(??) So..perhaps all of us who have been exploited -- we had a lot going for us that our various cults or paracultic therapists (my case) were willing to invest time in us.
None of us were fuck ups. Had we been so, SGI would not have wanted you.
A cult has to find a way to locate vital persons who have boundaries, then find ways to compromise their boundaries so it can take more from that person than the person would have given had he or she possessed both boundaries and...full knowledge of what the group was actually all about.
Often a bad group or fucked up partner will con us to feel shame about our anger or even our mild misgivings.
With our anger misdirected away from them and back to ourselves, our vitality is turned into the equivalent of the immune system attacking its own host.
Meanwhile, the rest of our vitality is misdirected to support the group - vitality used to work overtime for the group, value the group put ourselves down and stifle our own misgivings.
Am starting to suspect that many cults not only have the feature of unreciprocated loyalty, but also have ways to estrange us from our own anger.
A cult or predator who draws us into a cultic relationship usually begins with a narrative, a story that is appealing and trustworthy but not informative about long term consequences. And may be factually false.
I dont know if the rest of this is going to make sense. Am pondering anger and why it is important to feel that anger, not to act upon it, but to reclaim it for ourselves. I suspect many groups fuck us up by turning our anger against us, and often against outsiders.
A mirror reflects visible light away from its surface.
A cult or narcissistic predator may be analogous to this mirror.
A cult will reflect your *valid* anger away from itself and your anger will go back to you (shame for feeling anger at group or guru, shame for having boundaries that feel violated, shame for feeling tired when overworked) anger toward skeptical outsiders, and in some cases anger toward those who are designated scapegoats, anger toward those who have left or been kicked out.
As long as we dont act on anger, I think we must feel that anger in order to reclaim personal vitality that has been estranged from us.
Estranged from us by our being exposed to a group or bad relationship that has parasitized us.
Perhaps the first stage of parasitizing vitality is to find ways to estrange people from the anger function--which is tied to the biological fight flight response.
It may be that a lot of groups (and power hungry people) seek to estrange us from our own vitality, **perhaps because vitality and groundedness/boundaries may go hand in hand in persons who are useful(?)**
(An exploitative group or person will not bother with persons who are angry and not grounded - people like this are not useful. Loose cannons.)
A exploitative person or group will *want* people who have vitalitiy and boundaries - and that means you, by having boundaries will be someone with a conscience, someone who can be guilt tripped if skillfully manipulated.
Repeat, exploitative persons and groups dont want people who have vitality but lack boundaries. Vitality to be useful, has to be contained, paced in its expression and modulated according to circumstances -- that is what groundedness/boundaries are for.
(??) So..perhaps all of us who have been exploited -- we had a lot going for us that our various cults or paracultic therapists (my case) were willing to invest time in us.
A cult has to find a way to locate vital persons who have boundaries, then find ways to compromise their boundaries, convert the boundaries to allow intrusion and get some of the anger turned into self doubt, self recrimination, and then the rest of that vitality, minus the boundary limits is available to the group.
My guess is: take a person who is 100% vital but has boundaries.
Find a way to work things around so they come to fear their own anger. That means anywhere from 10 to 30% of the victims vitality is directed to attack them, and attack their own boundaries-shame about feeling anger at being abused. Shame at feeling reluctant to overwork past one's bedtime. Shame for having boundaries and feeling tired.
That frees up anywhere from 70 to 90% of the vitality to serve not the person but the group. The person is so tangled up with 10 to 30% of their anger attacking them for having boundaries and feeling tired that their boundaries permit intrusion and derision and they give away more time and energy than they otherwise would.
And any anger they feel now gets directed at their own boundaries instead of at the entity violating their boundaries.
When we are grounded and vital, we dont give away more of our vitality than we can sustain--groundedness includes boundaries and being aware of when we are feeling tired and need rest.
So, a person who is bounded/grounded will give away less vitality than someone who has lost sense of his or her boundaries and isnt grounded -- such a person will be a much larger "energy donor" -- give more money, work overtime, sacrifice privacy and home life.
So estranging people from vitality/groundedness is the way to turn them into larger energy donors, vs those who will say no they cant do any more volunteer work for the week.
Anger is biologically tied to our fight/flight response. We cannot get rid of anger and it is also a source of both our energy and our boundaries if we have enjoyed an upbringing that has given us form to contain our vitality.
So, many shitty groups and bad partners will look for ways to estrange us from our anger.
The other vitality fountain is sexuality. And that is another area where guilt is often sown by groups or bad partners. (Shame someone about feeling sexual. Shame them about being "too much" in bed or that what they like is disgusting. when all that person is doing is feeling erotically alive. Someone who wants to weaken you will find some way to guilt you no matter how consensual, empathic and nurturing you in erotic situations.)
* Get us guilty and confused and ashamed about one of our basic human features. Anger.
The covert goal is not to con us to eradicate anger, but get us ashamed of our own vitality in that form -- so as to direct that vitality against us (guilt about feeling justifiably angry at being exploited) -- and instead, directing that vitality against us and away from us and into forms of effort that benefit the group, and at the same time keep you controllable and predictable.
Imagine calling in a plumber to fix your toilet.
The plumber paid by you, claims to have fixed the toilet but what he has done is direct the sewage water away from the pipe that takes it to municipal sewage system.
Instead that fecal water is re-routed into yourhousehold pipes and then spurts out of the kitchen faucet when you turn the faucet to fill your tea kettle.
And when you freak out, the plumber tells you you're too sensitive, you're imagining it all, everyone else things its fine, etc.
Now imagine someone redirecting your vitality in a roughly analogous manner.
Instead of feeling angry at derision and intrusion we get conned. WE are told we were stupid to have put up with it so long, or are just 'too sensitive' or 'making a big deal out of it.
Well, imagine having sewage water pouring out of your kitchen faucet after a supposedly reputable plumber swears he fixed your toilet.
People would empathize.
But when someone does that to our emotions, we are expected to "get over it"?
Here is an article from the New York Times about betrayal. The person who wrote it notes how very little support the larger culture gives to persons who have been betrayed. A betrayal that disrupts our narrative, our sense of place, hits us especially hard.
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www.google.com]
Hope some of this makes sense. Have not had all my coffee yet.