Feedback on post deletion and 7 cups site structure in relation to mental health and integration
@MistyMagic, @GlenM, @neonblueberry1843, @Coco08061969, @lightIdea2663
This post was deleted from the "deleted thread" thread and @MistyMagic suggested placing it within the "feedback" thread. I have followed your guidance. Thank you for the suggestion.
Here is the "feedback" in its entirety. (Posted originally as a response to a Diary entry being deleted.) Quoted in its entirety:
"Your deletion of my diary entry confirms my nagging feeling of what is wrong with the primary division between Listeners and Members in the organization of 7 cups. @GlenM. Additionally, I would like to thank @neonBlueberry1843 @Coco08061969 for coming to my defense when I posted my diary entry and @lightIdea2663 wrote an unsupportive line. Now, in reading more about the development of 7 cups as a nonprofit business by Glen Moriarty as a startup in Silicon Valley mostly to support entrepreneurs who may also be seeking ways to balance their anxiety and depression and have a place to find information on work life balance, due to Glen M's Psy D background and desire to "help" others (from his clinical background) I have finally hit on what it is that I find disturbing about the 7 cups's division between Listeners and Members. So, thank you for that.
"In short, the goal of most therapies is for a person to achieve "integration" and "balance" and also be able to function in society. Glen and the other investors took on a lofty goal, which was to create a world wide platform where people could get and give support to each other. The premise is the "therapeutic model" and I won't go into that in great detail but I will explain why I don't believe it leads to integration of personality for just a minute.
"The reason I joined 7 cups was complicated. However, the part of 7 cups I was attracted to was the Sharing Circle, where everyone is more or less 'equal' and everyone's 'voice' can be heard. This model is based on Councils of Indigenous People, where persons would sit in a circle and pass a 'talking stick' around the circle. Each person would have the chance to talk whilst they held the talking stick. In this way, each voice of the community was given equal weight. The Sharing Circles, which I was supporting as a Room Supporter and as a Host, were formed on this premise. Glen and others who formed this didn't know that, perhaps because they are younger than me, or less interested in the historical roots of such things, they put in the original introduction to Sharing Circles that it was based on the Overeaters Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous (which, by the way, have mixed reviews as to effectiveness) rather than the ancient historical roots of Councils run by Indigenous Peoples (I can insert references here, but this is just an overview of my thoughts so I will save that.) This desire for a 'therapeutic' atmosphere, coupled with the desire to help entrepreneurs, was, from what I can gather, the motivation to establish 7 cups.
"However, there is a flaw with the argument that the therapist "knows" more than the one seeking therapy. Also, there is a fatal flaw when a person (one human) is differentiated or split into essentially two personalities: 1) the member: distressed, perhaps seeking help and 2) the listener: the helper, the one who delivers help.
"This division also has ancient roots. It also has been the cause of many problems, one of the chief being the ability for a human individual to achieve integration or 'enlightenment,' the 7th 'cup' within the poem Glen cites as one of the bases of forming 7 cups.
"My personal experience on both sides, being a Member and also a Listener, is that the more involved I became as a Listener, the more mechanistic and robotic my acceptable responses became. For example, pat phrases like: Thank you for sharing, One day at a time, and I am walking with you, became common. The real personality of the Listener is diminished. Listeners, as per the guidelines you state above, are to be 'lighthearted' and 'joyous.' Nowhere did I see it stated that they must be mechanistic and robotic and turn off our critical thinking skills. Yet, this seems to be what is encouraged. The false dichotomy between the therapist/Listener who knows better and the patient/Member who is seeking help. This is even evident in the giving of certain 'privileges' to Listeners, such as a special room where Listeners can support each other in their 'journey' and other perks, such as my perk as a Room Supporter to be able to post a banner on the room I am supporting.
"These are just the thoughts off the top of my head early on a Saturday morning. I still think 7 cups is the best little shop in the town, and how my little note of intelligent dissent (not so much for the removal of the thread as much as for the 'public shaming' by posting on a 'deletion forum' and also the pointing to 'educational resources' for me when it is me who was targeted by someone who chose to spew their hatred. I still plan on staying with 7 cups after a self care break. Perhaps someone will respond to my message. I do believe you have ways to contact me. There is an email associated with my account where I can receive messages. (I am interested in startups myself as I am running my own consulting business and have progeny, one who already has three patents and the other who is doing some ground breaking research on pain, along with being naturally intelligent and educated and about twice to three times the age of most people on here and therefore perhaps possessing of some historical reservoir of privilege as a 'brain trust.')
"Carry on! Be yourself! I certainly will continue to be myself."
I have copied my original statement in its entirety with the exception that since I'm quoting myself, a statement I placed in the "communicating forum" deletions thread, and transposing it to another location within the platform, I put my statement in quotes.
I wonder if anyone will even take the time to read this. I await your response with bemused curiosity while I wait to watch the third place match between Morocco and Croatia (Men's World Cup Soccer).