Ar Wahan's home office water cooler

In truth, magenta was not the color I saw that night whooshing from my mom. It was the primary color, but there was some orangish-gold mixed in. So I just went back again to the site (after putting dinner in the oven) to see what orange brought up. I don't know if I was seeing two aura colors mixed together, or what. As I've said before, I know nothing about them. But the following cut-and-paste fits her, too. My mother constantly pushed her physical limitations, and seemed to scorn introspection -- discovering "the inner dimensions of the self."

Cut and paste part starts here:

Oranges are daredevils. They are individualistic, fearless, physical, cunning, conquerors, danger-lovers and thrill-seekers. They have been known to tilt at windmills.

In the Personality Spectrums system, Orange is the color for individuals who need to test their own physical limitations against the environment. Fearless, powerful, heedless of their own personal safety, they shake their fists in the face of God. The challenge for Oranges is to deal with our increasingly complex society. We are faced not so much with physical survival problems as with complicated moral and ethical questions. We are coping with the quality of life as opposed to simple survival.

An Orange prefers a challenge requiring physical courage. But our society forces us to tackle the frontier of the inner self, which requires spiritual courage. This question arises: Does an Orange have the ability to distinguish between these two kinds of courage-the courage required to face physical danger and risk as opposed to the courage required to come to terms with the inner self?

The lesson that is presented over and over again to an Orange is that there are physical limits and boundaries to human capabilities. Instead of constantly pushing to find out what those physical boundaries are, Oranges must learn to use that same energy to discover the inner dimensions of the self. The challenge for an Orange is to live long enough for age and experience to begin to allow the more obscure image of moral courage to come to the forefront of their consciousness.

My mother would have been 83 today.

I have indulged in a fair amount of mom-bashing, if not here, then in my friends' journals. Many of us have what appear to be/have been mothers with Narcissistic Histrionic Disorder.

I want to separate the incarnate abusive parent with the eternal spirit.

Here is reposted an exchange with the wonderful Saizai (one of the Empaths moderators) about my mom. If you don't want to read the dreck, go down to the large PINK text, since that is the point I want to make.

(From November 2005, picking up an exchange)

I would never suggest my mother was evil incarnate -- I don't think anyone is. I tried so hard to see the good in her growing up, in fact, that I blamed myself for seeing any bad. Since it was dangerous to object to or criticize her in any way, this tendency on my part was of course reinforced.

Later, when my father's dying became the catalyst for getting me to see her differently, I realized that I loved her, but didn't like her much -- and it was easier to love her from a distance. Being in her physical presence for more than four hours at a time was painful.

But even so, I could always recognize that she had an outrageous sense of humor, passionately fought injustice, and had other admirable qualities (why everyone kept saying she was such "a wonderful woman!!"). I also recognized that she had been deeply hurt in life -- she felt "cheated" by life in many ways. This fueled her narcissistic sense of entitlement.

She fought back with cunning and courage. I knew her life was coming to an end when she told me, "I don't have the strength to be combative anymore." Combativeness defined her.

About her hurts -- she was raped in her own home when I was four. Look at photos of her before and after, and you (or at least I) can see a change -- a hardening. I don't usually see auras, or at least not the way others seem to, but in her case, it was as if it clamped down on her like a hard candy shell.

 Moments before her death, she appeared to me (I'll write more about that someday) and it was as if a frothy wave expanded suddenly from her like a tsunami and I was caught up and rocked in it -- only instead of being scary, it felt bubbly, warm and wonderful. I didn't know what to make of it, and could only write on a notepad immediately afterward, "Communion with [her name]." Later, I wondered if it was her aura that softened and whooshed out, expanding. As I said, we were at peace.

I have also come to know her better since then, in going through her belongings. (She died Sept. 2004, so I am still going through them...) I discovered that despite her endless criticism, she did want to love me -- it's just, as a wise friend noted, "she didn't know *how.*" 

(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)

Re: Seeing through lies
saizai
2005-11-22 02:15 pm (local) (link)
*wry smile* I'm not sure one *can* "know how"; it's too slippery a thing.

I'm glad you've managed to turn this to the good, though. It's a bit too dangerous - tempting, easy - a trap to do otherwise; even empaths tend to fall into it, sadly. One reason has to do with what you mentioned, the childish idealization: it can be easy to want to lash back against *that* in an extreme that also is not justified, to avoid feeling taken advantage of / deceived / etc in the same way.
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)

slippery love
ar_wahan
2005-11-22 05:07 pm (local) (link)
When I was writing what my friend said, I *wanted* to write that she said, "She [my mother] did love you, she didn't know how to show it." Which, of course, is something else again! But that was not what she actually said.

I think, though, that in fact that is really what was going on -- she did love me, but did not know how to show it.

When I was at a leadership training a few years ago, the speaker announced that the topic of this session was, "What do you do when people rub you the wrong way?" I misheard him in the noisy environment, and wrote instead in my notebook:

"What do you do when people love you the wrong way?"

I think our two titles -- his version, and my misheard one -- say a lot together.


(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)

Re: slippery love
saizai
2005-11-22 05:30 pm (local) (link)
*laugh* I agree.