Here at Croft Towers, we have a set of family values.
Nothing fancy, just a list of good ideas that the three of us sat down and agreed upon, one day.
(It was Mrs Croft’s idea, she’s good like that.)
It’s blu tacked to the side of the piano in the living room, and if things are getting out of hand, it’s a nice guiding light to come back to.
In a previous post, I talked about recovery from traumatic life events, and how the path to healing, is forgetting.
And one of our values speaks to this. It goes:
“Don’t put your hand back in the fire.”
You see, in a family, or any relationship really, there will always be little flare-ups.
I don’t know about your house, but here we often forget that we all live in completely separate realities and our flat-mates, no matter how close we are to them, can not read our minds.
Therefore, misunderstandings occur.
Thought Systems 📦 get all shook up.
Tempers flare.
And because of the nature of the human operating system, those same Thought Systems 📦 settle down again, pretty quickly.
A bit like a snow globe.
(Good job too, otherwise you’d be as angry/elated/sad/disappointed as you’d ever been, right now! 😳)
But here’s the thing.
Thought Systems 📦 have a very low tolerance for you feeling properly good, because this situation—uncomplicated, pure presence—equates to them not really being used. It means they've shut up for a bit.
(It’s called ‘peace of mind’ for a reason.)
And nobody likes being left out, especially Thought Systems that like to think they're in charge of everything.
So d’you know what they do?
It’s crazy, but they reactivate the hurt.
🥺🤦🏻♂️
That's right, having settled, and coming back to peace, the mind, so very often, likes to start thinking again about the thing that it got all upset about in the first place.
It makes it feel wanted & useful. Busy, and helpful.
But of course it just makes matters worse.
It means we hang on to our hurts, keeping them alive and fighting the present moment with our thinking, which in turn clouds any perspective that might be waiting for us to gain.
This is what we refer to, here at Croft Towers as, “putting your hand back in the fire.”
Now why would you want to go and do that?!
🔥
Giles
p.s. If your mind just. won’t. stop. “putting its hand back in the fire” over something and it’s driving you mad, then reach out for help → https://www.gilespcroft.com/individuals/
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Giles P Croft
Same. But in the shower. (I bet you've done this.)