Silencing a Mother’s Voice
And finding peace in stillness
--
Yesterday, July 3rd, was my mother’s birthday. If she were still alive she would have turned 88 years old.
There are so many stories out there from people who suffered mental, emotional and physical abuse at the hands of parents. Many of us go through much of our adult lives with the voices of those parents still echoing in our heads. After reading the article by Ann Litts on inner voices and narratives (The Things You Are) and especially after reading the discussion that followed that article I got a nudge to tell my story of how I dealt with one of those kinds of inner voices planted in our heads by a parent.
My mother suffered from a long list of psychological pathologies. To put it in laymen’s terms, she was an utter basket case. She constantly spewed forth abusive venom towards all four of her children as well as any other human who came within range. I longed with all my heart for the day when I could move out of the house and begin my own life free from her voice and abuse.
I left when I could and did not look back but sadly her voice followed me as it was stuck in my head. It happens to a lot of people. Simply leaving did not get rid of her voice in my noggin.
Many people turn to psychotherapy for help in quelling those parental voices echoing in their heads. And many people have received valuable help this way. Not me. I do not know why but I have always been a little skeptical of psychology.
Instead, I dived headlong into every non-religious spiritual practice I could find. I tried everything. I studied everything. I meditated, I did sweat-lodges, I did vision quests, I did past-life regression, I used countless affirmations, I performed mojo ceremonies and took divine substances, and I even walked barefoot over red hot burning coals (it’s easier than it sounds).
Just as with psychotherapy, it took many years of spiritual practice to come close to getting HER voice out of my head. As far as I can tell there is no overnight fix, whether through psychotherapy or anything else. HER voice was in my head and in my ears for the first 18 years of my life and it took longer than that to get it out.
