In a recent post Jane Stevens* presents evidence that Putin is an ACEs-Survivor suffering from insecure attachment - he never got safely grounded through another human heart to the Heart of the Universe. Like Stevens, we all want Putin to “stop what he’s doing before he shatters the lives of millions more”. We want Putin to suddenly feel safe and grounded through another human heart to the Heart of the Universe so he can behave differently. Is this likely to happen? Can it happen quickly? Here are three things to consider.
First, the model for emotional life demonstrated by our parents gets etched solidly into our subconscious. We unknowingly carry a silent emotional filter through which we evaluate all our experiences, and we believe our evaluations. If you’ve ever heard the phrase ‘don’t believe what you think’, this is what it references. Often it's great personal loss that convinces us to question deficits in our own thinking and behavior that everyone else can clearly see. Like most adult ACES-survivors, Putin’s deficits are likely unknown to him.
Second, the pain of rejection felt in childhood homes instills deep defenses against ever feeling that way again. Looking back at what happened to us, then looking around (in surprise and shock) at its continuing influence are vigilantly avoided. If the first step of looking back at what happened to us is hard, then the second step of looking around at what we do to perpetuate the pattern is excruciating. Only then, however, can come the slow, two-steps forward, one-step backward process of real change. What is the likelihood of Putin doing either one of these?
Finally, Putin’s lineage (and the lineages of most ACEs-survivors) courses through western individualism where unsupported mothering (parenting) is OK with us. Nuclear families are left to go it alone, leaving children with no one to turn to when their parents are overwhelmed (Manifesto Item #8). Like Putin, for many children experiencing ACEs, there are “no grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins” …no one. Will Putin turn to anyone when he “Never had anyone to turn to?”
Stevens points us to a renowned predecessor in ACEs work, Alice Miller, who implores us to face up to both what happened to us as children and our own part as parents in continuing ACEs through the generations. In her lifetime, she wanted us to “…become free to act from conscious motives instead of being driven by unconscious fears….” As a culture of majority ACEs-survivors, becoming free is a long game that we can only hope future generations will win. It’s so long because the journey is inward, the direction ACEs-survivors fear most. But, however daunting, this is the game we in the ACEs movement must play if we ever want to end ACEs. Private personal work plus public work creating a culture of well-supported mothering/parenting works both ends toward the middle.
“There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in.” ― Desmond Tutu
*Jane Stevens is a PACES Connection staff member and the founder and editor of ACEsTooHigh.
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