Esoterica > The Work
Emotional stiffening and Pure and Impure Emotions.
Jones:
Anart:
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--- Quote ---Quote from: j
It has just occurred to me that the above would impact on my ability to be empathetic....kind of psychopathic or ponerized.
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Yeah, that's the stiffening of the most humane, compassionate and wholly human parts of ourselves. Those parts open us up to getting hurt a lot - but they're also our only hope out of this mess, not only individually, but as a species.
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I recognised this in process today...I didn’t quite catch it from the beginning though. I did my best to keep everything below the neck for the day and just observe what was going on in me. Not sure how successful I was with this.
My stepdaughter received a note from her father. Their relationship hasn’t been great and they haven’t really communicated for nearly two years. He indicated in his note that he would like to try again with their relationship and told her that he loved her and missed her.
She was very emotional, crying and talking to us about how she felt about that. For me there was a very brief feeling of sadness I think, I’m not sure though, but very quickly it was covered by fear and anger.
I was uncomfortable with the above exchange and didn’t want to be around it. I felt the stiffening and realised that my breathing became shallower.
I recognised the urge to try and think about the magic thing to say that could fix it for her....so she wouldn’t be so emotional.
Once again, I see how this whole process had little by way of empathy for her and it was a way for me to try to prevent her from feeling what she was feeling, but also to prevent myself from feeling. Thing is though...I didn’t stop feeling, I just felt something different.
The fear and anger I felt is I believe the negative introject from my mum....she couldn’t deal with our emotions as kids and I think she may have been reacting from fear and anger. I think I’ve taken my mothers emotions and turned them on myself.
Can the emotional stiffening be formed from other emotions?
I’m wondering about what Gurdjieff said about ‘pure and impure emotions’.
Gurdjieff:
--- Quote ---It is current to talk about "pure" and "impure" emotions; but we do not know how to define their difference. A pure emotion is one which is not mixed, which never seeks personal profit. An impure emotion is always mixed, it is never one; it is mixed with personal profit, with personal elements; it has sediments of other emotions.
--- End quote ---
So, my reaction in the above was impure. There was the original emotion that I didn’t quite catch, maybe sadness or grief, then fear and anger. The personal profit or personal element was in the fear and anger side of it. For me, fear and anger represent the wish to either withdraw from a threat, or to make the threat move away. The threat being that I might feel the underlying sadness or grief and the program running predicted that I may be attacked for feeling the original emotion.
In writing this out, I’m beginning to see the connection to the emotional intellectualisations that I use as buffers because I also suppress the fear and anger then intellectualise because the emotional reactions of fear and anger also got attacked.
It’s kind of like when the original emotion got attacked, I perhaps started reacting in the same way my mother might – from out of fear and anger, perhaps because that was what was modelled to me as a way to be. But then mum couldn’t handle seeing herself in me, so she attacked that too. This reflects some of the reading from the Narcissism Big 5.
So there seems to be three different levels so far...the original emotion, then the emotions that come up to cover the original emotion, then I go into my head to try and find facts and figures to both stop the emotions in others, and in myself.
pstott:
So the initial response would be a real emotion, the cover-up feelings would be either a learned response or a result of what Gurdjieff termed "crystallization", and the third "in your head" stuff is not emotion at all, but the mental processes stepping in to try to manipulate things. I think he referred to such things as "incorrect use of centres".
IMO the thing to work on here is to try to let go - not suppress. Just let the first emotions manifest and activate the impartial observer to watch what happens without trying to change anything.
Jones:
Ah.
I'd not connected the term 'crystallisation' with the term 'learned response'. If that is the case then it does make some sense for me now.
c.a.:
--- Quote from: Jones on June 01, 2012, 07:25:14 AM ---Ah.
I'd not connected the term 'crystallisation' with the term 'learned response'. If that is the case then it does make some sense for me now.
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Session September 15, 2009
https://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,13716.0.html
--- Quote ---Laura, Ark, PL, Joe, A***, DD, Allen, Keit, C**, Scottie, G***
Q: (L) Hello.
A: Pause. Hello.
Q: (L) And who do we have with us this evening?
A: Soriah of Cassiopaea 6th density transmission.
Q: (L) Alright. First of all I guess, is there anything that you have to communicate with us before we begin asking any questions?
A: Ask questions to stimulate flow.
Q: (L) Alright. First of all, A*** {a friend doing the breathing/meditation program} is having a really hard time. She's going through some kind of - close to - an emotional breakdown sort of thing. Of course, she is concerned that she's just losing her mind. Other than what I've said to her, is there anything to add information-wise about what she's going through?
A: Her experience is similar to yours due to her rigid stubbornness.
Q: (L) Okay, so she's rigidly stubborn similar to the way I'm rigidly stubborn. Because of that, she's going to suffer as much in the breakdown as I did. Is that it?
A: Yes
Q: (L) I see.
A: If one crystallizes on the wrong foundation it means much more suffering.
Q: (L) Are you saying that she crystallized on some foundation, and I did too?
A: Yes
Q: (L) Were they similar foundations?
A: No
Q: (L) But just that it was a crystallization of some sort?
A: Yes
Q: (L) And what caused or what was the nature of this crystallization?
A: Necessity for survival of trauma.
Q: (L) Well, there are some other people who have suffered certainly much more trauma, or at least equal trauma, who I didn't notice going through any kind of similar really outrageous suffering.
A: They didn't crystallize, they split.
Q: (L) So one difference is that some people crystallize to survive, and some people split to survive. Is that it?
A: Yes
Q: (L) And I guess if you split to survive, all you have to do is bring yourself together and merge, and therefore it is somewhat easier than somebody who has crystallized and has to break everything down. Is that it?
A: Yes
Q: (L) So that's one of the reasons for some of the different experiences among the people in the forum for example. Is that the case?
A: Yes
Q: (Joe) Maybe people who split, reintegration happens over a longer period of time, where they slowly, slowly, slowly put themselves back together, so the suffering is in little bits at a time. Whereas people who crystallize hold it off until all at once something has to break down... (L) Yeah, people who crystallize resist probably more. I think that was the case with me...
A: Yes
Q: (L) So, okay... And there's some people who are having very mild experiences, and there are some people who aren't having much experience at all. What is going on with people who are not having much in the way of experience?
A: They are fusing smaller segments a little at a time. Tell them to be patient and persistent. At some point they will see their own progress in retrospect. It is like walking up a gentle mountain slope.
Q: (L) So in other words, they're the lucky ones!
A: Depends on the makeup and potential for strong emotions.
Q: (L) Any other questions on that particular topic? Any particular cases that stand out? (Ark) I think I am an example of the lucky ones. (C**) Yeah, me too. (L) You did it gradually. (Keit) Well, back in C****, I thought I was going crazy as well. Now I'm kind of okay. (A***) I had a horrible experience the other night. Joe and I were doing the whole program, and I kind of switched into a vision where I was being tortured. My fingernails were being pulled off, and I started crying couldn't stop. It was pretty traumatic. But that was the first time that something like that happened. (DD) I had a dream the second night after I did the first whole program. I was in a scenario where I was with a person who was a dangerous person. And I was being stalked by police or the army or something. And I was held by the neck by this person, and he had a thing that was about half the size of a hay hook that was made out of a thin wire. And he stuck it into my kidney on the right side, and when he would pull on it, it was like a taser shock. And I screamed myself awake at about 6 o'clock in the morning. It was the strangest dream I've ever had in my entire life. I woke myself up screaming at the top of lungs. Fortunately, that hasn't recurred. (L) What is the nature of some of these really upsetting dreams and experiences that people here and people in the forum are having?
A: Memories of lives of pain and suffering that remained unresolved at the end of those lives. We are sorry that some of this is painful, but this method is actually the least traumatic method of any for this purpose. Once the dark dreams are processed out of the system, all will be better. Then there are no more hooks for illusion to attach to.
Q: (L) In other words, then people are able to be less controlled by hidden unseen or unknown emotion and more able to... (Keit) Assess reality and reactions to see what is objective...?
A: Yes
Q: (L) I have noticed that quite a number of people on the forum seem to be getting smarter. Is that just - they really seem to be getting things, putting things together, and...
A: When energy is no longer needed to support illusion it is available for knowledge and awareness.
Q: (L) So there's a lot more hope for people than they even suppose. Even more than they suspected?
A: Just remember that the slow breathing and the meditation and prayer are the most important components. If things move too fast then cut out the round breathing doing it only occasionally.
Q: (L) If things move too fast… (PL) That's exactly what I noticed. In the beginning I was doing round breathing, meditation a lot. And since I had trouble to get to sleep, I was praying one hour or two hours until I went asleep. That's when I got all those very bad dreams about getting stabbed and shot and cut and tortured. It was going too fast. Apparently, the more you do it, the faster the purging of those memories and illusions goes. (L) So, you can gauge your own process by how uncomfortable you are. And if you're uncomfortable, back off the round breathing and just do the meditation. The meditation and the prayer are the gentle, subsurface healing process I think. Is that correct?
A: Yes
--- End quote ---
whitecoast:
--- Quote from: Jones on May 31, 2012, 06:42:27 PM ---I recognised this in process today...I didn’t quite catch it from the beginning though. I did my best to keep everything below the neck for the day and just observe what was going on in me. Not sure how successful I was with this.
My stepdaughter received a note from her father. Their relationship hasn’t been great and they haven’t really communicated for nearly two years. He indicated in his note that he would like to try again with their relationship and told her that he loved her and missed her.
She was very emotional, crying and talking to us about how she felt about that. For me there was a very brief feeling of sadness I think, I’m not sure though, but very quickly it was covered by fear and anger.
I was uncomfortable with the above exchange and didn’t want to be around it. I felt the stiffening and realised that my breathing became shallower.
I recognised the urge to try and think about the magic thing to say that could fix it for her....so she wouldn’t be so emotional.
Once again, I see how this whole process had little by way of empathy for her and it was a way for me to try to prevent her from feeling what she was feeling, but also to prevent myself from feeling. Thing is though...I didn’t stop feeling, I just felt something different.
The fear and anger I felt is I believe the negative introject from my mum....she couldn’t deal with our emotions as kids and I think she may have been reacting from fear and anger. I think I’ve taken my mothers emotions and turned them on myself.
Can the emotional stiffening be formed from other emotions?
I’m wondering about what Gurdjieff said about ‘pure and impure emotions’.
Gurdjieff:
--- Quote ---It is current to talk about "pure" and "impure" emotions; but we do not know how to define their difference. A pure emotion is one which is not mixed, which never seeks personal profit. An impure emotion is always mixed, it is never one; it is mixed with personal profit, with personal elements; it has sediments of other emotions.
--- End quote ---
So, my reaction in the above was impure. There was the original emotion that I didn’t quite catch, maybe sadness or grief, then fear and anger. The personal profit or personal element was in the fear and anger side of it. For me, fear and anger represent the wish to either withdraw from a threat, or to make the threat move away. The threat being that I might feel the underlying sadness or grief and the program running predicted that I may be attacked for feeling the original emotion.
In writing this out, I’m beginning to see the connection to the emotional intellectualisations that I use as buffers because I also suppress the fear and anger then intellectualise because the emotional reactions of fear and anger also got attacked.
It’s kind of like when the original emotion got attacked, I perhaps started reacting in the same way my mother might – from out of fear and anger, perhaps because that was what was modelled to me as a way to be. But then mum couldn't handle seeing herself in me, so she attacked that too. This reflects some of the reading from the Narcissism Big 5.
So there seems to be three different levels so far...the original emotion, then the emotions that come up to cover the original emotion, then I go into my head to try and find facts and figures to both stop the emotions in others, and in myself.
--- End quote ---
Congratulations on learning to see something in yourself you have not been able to see before, Jones. :)
What you're describing sounds like a relatively common reaction, in terms of impure emotions blocking the proper expression of purer human emotions. The deadening of the sadness you felt, replaced by fear/anger sounds like a fight-or-flight-or-freeze reaction. In this, the body isn't just leaving your sorrow on its own. It associates it with being attacked, physically or emotionally, and so your upper vagus nerve (associated with social connections and higher emotional content) shuts down in favor of more primitive reptilian or vegetative emotions (such as fear, anger, etc.) taking over to run the show.
My reaction in this state is similar to yours, because I also tend to become highly cerebral when I feel attacked, and try to argue or consider or dispute my way out of a problem. Though in your case it seems like you also use your mind to try and "talk" your emotions into suppression. This is ironic, because your higher emotions are already being subdued by your primitive emotions/instincts taking hold! So it's sort of a positive feedback loop. :P
One of the first steps in healing this is to uncouple the feelings of sadness/empathy from triggering instinctive fight-or-flight-or-freeze. Regular practice of EE helps to stimulate the vagus nerve, and helps to suppress the dissociative response which is linked to the mental center being usurped by your instinctive center. You can read a lot more about the science of this in Peter Levine's In An Unspoken Voice: How the Body Heals Trauma and Restores Goodness.
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