Unlearning

Most people go about their life not ever looking underneath the veil of “normal” because it kind of works for them. They are getting by. Most people are fish in water and don’t recognise what they are swimming in. People that experience mental health concerns understand that there is something not right but they direct it to, “something is not right with me”, instead of looking at there is something not right with normal. Even if you know there is nothing wrong with you, you have to play the game of labelling yourself as having an illness in order to attempt to get your needs as a human being met, often falling short and trapping you into victim consciousness.

I know what it is like to be stuck in victimhood. I get it, it sucks, that the people who were supposed to be looking out for you had let you down and now as an adult you have to fight for survival because you missed out on the things you needed as a child. I get the feelings of powerlessness, the despair, the anger, the injustice and the need for validation. You never asked to be born, yet there you were, a defenseless child and having to adjust to a world that didn’t honour you but instead made you feel like there was something inherently wrong with you.

Often unbeknownst to our parents, they inflict all sorts of damage on us as children. The truth is, a very few parents actually want to inflict harm on their children. But they were not given the correct instructions on how to raise a healthy well-adjusted child because they themselves were not taught this. They themselves are not healthy well- adjusted people. They too were indoctrinated into the same social system where their needs were neglected and they were forced into compliance and “good parenting” is there to create the same compliance in you.

The systems we are all in have us stuck in a negative feedback loop that spans generations. All of our social systems uphold this. A multifaceted system that up until now has remained invisible and sold to us for our own good but in reality, is built for obedience to the system. Our parents don’t deliberately squash our expression it has systematically been taken out of the human being.

In school we are further taught that our minds and bodies are not our own. We are taught to sit still, be quiet, pay attention, follow instructions, parrot information, ask permission to use the toilet and that our teachers are the ultimate authority. Free expression is not allowed, critical thinking is discouraged and our thoughts are limited to the syllabus. All preparing us for a life of obedience and compliance. If we don’t comply within any of our early systems, we are deemed difficult, labelled and either told or feel that we are the problem.

On top of that we have TV programming that gives us images of who we are supposed to be, what’s deemed important, normal and right, sold propaganda and stuff we don’t need, hypnotised, commodified, objectified and sexualised and most if not all channels echoing the same message. The social system or what I like to call the propaganda machine makes sure nobody steps out of line. A set of belief systems had been installed that everybody just goes along with and if you question what is deemed normal you are automatically ostracised by being labelled as a problem.

In a sense this is nobody’s fault but simultaneously, it’s all our fault, because we have up until now gone along with the narratives given to us. We have been led blind into a world that shouldn’t be. A world that is built for those running the system to benefit from. We were systematically “educated” into thinking and acting in a way that benefits the system, not us. Is it any wonder we suffer mental dis-ease and that it is on the rise? We are simply having reactions to overwhelming social and environmental stress. Our nervous systems are not designed to be in states of constant stress, this leads to dis-ease not only in our minds but bodies.

We are taught to give away our agency for the sake of validation and permission from another authority. We were never taught to think for ourselves, to tap into our own intuition of right or wrong, what’s good for us, what isn’t, what is true, what’s not. No room to explore ourselves. No education on emotions or self-awareness. Collectively spoon fed just enough to keep the system in place but not enough to question it.

Many of us grew up in environments where trusting our own inner guidance simply wasn’t encouraged. Instead, we were taught to look to outside authority for direction. As children doing our best to feel safe and belong, most of us naturally developed coping strategies that helped us survive. These patterns things like avoidance, emotional shutdown, people-pleasing, or impulsivity gave us temporary relief from stress, anxiety, or pain, but they don’t touch the deeper roots of our distress and, over time, can make life feel heavier. When we begin to see that our mental and emotional struggles are not a sign of personal failure, but understandable responses to the environments we’ve had to navigate, something gentle opens up. We can meet these old patterns with compassion, knowing they are learned habits that can also be unlearned, making space for new, kinder ways of being.

One of my favorite Gabor Mate quotes is, “We may not be responsible for the world that created our minds, but we can take responsibility for the mind in which we create our world.” Healing doesn’t come from dwelling in the past, it’s about taking responsibility for your now. You are not responsible for what happened to you but you are responsible for your present. We can begin to heal when we start take responsibility for our own lives and stop seeing ourselves as a victim. I acknowledge that these can seem like harsh words, especially when you have been a legitimate victim of misuse for most, if not all of your life. I’m not here to say healing is easy, I am here to say it is possible, if you want it.

Our lives are made by the choices we make. You can unlearn what you have been taught and you can take your power back, if you choose. Our minds are like the software on a computer, a virus has lodged itself into our consciousness and we need to dislodge it. There was never anything wrong with your hardware, being your consciousness (our essential nature), we just have been infiltrated by junk files. We need a system reboot back to our natural settings where our bodies and minds can relax and reset.

The real revolution isn’t raging at the machine it is a quiet recognition of where you are not yourself, where you negate your own feelings and go along with thoughts and actions that are not your own. It’s a tuning out of the noise and tuning back into yourself. There you can find your healing. As the cliché goes, you got to feel it to heal it.

There are many methods and teachings out there for assisting you to tune back into self. A lot of it useful, but some require you to give your agency and often money away with little return. What if I told you, you can start to take your power back right where you are and it costs you nothing?

It’s as simple as sitting with yourself with no distractions. I understand coming from a trauma background, the last thing that feels comfortable with a dysregulated nervous system is stillness. But just like we have been trained into distraction from self, we can train ourselves to tune back in.

It’s not about forcing stillness or trying to “fix” anything. It’s simply about being gentle with whatever arises, racing thoughts, tension, urges to move and listening in with curiosity and kindness. Over time, as we stop abandoning ourselves and start offering this quiet presence, the body begins to recognise that it’s safe. That’s when the nervous system can soften, shift out of survival mode, and allow the natural healing process to unfold.

I’d like to invite you to take 2–5 minutes a day where you just sit, preferably in nature but not essential. No need to change anything, racing mind, shallow breathing, tension in your body, urges to get up and move it’s all okay. No need to get rid of anything or add a practice. Eventually, if you do this every day and gently increase the time you sit, naturally your nervous system will start to regulate and switch from fight or flight to rest and digest, where healing and restoration can occur.

Another thing we are not taught is that we have our own in-built healing capacity. It’s just about giving ourselves the time and space to tap into it.