A question...

[johnpalmer]

I was speaking to someone who had been sexually abused as a child.

A spiritual advisor of hers said that she needed to make peace with the abuser to continue to walk her spiritual path. (NB: The advisor did not say "all victims must make peace with all abusers"... the advisor said that she had to make peace with *this particular* abuser... and maybe only because of certain special circumstances.)

She asked me what that meant. I said that she "made peace" once she wasn't hoping for this man to die or otherwise suffer, other than as was justified by his actions. She didn't have to talk to him, didn't have to deal with him, she didn't even have to wish him *well*... I said that once she wasn't wishing harm on him, she had made peace with him, as much as could be asked.

Keeping in mind that she asked me the question (so I wasn't telling her from out of the blue that she shouldn't wish ill on her attacker), how do people feel about that answer?

(Yes, it's an open-ended question.)

Comments

[ruth-lawrence.livejournal.com]

I don't think people should be forgiven some things.

"Make peace with" is a bunch of poorly-chosen words, I think.

"Heal to the point of rarely thinking about" seems healthier to me, honestly.

But I'm not a Christian, and I am a 'survivor'.

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Nod. I didn't use the word "forgive"; I wouldn't and couldn't. But, I grant that some of what I'd said is awfully close to forgiveness.

We did go over the situation where he wanted to talk to her, and I made sure she understood the concept of "a good deed that can not be demanded/made obligatory" (I've heard the term "mitzvah" used to describe this; I've also heard that definition disputed.) I then said to her that, *if* she had confidence that he wanted to extend a sincere apology, then it would be such a deed - one that can't be demanded - if she were to give him that chance.

But, I emphasized that if she didn't want to give him that chance, well, he's the one who hurt her. He doesn't get to make any demands, or apply any pressure, and if she never wants to talk to him, he earns no sympathy from me, no matter how much it pains him.

She deserves to do whatever was best and right for her... and I could see her advisor saying she had to stop wishing active harm on the man. I couldn't agree with anything more than that.

[griffen.livejournal.com]

I'm someone who can't even get that far, so it feels like the bar is set too high for me to jump, but... meh. I wish I could answer that question.

[ruth-lawrence.livejournal.com]

Of course I wrote out of my own headspace, and obviously she deserves to do what's best for her.

The guy who most seriously abused me is likely dead: it's well over thirty years and I realised a while back he was headed that way. I don't care enough to find out.

May your friend heal.

[odanu.livejournal.com]

Perhaps her spiritual advisor would have been wiser to advise that she make peace with herself, not her abuser. People who have been abused frequently fail to forgive themselves for their victimization. Given what her spiritual advisor told her, your answer was good.

[leiacat.livejournal.com]

To me, it's more about being ok with whatever one is feeling on the subject. It can be pity, or indiference, or the lack of detestation that you advise, or it can be a sincere loathing with a wish that he died horribly - so long as one is well and truly ok with those feelings, and there are no doubts or guilt or thinking oneself horrible for having those thoughts, peace is made.

[valkyrwench.livejournal.com]

I'm not so sure it's making peace with her abuser, as much as letting go of the anger and being peaceful within herself. It's not something that's easy to do, and it's taken me 4 years to get to that stage with my toxic mother, which was an entirely different kind of abuse. I still won't interact with her, but I wish her no ill, either.

I don't think you were far off on your answer. You're a wise man, John.

[kightp.livejournal.com]

I agree with those who suggest that it's more a question of making peace with herself than with the abuser, which sounds just enough like "forgive him" to give me chills, as a survivor who believes some things are not forgiveable.

But, yes, coming to the point where one is not actively wishing one's abuser ill is part of coming to the point where one is not actively thinking about the abuser all the time, and - for me, at least - an important step on the path toward healing.

I didn't consider myself truly healed until I was able to rid myself of the constant, low-level obsession about what had happened to me and the one who did it. For much of my adult life it was always playing and replaying in the background, infecting my spirit like a low-grade fever. It required actively letting go to rid myself of that background noise, but dear gods, what relief...

[teddywolf.livejournal.com]

Sounds about right to me.

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Um. I'm worried suddenly that my tone might have come across badly in that last response, from what you said in response. Maybe I'm completely misreading your tone, and just being really nervous over nothing, as well. But, let me explain my headspace, just in case.

When you mentioned 'forgive', I was thinking "Oh, shit, no, I hope nobody thinks I was saying she had to *forgive* him!" More like kightp's idea of making him no longer a part of her brain.

And so I was feeling guilty over having maybe-possibly having made it sound like I was pushing forgiveness, so I was babbling a bit, trying to justify what I'd said, and then trying to justify what I was saying, and... well. Anyway. So, if it sounded like I was arguing with what you said, I wasn't, I was explaining in a slightly worried manner.

[blackthornglade.livejournal.com]

I try to avoid the "make peace with X" because it's vague.

The approach I take is that it's important to let the past be the past. It forms a part of who you are today, but hanging onto it as the sole definition of who you are today is unhealthy. As an early exercise in the material I teach, I require students to examine their lives, take notes on the good and bad things that come up in a series of meditations, and then we get to work on them.

Deciding what to "keep" as being important to you today goes in one pile.

Deciding what to acknowledge as a part of you, but also as a part of the past goes in a separate one.

Both piles are burned in a cauldron, one at a time, with the acknowledgment that they are either moving on or keeping this one, then the paper it's written on is burnt. What's done and put in the past you walk away from.

Being "at peace", to me means letting the past be the past and getting on with today. You can't escape what may have been done to you, but you can move on from it.

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Nod. I don't know how I feel about the spiritual advisor, but I agree that making peace with one's self is generally a better idea.

[ruth-lawrence.livejournal.com]

It's okay, I was in a letting-it-out space.

And it *is* hard to read the tone of furriners. We use code-words differently at the least.

Yup, I agree with [Unknown site tag]: evict them from one's brain as much as possible.

I wouldn't recognise my worst abuser if I saw him now, which has to be good!

Sorry to have worried you.

[ruth-lawrence.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I can see it would be. Go you!

I've mostly expunged the stuff from 0 to 30, but have some more recent stuff with outrageous police inaction and mockery etc that isn't quiet yet. Or the stuff in England.

[kightp.livejournal.com]

One of the first rituals johnpalmer helped me put together was very much like what you describe, as it happens. I found it both powerful and useful, in fundamental ways.

[hobbitbabe.livejournal.com]

I can see that.

I understand what you johnpalmer meant by the indicator of not wishing the abuser harm any more. But I have a feeling (from my second hand observations) that maybe that is a sign that one has made peace rather than something to aim for directly. What I've seen seems to be more of a process of naming the hurt, being heard and agreed by somebody, and then letting go. The not wishing ill seemed to happen after that, not by specific effort.