This week I've been inspired by another motivational quote that I hadn't seen for a while: ”What you do speaks so loud that I cannot hear what you say.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson And it got me thinking. Looking back over my own experiences of abusive people, I realize that I believed words over actions. That because the things they were doing were so divorced from the story I was being told, I decided that I must have misunderstood. It must be me who is misinterpreting the situation. It must be because I'm giving out mixed messages. Heck, perhaps it's just that I'm asking too much — perhaps I just need to be grateful for what I have and be more understanding of the other person's point of view? …
Chain Reactions
It's been another interesting week for me with a good few ”˜ah-ha' moments sprinkled in along the way. So this week I decided to write about how we are influenced as well as how we influence others and ourselves. First off, I'm wondering how many of you have seen the Skype Laughter Chain on Youtube? The description below it says “Laughter brings us closer together — it's a language we all understand. It's also contagious..” and it was made by filming peoples' reactions as they watched other people laughing. My son introduced it to me at Christmas, and since then I've watched it over and over as I continue to share it with friends. And you know what? Each time I can't help but start gigglin …
Seeing Things As We Are
Last week found me involved in an unusually high number of conversations about sociopathy. By now I'm no stranger to explaining my own experiences to incredulous people and then patiently answering their questions and putting in to plain words the fact that no, a sociopath will not even begin to know the meaning of the word ”˜sorry' let alone feel it! “But surely Mel, I know if I'd done something even remotely as heartless as the person you've just described... well, I'd be eaten up with guilt! I couldn't sleep at night!” they exclaim, eyes wide open and hands held to their face. “Surely deep down they must know they've done wrong and feel ashamed?” Each time I hear that kind of respons …
New Beginnings
Happy New Year everybody! I'd really love to reach out to everyone on this site to give you a huge hug for 2012 and say thank you for allowing me to be part of your community. Even though I can't physically do it in person right now, I hope you can feel it any way :-) Perhaps not surprisingly, I am choosing this week to talk about new starts, new beginnings and renewed hope. Over the holidays I came across a statement that resonated with me on numerous levels. “You can't reach out for the new until you let go of what is in your hand!” It's another of those simple yet deeply profound wisdoms that convey the truth in a way that can be instantly understood. I smiled when I first read it …
Beautiful Birds
Thank you for your kind comments after the Tigers post — I'm so glad that people are able to identify with what I'm saying. It kind of makes all the past ”˜bad stuff' worthwhile”¦ you know what I mean? So again, thank you for letting me know what works — it means a lot to me. This last weekend was my birthday and I've been wondering what to write for this week's post. Do I talk about the celebration of birthdays? Or the festive season? Or perhaps the concept of rebirth and renewal? And then, all of a sudden, as I was consulting Google for a completely unrelated subject, a phrase that I had never heard of seemed to jump out of my computer screen: “It's the beautiful bird that gets caged” Si …
Don’t Think About The Tigers!
I am always fascinated by the way we use our thoughts and our language — both are extremely powerful tools, both have equally as much power to help us as to hinder us, depending on the way we use them. In the vast majority of cases, people have little idea of just how much control they actually do have over their experiences — and even less understanding about how to do something to positively influence how they're feeling. And you know the strangest thing? Most people are so acutely aware of what they don't want that they've forgotten what it is they do want — which is why so many remain stuck. Not so long ago I was working with a lady who'd had some pretty rough experiences. She'd alrea …
Get Out Your Rainbow Colours!
Many months ago, a dear friend of mine sent me a card with these words on it: “You, whose day it is, get out your rainbow colours and make it beautiful!” Traditional Nootka Song I still have it sitting on my desk because it always makes me smile and, when I need it, gives me a bit of a jolt as well! It's come in particularly handy over the past few days because, for whatever reason, they've been just some of ”˜those' kind of days. I'm sure you know what I mean. They're the days when, no matter what, it just seems there's a storm cloud following — not necessarily in full storm mode, maybe just moody and threatening. Either way, there's a kind of heaviness and flat feeling that just sits th …
It’s Up To All Of Us Now
Wow, last week's course with Dr Robert Hare was absolutely amazing! A huge eye-opener on how offending psychopaths are measured and dealt with in the criminal justice system — and also an insight in to the astonishing man who has given so much to so many of us. I'm planning to cover more about that in future posts... This week I'd like to talk about another subject that came up last week. It was also spelled out loud and clear in the Fishead movie that I know many of you have seen. It's the point that, even though it's widely acknowledged that a psychopath cannot ”˜get better' (and therefore it stands to reason that we cannot change the way they behave) it's also true that the vast major …
Reclaiming Who We Are
I'm so glad that so many of you found Fishead useful. It's yet one more resource, one more educational tool that can only help to highlight the cause about sociopaths. This week I am on a training course run by Dr Robert Hare, so next week I'm sure I will be writing about my experiences. Today, though, I felt it appropriate to share something of my own experiences following the aftermath of my relationship. It's a post that was written on the 19th June 2010, fourteen months after I discovered the truth. It was a time when I'd really begun to make progress. I had survived (probably the most important thing at the time!), I knew exactly what I was dealing with (in terms of the personality …
Sociopaths Can Only Talk The Walk
This week I have been reading Jon Ronson's book The Psychopath Test. It's been on my list of ”˜must reads' since it came out earlier this year, and just a couple of days ago I downloaded it on to my Kindle. I finished it within 24hours. Jon Ronson is a British journalist who, among many other things, wrote the film Men Who Stare At Goats, which was made in to a movie starring George Clooney and Ewan McGregor. Jon interviewed my friend Mary Turner Thomson (author of “The Bigamist” detailing her marriage to the sociopath Will Jordan) and became fascinated with the subject of psychopaths. He subsequently attended Dr Robert Hare's training programme to understand the PCL-R checklist that many …