violence is that all humans process, store, retrieve and respond to the world in a state-dependent fashion. When a child is in a persisting state of arousal due to persisting exposure to threat, the primary areas of the brain which are processing information are different from those in a child who can be calm. The calm child may sit in the same classroom next to the child in an alarm state, both hearing the same lecture by the teacher. Even if they have identical IQs, the child that is calm can focus on the words of the teacher and, using neocortex, engage in abstract cognition. The child in an alarm state will be less efficient at processing and storing the verbal information the teacher is providing. This child’s cognition will be dominated by sub-cortical and limbic areas, focusing on non-verbal information -- the teachers facial expressions, hand gestures, when she seems distracted. And, because the brain internalizes (i.e., learns) in a ‘use-dependent’ fashion, this child will have more selective development of non-verbal cognitive capacities. The children raised in the vortex of violence have learned that non-verbal information is more important than verbal -- “when daddy smells like beer and walks funny, I know he will hurt mommy.”

As a child moves along the continuum of arousal, the part of the brain which is ‘orchestrating’ functioning shifts. This process reflects ontogeny, such that the more distressed one is, the more primitive are the brain areas responsible. An important reflection of this is how the sense of time is altered in alarm states. Sense of future is foreshortened. The critical time period for the individual shrinks. The threatened child is not thinking (nor should she think) about months from now. This has profound implications for understanding the cognition of the traumatized child. Immediate reward is most reinforcing. Delayed gratification is impossible. Consequences of behaviour become almost inconceivable to the threatened child. Reflection on behaviour -- including violent behaviour -- is impossible for the child in an alarm state. Cut adrift from internal regulating capabilities of the cortex, the brainstem acts reflexively, impulsively, aggressively -- to any perceived threat. Eye-contact for too long becomes a life-threatening signal. Wearing the wrong colours.-- a hand gesture -- cues that to the calm adult reading about another ‘senseless’ murder in the paper are insignificant but to the hypervigilant, armed adolescent born and raised in the vortex of violence, are enough to trigger a ‘kill or be killed’ response.

What our parents do isn't an excuse ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

The following quote is powerful and relevant for our times. It's about taking responsibility and not using our past as an excuse. And striving to be grown-up - especially in our responsibility towards the next generation, irrespective of our own experiences."I have heard many stories about parents who have hurt their children so much, planting many seeds of suffering in them. But I believe that the parents did not mean to plant those seeds. They did not intend to make their children suffer. Maybe they received the same kind of seeds from their parents. There is a continuation in the transmission of seeds, and their father and mother might have gotten those seeds from their grandfather and grandmother. Most of us are victims of a kind of living that is not mindful, and the practice of mindful choice can stop this kind of suffering and end the transmission of such sorrow to our children and grandchildren. We can break the cycle by not allowing these kinds of seeds of suffering to be transmitted to our children, our friends, or anyone else. We can chose our reactions.

Challenges in relationships ........................................

Some of the biggest challenges in relationships come from the fact that most people enter a relationship in order to get something: they're trying to find someone who's going to make them feel good. In reality, the only way a relationship will last is if you see your relationship as a place that you go to give, and not a place that you go to take. 
--Anthony Robbins