“Only now have
I begun to recognize that there were many closely guarded family
secrets that I kept, and many that were kept from me.”(Griffin, pg.
18)
Susan Griffin
points out that the old habit of denial is an illusion that we
involve ourselves in. In her article, Denial, she illustrates
how, “We keep secrets from ourselves that all along we
know.”(Griffin, pg. 18) This is a hallmark of ecological theory,
the fact that we both adapt to and participate in the unitary system
of our environment.(Henry, 9/11/08) Denial is perhaps a coping
mechanism which aids in short term goodness of fit, where, “personal
qualities encourage or discourage reactions from an
environment.”(Henry, 9/11/08)
Susan understands
her family’s secrets as mingling, “. . . with the secrets of
statesmen and bombers [of Dresden].”(Griffin, pg. 18) This is a
prime example of the unchecked, absolute power of dominance. “A
dominant culture dictates reality through social
construction.”(Henry, 9/11/08) It appears she has a grasp on the
importance of moving out of this familial denial and secrecy. She
has been avoiding the knowledge of this pain and wants to live a
more, “authentic life by facing the best and worst [of
herself].”(Henry, 10/30/08) This is a postulation of Carl Jung who
writes about meeting and embracing your, “cultural shadow of
dealing with the uncomfortable.”(Henry, 10/30/08)
Susan is
exercising her ability to self direct by writing itself. “If I
tell here all the secrets that I know, public and private, perhaps I
will begin to see the way the old sometimes see, Monet, recording
light and spirit in his paintings, or the way those see who have been
trapped by circumstances – a death, a loss, a cataclysm of history
- grasping the essential.”(Griffin, pg. 18)
Susan searches
for relatedness to her family in discussion of their trials. She
also reaches out to connect with tragic events in her nation and the
rest of the world, instead of, “trying to write off the suffering
of my own mind and of my family as historical phenomena.”(Griffin,
pg. 20) This extends beyond a one on one bonding with another person
or family member, but a capacity to form an attachment relationship
to society or humanity as a whole.
“We are not use
to associating our private lives with public events. Yet the
histories of families cannot be separated from the histories of
nations. To divide them is part of our denial.”(Griffin, pg. 20)
Susan exemplifies competence in the way of, “being effective to
influence, learn and explore [her] environment.”(Henry, 9/11/08)
She pulls from effects of the war. “She herself learned not to
cry, or to fall apart, to dull the full dimension of her
feeling.”(Griffin, pg. 22) She seeks to understand someone like
the Air Marshall, who, in spite of his calm soldier’s appearance,
“some trace of descent into a less ordered region of himself must
exist.”(Griffin, pg. 22)
Personally, I
enjoyed learning from Susan’s avenue of self exploration. I feel
that pain of life in a society bent on emasculation of anyone in
opposition of a government’s political agenda. I see those things
in myself in the way I can have anger and resentments against others,
which mirrors my own low self-esteem or low self-acceptance level of
the day.
As a direct
result of this article of Susan Griffin's and learning about Carl
Jung, I am now embracing feelings instead of negating them in some
form of self-denial. Realizing that it’s okay to be
me. This Jungian termed ‘dragon’ or ‘shadow’ is a
part of me, and whatever I am going through will teach me something
if I face it and let it take its course.
I realize that I
have to do the next right thing in my actions, but that may involve
expressing myself to others about my true, sometimes desperate
feelings. Sometimes just breathing and waiting until negative
thoughts pass is a healthy experience of going through them, in place
of trivial attempts to block them out. I don’t want to push things
down and act like they are no longer there. Doing that has hurt me my
whole life. Yesterday I wrote this tool down into a positive
affirmation. It’s sitting above my sink, but I don’t see myself
forgetting this tool. It’s like a brand new, never ending roll of
duct tape.
More information
on the writings of Susan Griffin located at the following URL: http://www.susangriffin.com/
*The premise of this paper was developed by Dr. James Henry.
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