Tag Archives: choices

My friend Ray and the lesson of black tape…..

Recently, I had the great fortune to be in Trinidad with my only brother, his lovely wife and our childhood friend, Ray.

We were all headed to the store to purchase a 60th birthday gift for another friend.

My brother was riding in the passenger seat up front while Ray drove and in the midst of recanting an old and funny story, he said very casually,
“Hey brother, what’s that red light on your dash?”

Ray, quite nonchalantly said, “Doh worry ’bout dat man, I put a piece of black tape over it, I don’t want to know what it is.”

And in typical Ray style, he started to laugh.

My sister in law, sitting next to me in the back then says, “So why is there tape over the locks in the back?”

Ray says, “Oh the locks are broken and I just don’t want people messing with them.”

We all start howling with laughter and start teasing Ray about his ability to block out the everyday annoyances of life.

I immediately say, “You know that I am going to have to write a blog about this, right?”

The thing about using black tape to cover up warning lights and broken bits of a machine made me think of the hoops we jump through to hide our shameful abuse from others.

Women will use any amount of makeup to try to hide the black eye.

Teenagers will lie to their friends and wear long sleeves to try and hide the cutting they started as a result of the incest they are suffering in their homes.

Young children know that they dare not tell about the knock down drag outs that their parents engage in and they instead begin to create a fairy tale family that they trot out to mask their pain.

Recently, during a Train the Trainer, one of the participants told the group that he never knew his parents because the state had taken him away due to abuse. He then explained that he made up  a fairy tale of benevolent parents and used to tell fairy tale stories about the imagined family.

We use black tape in our everyday lives so effectively that we often forget the tape is there.

We begin to see the tape as the reality and we fight for the right to deny the reality of our pain.

What parts of your life have you taped over?

What is the tape hiding?

What would happen if you pulled the tape off and allowed yourself to face the truth?

I pull the tape off my own bruises every time I tell an audience that my abuse began in my childhood. When I am honest with my listeners and when they are able to receive the truth of what I am saying, they witness the absence of black tape.

I let them see my scars.

I let them in on my pain.

As a result of my being vulnerable, they give themselves permission to do the same.

Will you remove some black tape from your life today?

I give you permission to look at your truth.

 

Love and light,
Indrani

To be assertive or to not be assertive…a task we face every day of our lives.

uWowpolSelf assertion is not aggression. It is not banging people over their heads and claiming that you are better than them.

It is also NOT accepting others views of you.

“Self -assertiveness means the willingness to stand up for myself to be who I am openly, to treat myself with respect in all human encounters.”
Nathaniel Branden.

Let me tell you a story.

A few years ago a very dear friend of mine asked me to speak to his religious women’s group.

I knew that his faith did not allow women to see their priests for reasons I cannot fathom.

He knew what a strong and upfront woman I am and that I speak my truth.

I told him that I would gladly speak on any variety of topics BUT if it came up about their treatment of women with seeing priests that I would absolutely be truthful about how I felt.

He seemed to accept what I said and we agreed that he should get a different speaker.

However, his friend who had accompanied him to my home,  did not agree with me at all. In MY home he dared to challenge my point of view and was forcefully trying to make me agree with their views on women. I remained quite calm for about 15 minutes and then something happened.
I stood up and told him that this was my house and I was allowed my views in my house and he could not get me to change my mind.

I said we would have to agree to disagree.

He was shocked.

He was shocked because I DARED to stand and face him with conviction and clarity.

I am willing to bet money that NO woman had ever confronted him in his whole life and certainly no one had ever questioned his views on women in his faith.

He had never met a women who knew and understood her right to be assertive.

Nathaniel Branden tells us, “To practice self-assertiveness is to live authentically, to speak and act from my innermost convictions and feelings as a way of life – as a rule.”

Yes, this is what I did quite instinctively and with clarity of head and heart.

I am asking you, dear reader, to identify the areas of your life where conviction and clarity are lacking and to begin to take small steps to embolden your walk in your own life.

First you must talk the talk.
Then you must walk the walk.
Then you must encourage others to do the same.

Love and light,

Indrani

Not even with a flower. Hope for the future of Gender Based Violence.

What do a future fireman, police man, baker, soccer player, and pizza maker have in common?

They all have the same response when asked to slap a young girl.

Watch the video below to see their reaction:

Link: http://youtu.be/b2OcKQ_mbiQ

If this is a typical response by the young boys of today, then what changes between 7 years old and adulthood that results in women experiencing the violence that we know they do on a daily basis?

More importantly: What can we do to help young boys like this grow up into men that truly believe “girls shouldn’t be hit, not even with a flower”?

We all need to start sharing answers about this question.

Please share your thoughts in the comments below: what do we need to do differently to help young boys grow up into men who don’t hit women?

 

Love & light,

Jeremie Miller

Grand Theft Auto 5 – A letter to my son….

Fionn,

Dad here, remember me? I need to talk to you about something important, so look me in the eyes and listen up (yes, this is one of the “look me in the eyes” type of talks).

Remember when we started playing video games? Remember how concerned your Mom was with the amount of time we played video games and the effect that might have on you, and how I told her that was crazy, video games weren’t bad for you?

Yeah, well, you and I know that I am almost always right, but, I might have been wrong on the whole “video games aren’t bad for you” bit, and I don’t say that lightly.

As you know I spent a great deal of my childhood playing video games: Atari 2600, Intellivision, Colecovision, Super Nintendo, Playstation, Windows Computers, Amiga, Commodore 64; I played most of them.

I also spent a great deal of my time in the 90s defending video games, content in video games, and violence in video games. Fighting against people who said that content in video games could affect how people acted in real life.

For the most part, I still think this is true….but…but…after watching this video I am not sure how I feel about my old arguments. I am not sure how anyone could make a game that allows you to do these things, and if games like this are selling millions, and gamers have a desire to do these things in a game, I have to wonder where gaming culture is headed, how gamers will behave in the future, and whether you and I should even be a part of this group.

I want you to watch this video Fionn. I want you to realize that, even though this is “just a game”, these actions are wrong. Wrong on so many different levels. They are wrong in the Real World AND they are also wrong in a Virtual World.

(Please Note: this video is Not Safe For Work and contains disturbing images)

Now, I am not going to go so far as to say: “some kid will play this video game and it will make him go out and pay for a hooker, then kill that hooker with an axe”. What I am willing to say is: “some kid will play this video game and think that women, and how he treats women, aren’t important, and someone’s daughter may end up hurt because of this game”.

Fionn, this video makes me embarrassed to be a gamer, and it should make you embarrassed to be one too.

I don’t want you to stop playing video games, but I want you to think (and tell your friends to think too) about the games you play and what happens in them. If a game disrespects women like Grand Theft Auto Five I don’t want you brushing it off, or thinking that it is OK. I want you to stop playing, tell people it isn’t acceptable, and stand up for the boys and girls that could be hurt by disgusting content like this.

Can you promise to do that Fionn?

 

Love,

Dad

One simple act…..

Change the world with ONE simple act….like opening a door consistently.

What a guy!

Can we all be more like him?
http://www.wimp.com/simplething/

2015-01-21_1524

Sledge hammers, rubber mallets, nail guns…what’s your tool of choice?

woman-with-toolbeltYou must have heard the adage, “if the only tool you have is a hammer then everything looks like a nail.”

If you have not heard it, now you have.

I was thinking about expanding on this… what if you only have nails and you need a hammer? Then you have to determine what kind of hammer you need, right?

For instance, if you need to put a small nail in the wall to hold a small painting it would not help to use a sledge hammer because you would not have any wall left.

If you needed to put together some delicate furniture that needed some good pressure, you better use a rubber mallet and that too, very gingerly.

If we can expand this metaphor into the challenges that life gives, we must determine exactly what king of challenge is at hand and what kind of hammer we need.

If a child makes a mistake, say spills milk or pushes a sibling, then using a switch to beat the living daylights out of him, a la Adrian Peterson, is akin to using a sledge hammer. Your aim will be to inflict the most pain for the smallest injury.

Why would anyone choose to do that?

In my experience, sledge hammers and rubber mallets are NEVER needed, nor are nail guns. Instead what we usually need is to take a time out and to discover what other tools we have in our tool belt.

When you have a challenge, take a time out instead of taking out the sledgehammers.

Everyone will be happier.

 

Love and light,
Indrani.

Stopping sexism towards men – A solution for gender based violence?

Sexism is a term normally associated with women. It affects women in the workplace, on the street, in the media; it affects women in so many different ways, that we often forget an important piece of the sexism puzzle:

Sexism affects everyone: bisexuals, transgender, lesbians, gay men, and yes, even straight men.

Watch Laci Green as she unpacks and explores the idea of sexism against men and the effect it is having on everyone.

Watch and imagine what effect it would have on gender based violence if men no longer felt that they NEEDED to hide emotions, be powerful, and do manly things like fight, fix things, and have lots of sex to prove how masculine they are.

Could part of the solution be as easy as realizing that: there is no man or woman or gay or lesbian or transgender. There are humans.

Have you ever been sexist towards a man? If you are one of our male readers, have you ever experienced sexism?

We would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

 

Love & light,

Jeremie Miller

The languages of life… What’s your fluency?

woman_talking_iStock_000008940784XSmallYou may have heard of the very popular book called “Five Love Languages.”

The book tells us the different ways that we show love and how we like for love to be shown to us.

I was having an intriguing conversation with a dear friend this week and it occurred to me that when people speak, they immediately tell us what kind of person they are.

They can see the world in any variety  of ways and often all we need to do is USE our two ears more consistently than we use our one mouth.

We need to listen more than we speak.

When we listen, really listen, we will be able to hear what kind of life language people are using…

Positivity speak
Joy speak
Hopeful speak
Victim speak
Negativity speak
Powerless speak

I know that you understand what I mean.

I recently reached out to an acquaintance and asked how they were doing, and the litany of complaints began. I immediately felt deflated. I felt like saying, has nothing positive happened in this whole year?

I did not. Instead I just listened and made an excuse and got off the telephone.

If we wish to elevate our spirit, we must choose carefully the kind of person with whom we commune.

Now, comes the scary question, what life language do you speak?

Are you one of the people who is uplifting or down putting?

If you don’t know, try listening to yourself.

If you don’t know how to listen to yourself, then ask a trusted friend how you come across and promise them to not shoot the messenger.

It is a worthy exercise.

Try it.

 
Love and light,

 
Indrani

Whose behaviour are you misdiagnosing?

Getty Images

Getty Images

“What does it look like when you put [a traumatized] kid in a classroom? When people don’t understand there’s been a tiger in your life, it looks a lot like ADHD to them.” – Dr. Heather Forkey 

This quote comes from the last line of a recent article published about the misdiagnosis of childhood trauma as ADHD (you can read the full article here.)

Rushed doctor’s not taking enough time with patients, teachers and parents looking for a quick solution, families hiding the reality of their home life, and a lack of support for children experiencing trauma have all contributed to the possible misdiagnosis of ADHD, when in reality the child is suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder due to trauma.

Which raises an interesting question for all of us in our everyday lives: who have we misdiagnosed with a rushed and incorrect label in our own lives?

We call the neighbor’s teenage daughter that “gets around” promiscuous (if we are being nice) and a “slut” (if we are not being nice).

We call the boy in the Motley Crue jacket, smoking cigarettes a “thug” and walk on the other side of the road.

We call the lawyer at the party, who pushes everyone away with her know-it-all behaviour, a snob.

The child who never has lunch at school and wears old, torn clothes “just comes from a poor family”.

The bully in the playground is “big for his age, and pushy”.

The little boy, bouncing off the walls at the grocery store while his mother screams “must have ADHD”.

What if each of these people has a deeper story that we are ignoring?

Dr. Nicole Brown, Dr. Heather Forkey and their colleagues are working hard to change the landscape of ADHD diagnosis, hoping that they can teach professionals to look deeper, go beyond the quick and simple diagnosis and find what may really be going on with some of these kids.

You may not be a professional, but doesn’t taking more time and going deeper with your own “diagnosis” of people seem like a good idea?

How could your life, and their life, be different if you did?

 

Love & light,

Jeremie Miller

Let’s all do more of these in the New Year…..

Happy-New-Year-2014-Blast-Wishes-Greating-Card1

Smile more.

Speak with compassion.

Help a stranger.

Take more steps and move your body.

Tell yourself you ARE good enough.

Eat 5% more healthy.

Complete this sentence:
If I were to follow my purpose I would be brave enough to ________________.

Now find a way to begin that journey.

A very happy 2015!

 

Love & light,

TEAM ILF