Feeling Pulled In Two after Exiting a Manipulative Group or Relationship (More from Hamlet?)

Ever feel “caught between a rock and a hard place?”  Living life makes some frustrating situations unavoidable at some point, so such cliché’s develop because these “truisms” describe a universal and uncomfortable experience very well.  Prince Hamlet certainly understood this saying!  But if you’ve been a member or participant with an ideological group or in a relationship with a very demanding person, you definitely identify with the ongoing experience of a “no win” situation in a unique way, even though it is hard to describe sometimes.  Because of human nature, we tend to cope with this kind of situational stress, interpersonal stress, and social pressure within a group in predicable ways.  Just like certain physical illnesses produce specific physical symptoms, high stress relationships that place consistent pressure and demands upon people push them into predictable ways of coping with the inconsistencies that become an inevitable element of manipulation.

 

Even if you’ve left a manipulative group or a relationship some time ago, you may still experience the feelings and sensations that ex-members commonly experience immediately after leaving a group.  They can be brief or can emerge unexpectedly as more of a lingering annoyance or problem, even after you feel as though you’ve made a lot of progress and grown beyond them in the past.  Know that this is a very normal and healthy experience.  The experience results from your own good brain doing what it is supposed to do – it is protecting you.

Relationships build upon some positive or beneficial experience, otherwise we would not continue to return to them, and the best type of manipulators manipulate without people ever noticing the subtle nature of the manipulation.  If we perceived that we were being manipulated, we would guard against any kind of exploitation, but a person cannot guard against influence if they do not realize that they are being influenced.  As time progresses, individuals become more deeply connected to others within their group as the manipulation increases gradually.  Compliance with the expectations of the manipulator becomes commonplace, and most people do not consciously or readily recognize the things that don’t make sense.  Particularly in early stages within a group, people find it easy to ignore inconsistencies or minor problems in favor of the benefits that they receive and the assumptions they make about the virtue and intent of the manipulator.  But the frustration and discomfort does have a cumulative effect.

Groups prefer a standard, often rigid type of behavior and a model type of personality, and members find that they must suppress the elements of their own natural tendencies in order to meet this standard.  The use of positive experiences and rewards for desired behavior discourages the individual’s consideration that the group might be exploiting them, but they do feel some sense of the frustration, even if it is a more intuitive or unconscious sense.  Most people describe this as a sense that something is wrong, but it just seems to escape them and they can’t really find anything obvious and seemingly substantial enough to account for the discomfort.  So most people will rationalize this “check” that they seem to feel because it is not something that they can wrap thoughts around and describe clearly.  They dismiss any of these concerns or discomforts of cognitive dissonance as a fluke, some fault on their part, pushing the awareness into the back of their minds.  Why would they have cause to be so critical about something or someone who brings so many good benefits into their lives?  But the lingering feeling that “things don’t add up” persists.  To combat this sense, group members generally make an even greater effort to comply with the group standard and will tune out the discomfort and thoughts that cast the group or the relationship in any negative light.

But at some point, the pressure in a manipulative relationship builds until the manipulator employs negative stimuli to enforce the standard.  The authoritarian nature of the group limits the amount of positive rewards that can be used, because authoritarian systems place more emphasis on the needs and demands of leadership.  The group goals and the leadership in an authoritarian system do not bend and cater to the individuals in the group by nature and by definition.  By design, leaders possess much more power than do the group members, and the system therefore has a very limited capacity to allow for individual differences and unique qualities.  As a consequence, in very high demand, spiritually abusive groups, the member buries his natural tendencies and personality traits along with their concerns and frustrations in order to develop a secondary personality so that they can function in the group.  Because of the pressure, the secondary personality that is desired by the group becomes the primary one, but the sense of discomfort remains.  Something must be done with this frustration and discomfort.  This separation into two different “selves,” the natural one and the group persona, is a stress-related survival mechanism which is defined as “dissociation.”

Just like diseases have been studied to identify the hallmark symptoms that are used to arrive at a diagnosis, from nearly fifty years of studying how people respond to rigid environments, exploitation, and manipulation, we now know that people who suffer the trauma of spirirtual abuse develop high levels of dissociation.  The word itself derives from the Latin “dissociare” which means “separate.”   In terms of mental health and under normal circumstances, people should feel whole and function should flow naturally from that wholeness.  They don’t struggle with conflict or confusion, and they can think and make decisions because their mind, emotions, and their situations give them the faculty of focus and a sense of ease in function.  In dissociation, people cope with the stress created by inconsistencies by separating themselves from their situation somewhat, through varied degrees of psychological numbing.  In order to protect one’s sense of self, the mind pulls aspects of the person’s consciousness away from the stress, a natural and unconscious type of “stepping back” from it.  The secondary persona that a person adopts becomes a function of this “stepping back.”

This response of the body and mind to the sense of personal threat and discomfort manifests as a self-protective measure.  Though dissociation occurs and is somewhat predictable, individuals experience it in unique ways and to different degrees.  At lesser degrees of dissociation, the powerlessness of the individual renders them feeling as though they are merely watching themselves instead of feeling fully in the moment.  Some people describe this as the same feeling they get while watching a movie – they are there, but there are aspects of things that seem “unreal” or not quite real to them.  The late Dr. Paul Martin, (when he exited from the same the cultic group into which Vision Forum's Geoffrey and Victory Botkin were first recruited), explains that he felt “foggy,” believing that he had developed allergies.  After his tests came back negative for allergy, he understood later that his symptoms were not physical illness but were rather the protective response of his own good mind in its natural effort to protect him from the intense stress of manipulation that he experienced in the cult.  Other people describe a pervasive sense of apathy, fatigue, and a loss of interest in activities that used to give them pleasure, the very same response seen in depression.

Just as a person who has left a manipulative group feels “foggy” or “dull,” they also tend to feel as though they are not themselves.  On the outside, they feel somewhat removed from their environment and their experience of life, but on the inside, they feel disconnected from their true self and their identity to some extent.  They usually describe the feeling of not even knowing or being able to tell who they really are.  Generally, people feel a high level of anxiety because of this sense, as if one should be able to know anything, they should know who they are.  This is true in trauma and depression, but for those who have been in a cultic religion, this particular element can feel even more intense because they actually displaced their identity intentionally to mimic what the group demanded.  Such groups require members to displace their own traits to such a degree that it does produce anxiety for them to the point of distress and confusion on some level.  The group dictated the required personality for individuals, and those individuals had to compartmentalize themselves, dissociating from their identities. 

When members get away from the pressure and manipulation of the group, they must work through the anxiety they experience as they reconnect to their former and natural identity.  When they abandon the group identity that they adopted, they are left with intense feelings of emptiness and confusion.  Usually, groups encourage members to lay this sense of self on God’s altar of sacrifice by requiring the giving of the total self to God by giving oneself to the group.  Under the guise of surrendering negative character traits unto God, groups often require certain good individual character traits which are an integral part of the person that do not correspond with the group ideal be sacrificed and renounced along with notably negative traits.  For example, along with repentance from traits like jealousy or rage, groups also demand that traits such as healthy assertiveness and self-reliance be forfeited as well, because these positive traits render the individual with a sense of personal power.  That power competes with the power of leadership over the group, so the group redefines any and all manifestations of these character traits as negative or evil to discourage a member’s sense of self-direction.  Other aspects of manipulative systems reinforce this abandonment, including “Doctrine over Person.”  Individuals who have exited a group will have some anxiety until they reconnect to their sense of self and personal liberty.  The process takes time and requires soul searching regarding true personal beliefs and desires, and it develops through positive affirmation in the context of healthy relationships.

Emotional healing never occurs as a linear process, meaning that a person does a great deal of jumping around between states of positive progress and states of distress until they get to a place of deeper healing.  Generally, people feel very good when they first leave a manipulative group, but the find themselves suddenly feeling depressed or apathetic, even years later.  Dissociative states subside when a person begins to heal from a traumatic experience, but these states can reappear at any time, even years after a person feels that they have recovered.  The nature of spiritual abuse is so overwhelming, people cannot process everything required for their healing immediately and all at once, and the mind and the Spirit gently filter out and protect a person from more intensity than they can handle at one time.  As the person is ready, the mind allows a new element of the unresolved issues related to the group to surface, and the healing also creates a recalling of the dissociation experienced in the group.  It may seem to the person that they are backtracking, but they are actually moving forward into deeper healing.

If you find this happening to you, encourage yourself and remind yourself that it is a good sign that you are no longer strongly controlled by someone else and that you are making good progress.

In upcoming posts, I plan to address other aspects of this type of healing and more ways that dissociation can manifest, as well as other practical problems experienced by ex-members.  But before I do…

Hamlet’s lament over his own powerlessness and depression expresses aspects of dissociation, as he also experiences the confusion of cognitive dissonance.  His rightful place of succession has been displaced, and those around him aren’t behaving like most other people behave after the death of a loved one.  He becomes the fulcrum for the stress of the strange behavior all around him.  He struggles with the confusion he feels about whether he should act and how he should respond, and he expresses alienation from his sense of self-trust.  The world has suddenly become insane as everyone around him follows some agenda that he doesn’t understand.  He struggles with the stress as well as the sense of hopelessness and powerlessness, all while ironically holding one of the highest positions of power in Denmark.  He expresses a desire to escape the situation, but he realizes that his own situation is a “no win” one, and that he is caught “between a rock and a hard place.”  Listen to his "To Be or Not To Be" lament to see if you can identify with what he has to say.  I think that his experience also applies very well to the existential confusion that many feel after spiritual abuse, and I hope you will consider it, because I still find it helpful to me.  (For those of you who are not familiar with the language used in this scene in Hamlet, read more in a more modern English translation HERE.)

Patriarchy, Controlling Outcomes, and the State of Denmark: Desire that Gets the Best of Us

I’m always amazed at how different aspects of life converge to speak to seemingly unrelated matters.  As a friend of mine struggled this week with the very negative, long term consequences of following patriarchy, I also found time to enjoy a new rendition of Hamlet.  This found me as I finished the last of my preparations on an article that I wrote about patriarchy that I anticipate will be published in early summer.  I thus find myself pondering another aspect of the complicated and subtle topic that I did not have the opportunity to address in the article, resulting from all of these matters.  How can patriarchy’s desirous end of fostering wholesome family life by employing many wholesome and laudable means warrant criticism?  And…  What could patriarchy possibly have in common with Shakespeare’s Hamlet?

One of the great appeals of patriarchy for parents involves the idea that a prescribed plan can produce a specific if not a guaranteed outcome, a system promoted as God’s formula that can give parents the ideal family that they so desire.  Many swallow patriarchy like a medicine meant to anesthetize their fears.  The problem with this approach rests not with the virtuous end that seeks goodness but with the focus of the means one pursues to achieve the goal.  Desire gets the best of us as we seek the wisest and most expedient means to achieve our goal.  Much can be said about the trappings of formulaic religion, and it gives the illusion to the follower that they somehow bear less responsibility for their actions, displacing their responsibility on the plan that makes so many good promises to them in their great need. 

This kind of plan to control outcomes, craft as Shakespeare calls it, can also be seen throughout Hamlet in nearly every character, some for good in the pursuit of meeting God-given human need and some for evil in the pursuit of ambition.  Most spectators easily identify the murderous deceit of Claudius, but are Gertrude, Ophelia, and Hamlet any less culpable for their own choices?  Are they less culpable when they become the object of the craft of another or when they design their own craft as a means of coping with their own lot?  Can these examples provide some insight that might help us better understand patriarchy’s ambitions for virtue and the nature of its supposed error?

As I pondered and prayed about the difficult circumstances of my friend who followed patriarchy as compared to the plight of Gertrude, I thought more deeply about the influence that pain, fear, and the feeling of powerlessness poses upon us.  Like my friend who capitulated to fear and the premises of patriarchy that defined her far more helpless than she really was, I think of the influences upon Gertrude when Hamlet the King dies.  In addition to the grief over the loss of her beloved husband, Denmark’s precarious status under threat from Fortinbras of Norway likely heightens her sense of urgency.  If her husband’s brother can seize the crown and displace her son under the guise of the country’s best interests, how more easily could this ambitious successor dispense with her own head?  Infatuation magically assuages her grief and provides a ready-made formula that seemingly solves many problems through a would-be wisdom of craft.  Though we might judge her for her too hasty marriage, many of us can appreciate the pains and pressures of her human need.  The immediate benefits that satisfy some of her tremendous and painful needs make her vulnerable, and that satisfaction of the flesh makes it easier for her to avoid the turning of her eyes into her very soul to see its black and grained spots.  Vulnerability clouds her perspective which subsequently clouds and taints her judgment.  The formulaic solution seems to have pragmatic method in its madness.

Those who choose patriarchy’s prescribed formulas also fall prey to the promises of patriarchy because of vulnerability, much like Gertrude does.  The pressures upon the Christian family seem insurmountable, and when that family allows patriarchy to frame their perspective, the parent can feel very powerless.  Fear becomes a most potent motivator when one believes that their kingdom risks collapse under the threat of one’s formidable enemy, a godless culture.  Add to the mix the responsibility of the divine right of kings, and the paternalism of patriarchy’s leadership falls into play.  This craft alleviates the burdens that parents perceive, and it gives the illusion that the craft will control the outcome.  The system even appears to focus on how to achieve righteous means through the legalism of conformity to a formula as well as the righteous end, giving the illusion of wisdom while powerfully alleviating the stress and work of personal and dynamic choice.  It seems like righteous satisfaction.  Like Gertrude, choosing to look through a perspective that has been clouded by craft becomes too much painful work.  We are oft' to blame n this -- 'tis too much proved -- that with devotion's visage and pious action we do sugar o're the devil himself.  We ever so subtly allow the end to justify the means by failing to think about matters deeply, yet I find it interesting that the Bard's villains count this cost far more artfully than do the unwitting. 

Where does Gertrude go wrong in the pursuit of her desire?  Though the intensity of great desire makes us vulnerable when life presses us, God gives us human needs and desires, and satisfaction of those needs as gifts through which He bestows great blessing on us.  Comfort in the face of grief heals us.  Companionship comforts us in the painful loneliness of loss.  Ambition, the seeking of favor, derives from the “going around” to solicit support, but it can be a force that works much good for many.  Even Jesus speaks of great desire (epithumeo) in anticipation of sharing the Passover feast with his disciples (Luke 22:15), yet He uses the same word to describe sinful sexual lust in Matthew 5:28.  James 1:13-15 states that temptation provokes us through lust or strong desire, but that desire does not conceive sin without our participation.  We conceive sin through our personal choice of evil, a failure to exercise self-control over our own willfulness.  Desire becomes too great when we allow our focus to be drawn away, and sin is conceived when we choose the wrong object for our desires.

And herein, I believe, manifests the primary subtle error within patriarchy, a premise that I believe that 1 Corinthians 10 supports.  Paul explains in this chapter that the Israelites in the wilderness were drawn away into error through lust, and he lists the specific objects of their error:  idolatry, fornication, testing the Lord, and grumbling.  I believe that patriarchy fails to learn from the example of those who failed in their own ambitions to please God, following the ambitions of their own willfulness instead.  Patriarchy subtly shifts into idolatry when it focuses too heavily upon family virtue instead of due and balanced focus on God who created it.  Esteem for virtue combined with this displaced focus draws the system into error.  Using family as an end to achieve its ambition for virtue, it resorts to human striving through lists of rules and moral imperatives which are meant to protect the family.  In so doing, it loses sight of the end it seeks and treads upon the very families that it seeks to protect.  Not only does the family become an idol, so does the system, and even the system’s leaders do as well.  Patriarchy calls individuals to sacrifice their individuality on its altars of the traditions of men.  Gertrude likewise sacrifices perspective in this way when she places truth and clear perspective upon the altar of comfort and safety under the guise of wisdom.

Family dysfunction can be described in a similar way that perhaps will make my point more clear.  Dysfunction begins with addressing the needs of those we love, but sometimes we go over and above what is appropriate, doing for another what they can and should do for themselves.  It is not the caring itself that defines the dysfunction but the degree of care offered, even despite good intent.  Good service becomes obsequious, and that service hides one’s ambition to gain favor.  All human beings fall into this trap when we subtly displace our good feelings of worth that should derive from our identity in Christ onto the good feelings that we experience when we care for others.  We learn to identify ourselves through works and human striving instead of resting in stillness.  In so doing, we make those we care for our objects, people we use to find worth for ourselves, worth that should come from who WE are in Christ alone. 

From this same super-achieving that perverts appropriate love and care within a family into the dysfunction of the extremes of care-taking that typifies addiction comes the paternalism and caretaking that patriarchy offers.  Christians who unknowingly fall into these trappings of aberrant patriarchy subtly shift the identity and worth of each individual within the family from their identity in Christ onto the idolatry of self which the system demands -- that identity be sought through perfection, performance and earned merit.  Claudius strives to preserve the system of craft he has created to serve his ambitions, and his craft eventually demands payment with his own life, all because of the idolatry of his own heart.  In the end, he becomes a servant of his craft.  Though patriarchy strives to attain virtue, human craft eventually demands its wages.  The evil men do lives after them, and the good men do is not so memorable.  So it is with patriarchy, me thinks.