Is life lived in the intentions, with the actions or in their outcome? Where does reality bloom or how can we discern the value of the intentions from their literal outcome?
What I am noticing is that in abusive families, the intentions more often than not, do not deliver the favored outcome or an outcome aligned with their intentions.
And, I also believe that most who come from the distorted reality of abuse, believe that IF their intentions were wholly, then regardless of the outcome, they themselves cannot be held accountable. They see themselves only by their intentions and not by the consequences of them.
(I did go and look up the word Wholly. "Wholly - Entirely; fully.")
Reality seems to change depending whether you are focusing on the intentions rather than the outcome.
To me, IF my intentions are to be loving, but you feel hurt, than I am not loving you, regardless of my intent.
There is no doubt, that in my life, I have lived with wholly intentions that had terrible outcomes...and yet, I felt righteously right, for I knew my intentions. Yet, I was blind to the affects my active intentions had on others...let alone on me.
If you view the intentions of abusive families, their intentions are to love. They are not trying to hurt or deliver pain...or to annihilate individual feelings, yet they do.
In fact, I bet that most families mired in abuse, are totally unaware that their love hurts. And, they will fight and holler and scream and profess deeply and ardently their love. What they fail to appreciate is how their intentions fail to deliver their intended feelings of love.
This has to be the fine line of contention between a loving family and an abusive one, the lack of actually delivering love.
My mother will claim her undying love for me, yet her actions failed to match her intentions. Her letters always state how much she loved/loves me. And yet, she was not able to do what love would do.
So again, if her intentions were wholly; fully love, does it really matter the outcome?
I say yes.
For her intentions were to be loving, yet she failed in doing the hardest thing love does.
What does love do when someone abuses your child?
Does love forgive the abuser?
Is it possible to have loving feelings for both the abuser and the abused?
Her intentions of loving everyone, had consequences....dire ones.
What is the cornerstone of abuse, is the lack of being a responsible lover, of failing to carryout actions of love. Instead, no boundaries are erected, no relationships are severed, nothing changes. Abuse has no consequences in a dysfunctional home.
Even the wide variety of helping actions towards my father are not seen as being supportive of an abuser. They will each tell you of their honorable intentions, failing to see the consequences to themselves and others.
My goal in the past 8 years is to see how, what I do, DOES affect others and how am I contributing to or not promoting abuse.
Isn't the road to hell paved with good intentions?
Perhaps the abusive family lives in intentions and bases their confidence there, rather than in the collateral damage in its wake.
It is like there are two drastically different viewpoints of our family....intentions and outcomes.
And, I believe that many feel, that if their intentions were not cruel or harmful, then they are not 'bad' people. They want to see gleeful enthusiasm of ill intent...which is absent in many abusive homes.
It is like Patrick Carnes writes about in The Betrayal Bond, "There is always something kind, noble or redeeming about someone who has betrayed you. Victims of betrayal will hold on those good things even while the world crashes around them. By holding on they stay stuck..."
What most in my family are doing is holding on the to the good...which is normal in betrayal bonds. Seeing the bad, but giving it logical reasons and justifications.
My father's history lends itself to laying the foundation for my father's actions. Just because I understand them doesn't mean he is guilt free.
Most in my family are acting out according to the bonds of betrayal. I don't feel betrayed by them, although I used to. Now, I understand that coming from whence they came, they are behaving perfectly.
They will continue to reap what they sow...not their intentions but the consequences of their actions. Failing to see the consequences of their actions is to fail in seeing reality.
"We must always hold truth, as we can best determine it, to be more important, more vital to our self-interest than our comfort. Conversely, we must always consider our personal discomfort relatively unimportant, and indeed, even welcome it in the service for truth. Mental health is an ongoing process of dedication to reality at all costs." M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled...
