A former president – Álvaro Uribe Vélez, known for systematic human rights violations and other horrors – is my client. He says he is very lonely. I want to give him hell for what he did to others, but feel I can’t since he is my client.
This is similar to a dream I had about Trump a while back.
These dreams show us the human side of the ones we vilify, or want to vilify, in our minds. They fill out the picture for us. Yes, a part may see them as villains and monsters, for good reasons. And they are also humans like us. Their history can help us understand why they are as they are. Also, they are a mirror for this side of ourselves. They help us find the same in ourselves, even here and now in how we relate to them.
In this case, Uribe and Trump are as much victims as anyone else – of trauma, family dynamics, the mindset of empire and colonialism, and so on. In short, they are the victim of domination culture. They are damaged by domination culture and hurt people hurt people.
For whatever reason, they sided with the culture that hurt them and they dealt with their trauma by systematically hurting others. In the process, they also continue to hurt themselves. They have to live with their own mindset 24/7.
If we see the monster only in them, we become the monster too. We are bound to live it out without acknowledging it. We react to Uribe and Trump in ways that mirror their behavior.
It helps to understand some of these dynamics. Their actions are symptoms of trauma and domination culture. It’s an expression of collective and inter-generational trauma.
We all have it in us. All of us who live within or have been affected by the Western domination culture are marked by it. We have internalized the domination mindset.
Fortunately, it’s not all we are. We can learn to recognize it. We can relate to it differently. We can choose to live alternatives. We can explore how it is to live from more of a partnership orientation.
We can even find a conscious partnership with these sides of ourselves – the ones that perceive and live from a domination culture mindset, the ones that deal with their trauma by inflicting more hurt on themselves and others. We can dialog with these sides of ourselves. We can understand them better. We can find ways to recognize and relate to it more consciously. We can help these sides of us find another way to deal with their own pain.
In the world, we can still work to stop the harm inflicted on others by the actions of these kinds of people. We can speak up about it. We can work to prevent these people from coming into power. We can use legal means to stop some of their actions. And so on. We can live alternatives.
And when we do whatever we do – to stop the harm, to analyze, to live alternatives – we do it with a little more clarity and kindness. We recognize the behavior as a symptom of larger cultural and historical patterns. We do whatever we do knowing that we have these sides in ourselves.