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Your Own Book This is for teens who were born to emotionally unhealthy, neglectful or abusive parents. It is especially for teens who are feeling suicidal, trying to figure out how things got so messed up and whether there is any point to even living. I was reading something which I want to share with you. I hope it gives you a different vision of your situation, a different perspective on it and some hope. The basic idea is that you can write your own book about your life. One day you can look back and read it or share it with someone who cares about you. It might help you to think that you may meet such a person one day -- a person who wants to understand you and why you think and feel the way you do. A person who wants to know the pain you suffered at the hands of your parents, classmates and teachers. Or it might help you to think that you can send the book, chapter by chapter to us here at EQI and we will publish it for you. Or you can publish it on Lulu.com like we do our books. It is free. And not too difficult really. You can also plan to publish it with Chipmunka Publishing, again for free. That is a company that specializes in stories about mental health and abuse. I know one of the owners of the company and he said he is interested in books by teens. The most interesting thing about this idea is that you can write whatever you like - you are the author. You can write what you like about your parents, your classmates and teachers. Even now you can start to think about how you want the ending of the book to be. This is an important point. You can think now about how you want the ending to be. Maybe you want the ending to be something like, "After I moved away from my parents I realized even more clearly that not everyone is like them. Not everyone is as messed up. I came to understand that it was them that had the problem all along, and I came to realize that I was much better off once I got away from them. I met someone who likes me loves me, cares about me and tries to understand me, just like I planned while I was writing this book when I was living under my parents' roof in so much pain. Knowing that I would get away one day helped me make it through those painful days and even more painful nights. I hope you don't want the ending to be with you killing yourself. I hope instead you will think about another ending, an ending where you find someone to show the book to, someone who will read about all the times you really wanted to stop your pain by killing yourself and that someone will cry and say, "I am so sorry you suffered so much, and I am so glad you are alive." I believe it can happen. I believe it because I met someone who wanted to kill herself as a teen and now I am so glad she is alive. She cares about me and tries to understand me in a way no one in my family never did. Remember that you don't choose your family, but you can choose your friends, especially your online friends. In fact, if you are like most teens who read EQI, your online friends may be your best friends or even your only friends. Maybe you want to be able to write an ending one day that says, "Because of all the pain I suffered as a child and teen, I am now working to change the laws which give parents too much power, and which force children and teens to live with people they don't want to and go to schools they don't want to go to. And I am now helping teens who in situations like I was for so many years." |
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You can think about what role you want your pain to play in the book. I knew a teen once who realized her parents had screwed her up a lot. She called herself "twisted" because of it. She used to say, "I want to be twisted in a way that makes the world less twisted." You can also write about why you want to write the book and who you want to read it. Thinking about your book will give you something to focus on. |
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| Maybe it will help you to realize
that you are part of history and evolution. What I mean
is that for thousands of years your ancestors have lived
in a cave-man type mentality where the most physically
powerful people took advantage of the less powerful. Men would fight other men and the conquerors would get the prizes. The strong men in the group would rape women and girls. The strong men would become the leaders. They would tell others what to do. If anyone challenged their power there would literally be a fight for power. The strongest would emerge as the winner. Power was important. Very important. During the years physical power changed a little to psychological power. As groups became bigger it became important that you could get others to do the fighting for you. If a group of 20 men attacked you and you were alone, you could be the strongest among them, but they would still kill you. So it became important to know how to organize other men into fighting groups. If you were good at organizing and "leading," then you no longer had to be the strongest physically. Now let's fast forward to the days of Kings. Kings had others do their fighting for them. The King lived inside the castle wall where it was relatively safe. He had guards, soldiers etc. to defend and protect him. And also to go around stealing other people's land and possessions. This is actually connected to why you are being abused by your parents today and I will explain why. |
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| Think about the King of Spain when
the Spanish were killing people for him in South America.
They were bringing him gold and other goodies at the
expense of the native people who were less powerful. Then
the Spanish turned the area into what were called Spanish
colonies. In other words, they were controlled by the
Spanish. Now the King didn't care about the people who lived in South America, in fact, he might have never even been to South America. He controlled them but he didn't care about them. I spent four years in South America and I saw the psychological damage this did. In Ecuador I learned that the Spanish would literally tie someone up to a tree to force them to stay there and work, making clothes, blankets, etc. in the traditional local way. The workers were controlled by people who didn't care about them. If they complained or didn't work fast enough, they were beaten or killed. This went on for years and years. Imagine the effects of this. Imagine that no one cared about your father and he lived in constant fear. It would be understandable if he were unhappy when you finally saw him. It would be understandable if he had an unmet need to feel in control. He also had other emotional needs that were not met while the Spanish dominated his village or his community. He would not have felt cared about or appreciated. He would not have felt respected. So he would try to meet his emotional needs through his wife and children. This I believe is basically what has been happening for hundreds and thousands of years. While my example was about the Spanish, we can see similar patterns around the world. The British for example, circled the globe killing people, stealing their land and creating British colonies. If you speak English as your first language, this is part of the history that has shaped your parents emotionally and psychologically. Whether it was the Spanish or the British or some other group, we can say that in general, powerful people have been controlling others for centuries, but not caring about them. This is history. Emotional history. So now we have a planet full of people who have never had their emotional needs met. These people are your parents, your grandparents and your great grandparents. You are a product of their dysfunction. You did nothing wrong. Nothing to deserve the way they are trying to use you to make themselves feel loved, important, respected, powerful etc. This is where your book comes in. In your book, you can change history. Or at least you can help change it. |
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| In your book you can become the
character you want to be. You can write "I saw how
my parents used me to try to meet their unmet needs, and
I decided to make a conscious effort not to do that with
my children. I saw how they spoke to each other, and I
decided not to speak that way to my friends and
partner." You have the possibility of doing this because you have found this website. It offers a new way of living. It offers you a chance to change history. I would really like to see you write a book. And I will help you get it published. And, as I said, I will post it chapter by chapter here on the site. Your life is important. You are important. Not many people you know have found this site or will be interested in the ideas here. By reading EQI and applying the ideas to your life and by writing your book, you are making a small but meaningful contribution to the society of the future. I personally think things will get worse before they get better, but after they get worse, there will more people who will be looking for new ideas and for explanations of what went wrong. If the ideas I write about make sense, then please start to write your book, even as an outline or notes. Style and perfection don't matter. It isn't a school project where you will be graded. It is mostly for you. If you want to share it here, that's cool, but it is your book, for your life, for your improvement. Good luck, Steve Dec 14, 2011 |