Ingrid 2/21/2012 7:50:06 AM What I find really difficult is feeling rage for the abuse and neglect my parents inflicted on me ... because they were also harmed as children. How can I punish them, even in my mind, for something they had to endure in their own way in their own childhoods? I worked extremely hard not to perpetuate this inter-generational harm on my own now-adult children, and I think I was at least partially successful by always trying to be aware of their perspectives in any situation (but not always being able to respond entirely appropriately due to the harmed child inside me). I encourage them to notice my own failings as a parent, to become aware of the (deeply-regretted, unintentional, inevitable, unknown) harm inflicted on them by me, in order to heal from it and learn from it, and to be driven to seek better ways of creating a sound foundation for their own children\'s lives. I completely agree with Jeanne Duvall-Orr that \"going into a pit and climbing out are not the same as climbing a mountain\" in relation to the way in which you have used the term \'enlightenment\'. \"Enlightenment comes at the top of the mountain ... whereas, psychological recovery merely makes you fit to become a mountain climber.\" So absolutely true. Angel 2/15/2012 8:01:32 PM Thanks my friend, Im a SuperKid right now, and is because of telling the truth. Thanks for yours...:) Ann Rider 2/15/2012 5:29:08 PM Hi, Daniel! Hoped to see you at ISEPP, perhaps somewhere else along the line. Just ordering your two newest DVDs and can\'t wait to see them. Thanks for your continued courage in exposing what truly works for those us who were once wounded and now strive to heal. Peter Gerlach, MSW 2/7/2012 5:51:57 AM Hi - like you, I am an ACA and a (family systems) therapist interested in internal awareness. Please scasn my YouTube videos (\"gercacn\" channel) and my non-profit educational Web site http://sfhelp.org. It\'s about freeing your tyrue Self, and moire. RB 2/6/2012 2:24:44 PM I couldn\'t have found better information that I needed at a more perfect moment. Having had awful childhood trauma\'s, father an alcoholic and mother has a victim/martyr complex. My childhood was so volatile, hurtful and fragmented, I can barely think of it at times. To be honest, I don\'t know how I have come this far, I have had many moments of self destruction, but my will is strong. I can really relate to your essays, particularly the ones on sex and trauma. How true it is, that we yearn and crave and project fulfillment onto every potential love interest and partner. I have been doing this all my life, without realizing it. To truly heal, we must become connected fully with ourselves and not expect another person to provide this inner healing for us. it\'s all delusion, absolute self delusion. I plan to become celibate, that\'s how I stumbled onto your articles. Sex, relationships, love and the pursuit of them are a waste of energy David Elliott 1/27/2012 2:30:56 AM Yes! This is the way it is! If the USA ran it\'s government this honest we could have a free America. Almena 1/20/2012 12:14:07 AM A simple and itnelligent point, well made. Thanks! J. Miller 1/19/2012 2:30:43 PM Those for whom true love, defined well in \"The Road Less Traveled\", was defective in childhood may, of many options, be a perfectionist highly demanding of himself and those that he mistakes for the people that harmed him. Part of his recovery then is to address his set of values or view of what different accomplishments or tasks mean. A person in such pursuit has introspection and awareness that comes from long term relationship with an \"enlightened witness\". A deprived child does not know how to define a good parent/spouse/friend. Either he spots the abusive in a good light, or the imperfect in a negative. This black and white perspective; a standard that prevents acceptance of love and care. A friend may seem not to like her only for failure to call today - would be an example. Anyway my point put forward to consider is this; awareness of ones issues, ability to admit her wrong to others is more than the material of a great parent. she knows the importance of allowing her children to develop well. mostly this will NEVER provide that a great parent may in fact be perfect. Example: Friend of mine. His father - a stand up guy. Father has an issue; he must be unreasonably early to flights. But father knows that he is nuts. When his children and wife scream as one should at ungodly hours they are not met with manipulation or intimidation. To me that is a sign of a good parent. Regardless its just an example. The point is good parents dont need to flesh out all their issue. They need enlightenment honesty and enough progress to enable themselves to be wrong both when they catch the wrong and when others do. (abuse etc. is outside the scope of this comment) Stone 1/19/2012 10:52:49 AM That\'s way more clever than I was epxecitng. Thanks! Happy 1/19/2012 3:41:45 AM I never touhght I would find such an everyday topic so enthralling! Gabriel Raoust 1/16/2012 2:58:55 PM Thank you! Wendy Dixon 1/16/2012 1:36:24 AM Tried to buy your DVDs but paypal kept coming up with an error. Could you check this please? I want to purchase. Thanks. Ginger Yancey 1/14/2012 4:07:26 AM Hi Daniel, I love watching/listening to your videos and reading your writings. There is something very special, excuse me \"rare\", that you are bringing forth into this world. I too was traumatized as a child and it has had a profound effect on me, my health. I am realizing after a long journey through the spiritual labyrinth, that my real growth is returning to my traumatized child and facing my shadow head on. I was sad to see you stopped practicing but then I got it. You are keeping in step and flow with where your Spirit is guiding you for healing and authenticity. If we all would be so brave! I am glad to see you are continuing to put your messages out there some way some how.....I\'m sure it will continue to be gift. A hopeful friend, Ginger Yancey Tara Hill 1/12/2012 1:02:17 AM Your CD \"Songs from the Locked Ward\" is very helpful. I have been on this journey, have been TDO\'d (I saw a shrink = made me cry). I have taken many of the meds u describe. I now see a therapist and am much better. your songs are spot on! Thank You and God Bless Nadia Mahjoub 1/9/2012 7:33:36 PM I would very much like to order the dvd Open Dialogue, but I wonder if the dvd is techically \"watchable\" in Europe (do you have the Region 2 version of the DVD? USA = Region 1, Europe = Region 2) Greetings from Brussels, Belgium and congratulation on your work! dina poursanidou 1/7/2012 8:24:37 AM Hi, Daniel. just finished watching healing homes...i thought it was brilliant and very moving. i loved it dina Joe Newton 1/5/2012 4:08:10 AM Mr. Mackler, Great work! I also do social work and admire your practice. I work in Queens and would benefit (as would the people with whom I work) from a short discussion about helpful practitioners in the area and opportunities for future dialogue. Maybe you would present at the clubhouse where I work? Please email me and thank you for your consideration Joe Konstantina Poursanidou 1/4/2012 9:58:53 AM Dear Daniel many thanks for sending me the Healing Homes dvd. really looking forward to watching it. Have a joyful 2012 Cheers Dina MaÅ?gorzata 12/28/2011 1:39:58 AM Thank you for telling the truth. Best regards. MaÅ?gorzata 12/28/2011 1:38:39 AM Dear Mr. Mackler, I\'ve just found your videos on youtube and all I can say is ...they\'ve improved my mood 🙂 After experiencing some very ,very traumatic experiences in my life, getting my health ruined by psychiatrists (prescribing me tons of antidepressants instead of asking me about a reason of my depression!!!!), I dumped that \'conventional treatment\' and started to follow my own intuition. I found a great support group (NPD relationship survivals - wonderful people,by the way) and we all started to fight for living in truth. No more denial,no more dissociation. The results are impressive! What is even more interesting, we have never heard before about your theory. We just follow our inner need to face the truth. 🙂 IT WORKS! All you say is very wise. P.S. I\'m a Catholic. Your interpretation of Jesus words is absolutely correct. Pei 12/23/2011 7:59:57 AM Greetings from Beijing, China! What is your view on ACA, Adult Children of Alcoholics/dysfunction families? It is a 12 step program modelled after AA and Al-Anon. Email me if you come to China! Jeanne Duvall-Orr 12/19/2011 5:29:45 PM You are a remarkable man... willing to see the truth as it is. Thank-you for sharing your courage with all. I am, however, at odds with your use of the term \'enlightenment\'... at a stage that is better termed, psychological recovery. Going into a pit and climbing out are not the same as climbing a mountain. Enlightenment comes at the top of the mountain... whereas, psychological recovery merely makes you fit to become a mountain climber. Thomas Jespersen 12/18/2011 9:15:43 PM I am very interested in watching your documentaries. Instead of ordering the dvd I wonder if you would consider some \"pay-to-view-online\" system? Berit 12/10/2011 7:10:02 PM Reading your words on this page is probably the closest Ive come to seeing my own deepest held beliefs, that have been buried under heeps of denial most of my life, reflected by another human being. Thank you! Cee Louis 12/10/2011 11:05:40 AM From your article, \"What Constitutes Child Abuse\": \"For most parents I set the bar impossibly high because most parents have absolutely no business having children. On their deep emotional levels they can barely take care of themselves, and still ARE emotional children themselves.\" I agree with this 100%. I am so tired of witnessing people screaming (and often cursing wildly) at their children. If they\'re treating them like that in public, I can only imagine what happens behind closed doors. How dare anyone bring a life into this world and proceed to kill its spirit like that! And any living thing -- human or animal -- that you continually scream at will most certainly have its spirit crushed. Good reading. Thank you. Matthew Beckman 12/9/2011 8:30:57 AM Hello, I stumbled across your website today and it really brought my spirits up. I am a collage student and I get lost in the fake world of collage sometimes but it always feels the wonderful to take a look at who I really am sometimes and let out the emotions that we are to afraid to show people. Being honest with myself, and becoming who I want to be spiritually is hard when drugs alcohol and sex is around everywhere but thank you for your words of wisdom, it helped me get back on track. Sandra Stanley 12/1/2011 7:48:43 PM Greetings Daniel, Just a quick \'hang in there; keep going; you are SOOO needed and thanked (certainly by me and my Lil San!). Those who \"get it\" appreciate it; those who don\'t (yet) will, I\'m sure, at some point. There are, in all groups, the \"before\" people and the \"after\" people. Thank you for being a friend, Sandra Stanley mark 11/24/2011 2:06:42 AM schizophrenia is a catch all disease if they don\'t really have you diagnosed with some other mental illness they just pitch you in the schizophrenic pile. Consequently it is hard to decided if it is caused by some thing internal or external. I do appreciate the page and the 32 reasons. Samadha 11/13/2011 2:10:54 AM Yay, this is such an inspiration. It is refreshing and validating to read that another holds the same ideas about the road to enlightenment and the potential for cycle of oppression in the family system. I have taking these steps and been punished by family and publicly humiliated for my actions that have been medicalized, all being supposed proof of my insanity. I set out to fight this while deeply suicidal this time last year. Now that I am making some real progress my father has rejected me, my mother attacks me any time I am happy and my son was taken away from me because I am sick but his going has been a healthy move for him and though he hates me know I am so proud of him for embracing his passions. He does not want to be attacked like me so joins in the attacks, too bad but I know the son of Quaker George Fox hated his father. I must draw from within to heal the abuse I internalized, only I can do this work. Alex 11/12/2011 7:56:33 PM Ã? share a lot of your point of view. Good work. Even better that it comes also from a psychologist. Han Deibert 11/5/2011 3:21:59 PM Dear Daniel, Thank you for your warm and interesting emailcontact and especial your interesting documentaries about the projects in Finland and Sweden. We also in the Netherlands are on a quest for humananity in the Mental Health and the only way to achive that, is a paradigm shift. Hopefully our mailcontact will be also inspiring in the future, warm greatings Han Deibert, foundation Soteria the Netherlands. mishellerose 10/28/2011 5:21:33 PM Hooray for you!! Last night I discovered that what motivates me is enlightenment. So, this morning I googled motivated by enlightenment and Dissociation Mimics Enlightenment - Healing from Childhood Trauma showed up third on the list. Thank you for sharing your writings where I could find them. 🙂