Before I started personal psychotherapy, I had not suspected the number of complaints I had about my parents. I did not even think that there was anything wrong with my family, my childhood, my upbringing. I did not observe in a critical manner what values, messages, strategies, restrictions I had adopted from my parents and family and still used, even though some of them were no longer effective, some were obviously unhealthy and others even harmful. I did not realize what feelings and emotions had become forbidden and locked in my heart. I did not even use and know some words and notions I could confidently wield nowadays. If I hadn’t chanced upon a psychotherapist four years ago, I would have followed the restrictions and passed down the traumas and restrictions and negative messages to my son. It’s good that I’ve been brave and courageous enough to embark on a new way.
Some years ago, I asked God to give me wisdom. Here and there, people – and I think they are really lucky – inherit it from the older generations of their families, but my story is different. I wish I could inherit values and wisdoms from my relatives and parents. Now I know, no wisdom could ever be gained by me other than by making mistakes, learning lessons and becoming aware of things.
This is my way, and this way is harder.
Sometimes I feel tired, frustrated and even too exhausted to continue. Then I am ready to give up. There are periods when I dismiss all my previous achievements and results because I cannot bear the tension of the problems I have to face. This is sometimes caused by new questions I have to find answers to or by obstacles I did not expect to face. At those moments I feel depressed, frustrated and angry. But after emotions are lived through, I feel enough strength to tackle the new issues, learn, overcome and become wiser than before. I regain respect for my achievements and my way. Recently, I did realize that this will not end with the completion of psychotherapy. This will last because this is indeed what life is. And life comes in so many unexpected ways that we cannot even imagine.
We have a Russian proverb that can be translated as “the ways of the Lord are inscrutable,” and that is true.
Each time I will discover new sides and new faces of life. And I will become wiser and wiser if I learn the lessons right and well.
2021: Conceived – Volume 2 of a Contemporary Transadaptation
January: The Pack – Alejandra Baccino (Uruguay)
February: The Pink Shirt – Talia Stotts (America)
March: Dragging the Past out into the Light – Kate Korneeva (Russia)
April: Looking Forward to Spring – Marilin Guerrero Casas (Cuba)
May: Every Little Thing – Gennady Bondarenko (Ukraine)
June: The Girl Who Chased the Rainbow – Toni Wallis (Sarah-Leah Pimentel) (South Africa)
July: Another World – Jonay Quintero Hernandez (Spain)
August: Life after Nare – Nane Sevunts (Armine Asryan) (Armenia)
September: Meeting My Homeland – Rayan Harake (Lebanon)
October: Catching Water (Part Two) – Javier Gomez (Argentina)
November: Remember – Seyit Ali Dastan (Turkey)
December: I Can’t Breathe – Veronica Cordido (Venezuela)
Background – Context
In the Middle – Prelude to a Contemporary Transadaptation, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2020)
Peripatetic Alterity: A Philosophical Treatise on the Spectrum of Being – Romantics and Pragmatists by Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
La Syncrétion of Polarization and Extremes Transposée, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2018)
L’anthologie of Global Instability Transpuesta, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2017)
From Wahnsinnig to the Loony Bin: German and Russian Stories Transposed to Modern-day America, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2013)
Emblems and stories on the international community
Perception by country – Transposing emblems, articles, short stories and reports from around the world
Credits
Cover photo: Moscow, Russia – Silhouettes – Alexander Popov (Unsplash)
Source: The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed