This post is a deep dive into various authors, of article and videos, on the subject of surviving cannibalizing in dysfunctional family systems.
The video below, by Jerry Wise, uses strong language to describe dysfunctional family systems. He states that dysfunctional families are cult like. They are filled with alcoholism, abuse, unhealthy anger, guilt, shame, put-downs, triangles, hyper-religiosity, lying, manipulating, disappointment, poor communication skills, emotional reactivity, cut-offs, non-acceptance, backbiting, addictive behaviors, betrayal, disappointment, poor intimacy, enmeshment, etc. These families never have enough. They never have enough love, communication, acceptance, self-esteem, etc. which keeps getting lived out. This is because the problems are not discussed as family members live in denial.
I thought about this strong language and decided I agree. Whenever we are trying to control, dominate, or get our needs met through manipulation, enmeshment, or exploitation, especially with using our children, we are disturbing the peace and harmony in the body of other family members including our children. What follows is stress, conflict, and damaged relationships. We feel eaten up inside = cannibalized. We end up feeling:
- invalidated
- criticized
- drained of energy
- emotionally disconnected
- like our emotions are not valued
- like we are not good enough
- like we have to try harder to get along
- like we are in an adversarial relationship
Cannibalized
What are we to do, in family, when we are being cannibalized? What do we do with family members who are narcissists, sociopaths, borderlines, flying monkeys, alcoholics, codependents, etc.? I believe we are dealing with people who “resist the awareness of their own condition”, per Dr. Scott Peck, who defines such people as evil (The Road Less Traveled, pg. 280)
According to Peck an evil person:
- Is consistently self deceiving, with the intent of avoiding guilt and maintaining a self image of perfection
- Deceives others as a consequence of their own self deception
- Projects his or her evils and sins onto very specific targets (scapegoats) while being apparently normal with everyone else
- Commonly hates with the pretense of love, for the purposes of self deception as much as deception of others
- Abuses political (emotional) power) “the imposition of one’s will upon others by overt or covert coercion”
- Maintains a high level of respectability and lies incessantly in order to do so
- Is consistent in his or her sins. Evil persons are characterized not so much by the magnitude of their sins, but by their consistency (of destructiveness)
- Is unable to think from the viewpoint of their victim (scapegoat)
- Has a covert intolerance to criticism and other forms of narcissistic injury https://kc.instructure.com/courses/790250/pages/dr-scott-peck-on-evil
He argued that a diagnosis of evil should come from the standpoint of healing and safety for its victims, but also with the possibility even if remote, that the evil themselves may be cured.
Ultimately Peck says that evil arises out of free choice. He describes it thus: Every person stands at a crossroads, with one path leading to God, and the other path leading to the devil. The path of God is the right path, and accepting this path is akin to submission to a higher power. However, if a person wants to convince himself and others that he has free choice, he would rather take a path which cannot be attributed to its being the right path. Thus, he chooses the path of evil.
I believe that most, if not all people on Planet Earth, have suffered some form of trauma. I believe we either decide to recover and help others to recover or we decide to hurt other people. When we choose recovery, our inner GPS intuition from our Creator will guide us to recovery. When we choose to hurt other people, we are choosing the path of ego, darkness, and manipulation. Trauma does not cause evil. Free will does.
“Most evil people realize the evil deep within themselves but are unable to tolerate the pain of introspection or admit to themselves that they are evil. Thus, they constantly run away from their evil by putting themselves in a position of moral superiority and putting the focus of evil on others. Evil is an extreme form of what Scott Peck, in The Road Less Traveled, calls a character disorder.”
Character Disorders and Personality Disorders
Dr. George Simon, PhD, states that “Personality and character disorders are not the same thing. Our personality defines the stylistic way we tend to interact, while our character is defined by the level of social conscientiousness and virtue in our personality. When personality or character traits present major obstacles to functioning in a healthy way, they might constitute a disorder.
All of us have different personality traits or attributes. It’s only when these traits cluster in both a manner and intensity that makes it difficult for a person to function adaptively that we consider designating them as having a personality disorder. Similarly, all of us have traits that reflect upon our character. When those traits cluster in both a manner and intensity that causes us to function in a licentious or socially irresponsible manner a good deal of the time, we say that someone might have a character disorder.” https://counsellingresource.com/features/2008/09/10/what-is-a-character-disorder/
- Paranoid personality disorder
- Schizoid personality disorder
- Schizotypal personality disorder
- Antisocial personality disorder
- Borderline personality disorder.
- Histrionic personality disorder
- Narcissistic personality disorder
- Avoidant personality disorder
The following video, from Eva at Soul GPS, is very helpful for clarifying whether there is consistency of evil in people:
The two main feelings we will experience, per Eva, who studied Dr. Scott Peck’s book People of the Lie are:
- revulsion which can be instant, if blatant, or subtle if revulsion develops over time. Over time, we discern consistency of evil as this darkness has the mark of manipulation.
- confusion as if we are suddenly unable to think. Layers of lies leave us feeling confused.
How is child development affected by significant evil in parents and dysfunctional families? Eva explains per referencing Dr. Scott Peck’s book People of the Lie:
- the child will most likely misinterpret that the condition lies in itself. We may deal with this our entire lives unless we listen to our soul and rightly place responsibility where it belongs.
- we need to discern whether there is consistency to the revulsion, confusion, darkness and manipulation. If we feel as if we are on a slow burn, always on alert, always wondering what is going on, we may be discerning evil in our parent or family member.
- since scapegoating is a predominant characteristic of evil, there will be blame shifting. Evil people run away from conscience. There is a nuance here. Evil is utterly dedicated to preserving the self-image of perfection and moral purity. These people have an intense desire to feel good and to pretend which explains the lie. They have a rudimentary conscience which tells them they have the need to hide something. They are frantically trying to flee their conscience, are experts of disguise, and play an uncanny game of hide and seek as their soul seeks to evade itself.
Scott Peck, MD, says RUN if we don’t know how to deal with these people. Evil is the reason our world looks as it does and why we have to clean up the messes these people make.
Pathological Dependency
Are we pathologically dependent, in dysfunctional families, when we cannibalize rather than introspect? The following wordpress blog article, written by John based in Dr. Scott Peck’s book The Road Less Traveled (pages 98-105), describes what used to be called Passive Dependent Personality Disorder. The author of the article notes that “Peck was writing this in 1979. Since then, Passive Dependent Personality Disorder has been revised and replaced, and no longer appears in the DSM. Much, if not all, of what Peck is describing in this excerpt would now fall under the diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder, which is now one of the most common [and most difficult to treat] personality disorders.” I will note the highlights of the article as follows:
- dependency is defined “as the inability to experience wholeness or to function adequately and morally without the certainty that one is being actively cared for by another.
- dependency in physically healthy adults is pathological. It is sick. It is always a manifestation of mental illness or defect.”
- we all have the desire to be cared for. “But for most of us, these desires or feelings do not rule our lives. They are not the predominant theme of our existence.
- People with this disorder—passive dependent people—are so busy seeking love that they have no energy left to love. They are like starving people, scrounging wherever they can for food, and with no food of their own to give others. It is as if within them they have an inner emptiness, a bottomless pit crying out to be filled but which can never be filled, except very temporarily. Because of their lack of wholeness, they have no real sense of identity or of who they really are, and so they define themselves solely by their relationships.
- Their relationships, although seemingly dramatic in their intensity, are actually extremely shallow and other people are actually very disposable and interchangeable for them.
- The word “passive” is used in conjunction with the word “dependent” in the diagnosis because these individuals concern themselves with what others can do for them to the exclusion of what they themselves can do. This is not to say that passive-dependent people never “do” things for others, but their motive in doing things is to cement the attachment of others to them so as to assure their own care.
- Most importantly, passive-dependent people lack a sense of responsibility—not only for their words and actions, but for themselves and their own happiness and attitude. They passively look to others—frequently even their own children—as the source of their happiness and full-fillment, and therefore when they are not happy or fulfilled they “feel” that others are responsible, and act out on this feeling. Hence, they are endlessly angry and unhappy, because they endlessly feel let down by others who can never fulfill all their endless neediness or make them happy.”
When we require another person for our survival, we are a “parasite on that individual” (pg. 98)
“In summary, dependency may appear to be love because it is a force that causes people to fiercely attach themselves to one another. But in actuality it is not love; it is a form of antilove. It has its genesis in a parental failure to love and it perpetuates the failure. It seeks to receive rather than to give, to exploit rather than to nurture and to grow. It works to breed immaturity and infantilism rather than maturity, respect, goodness, love, virtue, decency, and growth. And ultimately it destroys rather than builds relationships, and it destroys rather builds people.” https://realtruelove.wordpress.com/2011/06/09/m-scott-peck-on-dependency-and-borderline-personality-disorder/
Soul Speak About Gut Sickness
This deep dive helps me understand why I have suffered confusion, pain, loss, trauma, always thinking I was doing something wrong, an autoimmune disorder (emotionally allergic to people who cannibalize), gut nervousness, anxiety, and health challenges since childhood. I was being energetically eaten alive in a dysfunctional, scapegoating family. I have heard it called “gut sickness” when we know something is wrong but it takes a lifetime to figure out what is going on. I imagine this dysfunction is common because we live on a planet filled with horrendous violence and dysfunction. To survive, we rationalize and we deny because reality is hard to digest. I now choose a contemplative journey to figure out what happened, to recover, and to avoid passing family dysfunction on to the next generation..
We often say “I love you” too easily. Genuine love is not cannibalizing one another. Genuine love is a mutual exchange of energy which is accepting, safe, and supportive. It is looking out for the best interests of the other person at the same time we keep our interests in mine. It is a win-win relationship. When we decide to learn healthy patterns for interacting, the energy in our body begins to return to calm. This is the calm our bodies need so that we recover. We implement protective boundaries when a family member begins to cannibalize.
Dysfunctional families create wounded people and broken hearts:
Energy Healing
Once we decide to emotionally grow up and recover, we no longer have to participate in family dysfunction. We are not being mean or trying to punish. Instead, we choose to survive and recover. We have no other choice if family members cannibalize to get their needs met and to avoid spiritual growth. We can love from a distance, or keep contact to a minimum, or respond with language which does not escalate situations, or we can go no contact. When we finally create boundaries, in the cult-like family system, stress levels lower in intensity and we heal our bodies. Our bodies can return to a baseline state of calm rather than feeling as though we are being eaten up on the inside.
We can learn to share healing energy with one another as we recover
Recovery means:
- we take responsibility for spiritual growth
- we release trauma
- we learn healthy behavioral patterns
- we practice respectful communication
- we are sensitive to feelings and needs of other people
- we support one another’s recovery for those who breakthrough denial
- we make amends when we hurt other people
“We Have the Power to Trigger Everybody”
I chuckled when I read the statement “we have the power to trigger everybody”. It felt like it was my life with uncovering truth about dysfunction and with seeking answers for healing. I was told, years ago, I am a lightworker. To me, that means I am continuously seeking truth and desire to share what I learn with others. I don’t want others to suffer what I have experienced. However, speaking my truth triggered other people. Those in recovery, who share their truth, may trigger those who have not searched for truth, who are stuck in ego, and who avoid healing inner wounds. I had to learn, the hard way, to be careful with what and when I share. That is because people walk their individualized soul journey and receive new information if and when they are ready.
How does one walk through the minefield of a traumatized, dysfunctional family while one is in recovery? There is so much emotional and psychic damage done in dysfunctional families who have personality and character disorders. Those who choose to recover become scapegoats. This is because:
- family members project their issues on to the scapegoat
- when family problems are not dealt with, they are projected somewhere else
- someone has to pay for dysfunction when family members do not get help
- family needs someone to punish
- the dysfunctional family has to project in order to have stability
- the family gets programmed that the scapegoat is the problem
- the scapegoat will always feel like we’re navigating a minefield
- family is not interested in the truth as they are delusional
- family cannot validate the scapegoat or the family system would come tumbling down
- family dumps their shame on the scapegoat
Overcoming the sole of scapegoat is knowing we are both the least powerful and the most powerful
Pain and Chaos With Change
It is a nightmare to survive on this planet. We experience pressure which causes what is not working to burn away. Burning away what is not working produces change. We are experiencing much pressure and collapse in both dysfunctional families and in our dysfunctional society. There are so many dysfunctional families and, thus, so many scapegoats. We are like one huge dysfunctional family, humanity, on Planet Earth.
There is gold in alchemical transformation if we stay the course of recovery. We need both individual and collective self-discipline and self-reflection if we are going to change both family and cultural dysfunction. I believe our children are the innocence and beauty on this planet which can turn life on this planet around. Why not place the safety of our children FIRST?! Why not go within and heal our traumas, our losses, our personality and character disorders?!
We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We cannot change our dysfunctional world unless we heal and change ourselves.
Empaths, Sociopaths, and Post-Traumatic Growth 
