You have probably heard it said "go within to find the light." While this might be a true enough statement for the majority of us dealing with broken, fragmented emotions such as despondency or pointlessness it is much easier said than done. How do we overcome pain? How do we atone for guilt? How do we forgive and let go when the suffering has been real, when the consequences can't be changed, when our isolation, self hate, loneliness stare us in the face every day we look in the mirror? I'm not going to lie and say there is an easy solution to any of these things, nor will I try to play them down, pretending if we don't face our inner demons they'll just go away. Regrets, sorrow, the list goes on, these are a part of life, they can destroy us for sure, leaving feeling people unable to come to grips with circumstances they will never change and which if left to ferment become a toxic mix of emotions which can and do lead to suicide.

Life is short and sweet yet it is hard to taste the sweetness when burdened by negative emotion. Many of us feel our circumstances are so bad there is no way out, no way forward, we might be trapped in a cycle of substance abuse in order to contain memories which overwhelm any hope for light. We might be victims or even perpetrators of violence which shocked us from a core of peace, unable to get past the experience which shattered our worldview. We may never have felt the love, or been recognized as anything more than worthless. These things are real for so many people. They are dangerous, compounding emotions which drive us toward damaging mental states such as anger, fear, anxiety, self hate... on and on. It is a diabolical circle of the mind! Such emotions can only lead down and in common but extreme circumstances can lead to a fragmenting of the mind with no meaningful reset to hand. In such cases, mental fragmentation is a slippery slope to serious illness and can never be made right, peace attained, until the fragmentation is healed, the experience consciously dealt with and new ways of handling the trauma created.

A never ending parade of to and fro, of one step forward two steps back is often the case. This leaves us empty and vulnerable to repeating over and over the abusive patterns or self loathing cycles we have become emotionally accustomed to. Self loathing then takes the place of positive thoughts. Anger either turned in leading to suicidal obsession, or turned out leading to violent fantasy becomes the overriding emotion. With no circuit breaker to ease the tension substance abuse, self harm, many other nasty practices become palpable mechanisms for relief. It is not surprising that just like in the course of physical disease a set of definable symptoms describes the malady, so too is it with emotional or "mental" illness. Core symptoms often play out with alarming regularity but they don't have to control our lives. We are not bound by soul to live and die in such a way.

At any point we can take control, we can and must do this, we can and must help others do this by showing the love and wisdom lacking which leads to this unfortunate state of being.

Violence Takes many forms but it always leads to the same result...

Violence does indeed take many forms, it is a shattering experience for all involved and is the number one way to create fragmentation of the mind. Even very seriously ill sociopaths, trapped in cycles of abusive patterns, perhaps with the urge to hurt and who are violent display remorse when in their "right" mind. It is the fragmented aspect of the mind, the part which desires above all else to find expression for the explosive feelings it has to deal with which can take control with devastating effect in such individuals. While this might be an extreme example, it is not uncommon. Fragmentation caused by violence is a very common experience and while for most the "right" mind might be able to contain the explosive tendencies of the "wrong" mind 99% of the time, it only takes that 1% for an incident to happen and the damage is done. Compounding negative experience gets deeper and deeper as a result and in very extreme cases the "right" mind loses its' grip and we have the beginnings of a very dangerous, seemingly emotionless individual who in very real terms has sacrificed a part of themselves for the crushing expression of the trauma they carry but have never dealt with.

While the case of perpetrators of violence have a set of circumstances common to them, so to do these mechanism work with the victims. Explosive rage is always seeded somewhere. People are just not born as vicious individuals. A victim always becomes a perpetrator if meaningful ways are not found to deal with the fragmentation... always. It is only a very small percentage of victims who become perpetrators outside of themselves, who knowingly, willingly commit acts of violence to others.

By far the majority of people become perpetrators of self harm!

If we are willing to consider emotional abuse as a form of violence the panacea of events which could trigger fragmentation becomes so much wider. If we are willing to consider fragmentation itself occurring across a broad scale with varying degrees of effect, it becomes easier to see that a fragmented mind is not as uncommon as we might suspect. In fact most of us live with our fragmented minds and have long found ways to adapt to it but as I have said it is in those moments, where the trauma held within the fragmentation comes to the fore and we do or say something we regret that the damage is done. Self hate then follows as a cycle and we either have to do the work of regaining our lost ground or it overwhelms us and we simply give in to whatever negative circumstance we have created. This might be the former drug addict slipping in a weak moment. The loving parent suddenly becoming toxic with no rhyme or reason, the list goes on. With honest self reflection once we know our mind is fragmented a majority of us can find a pathway to heal.

There are not enough counselors in the world to deal with our collective trauma

"Our collective trauma is a debilitating self defeating cycle which picks up individuals, fragments their minds, then spits them out like garbage with self hate, rage, loathing all nicely programmed in ensuring the cycle continues, on and on, forever..."

Visage Futures handy quotes...

Unfortunately there are just not enough counselors, therapists, psychiatrists in the world to cope with our collective trauma as it is today. We are going to have to find ways as a society to do this if we are to pull through these dark times into a world of joy. Never forget, I am you, you are me, what I do to myself I do to others. I cannot be free until we all are free. Pull through we can!

Our wisdom is not bestowed upon us, it comes from within!

Our ideas and expression are not educated into us from outside but rise from within. Only when we come together in shared experience of affirmation do we begin to see the patterns and then only with loving reflection, with wide and varied inputs and with a focus toward really helping our fellows should anything ever become doctrine. So many variables exist, so much is drawn from this one source of fragmentation it would take lifetimes of effort to trace every conceivable variable while we persist with isolating every form of mental or emotional malady into its' own little box. In the end we will find the triggers are always the same thing. Human suffering occurs because humans act violently and obsessively when they have not come to terms with their own fragmented minds. That there are real psychopaths out there, people who obsessively do great harm, commit unspeakable acts of horror, is a given: we know this! We see it everyday, trauma, violence, institutionalized horror, bombs, killing, on and on it goes.

There is an end to these cycles of hate!

Find your fragmented mind, own up to it, explore it and understand it. Forgive yourself for being depressed, for your feelings of pointlessness and anxiety, seek always to understand the source. If the world around you makes you depressed: good. How can we not be depressed with so much malevolence and war, so much division and poverty, waste and pollution. We have not been handed a nurturing society with a legacy of care. We have never been shown the power of gentle living and so we take our frustrations out on each other with no real idea that things need not be this way. Many of us bring these outside influences in upon ourselves and allow them to overwhelm any potential we might have for self love. Issues of the world compound against our personal worries and there comes a point where it is just too much for one person. You can change this, you can become a part of the solution, you do have power. In personal relationships the same rules apply. No matter how connected you might be to a toxic situation you can change your role in it. Go into the fragmentation of your mind, look at the hopelessness of the situation, acknowledge your role in it, forgive yourself! Reach out to someone outside of your circumstance, people you trust, or could learn to trust. Find a way forward, have faith in your soul.

So many of us are trapped in toxic situations, we turn our anger inward and gradually evolve into perpetrators of self harm. When these cycles become so encompassing we no longer see any purpose to life, we kill ourselves in alarming numbers. Systems we have created to deal with these issues are underfunded and overwhelmed, at best people get a surface treatment, drugs to quell the raging emotions, at worst they simply fall through the cracks and go out to commit real violence either to others or themselves. In essence suicide and murder are the same thing, the same end of the line scenario and nothing can change the result once it has happened.

Fragmentation of the mind is real and very common, so common in fact most of us wouldn't even recognize it has happened to us, we have coped with it, we deal with it day to day

Use the internal dialogue as a vehicle for acceptance. Understand that your suicidal thoughts going round and round in your head with no meaning, no focus, in a never ending pattern of self abuse are real you can't actually just magic them away. Own them. See them for what they are, a vehicle pointing you to the circumstance which led to fragmentation. It is the fragmentation which makes people sick. Although the symptoms might vary down certain seemingly common lineal paths it is nevertheless true, you can come to terms with these out of control thoughts. Give yourself time, go one step at a time. Let those negative thoughts be just what they are. Embrace them not as a negative emotion which is going to cause you to do harm, but as a vehicle toward self awareness, a glitch in the machine pointing the way toward what has gone wrong.

You have a timeless soul. You can communicate with it because it is you.

Never ever be afraid to live, living is often the hardest part. You will die in time. Atone for your role in the collective trauma if that is what you have to do. Forgive those who hurt you if that is what you have to do, but always accept your role in it. It is ok to leave a traumatized person who doesn't see how they are spreading the toxic nature of their pain. It is ok to see that you have been that person. Feelings of guilt, while they may be debilitating, can only ever make you a better person because they come from the "right" mind. You may never be able to make an old situation good again but use your energy to make future ones so. Love yourself, even as you hate yourself: please my friend, know you are not alone.

Recovering the fragmented mind is a step by step process. It will take humility and honest self reflection, some people will never do this but many others can. Start being gentle on yourself. Expand your worldview. Read books, get into the habit of finding stories that take you to a better place. People pour their heart and souls into the books they write and in your isolation you can access this as a resource. Often a good story given from true heart becomes the sounding board where you can reflect upon yourself and your experience. In this way you are opening your mind to something different, something bigger than your pain, something outside of yourself yet given as a gift for you. Clawing back the fragmented mind is in fact a natural process when you begin to see the wider world around, its' pain and shame, it's own fragmentation. Take little steps to improve your situation, remain humble, keep your expectations real but never stop expanding your mind. Isolation can be debilitating, soul destroying, but flip the coin; it can also be uplifting if we use our time productively. Going outside of yourself by immersing your mind in human stories is uplifting, people offer so many little clues and you will find, along the way, you are loved, you are valued you have a spirituality which is deep and nurturing if you will only allow it to come to the fore.

It is a cliche to say it but you do have a spiritual family and home if you can but learn to value caring for yourself and soul.

I can say these things my friends because I have been there. I have shamed myself, broken myself, been a toxic person, had an obsessive mind. I choose to put my faith both outside and within, I choose to believe I am part of a bigger picture, that I am learning and am grateful for the grace I have been offered, although I may have wandered far from peace. You may come to understand, as I have, that once you've let them in you may never truly free yourself from thoughts of suicide and the like, but you can achieve a state of grace, they do not have to have power over you, you can put them into different things. Find a way to be productive, join groups, actively reach out to fellow travelers, become a solution for someone not so far down the road of healing as you by appropriately reaching out. You don't have to let people into your private space but there are many ways to join the process. People are basically good at heart, we come to evil as a consequence of many factors but it is never anyone's destiny to dwell there forever. Even if we might waste a few lifetimes being awed by the magic and trickery of "the dark side" we eventually see it for what it is. Our souls are universal, our lives here on earth fleeting. Please know this for yourself. You were not created out of evil! You were created out of love! Allow this core creation to inform your meditations, it lives deep inside of you and exists regardless of the trickery of the mind.

By expanding your mind, embracing the power of books, by allowing yourself to know that abundant, immeasurable love dwells inside you, regardless of the thrashings of your mind, you will be chipping away at those feelings of pointlessness. There is nothing pointless about your life! If you choose you can be an effective purveyor of your own truth and in this way come to see the power of that truth in others. Herein lies a point of celebration, seeing the light and love in others. We can never see this while our minds are ravished by darkness. When our minds are trapped in obsessive cycles we can only see the pain and shame, we can only access the hate and division, we become drawn to narcissistic individuals because they will shame us in the ways we expect. When you see them from the other-side you will be amazed at how little power this charade has over you. You will see them for what they are, damaged, vulnerable people who haven't yet understood they are in fact born of the light and like us all, share the same destiny of coming home to the light, no matter how long it takes. Come home to the light now. Find good people, value love, seek truth and do not fear simple beauty. Expand into an artistic, wise creative soul, use your deep feeling to go beyond the shadows and realize you can be whatever you choose, even when the world is gripped by chaos. Life here on earth is short, we can never know everything or do everything. Look around you, accept your circumstances and be the light within them. You will make a difference, you will learn strengths you never knew you had. When it is time, when you are ready, one day, as do we all... you will go home!