Tyler Perry's High Self-Esteem Despite Child Abuse

Jungle Beauty Goddess Sahara 

Ruler of the Mind, Knowledge, Rational Thinking, and Information

Via the Imagination of Cassandra George Sturges

For Entertainment Purposes Only

Dear Jungle Beauty Goddess Sahara,

I was watching an episode of the Oprah Winfrey show where Tyler Perry talked about how his father abused him as a child by beating him with a vacuum cleaner cord. As I sat and watched, Tyler Perry whom I happen to be a big fan of, I thought to myself, why is he complaining so much? My parents beat me all of the time with extension cords for the smallest of things. My siblings and I had whelp marks all over our bodies and we don’t go around complaining about being abused. 

I think we turned out just fine. None of us are in jail. The only difference between us and Tyler Perry is that he is a wealthy writer, director, and film maker. My siblings and I are all in debt working 2 jobs or more, two of my sisters suffer from alcoholism, but overall we are respectful decent human beings.

I think the problem with this generation is that their parents don’t beat--I mean physically punish them enough. When I was in school, I never heard of children killing each other like they do today.  Sometimes I think celebrities feel guilty about having so much money, so they exaggerate about being abused to solicit public sympathy so people can keep buying what they are selling.

I am happy that my parents used a firm hand to raise me; I know that’s why I am good person who would do anything to help another person even at my own expense because it is the right thing to do.

Sincerely,

Proud of My Past

Dear Proud of My Past,

The difference between you and Tyler Perry is not the amount of money or fame that he has acquired in comparison to you. The primary difference between you and Tyler Perry is that he has positive, healthy levels of self-esteem and self-worth; whereas on the other hand, you suffer from low self-esteem that has affected your ability to rationally analyze that what happened to you as a child was not your fault--and perhaps you were indeed physically abused by your parents. No child deserves to be abused in the process of being disciplined.

Let me put this another way for you to understand. What is the difference in thinking between Harriett Tubman, Frederick Douglas, Dred Scott and hundreds of thousands of other African slaves in the United States of America history?  

Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglas, and Dred Scott had a different way of thinking about the system of slavery and its impact on their self-worth as human beings.  They and many other slaves who thought like them during slavery, could not psychologically remain slaves because their high levels of self-esteem and self-worth would not allow them to rationalize why they should remain in human bondage without committing their life to freedom or death. This same manner of thinking can be applied to men and women who remain in physical and emotional abusive relationships. They stay because at the deepest level of their psyche they believe that they deserve maltreatment. When they mentally declare that their reality must be in alignment with their highest truth about themselves this is when their actions are focused on escaping by any means necessary.

So let me be clear, it is not the negative event that happens to you that determines your ultimate fate. It is your perception of whether or not you deserved the negative event will have the biggest long-term effect on your level of self-esteem, self-worth, and overall life experiences. You mention that you and your siblings are “good people” in your letter—I am not disputing this fact—however, do you think that you and your siblings would be in a more financially stable condition and have more joyful lives as adults; if you believed that it was wrong to be beaten as children with whelp marks from extinction cords on your precious little bodies; and if necessary sought counseling, or other means of healing?

What could a young child do that is so odious, that he or she would deserve to be beaten in this manner?  

The fact that Tyler Perry was able to separate, extract, and maintain his self-worth from these abusive incidents and sublimate them into  creative works of arts that  entertain and enrich the lives of millions of people is a testimony of how his true wealth is not external; but internal  because his riches flows from his connection to his highest self and God.

Sincerely,

Jungle Beauty Goddess Sahara

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