Great idea Christi!
Sparkle,
Finding a good therapist is like finding a good spiritual supervisor. 
It’s a jungle out there and some are saints, some are devils to your psyche or development. It that doesn’t mean psychotherapy or spiritual development is bad in itself. You know when you have found the one that is right for you. I guess you have met therapist from the psychodynamic school - based on the old freudian heritage, which nobody really takes seriously anylonger. However, cognitive and behavioural therapists say: Change your thoughts and your feelings will change as well. You just have to find therapists that are a bit up to date. 
Kirtanman and Christi,
Great posts! It makes me wonder, though… As I see it right now:
As long as I am not steady and stable in presence, I will flip in and out between mind and presence - as long as I can’t stay home I will separate myself from home and suffer from my mind. Then I see several things that may happen
- I can try not to bother with my suffering mind/emotions and just focus on dropping the thoughts as you suggest. But that takes a great bit of awareness to be able to do that.
- I can lose my awareness and fall into my suffering mind for a while until I catch a glimpse of awareness and start working from there trying to drop my thoughts. Meanwhile I have been deep down in great pain and perhaps caused further damage to myself and others.
- I can be aware of my switching between my suffering mind and awareness and decide to make the dips into unaware suffering a bit more bearable by working psychologically with my mind.
I wonder if the last post is a good solution for persons with very painful minds? Or people who have not come so far yet on the awareness practices? I guess that is what I try to do to get my life running somewhat smooth anyway. I am a beginner at meditation and staying present. What am I to do when I get into uncontrolled emotions without awareness being able to get hold of? Well… I continue with my meditation practices and hope the forces will transform my mind, but I also help myself when I am in my “mind state” to work with my mind.
There is something called maturity. People do get calmer minds if they learn to think, feel, behave more functionally, even without meditation.
But that also makes me wonder about the characteristics of the mind… as the purification process goes further… is the mind transformed automatically? Will I get rid of my negative thoughts, will they diminish, or will it just be easier to not mind about them?
I also wonder about what child sexual abuse actually does to our energy body. It awakens sexual energy far too soon, before the neurobiology is ready for it in any way. What happens to the neurobiology and energy paths in abused children?
And also… What psychologists call “dissociation” is very common in victims. From what I understand, they learn to open a link into the astral world and become very medial persons. However, the link opens automatically on conditioned stimulus and is therefore very dysfunctional for them. They are no longer “here”, they become passive and are easily victimized over again. Example: Woman meets man at pub. Man shows sexual interest, which is a trigger. Woman dissociates, flies away in some space, loses control over herself, and ends up in bed with the man. Afterwards she can not recall what happened and why. Very common story from victims.
How does this ability to dissociate affect the purification process?
Hm. Many new questions for me now with this new perspective…
I know I should have posted something much earlier, everyone here has taken so much time to post their thoughts to help me… every single post has meant more to me than anything else has in my life for a long time. Every post has so much feeling, compassion and meaning.
Now to explain why I have not been replying. I will try my best… but at times its hard to put my thoughts in words… esp. in this case, because… I am a little lost as to what my thoughts really are…
I read your posts… and I have tears in my eyes… it touches a part deep inside me. But they are all just a bunch of words… that have a meaning in English, that makes perfect logical sense… and yet I don’t understand them… does that make sense? 
. I don’t want to sound rude. I am not saying the advice you are giving me is useless… on the contrary… it is way more useful than anything else I have had in my life… I see things so much more clearly now, than I did a week back… I can find an explanation for a lot of things that I was and am going through… however, I cannot figure out how to apply it… like Sailor Bob says… I am using my mind to understand my mind.
All of you have said, forgive him and yourself… at a conscious level I hold no grudges against him, and with all your help, I think I am over the fact that it was my fault… like many of you said… put yourself in the place of the 7 year old, could you have stopped it… the answer is NO.
Some have said just drop the feeling, some have said move on. I think I have moved on, I don’t feel like a victim, I don’t hold any grudges against my uncle, I can think about that afternoon and the 2 years that followed… without stirring up any emotions. I don’t curse my fate, my life, my God anymore. I don’t hold on to the story that he ruined my life anymore. I don’t blame everything that goes wrong in my life, on the abuse anymore. But this is all at the level of the mind I understand. and this seems to be at the surface level…
This morning… I was up early, and did not feel like getting out of bed, nor could I get back to sleep… so I tried what EMC suggested… I stink at visualizing… so I was not expecting anything from this. I walked down a path and was met by a bunch of kids I sat down and tried to listen to what they were saying… they were all speaking together… a lot of noise… everyone was speaking together… I have no clue what they said and then one of the little girls came forward… and said “he hurt me” and started to cry… I held her but I forgot what i was supposed to say to her… all I did was hold her in my arms and cry with her… Not sure if that worked like it was supposed to… maybe a few more trys at it may tell me something… or maybe it did work… so many of you have said crying is a way of surrendering and letting go…
I also tried what Christi suggested… I waited with my uncle in front… I am really surprised at how clearly I could see him… Esp. because, after those 2 years, I did not see much of him, and he died in his forties… Anyway… so I could see him… his face, his expressions… it was a bit unnerving and unreal (like I said I stink at visualizing… and this is the first time I guess I saw things so clear)… My mind kept moving away from there… I brought it back… it may have been almost half an hour… but I could not do it… I could not get myself to touch him… leave alone hug him… I did not feel any anger, hatred, guilt, fright, love,… actually I was completely indifferent…emotionless… and yet I could not touch him…
I am not trying to analyze this… I am a little tired of analyzing and justifying. Esp… because I don’t really think I know what it is that is bothering me anymore. I truly have a feeling my practice will get me through this.
I hope I don’t sound ungrateful. I have never had so much good advice in my life before… and I really think… with time, everything you all say here will become clear to me… just that, right now… I seem to be looking through a fog… and I don’t see clearly what I should be seeing.
Thank you all… this thread has proven to be very helpful. I appreciate all your help.
Sounds great. You took care of her, you dared to see her and you could feel with her and comfort her. It will ease the pressure. When you put light on the pain it will fade away. Your sense of confusion is perfectly okey! You are handling a lot of old pain and it always feels strange. You should do exactly what you do, since that IS what you do. You need a bit of “fog” right now.
I love your courage! It is beautiful.
EMC said:
“But that also makes me wonder about the characteristics of the mind… as the purification process goes further… is the mind transformed automatically? Will I get rid of my negative thoughts, will they diminish, or will it just be easier to not mind about them?”
My experience on this has been, meditation , inner silence and self inquiry work hand in hand. If I had tried self inquiry before I was into meditation, I don’t think I would have got much out of it. Meditation itself unclogs and digs stuff out to the surface. It also brings in us inner silence and surrender. So at this point if we apply self inquiry… which is one of the 8 limbs of yoga… Jnana Yoga , it fits right in with meditation. Only meditation without self inquiry may work just as well I think… and vice versa… but having self inquiry with meditation may hasten the process, and if nothing else, make it easier to accept the things that are surfacing with meditation.
EMC said:
“I also wonder about what child sexual abuse actually does to our energy body. It awakens sexual energy far too soon, before the neurobiology is ready for it in any way. What happens to the neurobiology and energy paths in abused children?”
You are right EMC, a child’s neurobiology is not ready for the high levels of energy… that is why most sexually abused children suffer from depression.(I think) That is one reason Yogani does not recommend children doing 20 min meditation… or any of the other AYP practices Lesson 256 - Yoga for Our Children . When you and I have energy overloads… we get depressed… and we self pace, and do grounding stuff… but a child does not know, and has to live through these energy highs without help. But one thing EMC… the exposure to this is one of the reasons, I find the tantra practices so easy. So there was a silver lining in that dark cloud. 
EMC said:
"And also… What psychologists call “dissociation” is very common in victims. From what I understand, they learn to open a link into the astral world and become very medial persons. However, the link opens automatically on conditioned stimulus and is therefore very dysfunctional for them. They are no longer “here”, they become passive and are easily victimized over again.
How does this ability to dissociate affect the purification process? "
I feel what you say. I can also say, I have experienced it… there are many periods of my life that are a blank in my head too… but I don’t have an answer for this one… not yet.
Hi Shweta,
That was really brave of you! When I posted up the visualization that I used, I wasn’t actually sudjesting it as something for you to try, although of course you are free to if you want. I am sorry if I did not make this clear. I was trying to show you that these things can be overcome, and we can move on in a positive and fulfilling way. I posted the visualization to show you how I did it, because it was something that worked for me in my situation.
If you ever actually manage to imagine yourself hugging a man who sexually abused you, with a completely open heart full of forgiveness, that would be a huge step, (I would bow down and touch your feet), and the culmination of a long process that would take a fair bit of working at. In the case of the visualization that I used, that would mean starting off with imagining a friend who at one time had done something to hurt you, and building up from there, over a period (maybe a long period) of time, until you felt ready to incorporate your Uncle.
The visualization that EMC recommended sounds much more suitable for you to practice at this time, and sounds like it could be very positive.
Love and light
Christi
I thought I should share this with you.
I have been trying Christi’s technique, with my uncle, ever since that day. This morning, I decided to talk to him. I told him how, what he did to me, had affected my life. Very matter of factly, no tears, feelings or emotions. I was really surprised by his reaction. HE broke down in tears and said, he knew that, and it had ruined his life too…(I remember meeting him once, about 10 years after this happened… and although he was much younger than my parents… he looked old and tired and sad… he had a daughter about 6 years old… and all the time I was there, I did not leave my mom’s side, and all I could think was… I hope he has not treated his daughter the same way… and I remember I kept looking for a sign … something in her behavior that would tell me if she was facing the same thing… I wanted to go tell his wife what he was capable of… but that visit was over… and I did not think about it again… till a year later I found out he had passed away)… anyway… back to my morning… like I said, he was crying… and he said he was very sorry. He then touched my hand. I though I would pull it away, but instead I hugged him and said it was OK. 
The biggest surprise was… the hug was completely platonic… like Christi said… a bother/sister hug, not a girlfriend/boyfriend hug… that is what I was scared of, that is why I did not want to touch him, because I was scared it would arouse feelings in me… that would result in me re-living all those moments again. Well, this was very interesting. I am a little numb now… this morning really took me by surprise…
Thanks Christi.
I have been continuing with EMC’s inner child visualization too. It’s awesome. 
I think everyone should try it. It has been revealing stuff about me that is not related to this topic… there is nothing more enlightening… than a brutally honest child, who can look you straight in your eyes and tell you the absolute truth… no sugar coating on it… no mincing words… just a straight fact… it is amazing. Thanks EMC.
Thanks Yogani for letting me post this. And a BIG thanks to all of you 
… I think all your words did the groundwork for these techniques to work. I think I will be OK now, this is not all gone, I think more stuff will re-surface… but I think I should be able to handle it on my own going forward… Thank You.
Tipping my imaginary top hat to you Shweta… all the best. Way to go!
Emc, tried your children visualisation cursorily… it did take off in a surprising manner. Will do again and if anything of public interest emerges will post.
I am so glad it is working for you, Shweta and Sadhak!
I have to emphasize though, that the visualization practice is not “mine”. I found it on this (for me) extremely helpful site:
http://www.jeshua.net/
You will find great info in the Healing Series on that site.
So… miracles really do happen .
This reminds me of what Yogani wrote in a post in a different discussion:
Keep up the good work Shweta
Love and Light
Christi