The Moment of Decision:
Fatal Peril
My Agreement
I made an agreement with my TopsAlive group yesterday to write up and post this experience of noticing my Moment of Decision. The place that Hamish and Alive Program label as a Fatal Peril and an opportunity to decide to follow the Superior-Role (or Male-Role) Belief System story or to give my power to my Authentic Self…to Choose to Equalize with myself and others.
One thing this program teaches is that a Fatal Peril happens in an instant… and…it is possible to slow down and notice that moment. It is possible to make a different decision. I have been working with this tool to notice and stop my violence, towards myself and towards others, for 9 years now.
This blog is dedicated to sharing and supporting each other as a community committed to being Equal with others…I am willing to notice and stop Superior-Role habits and patterns…I am willing to learn Intimating skills…and I am offering and asking for support in that process.
What I experienced yesterday was fascinating and I am willing to share it with you all. I look forward to hearing others experiences with the Alive tool…and to receiving Pull-Ups in the form of Feedback about my shares in the Alive Program practice.
My Fatal Peril:
I am finishing the book “Epstein: Dead Men Tell No Tales”. *After a book full of Survivors describing their child-self’s thoughts of hopelessness <Colluding with> about the inevitability of this Rape Culture’s violence.
For example, Virginia Roberts, a woman who describes a life of sexual slavery to Jeffery Epstein, has come forward with her story. She said of her first experience of sexual abuse at his hands, ‘I thought this is what life is about…there is nothing else…I did what they said.’
15 years old at the time, she describes her life as a Survivor of sexual violence at the hands of adults since she was 9. I am sad, afraid and angry when I hear about anyone growing up in such violence. I am not surprised.
She is only one of the victims who have come forward. One of the many who told a repeated story of hopeless surrender to this ‘inevitable violence’ from people…especially men of power, money, and influence.
I hear Hamish calling this experience a ‘You Can’t Fight City Hall’ type of despair. Those in a Power-Over position are going to do whatever they want and there is nothing the Power-Less can do about it.
The Hitman/Perpetrator’s story to the Victims here is one of utter hopelessness. “Don’t even try to fight. There is nothing you can do to change what is and what is…is unavoidable violation. It is the way things always have been and it is the way things always will be.”
In the last chapter of a book that has been very difficult for me…I have a major What-The-Fuck. The investigative reporters are naming names and connecting money from the 1920’s thru to the present with Epstein and the child sex trafficking.
WTF
There is no escape. They control everything and they know everything because they are watching us.
My Victim-
Hopeless Trapped Battery (feeding the violence that is)
My Stepford/Colluder-
Co-operating Silent Collaborator
My Rebel
Furious Soapboxing Vigilante
My Hitman/Perpetrator
Cold Ruthless Hammer
My Authentic Self
Afraid/Angry/Sad Noticing Human
My Power to Decide
What I notice in this Fatal Peril was the moment of my Power to Decide stretching for 3…4…5 minutes. In that long moment I notice that I am not going into my usual story…my Soapboxing Vigilante is my usual immediate reaction to the stimuli of looking at the violence of the so-called 1%.
In the religion I was raised in there is an instruction (Expectation) for all children to sit through the two-hour meetings quietly ‘paying attention’. If they do not their parents are instructed (Expected) to take them in the back or outside and spank them.
On this day last week what came up for me was a memory from when I was about 6.
I hear my mother telling me a story from before I was born. She tells me many times about a little 3-year-old boy who she describes as always in trouble. What she means by ‘in trouble’, is he does not sit quietly for 2 hours very well. She describes his parents struggle to consistently and strictly apply the instructions (Expectations) of the Organization as the reason for his on-going fight with the rules.
He would ‘be good’ if his parents would just do the ‘discipline’ correctly, and they weren’t so he was still fighting. This was the setup for her story. She tells this part with a sad shake of her head. They can’t see how hard they are making it for him. It would be easier for him if they would be steady and strict in how they hold the rules for him.
So, there is one meeting where he is squirming and making noise. This particular time his father decides to take him outside to spank him. Everyone know this is what is going to happen, including the little boy.
She tells me, “He is shrieking and kicking as he is being carried out, all of the sudden, he stops crying and struggling and instead in a loud clear voice that echoes thru the room says…‘Isn’t anybody gonna to help me!?!’
So, it is a success story and my mother crows with laughter as she tells the last piece. No of course no one is going to help you. They all are supporting (Colluding with), the belief system that surrounds you. They believe it is for the little boy’s own good. They will stand by and watch this violence and do nothing to stop it.
As I finish the last chapter of the Epstein book, I notice this story from my childhood in my mind, and I am startled.
For a moment I think, “Why am I thinking about that?”
Then I experience a click of recognition. This story my mother use to tell me is part of the root of my Helpless Colluder. My safety lives in co-operation with ‘what is’ because I am Power-Less to change it.
I remember clearly understanding this point of my mother’s story. I am a fool if I think any of the adults around me are going to help me. My only option…to endure. My best survival…co-operate in all things.
My Stepford- the Obedient Good-for-Nothing Slave was trained into me using, among other things, this story.
I also realize I have my own Agency (my Power Within). I can choose to do something different…something other than Collude with ‘what is’.
I am not a 6-year-old child anymore. I have options my child-self did not have. Noticing this experience from my past, and its impact on me, is helping me to notice my choices now.