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Thread: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

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    Canada Avalon Member Czarek's Avatar
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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Quote Posted by Rahkyt (here)
    Sometimes our definitions of toxic differ from others.

    Sometimes people that are toxic to some, are not toxic to others.

    Sometimes, we perceive people according to our own preconceptions and intentions, which take our interactions with them down prescribed and limited pathways, with the outcome being inevitable.

    Then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy as people live up to our low expectations of them, as we've guided them all the way down the primrose path to their own destruction.

    I couldn't agree more with the above. Thanks. I'm sorry for wasting bandwidth but I had to reply to this for personal reasons.
    The ultimate ignorance is the rejection of something you know nothing about and refuse to investigate.
    – Dr. Wayne Dyer

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Thank you for sharing this experience Bill. I had tears in my eyes by the time I was done reading it, from both the comedy and the tenderness. Humanity can be so beautiful.
    Last edited by Innocent Warrior; 18th November 2014 at 02:56.
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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Wow, this was a brilliant story...and it came just at the right time. (But, of course!)
    I have just been sat here crying my eyes out before reading this as I had an epiphany about my past relationship, and how the negative things that happened during that time have taught me so much!
    Thank you Bill.
    Love and light x

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    i hope Maurice will learn something from this

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Lovely story. Though, a, "sound geezer" is much more than just an "okay person", in my opinion.

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Bill, I just was reading this beautiful post and again, for the 2nd time it brought tears to my eyes!

    This is such a valuable lesson for us all and very worthy of a bump!

    Peace,
    Journeyon

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Brought tears to my eyes.

    This is why the human race matters in the Universe.

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Sometimes people expect other people to treat them a certain way. If they have had a traumatic childhood they expect the same as adults and act out. When they act out that's when other people react back in a negative way. Sometimes its just braking the negativity cycle and by seeing people who trust and show respect for him his views then changed to break the cycle xx you changed that mans life because you showed respect for him when nobody else would xx

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    This story reminds me of my dad so much. Would be what he would do. His kind patience and intuitive insight on other persons that some people just don't see.
    "Wait" a word my dad used to say all the time. And "patience"
    Giving of yourself, your time and patience to allow this man to open himself to people around him to see the real man inside. The one crying for help that no one else could see.
    I'm sure this man has had people talk to him to try to change him. And ridiculed and chastised, but all unsuccessful. Maybe he just wasn't ready, or didn't have someone willing to listen to him instead.
    Thank you Bill for the story and for allowing this man the time and patience to change himself.
    As they say, You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. But the wise man who has patience, would "Wait" and eventually with quiet patience, he will partake of the water!

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Every time I read the OP, I think of how wounded that man must have been inside, and when the girl got wounded outside (her ankle), his wounded inside found its match, and a way to express itself in a way that was pure love.

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?


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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    "As God is Love: every kindness to another is a little Death in the Divine Image, nor can Man exist but by Brotherhood."
    -William Blake

    Beautiful OP, Bill. I had not read it before today.


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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?



    Geophyz tells a most wonderful story here, that has some similarities.

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Such a beautiful story, thank you for sharing.....must be pollen in the air...my eyes are watering.

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Quote Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
    -------

    Hi, All:

    This is a true story of an experience I had on a personal development training course about a dozen years ago, in the UK. Many of you reading this may know that this kind of thing used to be my profession.

    The client was a public institution, internationally very well-known, and my team and I had a mixed bag of employees, at all levels, in our care for six days. It was a pure residential personal development training program, and it took place in a little farmhouse in the Welsh hills, a very beautiful and peaceful place.

    Working with this organization on this program was always one of my favorite events every year. The employees were almost always pleasant, intelligent, enthusiastic, and extremely nice people to work with.

    But on this occasion, they had sent along a member of the security team (not in itself any problem: they were usually extremely nice people, too), and his name was Joe. Joe was as toxic as it was possible to get. He was negative, disruptive, destructive, snide, cynical, aggressive, and basically very nasty to everyone, all the time. He was like a caricature from some movie.

    There were three others in my training team, and they all wanted to send him home on the train immediately. No possible good could come of his being on the course. His manager back in London had told me about him, and was desperate for a solution. He was also a union rep, and was apparently as hostile and aggressive at work as he was in the Welsh countryside.

    However, something told me that he should stay. It was my program, and I over-ruled my three colleagues. "Wait", I told them.

    They were not happy with my decision. We worked in small teams, so I made sure I had Joe in my group where at least I could protect some of the others (and my staff, too) that way.

    Four days into the six, and there was absolutely no change. I was taking a huge risk, and I knew it: Joe was disrupting all the sessions, interrupting, laughing, sniping at the other course members who were trying to talk about their lives. It was not at all easy.

    Then, something extraordinary happened.

    We were on a mountain walk, and one of the girls sprained her ankle. We had to return to the farmhouse early.

    Without any bidding, Joe took her backpack, and with his arm round her shoulder, supported her all the way down the hill. I was rather amazed, and just let it all happen. Back at base, we strapped her ankle, and put the kettle on. Joe was very quiet for the rest of the day. I thanked him for his help, and so did the girl, who had been quite distressed.

    The following day, the fifth of the six, we started to see a change. Joe started to talk about his family and his childhood, which had been pretty rough. We all listened well, and thanked him for sharing his story with us.

    Joe seemed now to be changing by the minute, trusting us at last with some of his vulnerability. My colleagues were starting to give me funny looks. I again asked them to hang in there with me.

    On the sixth day, we were all due to pack up and depart at noon. The final session had us all sitting round in front of the farmhouse fire, sharing what we'd all learned or gained from the week. We gradually went round the circle, as the delegates shared their thoughts and feelings.

    And we were getting closer and closer to Joe's turn. I could sense the uneasiness. Was he going to ruin it all with a clever-clever comment?

    When Joe's turn arrived, everyone just looked at him, waiting. There was a tension in the room, and there was a very long silence. Finally, Joe took a deep breath, and said:

    "This has been the first time I ever felt I belonged to the human race."

    Then he began to cry.

    That set us all off. Everyone got up and hugged him. It was a like a religious revival. No-one could speak. Even now, I have tears in my eyes as I recall this story.

    In the minibus on the way to the train station, which I was driving, Joe got straight in the front and sat right next to me. Quietly, he said:

    "You saved my life. I would either have killed myself, or killed someone else."

    He paused. "You're a sound geezer."

    (Cockney: 'you're an okay person'. )

    I shook his hand, and told him he was a sound geezer, too. We both laughed.

    On Monday afternoon, his manager phoned me. "What happened?" He said. "Joe came right up to me this morning and said: 'Come on, let's sit down and talk. We have to work together.' What on earth did you do?"

    My reply to him was that Joe, of course, had done this all himself. He had taken advantage of an opportunity, the kind that presents itself to every one of us, every day. He was responsible for his own transformation, as we all are. And some of us take advantage of the chance, and some don't.

    This is what life is all about.
    You never know how much I'm pleased and satisfied when things like these are happening and is happening very often to me when I speak with strangers...they simply looked at you like they found jesus,god or whatever they discovered

    EDIT...
    What I don't understand is how they wasn't able before that talk to see what was obvious for them.It's still a mystery for me...
    Last edited by EFO; 2nd March 2020 at 20:06.
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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?

    Quote Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
    -------

    When Joe's turn arrived, everyone just looked at him, waiting. There was a tension in the room, and there was a very long silence. Finally, Joe took a deep breath, and said:

    "This has been the first time I ever felt I belonged to the human race."

    Then he began to cry.

    That set us all off. Everyone got up and hugged him. It was a like a religious revival. No-one could speak. Even now, I have tears in my eyes as I recall this story.

    In the minibus on the way to the train station, which I was driving, Joe got straight in the front and sat right next to me. Quietly, he said:

    "You saved my life. I would either have killed myself, or killed someone else."

    He paused. "You're a sound geezer."

    (Cockney: 'you're an okay person'. )

    I shook his hand, and told him he was a sound geezer, too. We both laughed.

    This is what life is all about.
    It is a beautiful life lesson that recovers the entire need for help we all have in one way or another.
    The portal of our existence is a whole charity at our fingertips, and the ability to recognize a person in need of help is the basic component of the gratitude that we are here and we can do it anytime.
    Sometimes what is toxic to us is really a whole living with the suffering of the other near us, a suffering that he endured alone.
    The examples of life show us through the most secret ways that we can recognize the suffering in those around us, through love and sincere sharing, so that in time or through a miracle, his suffering becomes toxic to him and removes it.

    I know we live in a world where it is not normal to run on the street and hug people, of course, if it could be possible, then my emblem would be:
    "I hug you first and then I ask you who you are and what hurts you !" :

    Sometimes "a hug can say what words cannot", we live in a world of encouragement so we have the courage to encourage others.

    And all this to be just human.

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    Default Re: The story of an epiphany. Should a toxic person leave a group, or hang in there and change their life?


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