Or Else — Bring it

Oh, Like a lightning bolt- it struck me, again. How much, extremists of any sort can not “tolerate” peaceful protest or resistance. To them– to not conform to the forced consensus or to resist their agenda– must be acts of hostility– a war. “You are either with me or against me. I will take you down if you get in my way.” EW!!!

In my family and marriage, it was not welcome/tolerated to openly resist or object to their status quo. Overtime, this made me increasingly hostile & reactive. I remained in a state of constant brittle agitation over having expression of my needs, experiences, and preferences treated as invitations to battle and debate or as purely inadmissible. War or silent dismissal–the way it is done, in each of those systems. Sickening. Literally.

How upsetting peaceful resistance is for entitled controllers. As they recognize that it is inappropriate to respond with their standard flexing: threats, big guns, and retaliation. So, they will escalate the situation to justify “any means necessary”. Righteous folks are quick to feel offended by an invitation to collaborate with someone who openly differs in mindset or belief. They will designate a confrontation as an attack or dismiss it entirely- refusing to engage as equals -EVER. They simply will not be influenced by or open to things, not of their own design or choosing. I understand that I am not qualified to diagnose, but everything I read indicates that THIS IS NARCISSISM.

I am mentally recounting in my head my saying no to things that did not work for me, requesting alternative arrangements- and recalling with full blown PTSD, the immediate blowback of having done so. It always was exactly this way. Shut TF up or else. Get in line or get small.

Only a badass will hold and respect clear boundaries. A coward (Cowards and bullies tend to be one in the same (I have first hand experience as both)) may smile kindly and say yes, while passively calculating ways to not do the thing they are agreeing to, or they will scheme to indirectly undermine the thing to which they have only mentally rejected. Open dialog appears to not be a possibility with the coward, the bully, the narcissist.

I am literally thrilled by all of the people uniting in peaceful protest- ALL OVER THE WORLD, right now. Fiercely courageous and willing to say and do difficult and scary things. I learned courage and willingness in my program of recovery. These two qualities have cost me relations with people who need to be revered as in charge or else. I say Bring it. I will always roll the dice on the Or Else. My reverence cannot be purchased, extracted, or forced.

My Brother In Law- the Trustee of my mother’s estate, has still not responded to my inquiry from 2 weeks ago. It feels as though my options are: to let my child go without what he needs or to ask again so that I may be told off or ignored. You can probably guess which I will do. Updates to follow. Fusho.

The similarities between the dysfunction of first my family of origin and then my very similar marriage and our current state of affairs in this country are undeniably parallel. I find this oddly comforting. “These systems are not broken. They are working exactly as they were intended to.” Not sure who spoke these words, but I love them.