In my previous post - Day 146: The Credit is Mine! - I said that as I was writing, I had a memory come up. So, if you haven’t yet – I suggest reading the previous post first.

The memory that came up was quite a ‘significant one’ – meaning: a memory that I have been working with for quite some time or that has come up several times in my process and each time there are different points revealed from/of it. And so, here again, lol.

This memory stands in relation to my relationship with a particular person that I was not on good terms with. I experienced this person as judgmental, unfair and brutal. Needless to say that over time, I accumulated a vast amount of reactions and resentment towards this particular person, but I would never voice them – I would brood and curse in silence and complain about the person to others. Now, within this memory – I was having a discussion with my mother and we were not agreeing on something. This other person was present as well and at some point started shouting and ranting at me – I cannot remember all that was said – but one particular point I remember very clearly – these were the words that triggered my reactions to ‘shoot through the roof’, smash the plate I was holding onto the kitchen floor, shout that I’ve had enough at the top of my lungs and get into a huge fight.

Now – those particular words that were said that triggered my reactions to go through the roof – I had always remembered them, but I hadn’t placed any importance on why I was remembering these words or even why these words had such an impact in terms of the intensity of my reactions increasing so extensively. The words were ‘you think you’re the queen and everyone must just bow for you’ – lol. So, in writing my previous blog about how I experience the prideful character as being a queen on a throne within myself and any time someone gives ‘praise’ it is like a person bowing before the queen and how this relationship to praise had become like an addiction within myself – in ‘needing people to praise me’ – I could suddenly why these words that were spoken in that moment would have such a big impact – because they were striking at the heart of the prideful character that I had become, lived and embodied totally and completely by that age.

It is fascinating – every time I would remember these words I would think ‘that just shows how little this person knew and understood me, if that’s how they see me – a queen who wants everyone to bow for her’ – because on a conscious level and how I would interact with people on a conscious level, I did not at all see myself this way, let alone want to be seen this way – but on a deeper level, these words summarized a very large aspect of who I was accepting and allowing myself to be and exist as.

Herein – I remember very clearly how the word ‘queen’ within what he said, was the one word in relation to which I allowed a flood of reactions to surge up inside me – showing that this is a word that is polarized within and as me – holding both positive and negative charges.

So, I’ll write a bit more on the polarization of the word ‘queen’ in my next post. Learn more »

In my recent blogs I’ve been exploring the Prideful Character – for more perspective read:

Day 141: Pride – The Root of All Sin?
Day 142: Pride and Perfection
Day 143: Pride – Prize versus Hide
Day 144: It doesn’t matter what you say, I already decided I won’t listen to you
Day 145: Maleficent – Pride and Regret

Another aspect of the Prideful Character is wanting to get credit for ‘doing something good’.


Examples are for instance:

• Sharing an idea with someone and then another person sharing that idea with a group where the group then perceives that the person who shared the idea with the group is the one who came up with the idea and people are then congratulating that person – and now self reacts – because ‘that was MY Idea!’, ‘the credit should go to ME!’.

• When working in a group on a project or to achieve a certain goal and as the group is moving towards or reaching success in its goals, self is convinced that it is because of one’s own contribution that there is success – for at one point raising an idea, or for carrying out a specific task – as though self is the one to which all the credit for the success belongs – when actually, there was a whole group involved.

This point stems again from one’s relationship to praise – where, if one has created a relationship to praise in a way where one believes one ‘doesn’t exist’ if one isn’t being praised – then any and all situations in which self would expect a possibility of praise – will be grasped at and if the praise does not come – there is a tantrum – because self perceives having a right to the praise.

It’s fascinating, because there’s a point of desperation within this point – similar to an addict desperately needing a ‘fix’ to feel okay, to feel at peace – as though one is time and time again building and walking into this intensifying experience of anxiety and instability – as though, if someone doesn’t give some praise soon – one’s foundation will be pulled from under self – because ‘who am I if I’m not being praised?’.

Lol, when I look at the prideful character, it’s truly like seeing a queen on a throne within one’s mind – and within sitting on the throne – hands on the arm-rests of the chair – eyes straight ahead– there is an experience of absolute stability – but it’s not in fact stability – it’s an experience of control. But! The queen can only be queen if it has subjects that recognize her as the queen – and if no one has come by in a while to bow at the queen – then who is the queen a queen of? What does it mean to be a queen if there is no one bowing before the queen??

And this ‘bowing before the queen’ is in the form of receiving praise from others – when praise is given – which is not necessarily praise from the point of the person giving, but how it is perceived by the prideful character; for instance, it could just be a point of cross-reference and a person agreeing, or it can be someone encouraging what self is busy with – but in the eyes of the prideful character, any and all feedback that is not ‘negative’, is ‘positive’ and is ‘praise’ – as though someone is actually bowing before self – before the queen – and now the queen’s legitimacy is restored and can ‘rest assured’ on the throne for a while again – experiencing that point of ‘apparent stability’ which is in fact control – in being able to suppress the actual anxieties and fears underneath the surface by placing ‘praise’ on the forefront.

I’ll continue with this point in my next post, because as I’m writing I have a memory coming up that I’m starting to see in a new light, in new understanding – so will share that in my next post! Learn more »