Forum Post: Ending the Violence without Must Start within

If We Believe Anything We’ve Tried So Far Is Going to End The Violence . . . http://polipsych101.wordpress.com/2012/08/01/if-we-believe-anything-weve-tried-so-far-is-going-to-end-the-violence/

There is a violent current in every single one of us . . . Whether we realize it or not; whether we want to know it or not; whether we deny it or not. And no laws, no gun control, no punishment is going to end the violence in our world. In fact, nothing in the outer world will end the violence. Instead . . . the violence will only end when every single one of us does our own inner healing with that violent current inside us.

That violent current that was created by our having been wounded somehow in our childhood – whether in our families, our neighborhoods, our schools, our places of worship, or simply by living in a society where violence exists.

If we don’t do our own inner healing with the violence within us . . . Even those of us who think we would never act out our violence, could some day be pushed up against a wall (literally or figuratively) and find ourselves being actively violent. . . shooting someone, beating someone up, throwing someone around, and on and on and on. We would never know when that time might come, or what context it might be in.

If we don’t do our own inner healing with the violence within us . . . Even those of us who fantasize violence and think it has no impact on the world, will be contributing to the violence in our world. For the violence within us that we fantasize, as well as the violence within us that we’re not even yet aware of, will feed and be fed by the violence in the world that is acted out – the wars, the tragic attacks like 9/11, the nightmare events like the shootings at Virginia Tech, Columbine High School, and Aurora, Colorado.

If we don’t do our own inner healing with the violence within us . . . The violence in our own psyches will be fed by the violence in the outer world. The destructive events will stir the anger and destructive feelings, thoughts, and impulses within. People will get “excited” or “turned on” (not necessarily sexually) by the violent events and the media reports of those events. I was first aware of this when I watched the first war televised live – the first Iraq War – and the media was reporting the war as though it was a sporting event. And you can see it in the angry, destructive comments on the internet in response to tragic events like the shooting in Aurora, Colorado.

In turn, the violence inside us that has been fed and turned on will feed the violence in the outer world. If your own violence is stirred up by reports of violent events, you will watch more reports so you can feel your anger about the shooter or the bomber . . . instead of finding the roots of your own anger and your own shooter or bomber within you. You will watch more violent television shows, more violent movies, and play more violent games. You will look outside to stir the angry feelings within, instead of finding the source of that anger within you.

Or, you will hide from the anger within till the next time, and eventually your angry, destructive currents inside you will have to come into consciousness and be worked with.

If we are really going to end the violence in our world . . . we are going to have to heal it. Doing anything less will not work. Doing anything less will be deluding ourselves.

If we are really going to end the violence in our world . . . we are going to have to heal it, one by one, individually, each of us doing our own work, each of us helping to change the fabric of our culture, each of us helping to heal the violence in our world from the inside out.

© Judith Barr 2012