Being A Disruptor
The Cambridge Dictionary has one of the best definitions of a disruptor. “Disruptor – a person or thing that prevents something, especially a system, process, or event, from continuing as usual or as expected. A company that changes the traditional way an industry operates, especially in a new and effective way.” Example: “If customers or clients talk to everybody else they get the status quo. We’re the innovators; we’re the disruptors.”
Reading blogs, listening to podcasts and journaling our own thoughts and feelings is all geared to open our minds. A TED talk, interviews with innovators and forward thinkers, does not go against the ‘traditional way’, it is in addition to them. We are now free to share our own thoughts and, most importantly, our experiences.
Being use to those who would have us believe the ‘status quo’ of their operating instructions, many fear being ridiculed or sued if they challenge ‘authority’, a disruptor realizes those who believe they are in ‘control’ are petrified to loose it.
Anyone who must use negative outward signs in an attempt to bring another down is a neon sign for being threatened, jealous and most of
all, unable to control those who choose a new way within the ‘status quo’. This type of behavior has been ongoing since the beginning of time. I believe there is no other way forward but to be a “Do no harm disruptor”.
In this day and age of the myriad of mental health therapists, inpatient and outpatient mental health facilities, as well as inpatient and outpatient substance abuse facilities the US population continues to see an overwhelming epidemic of drug overdoses and suicides. These numbers increase each year, actually each month, as if there is no system in place.
The disruptor’s job is to shed light on a system that is no longer working. The ‘model’ is flawed of how anxiety, depression, addiction and grief are treated. A hand off approach does NOT work. My goal as a ‘disruptor’ is to always, to the best of my ability, seek the truth of things for my clients and for myself. Very little is accomplished by those who would tell others what and how to save their lives if they, themselves, have not gone through it.
Those who are in desperate need of help with any of the aforementioned issues always see that their therapist or counselor has
no clue as to the experience of addiction, for example. We need to seek other ways such as being more of a life coach, companioning those who ask, “But how?!” to all of the well meaning advice and suggestions given in any helping environment.
Guiding and companioning those lost in the dense fog of anxiety and self-hate is the goal. Ethics guidelines would have us stay at least 6-10 feet away from our ‘patient’ and never even acknowledge them when we see them, for instance, in the grocery store. Oh my gosh, stop it! I believe the most important work one can do in therapy is trauma and abuse issues that have been left hidden but still operating within a person’s attitude about himself or herself.
Without blaming anyone, we look at the abusive behaviors and trauma experiences that flow through every family tree in one way or another. Bessel Van der Kolk, in his book, “The Body Keeps Score”, emphasizes the biggest threat to the health of children is, and always has been, child abuse.
Once these experiences are imprinted on the very vulnerable, developing brains of the littlest ones, trauma and abuse lead to one conclusion. They think it’s their fault. Witnessing abuse in those early years can be as traumatic, or more, than it happening to them.
This is where self-hate is born. Siblings are either the witness or the abused, which changes the outlook on life and them, which continues into adulthood if not acknowledged and treated. From family, to corporate,
to social circles and beyond, those who would demand to control seek out
those they assume are likely to be familiar with being a victim. Disruptors see through all of it.
Let’s talk about it.