Анна Шиман
Draft translation. This text was translated automatically and has not been proofread yet — if something reads oddly, it does.
“The Thief”
It was a beautiful spring day, and Dasha was in the brightest of moods. She was on her way to buy new shoes, a well-stuffed purse lay in her handbag, and she stood leaning on the tram rail, lost in her daydreams. Suddenly her eye caught someone’s hand in her bag. It was as if it were nothing at all. But the image stayed in her memory forever: the open zip of the bag and a thin but strong man’s hand inside.
The man snatched his hand back the instant she cried out: “What are you doing in my bag?” After that, everything came in frames: Dasha’s loud shout, “He was rummaging in my bag!”, the threat from a passenger standing nearby, “Want me to smash his face in right now?!!”, the thief being ignored, and then…
Then Dasha was sitting next to this pickpocket on the very back seats of the tram, listening to the story of his life. It turned out that in 28 years he had never earned a single kopeck any other way! That is, all his life this man had knowingly made trouble for others; curses flew his way from people who never saw him, and tears were shed because of what he did. And every day he added to the number of unhappy people, taking away their material and moral stability. Even if only for a short time.
This story led me to an interesting thought. The inner values of people with weak psychological boundaries, a weak centre of consciousness — the ego, can also be stolen by energy thieves. Trampled, spat upon, mutilated.
It has long been no secret that there is such a thing as psychic energy, through which a personality influences the world around it.
— I’m so tired after a whole day with the baby, please help me!
— Ha! She’s tired! You were at home, and with just one child. I run a whole office! — and a finger raised for emphasis.
Or, as another option, this reply to the same tired mum:
— Oh, how feeble women are these days! In my time I had three children and still milked the cow, and hauled the water, and worked on the farm 8 hours and more!
And what does a woman feel in a case like this?
That her sense of herself is unreliable, wrong. She is overcome with doubts. Is she really that tired — maybe she should push a little harder and put up with it?
Many people with psychological difficulties would agree to put up with it a little longer. And that means they would agree to become the victim of manipulators.
Every person has their own limit of tiredness. And in this case they simply need help.
And the reply they get is
— Don’t lie! You’re not tired! There’s nothing here to get tired from.
This is how what a person leans on gets stolen. Their resources. Their real ideas about themselves and their strength. Their self-esteem and their right to self-respect and to love themselves. The “thief” gains something too — showing that asking for help is illegitimate and pathetic.
At that moment the person in need stops sensing reality. They think: if they can do it, then I must manage too.
The key phrase here is “must manage”. To force yourself to feel and act the way it looks in other people’s minds. In the end the tired mother wears herself out following someone else’s norms and judgements. The result is physical overstrain plus a loss of trust in herself. Inwardly such a woman feels suppressed and has no contact with her aggression or her needs. She seldom has wishes of her own, and if she does, she may quickly give up on acting on them if she meets the displeasure of those around her.
What is needed here is a strong ego and the ability to say a firm “no”, which will give you the strength to set a boundary and say
— fine, so you can manage it. That means you are stronger than me at this. But I can’t! I need help. And if you can’t give it to me, I will look for support elsewhere. Or try to lighten the load. But I will not betray myself and my sense of myself. I will not let myself agree that you may steal my connection with my own body and feelings.
Admitting that you need help does not mean you are weak. It only means that you can assess your resources and capabilities realistically. For this you need to develop your connection with reality, through awareness and self-awareness.
Studying psychology can help you with this.
Iryna Stadnytska,
a participant in our centre’s programmes and courses.
More about the “Practical Psychology” course:
