It’s
really hard when someone tells you that your words or actions have hurt them.
Our brain goes into denial and defense mode because we feel attacked. Instead
of paying attention to the harm done, we start thinking about the consequences
and impact on ourselves. Maybe we
blame the other person, or come up with reasons and excuses for our words and
actions. By the end of the interaction, we have added more pain to the person we
had already caused so much pain to! I’ve done this. I think we’ve all probably
done it, but it’s really damaging. Maybe we had no idea that our behaviour was
doing so much harm and we are shocked to find out it did. Regardless of
intention, hurt is hurt. We can’t let our ego get in the way of making things
right. When I think about values in Sikhism, one of the most important things
that comes to my mind is accountability for our actions.
I’m
going to use the example of emotional abuse to talk about accountability. Relationships
are one of the biggest areas of our lives so if we are going to be accountable
and take responsibility for our actions, our relationships are a good place to
start. I chose this topic because it’s a lot more common than people think, and
it’s one that we tend not to talk about. People often think of abusive
behaviours as physical abuse. Because of this, I think emotional abuse can go
unrecognized. The abuser may not realize it is a very-real form of abuse, and
the victim may not have a name for their pain. Emotional abuse is extremely
damaging: “Abused women have identified that the long-term effects of emotional
abuse are greater than any other form of abuse, including physical violence”
and it “slowly erodes the victim’s sense of self-worth, security, and trust in
themselves and others” (2). (Note that although this quote was about women, men
are emotionally abused as well, and I will be using neutral language for the
rest of this post. Also note I have a paragraph at the bottom of this article
with a note about victims/survivors of abuse, but the next bit is going to be
about abusers and accountability.)
Emotional
abuse is defined as “when a person uses words or actions to
control, frighten or isolate someone or take away their self-respect” (3). Emotionally
abusive relationships can be any relationship- parent/child, siblings,
relatives, friendships, partner, etc. (2).
This is a big topic, so there are longer lists of what
emotional abuse can look like, but I wanted to provide some examples below
(sources: 2,4,5,6,7)
Lack of
empathy/not caring how you feel
Silent
treatment, emotional isolation/distancing, ignoring you
Make you
feel they are right and you are always wrong
Belittle
your goals/accomplishments
Humiliation
Judging,
criticizing
insults,
yelling
Threatening/intimidating
Neglect
Isolating
you from family or friends
Withdrawing
affection and attention
Manipulation
Guilt trips
Some
people might look at that list, or read more about emotional abuse and
recognize their own behavior. Maybe someone has even pointed out that you are
doing some of those things. Maybe you are questioning now whether or not you
have been emotionally abusive towards someone. Even people who have realized
they are abusive (including physical, sexual or emotional abuse) might be
scared to change, and I can understand that because I would be scared too. Change
is especially hard when you feel like society is painting a picture of “the
abuser” as a monster or a psychopath. As I posted about previously in my post
“Male Privilege Part 2”, that’s not reality. There is no image of what the
abuser or abused person should look like, it could be any of us! The authors of
‘Out of the FOG’ write:
“Abusers aren’t pure evil. They aren’t
like the bad guys in the movies. They are regular people. When a criminal is
apprehended, there will often be neighbors who will say that ‘they seemed
like such a regular person.’… Abusive people are just like the person next
door because abusive people are
the person next door” (8).
Abusers
don’t abuse in all of their relationships or even most of the time, but “it
doesn’t take much mistreatment to terrorize or demoralize a person for a very
long time. It is quite common for an
abusive person to behave normally most of the time and even be kind, polite,
humble, gracious, generous, devoted or apologetic in periods between and
immediately following episodes of mistreatment” (8). The reason I am making
these points is because when we create the picture of the “monster”, then we
can separate ourselves out and deny our abuse. Victims of abuse will also fail
to identify the abuse by saying “but this is someone I love; how can they be
abusive? (Where is the monster you speak of?)” This prevents them from getting
the help they need. Kai Thom writes “When we are able to admit that the
capacity to harm lies within ourselves-within us all- we become capable of
radially transforming the conversation around abuse and rape culture. We can go
from simply reacting to abuse and punishing ‘abusers’ to prevent abuse and
healing our communities” (9). Remember, there is stigma for BOTH abusers, and
the survivors of abuse (10). Also, people can be abused in one relationship and
abusive in another (not the same relationship) (9)
Changing
abusive behaviour is a hard process and you have to make the decision to do it
for yourself. You will benefit from it- just think of all that bad karma you
are going to avoid, and all the good karma you are going to create! It will
greatly help your relationships, and you will avoid passing on the patterns of abusive
behaviours to your kids, who will watch/are watching you as their role model. The
younger you are when you change your ways, the better, but its never too late. (Note:
If you are single, its really good to work on this before you are in a relationship,
because you will not still be actively abusing a partner while you are working
on yourself (12). It’s better to go into a relationship after you have already
made significant progress to know you aren’t going to hurt your partner/kids (12).
If you really want your future partner to live a happy life with you then
sacrifice this time and instead of going out to look for someone, look inside
and work on yourself). If you are ready to take responsibility, this is what it
looks like (for any type of abuse):
Listen to
the person you have abused, and do what you can to help facilitate their
healing based on what they need (9,13). If this means they need to be left
alone, respect that (14). Remember this is based on what they
need, not what you think they need. You
can’t really make it up to them for what you did in the past, but the least you
can do is help them in whatever way you can now.
Admit what
you did, without blaming the other person, rationalizing, minimizing or making
excuses. Understand the impact of what you did and accept the consequences (13,
15)
Are you
ready to give up the power? Every type of abuse is about control. Fixing that
is a long-term commitment to changing your controlling beliefs and attitudes to
respectful ones and figuring out where those beliefs come from (9,13,15)
Change
requires professional help. There are specific programs dealing with addressing
abusive behaviours (and it helps to have support!). Things like anger
management and couples counselling are not effective for addressing abuse
(16,17,18)
Forgive yourself and heal your shame- seeing
yourself as a bad person prevents you from being able to move forward and being
accountable (remember shame is different than guilt) (9). Ask Waheguru for
forgiveness.
I
know this sounds like a lot of work but honestly it’s you that’s going to
benefit, and you that’s going to pay if you don’t. Some people end up making
these changes after they are forced to from the criminal justice system (I’ve
seen that happen, and it really isn’t pleasant to watch). Some people will end
up wasting the rest of their lives hurting other people, and ruin their chance
at meeting God (I’ve seen that happen too and its even worse). Why not make the
effort ahead of time? If we fail to
recognize how we are treating other people, we are leaving behind a trail of
destruction and that’s not what we came onto this earth to do. Who are we
hiding our actions from? God is all-knowing and all-seeing and is the one
delivering the karma! Who are we harming? Each person is the sargun-saroop of
God Himself! If we saw Waheguru in each person we would not be anywhere
near abusive. So it’s important to build towards that by doing our prayers,
simran, and practicing the values we learn from Sikhi. With the grace of God
one day we will be able to actually meet God, and see God in everything and
everyone. If we continue to deny our actions and harm other people we can’t get
there and our lives will be wasted away. So, please, be accountable for your
actions. This applies to how we are talking about people, talking to people,
and how we act in general. Treat people with the respect that you would treat
God.
Special
note for survivors of abuse:
If
you looked at the above list and realized you are in an emotionally abusive
relationship, I want you to know that it’s not your fault. It might feel
isolating, but you aren’t alone. There is no excuse for how you are being
treated. Some of the effects of emotional abuse include low self-esteem,
depression, anxiety, and PTSD (2). You deserve to be treated with love and
respect in your relationships, and there is help available. A good place to
start is the doctor’s office or counsellor (and in an unsafe situation, the
police). You have a right to get help and stay safe.
References
8http://outofthefog.website/top-100-trait-blog/2015/12/20/the-abuser-profile
