Imprinting
Breaking the chains of generational
and mental abuse
Imprint-any impression or impressed effect
We are all products of our environment, a culmination of
experiences that shape our thoughts, actions, perception and social skills. To
understand how we perceive the world, its people and social co-existence, we
must understand how important our childhood experiences positive or negative
subconsciously teach us how to socialize and navigate as an adult in society.
In a previous post, I asked the question:
How does a person continue to reenact a thought process
of racism and bigotry generation after generation?
Well, how does a person born into the shackles of
poverty, a history of mental slavery and systemic racism rise above their
condition to be successful despite their circumstances? And why does a person
under the very same conditions fail in their attempt to overcome their
circumstances?
I've asked myself these questions often with very little
understanding to why this happens. Through spiritual understanding, research
and self-discovery I have come to the conclusion of a possible theory to the
answer.
I recently read the Joy Degruy''s book, "Post
Traumatic Slave Syndrome" and she writes in her book how the history of
slavery has a generational impact on African Americans even to this day.
I have always believe that it is possible to be
influenced through generational imprinting, in other words, thoughts, action,
perception, failure, success as well as habits and personality traits can all
be passed down generation after generation.
We are not just products of our own experiences, but the
past experiences of our parent's, and we can even influence our children's
perception positively or negatively before they begin their own experiences.
Of course, there are variations on how we apply these
experiences to our lives and that comes with how early we become self-aware of negative
circumstances and positively apply them in our life. For example, if a person's
family has a history of going to college, becoming successful in business and
have been taught the importance of investment and saving money, chances are
they will teach their children the same values.
Or by the same token parents or a parent can inflict the
same failures and dysfunction down as well. If a person's family has a history
of dysfunction, low self-esteem or lack of knowledge in the survival tools
necessary to achieve success, chances are they will pass the same value system
down to their children and so on. Of course, there are always exceptions to the
rule in either example.
I personally know people who have followed the same
pathways as their parent, a child ending up on drugs just like their parent, an
alcoholic parent producing an alcoholic child, a daughter having many children
without any expectation of marriage just as her mother had done. Sometimes as
numerous as two, three and more generations have carried on the same patterns
of behavior. How does a child break the negative cycle passed down from parent
to child?
One of the ways it can occur is through self-awareness,
having the ability to choose to be different, the self-determination and will
to want to be a better example for themselves as well as their children. I
believe it can occur when a child is exposed to a positive influence, an
example of a pattern of behavior that is contrary to what they have seen in
their particular environment. An environment of dysfunction, abuse and neglect
doesn’t have to mean a life of the same treatment as those who perpetuate the
offense. A conscious choice can be made to follow a different path, to want to
change, to be self-aware of the tendencies that may occur if left unchallenged.
It is important to note that one of the ways to challenge that dysfunction is
to recognize those feelings within one’s self and choose not to inflict someone
else with that same abuse. Empathy is a
part of the healing process; a person understands how it feels, through the
emotional feelings of their own abuse. A conscious choice is made to not repeat
the behavior, especially to one’s own child. It is easy to become the abuser, a
carbon copy of the person who inflicted that pain, but it takes courage and
empathy to choose to be a better person.
In European culture hatred, bigotry and abuse comes from
a place of scorn of one’s self and most likely was inflicted by a parent or
parents with those same qualities in their psyche. It is a pathological
sickness that can be passed down generation after generation. Oppression and
the effects of racism and hatred can also carry down generation after
generation. Its effects can be seen in the African American community on a
daily basis.
To overcome the patterns of negative behavior really
comes down to a choice to be a better human being or to sentence your child to
the same destructive behaviors that were inflicted on you. It is not only
selfish but cruel, especially since that same behavior has bought so much
destruction to the family already. It is possible to severe the chains of
generational abuse by first becoming aware there is a problem, then by seeking spiritual
and psychological counseling to overcome the damage that has been done. Change
can only come from within first and from the change in you it will permeate
outward and the healing can begin.
Do it for yourself and for the next generation….
