Focusing Tip #603 – Where does violence come from?

Dear Readers:

Today I am filled with sadness as I think of the great American leader and peacemaker who was assassinated fifty years ago – Dr. Martin Luther King.

There have been too many assassinations, all over the world… and too many killings that never make the news because the people who die aren’t “newsworthy” — and those deaths are tragic too.

Where does such violence come from, and could the kind of emotional healing that we do with Focusing have an impact on how much violence there is in the world?

I think that a lot of violence – maybe not all, but a fair amount – happens because people are taken over by their desperate parts. Many of them are taken over by feelings of hatred driven by an unbearable longing for respect and connection.

I’ve seen a lot of low self-worth in my work, and I see it in the shooters and the abusers. I don’t say this to excuse violence. I say this because I hope that if we understand we can help this all to shift.

A person who gets hijacked by violent parts can change. I know because I have had parts of me so desperate and needy that they were willing to steamroll other people to get what they wanted. And this has changed, with Focusing.

Let’s each turn toward the most despised places inside us. Let us gather in the starving, grasping little children in our deepest hearts. The needy ones, the vulnerable ones inside of us… they need our love and our company. Then they don’t get loose and act in the world in ways we are sorry for.

And perhaps then we can help other people in our lives to do the same… and the circles expand outward from each of us. That’s my hope today.