The Global Conversation

What could cause the Cleveland kidnappings and years of abuse?

Written by

Neale Donald Walsch

in

It was a miracle that three young women in Cleveland escaped from the home in which they were kept imprisoned and were physically abused for years, allegedly by a man named Ariel Castro.

Today we are left wondering how any person could do a such a thing.

News reports now have it that Ariel Castro had apparently written a suicide note in 2004 questioning himself on exactly that, and making references to wanting to die.

In the note — which reporter Scott Taylor of Cleveland’s WOIO-TV “19 Action News” says police found in Castro’s home, and of which Taylor says he obtained a copy — Castro allegedly wrote: “I am a sexual predator. I need help.”

The sadness is that he did not call for help outside of his own mind. TV journalist Taylor also reports that Castro’s note goes on to question why he grabbed a third young lady off the streets in 2004: “I don’t know why I kept looking for another. I already had 2 in my possession,” the note allegedly said.

He also supposedly writes about wanting to kill himself and “give all the money I saved to my victims.” Castro is also said to have written that he was surprised by how young one of his victims was (14 at the time of the kidnapping). The note he allegedly wrote he says he thought she was a lot older.

According to the online news source Slate, another media outlet, CBS News, “reports that Castro wrote about his whole life in the letter, at one point ‘saying that he was abused by his parents as a child and that he was raped by an uncle’.”

If this is true, it becomes a little easier to understand how a man could have perpetrated such crimes. None of this, we are all clear, excuses anything that Mr. Castro is charged with. It could, however, help explain it. It could open a window onto the life history of the accused, and his state of mind.

Conversations with God invites us to ask a remarkable question of people who would do things such as Mr. Castro is accused of doing. The question: “What hurts you so bad that you feel you have to hurt others in order to heal it?” I am deeply, deeply sorry that these terrible events occurred in the lives of those young women and their families. I am also terribly sorry that any human being could hurt so bad as to hurt others in this reprehensible way. I pray for the day when all members of our human society treat all other members with honor and respect, with caring and compassion, with pure and good and undistorted love.

Comments

25 responses to “What could cause the Cleveland kidnappings and years of abuse?”

  1. Michael Avatar
    Michael

    I think I need to ask myself that last question. Is that why I sometimes want to hurt all of these oil company psychopaths? And all these politicians that treat us all as if we mean nothing?

    Reply
    1. mewabe Avatar
      mewabe

      And the answer is…..within yourself, specifically within your past. Follow your feeling all the way, it will take you there, guaranteed.
      Who hurt you, in your past, who made you feel like nothing, like your existence was not important to them?

      Do not use your mind…feel your feeling and let it take you to where it originated, to the memory of the original pain, and feel it fully. That’s how you end suffering, by expressing and releasing your pain.

      That’s how we heal the world, because the root of world is within us.

      (I am using what you said to make a general point…not to imply that you personally need therapy.)

      Reply
  2. Awareness Avatar
    Awareness

    “There are no victims, and there are no villains in the world” in “Home With God” by Neale Donald Walsch 🙂

    Reply
    1. hempwise Avatar
      hempwise

      We are all doing the best we can with the information at hand !

      Reply
      1. mewabe Avatar
        mewabe

        The information is within…when it is unconscious, it needs to be made conscious.

        Reply
    2. mewabe Avatar
      mewabe

      Yes, there is no valid judgement…but there is pain. Pain is not to be judged…but it is to be healed.

      Reply
  3. Mike Brown Avatar
    Mike Brown

    Or maybe there is evil and he’s evil not to reform himself or seek help in 10 years. after such crimes as allegedly starving and beating one of his three prisoners to make her miscarry her baby , only allowing them to see the outside 2 X in ten years. Would you take the high soul road if it was one of your kids?

    Reply
    1. Awareness Avatar
      Awareness

      What other road would you take apart from the “high soul road”? Remember we are ALL ONE. There is no separation between us. There is only ONE “entity” in the “room” expressed as the many which is each of us. What you do to another you do to yourself 🙂

      “Conversations with God” says: “Judge NOT, and neither condemn, for you know not why a thing occurs, nor to what end”. “And remember you this: that which you condemn will condemn you, and that which you judge, YOU WILL ONE DAY BECOME”. “Rather, seek to change those things-or support others who are changing those things-which no longer reflect your highest sense of Who you Are.” “Yet, bless all-for all is the creation of God, through life living, and that is the HIGHEST CREATION” 🙂

      Reply
      1. Mike Brown Avatar
        Mike Brown

        I know what Conversations with God says and I take it under advisement not gospel.
        I don’t think the guy writing it took it as gospel as he had a back
        and forth about many issues and he was there writing it down.
        I haven ‘t got to the bless all stage yet.
        If convicted I hope he never sees freedom again.

        Reply
        1. mewabe Avatar
          mewabe

          Imprisonment as a form of punishment is senseless. Imprisonment as a form of protection (to protect society) makes sense, but only as long as an individual remains dangerous.

          If we focused on healing rather than judgement, punishment, paying one’s debt to society, revenge, we might get somewhere…but then we would also have to all heal ourselves, not just those who actually commit crimes.

          There is no need to bless the world’s sickness. That’s a useless trick. But there is an urgent need to heal it, beginning within each one of us, because within each one of us is the birthplace of our world, like it or not….it all starts within, the good, the bad and the ugly.

          When you say that you hope he never sees freedom again, you come across as angry. If that’s accurate, you then may want to ask yourself where your anger is coming from. Most likely it is coming from a place of hurt that has NOTHING to do with this case, the case is merely triggering something that is already in you.

          When we start to understand ourselves, rather than projecting our own demons outside of us, we are on the right path, the path of healing.

          Reply
          1. Awareness Avatar
            Awareness

            “The studies show that a relatively few number of people with a focused intention have tremendous leverage in terms of affecting how our reality is responding, both in our bodies and in our world.

            One famous example was a research project done during the Israeli-Lebanese war in the early 1980’s*. In this study, people who had been trained to feel the feeling of peace in their bodies were positioned in war-torn areas in the Middle East.

            When they were intentionally feeling peace during specific windows of time, it changed the level of violence happening in the area around them in statistically significant ways. Crime, hospital emergency room activity, and traffic accidents declined, and terrorist activities stopped altogether. And when the practitioners stopped, then all those activities reversed.

            Since these practitioners had been trained by Maharishi in TM
            techniques, this phenomenon became known as the Maharishi Effect.

            And the results were so clear-cut that the researchers were able to determine the exact percentage of a population needed to create this effect. That amount is the square root of 1% of a given population. So, when that critical mass of practitioners participated, the threshold opened up and we began to see the
            effects. Obviously, the more people who participate, the faster we are going to See those effects.

            The square root of 1% is just 100 people per million, or only about 8,000 in the current world population of 6.5 billion. THAT IS ALL IT TAKES to make the difference.

            Whether we are talking about one woman’s healing in the video of the dissolving tumor, or about healing between nations — as different as they seem from one another — the principal and the effect are the same.” by Gregg Braden 🙂

            The square root of 1% of the entire earth population of say 7 billion is approximately 8,366! 🙂 Well why not form an organisation to gather 8,366 people, train them to have the feeling in their HEARTS of peace on earth, abundance for all, well being for all and all the wonderful things that serve life? The solution is in our HEARTS. Our HEARTS are connected through the Unified Field which has been shown scientifically to exist. We are definitely ALL ONE. This is such an elegant simple solution for the world 🙂 It makes all the current physical enforcement mechanisms on Earth appear obsolete 🙂

            *International Peace Project in the Middle East: The Effects of the Maharishi Technology of the Unified Field
            Author(s): David W. Orme-Johnson, Charles N. Alexander, John L. Davies, Howard M. Chandler, Wallace E. Larimore
            Source: The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 32, No. 4 (Dec., 1988), pp. 776-812 Published by: Sage Publications, Inc.

          2. mewabe Avatar
            mewabe

            Awareness, I am aware of this, and I think it is quite amazing.

            But for all of its power to change certain outcomes, it is still what I call “crisis management”, not permanent healing.

            Proof: “when the practitioners stopped, then all those activities reversed”.

            Crisis management has its place, it should definitively be used, as there is no lack of crisis in our present world conditions.

            What I call healing however comes from within each individual, through the process of healing his own personal “shadow” as Jung called it, so as to no longer project it outside and into the world (no longer acting out his/her unconscious pain).

            A healed individual would not participate in war, support war, and a healed population would no longer tolerate war, so there would be no need to meditate on peace, as peace would already be here.

            A person who is healed, who is psychologically and emotionally healthy is far less at risk of developing an illness, having a strong immune system.

            A world healed from within would produce far less crisis.

          3. Awareness Avatar
            Awareness

            “We did not all come to do it the same way. We did not all come to be alike. We came as a diverse bunch of Non-Physical Energies wanting DIFFERENT experiences.” by Abraham (SOURCE ENERGY). Excerpted from the workshop in North Los Angeles, CA on Monday, August 13th, 2001 🙂

            “This Awareness indicates that entities seeking security upon this plane shall find it is a fleeting Quest; and entities identifying with the physical, shall find it a poor foundation. Entities who are aware, and identify with CONSCIOUSNESS itself, who are aware that the universe is teeming with life, that space itself is alive, and that to identify with the AKASHA or SPIRIT of the universe is the ONLY security and stability that is PERMANENT and LASTING; these entities can survive psychologically, without great stress and fear, until that time when they leave this plane. This Awareness indicates that those who cling in fear to the physical matter, these entities shall not enjoy the plane, the physical life in which they reside.

            This Awareness suggests that you not make your permanent home the physical plane, but consider this as a BRIEF VISIT from HIGHER DIMENSIONS, and that you consider your true home that which is in CELESTRIA, that which is in the SPIRIT, the AKASHA, the CONSCIOUSNESS of the universe. This Awareness indicates that wherein this is experienced, this becomes a NEW LEVEL of AWARENESS, A NEW REALITY, one which can give you the sense of being Who in Fact, You Really Are.

            This Awareness indicates that meanwhile, you may ENJOY the VACATION upon this plane, or the sentence which you are enduring upon this plane,–depending on how you wish to view your presence here.” by Cosmic Awareness (GREAT SPIRIT!) 🙂

            In any case from this year forward, the “human race will create 1000 years more for its existence on the Earth in which it will
            know PEACE, EXPANSION, CREATIVITY and FAR LESS limitation and will become true 4th density beings.” (See my previous post from BASHAR of the Sassani Civilization) 🙂

            LOVE, Oneness, LAUGHTER and The LIGHT of GOD Almighty, ALL That IS, GREAT SPIRIT! GREAT SPIRIT! 🙂

          4. mewabe Avatar
            mewabe

            Awareness, beware of channeled material presented as the ultimate truth, there is no such thing.

            The way I see it, the idea of detachment from the physical leads to self delusion. Unresolved emotional and psychological issues do not vanish just because a person concentrates on the idea of a “higher” consciousness.

            Serious unresolved issues do not even disappear upon death…the baggage remains ours, and when not resolved in one life, it shows up again in another, still waiting to be healed.

            We cannot run away from ourselves. All the problems of the world and all the solutions are within us.

            Healing is not a magical trick. Healing involves consciousness…to become fully conscious, not to attempt to bypass unwanted aspects of ourselves, unwanted because of judgment as to what is acceptable or good in social, emotional, spiritual terms, such as…”If I am angry, does this emotion fits with my idea of higher consciousness?”

            Such misleading judgments lead to inner conflicts that usually lead a person to act the opposite of how s/he actually feels…it leads to becoming a perfect fake, acting upon a concept of what should be rather than what is.

            Healing is concerned with what is.

            The physical itself is an idea…matter is a convention of the senses, we create it through our senses, our receptors. We read sound, we read light, but these are merely energy waves. In reality we live in a quantum universe, in a holographic universe.

            All is energy, not matter. The IDEA of matter creates a mental separation. Separation exists in the mind only. The body is never separated from the universe. Neither is the spirit, obviously.

            What we call the body is also an idea…the idea is that the body is separate, a bag of flesh tightly wrapped in an envelope of skin and ego. It’s a false perception, a mental creation, a belief.

            Your body is at one with everything…its subatomic particles were once part of stars…its atoms part of dinosaurs…it has a cellular memory…when you breathe, a little bit of you goes out into the air, and is breathed in by other creatures.

            Your body is totally in sync with the outer environment, and responds with health or disease to different conditions. It also responds to the inner environment, to your state of mind, your feelings and emotions, your thoughts and beliefs.

            Go into your body, into what is called the subconscious, to the intelligence of the cells, and you will find “higher” consciousness…you will find oneness with all life, and a supreme harmony that your conscious mind alone could never achieve.

            Higher consciousness is actually below…it is within, IT LAYS AT THE HEART OF ALL LIFE, not above it.

            There is no hierarchy in the spirit world, because there is no gravity…there is no “higher” or “lower”. These are concepts derived from living in an environment ruled by gravity. In the spirit world there is only oneness, and being centered, just as the divine is one and centered.

            The only thing worth transcending are erroneous beliefs and perceptions, NOT THE PHYSICAL CREATION, which is a precious, magnificent jewel where consciousness is meant to find its place and shine to its full potentials in glorious harmony with ALL life.

            This is my experience. It doesn’t have to be that of anyone else.

          5. Awareness Avatar
            Awareness

            “This Awareness indicates you need not think any particular religion has the final answer or that becoming an expert in a particular religion means you have reached absolute spiritual evolvement, for you will ALWAYS find more room to grow. It is like trying to find the edge of the Universe; as long as there is the potential for something beyond this limit, there is ALWAYS further room to expand, and entities should understand by now they do not EVER find a limited amount of knowledge or understanding. There is ALWAYS room for more understanding and more knowledge.

            Likewise, there is ALWAYS room for further spiritual growth and to assume you have grown spiritually as far as you can because you have become an expert in a particular religion is folly. This Awareness suggests that it is entities’ nature to search for truth, to seek truth in every nook and cranny available, and when finding a truth, to recognize: “THERE IS ONE; WHERE IS THE NEXT?”

            This Awareness indicates that by continuing to search for truth
            throughout your life, you will continue expanding spiritually evolving, evolving, and further evolving in a spiritual sense. This Awareness indicates you need not search for the “correct” religion; you need to search for truth wherever it can be found. It may be hiding in some obscure religion or some obscure philosophy, or it may be right there in plain sight and you may have missed it until someone points it out and you take a second look at something you have seen time and time again without seeing it from the right perspective.

            This Awareness indicates that truth is that which you seek for your higher spiritual growth and evolution and much of this truth will begin to come to you at greater speed as you continually surrender yourself to the Divine on all levels of your existence. When you totally surrender to the Divine, information begins to flow to you. You begin to tune in to cosmic truths which yield up their secrets to you.” by Cosmic Awareness (GREAT SPIRIT!) 🙂

          6. Therese Avatar
            Therese

            Only one thing to say to your response, Mewabe…

            AMEN!

          7. mewabe Avatar
            mewabe

            Thank you Therese

    2. mewabe Avatar
      mewabe

      There is no evil, only bottomless, unfathomable suffering. Not seeking help can be part of the sickness, of a form of hopelessness.

      Or it could be that our society and culture are so ignorant and undeveloped when it comes to understanding and healing the human psyche, people in trouble do not know where to turn. Social workers and cheap therapists abound, but none can do the job.

      It is unfortunate that anything that is useful or effective in our world is usually out of reach of the poor or uneducated.

      Reply
  4. Awareness Avatar
    Awareness

    “You have ALL created the consciousness which makes rape possible. It is when you see in yourself that which caused the crime that you begin, at last, to heal the condition from which it sprang. Feed your hungry, give dignity to your poor. Grant opportunity to your less fortunate. End the prejudice which keeps masses huddled and angry, with little promise of a better tomorrow. Put away your pointless taboos and restrictions upon sexual energy—rather, help others to truly understand its wonder, and to channel it properly. Do these things and you will go a long way toward ending robbery and rape forever.” from “Conversations with God” by Neale Donald Walsch 🙂 LOVE, Oneness, LAUGHTER and The LIGHT of GOD Almighty, ALL That IS, GREAT SPIRIT! GREAT SPIRIT! 🙂

    Reply
    1. mewabe Avatar
      mewabe

      Yes, it is accurate to state that “If we did this or that, the world would be better”.

      But the relevant question is, why don’t we? What is preventing our happiness here and now? What is preventing our beingness here and now, free of all reality distortions?

      If you ask these questions, and answer them with the thought that we have erroneous beliefs that get in the way of fulfilling our human potentials, then the next question is, where do these beliefs come from, and why is humanity so desperately attached to them?

      If you ask yourselves these questions, and try to find the answers within yourselves, you may find out that these beliefs are just another form of defense against feeling.

      You may find out that these beliefs are another expression of neurosis…that the idea of separation (from the divine, from each other, from nature) for example perfectly mirrors the fragmentation, the inner dissociation of neurosis, which could be described as a separation from a part of oneself.

      Reply
  5. Theresa Weaver Avatar
    Theresa Weaver

    I think what I see most is an utter source of disconnect from the pain Castro experienced in his life. It was something so profound that he didn’t have the personal fortitude to really feel it or work through it. That disconnect led to several other things including a sense of disconnect from the Source, from others, and from the ideas of treating others with compassion and respect. There was also the feeling of powerless or lack of control in his life multiplied by 1,000. I see kidnapping not as a sexual thing but as a means of gaining control over some aspect of life and an exercise in power in the absence of power perceived in life.

    The hope in saying this is not in excusing his actions or saying that he shouldn’t face consequences for his actions. It is a hope that we can see the parts of ourselves that we perceive as broken or disconnected. It’s a call within to look deeply into our shadows. It’s not about getting stuck there but moving through it to fully embrace who we are. I hope that is something we all can do collectively… and that we can offer a hand to those who seek help in the process of being real and authentic, even in their pain.

    Reply
    1. mewabe Avatar
      mewabe

      “I hope that is something we all can do collectively… and that we can
      offer a hand to those who seek help in the process of being real and
      authentic, even in their pain.”

      Yes there is, see my comment above…Yes it is very accurately put: “Being real and authentic even in their pain”.

      This describes the true process of healing. Healing is not about facing one’s pain or trauma, of fear or guilt, need or anger, but about feeling and expressing these things fully in a safe environment (therapy) and integrating them with the memory of what originally triggered them, sometimes repeatedly, most often in early childhood.

      And this process has very little with talking, which is another form of defense against feeling, and everything to do with feeling, with diving into the heart of the matter, into what is temporarily hidden from full consciousness, namely intense, sometimes life-threatening childhood emotional pain/trauma/unmet needs.

      It is not an easy path. But it’s the most direct and effective, and permanently healing.

      Reply
  6. mewabe Avatar
    mewabe

    Simple. Read “The Primal Revolution, Towards a Real World” by Arthur Janov, particularly the chapter on Perversion and Bizarre Murder.

    Quote:
    “The denied feelings are not felt but ACTED OUT IN SYMBOLIC FORM. They are RITUALS, temporary insane states in which present reality is submerged by the past feelings on the rise. Consciousness is diminished AND WHAT IS UNCONSCIOUS TAKES OVER.
    THE INTENSITY OF THE COMPULSION OR RITUAL IS COMMENSURATE WITH THE INTENSITY OF THE UNCONSCIOUS PAIN.”

    Why is it important to understand the origin of such things as a compulsion to commit rape? Because, as Janov puts it, “THE PERVERSION IS THE EXACT MESSAGE”. It reveal the exact nature of the pain… “All that has to be done is to HAVE IT DECODED BE THE FEELINGS OF THE PERSON.”

    This book is not about “talk therapy” which resolves absolutely nothing, but deep feeling therapy, which is about following the thread of the feelings or compulsions all the way to their source, which in this particular case would be abuse, trauma.

    The unknown reality here is this: a young child, who has been abused or neglected, cannot deal with his pain, and buries it. Sometimes these feelings are buried in the unconscious automatically because their intensity cannot be dealt with. When these feelings (childhood pain, need, fear, anger, etc) are fully felt and integrated in adulthood, permanent healing happens. That’s the miracle, the unknown factor, the ONE thing our world and society have yet to understand and to APPLY.

    And you will find that most people will RESIST this idea, although it has been proven by decades of research and deep feeling therapy…because the defense system of most people precisely defends against suppressed pain, AND NO ONE WANTS TO TAKE THAT ROUTE of opening up the defense system, and no one wants to even talk about it. Global neurosis IS THAT POWERFUL.

    Most of what people do at all levels of society, individuality and collectively, IS A DEFENSE AGAINST FEELING. People use anything and everything to keep feelings at bay, including what they think is spirituality. Our world is sick at a massive level, at a very deep level.

    And the simple solution to ALL our problems is within…not in the process of navel gazing, but in following the thread of all our feelings to their original source, to the original imprint.

    We could all use this process. You would be surprised how much buried childhood pain or anger, fear or need, or even rage many seemingly very well adjusted adults carry around unconsciously. When you get past the defense system, a whole new world reveals itself…a world which, because it is unconscious, unconsciously controls us, motivates us, drives the entire world.

    That’s why although we all want to be happy, the entire world appears to be addicted to suffering. It is not addicted, it is driven by unconscious pain.

    Reply
  7. Awareness Avatar
    Awareness

    “From this year forward, as we have said before, your human race will create 1000 years more for its existence on the Earth in which it will know PEACE, EXPANSION, CREATIVITY and FAR LESS limitation and will become true 4th density beings. And in that thousand years you will become as we have become and will approach the time and the timing when you will no longer be quite as physical as you are now.” “And at the end of that thousand year cycle, humans will no longer need to incarnate in that density, and many of you may become the GUIDES and the SPIRITS for those that will come after, for those that will be the new race on your planet. Those that will be the continuation of the expression of the hybrid children that will arrive. And your Earth shall become the 6th hybrid race and will move toward a blending and a balance with all other five, our civilization included, the Yahyel included and the others that have not been named. All together forming a blending that will create the 7th hybrid race of which you will be a part in a variety of ways that you cannot even yet imagine.” from BASHAR of the Sassani (Living Light) Civilization 🙂 LOVE, Oneness, LAUGHTER and The LIGHT of GOD Almighty, ALL That IS, GREAT SPIRIT! GREAT SPIRIT! 🙂

    Reply
  8. Marko Avatar
    Marko

    “News reports now have it that Ariel Castro had apparently written a
    suicide note in 2004 questioning himself on exactly that, and making
    references to wanting to die.”

    “In the note — which reporter Scott Taylor of Cleveland’s WOIO-TV “19
    Action News” says police found in Castro’s home, and of which Taylor
    says he obtained a copy — Castro allegedly wrote: “I am a sexual
    predator. I need help.” etc..

    What fascinates me is this even true? Alleged is not verified info. I’ve never heard any major news programs even mention this information or letter at all. If true, this seems to show the media hiding relevant information in place, of sensation. Or, that this source is unreliable & credible news media will not use such information until it’s verified authentic.

    Hurt people hurt. Healed people heal. It’s as simple & complicated as that.

    Reply

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