See Page 53->59 The Door

What Do I Support

My name is {     }, and I am not a { burden, victim, etc etc  }.  Today I am: .......... and proceed to write 3 pages .....

SHAME GENERATING MESSAGES AND BEHAVIOURS

Here is a brief list of statements that taps into just how shame messages and behaviours can affect individuals ...

Deficiency Messages:

• “You are Not Good.”

• “You are Not Good Enough.”

• “You Don’t Belong.”

• “You are Not Lovable”

• “You are Not Worth Listening too.”

• “You are Not Worth My Time.”

Sub Set of the Deficiency Message

• Physical or sexual abuse

• Parental Neglect or Disinterest

• Secret Keeping

• Abandonment and Betrayal Themes

• Control through withdrawal of Love

• Control through Shaming

• Emphasis on being Perfect

• Parents being deeply shamed themselves 

Answer These Questions In Your Journal

• My father thought I was a bad person:

• My father thought I was the cause of his problems:

• My mother thought I was a bad person:

• My mother thought I was the cause of her problems:

• I was never good enough to please my mother... my father? ...

• There were times when I felt my parents did not want me in the family?

• I was never sure if my parents loved me?

• There were times when I felt unsafe at my house?

• I didn’t think my parents were interested in me, what I wanted or what I did?

• Other people’s opinions were very important to my parents ... and not mine?

• My mom and dad had and kept a lot of secrets?

• I often feared they would abandon me?

• My parents would threaten to withdraw their love from me if I was bad?

• My parents often said shaming things to me for my behaviour ... Shame On You ... or ... You Should Be Ashamed Of Yourself ... Look what you have done now?

• My parents expected me to be Perfect all the time?

• My mother and father were deeply ashamed of themselves?

Life is a Puzzle

I think my life is a puzzle … not a chess game as I once thought … but simply a puzzle. And I have to wonder aloud at times “Are there pieces missing” … “is this a deck of 51?”

Thus far in my experience … if I were being honest about things … I have noticed that this puzzle is only partially completed … there really is not enough of it put together yet to really recognize what the message or the picture is … oh I can make out form … and a few things that leads me to believe that I understand … but I suspect that is my ego at work appearing to do something for me that is really beyond me for the moment.

I can’t seem to comprehend it completely … oh I can grasp the idea … I think … but the overall message seems to slide right past me …

Now it seems to be that if I can just get a few of these unfit pieces into someplace in the puzzle … actually at this point anyplace is fine with me … then my life will finally work for me the way I want it too … Round Pegs, Square Holes, Large Mallets?

Then something that I notice begins to bother me to no end … as I begin to notice what the puzzle is saying to me … the puzzle changes … right there before my eyes … it changes and I am back to not understanding … yet again …

“Is this Eternity?” And  “Am I rolling rocks uphill forever?”

As I look back on my life’s journey … from age 55 … try it from where ever you are … have a look and write down what you see … I can honestly say that no matter how hard I strived to get to a place call “Having Everything the way I wanted,” I never made it.

On the other hand, I have noticed that during the course of doing life that Everything is Exactly the Way It is Supposed to be but … and this is the big one … Most of it does not agree with me most of the time … But Who Said It Was Supposed to Besides Me?

So again I have to wonder aloud “is it as important that I complete the journey my way … and get my prize … the one I think I want or deserve … or is it more important to simply begin to do the journey as it unfolds before me???

Sometimes I have to have a good look

Sometimes I have to have a good look at what I am leaning and depending on

On the Day Before You Die

It is the day before you are about to pass on and you know it.

1) What do you have to do to get your house in order?

2) What is left undone?

3) What does it mean to you to get your house in order?

Just to be clear, it refers to relationships rather than referring to dusting the furniture or mowing the lawn, although unfinished business is unfinished business.

Write out what you believe and know that you would have to do today if you were to follow this advice getting your house in order.

4) Previously, you described those things that you would have to do to fix up your life-to "get your house in order." What “in you” has kept you from doing these things before now? Is this the same thing that makes it so hard to do them now?

5) Do you think that you will do these things in the foreseeable future?

6) If not, what would have to happen to you for you to do them?

Basic Ingredient for Self

There seems to be four aspects of human interaction that are the essential for spiritual growth.

These are For, At, To and With.

These four basics essentials are:

Being responsible For someone

Being responsible At someone

Being responsible To someone

And

Being responsible With someone

These sound similar but in reality are miles if not universes apart in application.

If each of these components is not properly utilized and an appropriate balance maintained between them, then the basic bulwarks of life 101 simply will not work. It follows then that what I offer out into the day-to-day world will always come out twisted somehow, no matter how hard I try, no matter what my intent. What I do with someone, what I do for someone and what I do at or to someone are the basic criteria for my own spiritual growth. Why, because as I do with, for, at and to then I am in fact making an offering to myself of similar proportions and intent. If I do this with wounded intent then ... no matter what I do it is off the mark. The trick to the whole thing is, knowing how to bring the four aspects into balance. Most of us have no idea what to do with “WITH”... hence the lack of balance.

It is something like fueling your car. Put in first grade fuel and you generally get first grade performance, but if you pee in the gas tank, you will be lucky to get off the starting grid.

The Last Piece of Advice I got before I was Born

Warning

At

Times

This Path Way Can Be Slippery

And

The Water Deep

Alex the Flying Frog

Once upon a time in a tiny town, there lived a family with a pet frog named Alex. The family lived a modest comfortable existence on what they earned working at the Wal-Mart but always dreamed of being rich. "Alex!". They exclaimed one day, "We're going to be rich! We're going to teach you how to fly!" Alex, of course, was terrified at the prospect: "I can't fly, you idiots....I'm a frog, not a canary!" The family, disappointed at the initial reaction, told Alex: "That negative attitude of yours could be a real problem. We're sending you to special classes”. So Alex went to a three day seminar and learned about problem solving, time management, and effective communication...but nothing about flying.

On the first day of "flying lessons", the family could barely control their excitement (and Alex could barely control her bladder). The family explained that their apartment building had 15 floors, and each day Alex would jump out of a window, starting with the first floor and eventually getting to the top floor. After each jump, Alex would analyze how well she flew, isolate on the most effective flying techniques, and implement the improved process for the next flight. By the time they reached the top floor, Alex would surely be able to fly. And, of course, the family would be rich, proud and fulfilled. Alex understood that the fate of the entire family depended on her success.

She pleaded for her life, but it fell on deaf ears. "She just doesn't understand how important this is..." thought the family, "but we won't let nay-sayers get in the way."

So, with that, the family opened the window and threw Alex out (who landed with a thud).

Alex tried many different techniques for dissuading the family and became very proficient at manipulating, cajoling, using humor and persuading but to no avail (she had read somewhere that the light bulb had to want to change?). The family continued and Alex tried her best. But try as she might, she couldn't fly.

By the seventh day, Alex (accepting her fate) no longer begged for mercy...she simply looked at the family and said: "You know you're killing me, don't you?"

The family pointed out that Alex's performance so far had been less than exemplary, failing to meet any of the milestone goals they had set for her. With that, Alex, said quietly: "Shut up and open the window," and she leaped but, taking careful aim on the large jagged rock by the corner of the building. And Alex went to that great lily in the sky.

The family was extremely upset, as their project had failed to meet the single goal they set out to accomplish. Alex had not only failed to learn to fly, she hadn't even learned to steer nor had her productivity improved when told to "Fall smarter, not harder".

The only thing left for the family to do was to analyze the process and try to determine where they had gone wrong. After much thought, the family smiled and said: "Next time.... we're gonna get a smarter frog!" Tiny-town is incapable of change or insight – only expectations for others to make them feel OK.

As Long As I

It's not difficult to recognize how deep are the ways our mind has been conditioned to deal with unpleasant situations when we examine how we resist those situations.  Throughout our entire lives we have been encouraged to do anything we can to escape "from" rather then to explore and investigate "into" our unpleasantness.  Our society literally consumes tons of aspirin daily.  It is not just the physical pain we try and avoid, but all kinds of unpleasant conditions: boredom, restlessness, self doubt, anger, loneliness, hurt and the list goes on.  In our culture we do all we can to push these experiences aside,  or keep them at a distance.  When you think of "it" this way, we actually choose to be entertained in the fashion that we are. 

So

As long as I was pushing away the pain, it had me nailed to the wall.  But then I stopped resisting it.  I sort of let it in.  It was actually a relief.  I felt better in spite of it.  No longer at odds with everything.

adapted from How Can I Help Ram Dass

A Necessary Listen

Economics writer Tim Harford studies complex systems -- and finds a surprising link among the successful ones: they were built through trial and error. He suggests us to embrace our randomness and start making better mistakes.


http://www.ted.com/talks/tim_harford.html

From EHTU-175

68 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time
EXPERIENCE has taught us that all who enter this territory of willing exploration and recovery have to, sooner or later, put down their devices of mood alteration.

These devices may be some variation on chemical or substance use, or they may be activities that we do as part of our daily rituals, or they may be people with whom we are in relationships. Still, they are devices that we use either overtly or covertly to mood-alter, and they stand between us and our escape from the prison of our minds.

The Key Is Always In The Hand Of The Seeker.

69 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time
EXPERIENCE has taught us that the process of no longer using any mind-changing, mood-altering devices (chemicals, or otherwise) can induce a twisted form of thinking for the first while. This twisted form of thinking sets into motion a false belief that the worst is over (this is called the pink cloud effect) and that all our problems are fixed.

Not true, but . . . well, not really true is a better way to try to describe it. If we really stopped and thought about it, not really is not even close to the truth of the matter, but we have taken a step in the right direction, finally. More land mines up ahead, though.

The truth is, life’s conundrum has just changed faces. It just sits there in another form, waiting, like a huge, silent demon, waiting and wanting to control everything in our lives that it can.

Quietly It Waits.

. . . You Stumble . . .

. . . It Stirs And Smiles . . .

Yet Again.

70 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time
EXPERIENCE has taught us that the process of being out of touch with our true feelings induces grandiosity and compulsivity.

Grandiosity and compulsivity are clear symptoms that the demon is quietly waiting, and that the core problems have yet to be addressed. This insight often comes forward during some form of counseling or intimate sharing; it is generally when we get the first indicator that something is hiding in our blind spots and is having a profound effect on our lives.

Often it gets pointed out to us that we really don’t have friends or that our primary relationships are becoming progressively more non-intimate or . . . and there are hundreds of “or’s,” and our journey does not truly begin until we begin to notice this.

Know this.

Noticing And Accepting Are Two Different Places

71 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time
EXPERIENCE has taught us that the process of accepting “life is not working the way we thought it should” often leaves us deeply shaken.

John Bradshaw said, “The disease of my disease was the hole in my soul, there was an insatiable child inside that was ruling my life.”

To heal ourselves and grow, each of us has to do what everyone else on the face of this planet has to do to come to spiritual completion. We have to surrender to the Greater Way of Things and experience that original pain that can only be discovered from our childhood, the pain we have kept bottled up inside for so long and avoided like the plague.

As Scott Peck points out, we have to go through the pain, to embrace it, to process it, to reduce it and transform it; that is the only way out.

The Way Out Is Through . . .

… Simple …

Just Hard To Do!

72 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time
EXPERIENCE has taught us that people who identify themselves (willingly or not) as co-dependent will have to go through a process of unraveling and processing if they want to free themselves. This thought stems from Alice Miller’s benchmark work Drama of the Gifted Child.

“When we are in touch with our true feelings and can express them and not have to repress them, the energy to act them out at inappropriate times and places diminishes over time.”

It is a given that if we lost our voices to speak about our pain, then we will act it out. Conversely, as we recover and regain our ability to speak and process our deep-seated feelings, then the need to act out in order to be heard will diminish.


"It Is Very Striking To See How ... Acting Out Ceases When The Patient Begins To Experience His Own Feelings."

(Alice Miller)

73 On Seeing Clearly and Maybe Understanding for the First-Time
EXPERIENCE has taught us that sometimes there are things that we should not attempt. Things that can’t be done, things that we shouldn’t touch. Sometimes we just have to observe, and possibly be observed in the process.

Steinbeck put it thus: There Are Those Who Must Live In Rooms Of Experience That The Rest Of Us Can Never Enter Perhaps We Should Quit Trying To Intrude Into These Places, And Simply Learn To Guard The Door.”

John Steinbeck

74 On Seeing Clearly The Fantasy and the Reality
EXPERIENCE has taught us that deep inside each of us is a part of us that wants everything right now and a place for it to hide—something like Peter Pan and Never Never Land. In combination, this place in us and that part of us are very insatiable and very demanding. Some call it the inner child, but I have to wonder at that. I believe this to be a misnomer because it seems more complex than that. I have come to believe that this is the soul wearing the cloak of the inner child, hiding from the world it has been born into.

This place seems to be a shadowy land of the phases of who and what we were meant to be and what we are to becomehopefully; who we were last time around, and who we are right now, all rolled into one.

It is like a staging area for life, and the soul is hiding there, too afraid to come out into the life it was supposed to be born into.

Facing Your Destiny Is A Difficult Business,

Yet It Seems To Be The Only Business At Hand

If You Really Get Honest And Look.

I Got A Note In The Mail This Morning

Neil, for many years I felt I never fitted in ... even before my accident, and being 'popular' didn't really make it better. I use to party hard to be comfortable, of course that didn't make it any better either. Now, being stripped of everything I am forced to face myself...and I found that I'm ok. In fact I'm more than ok. But sometimes that old 'low self esteem, no confidence' ... that old me still shows up...but not for long though. As long as I 'fit in' with myself...that’s most important. I = numero uno!!


If I don't have to try hard with myself why do I have to do it for anyone else?

I should be good enough as I am.

As simple as that my friend.

Love yourself first and the rest will fall into place.

It’s easy and it works. I try to teach that to my kids, but it can get tricky.

I think that its best learnt with life’s lessons, unfortunately the hard way...otherwise the ego gets in the way and it can result in self obsession instead of that balance that is required in putting yourself first. But both son and daughter are good, thank God. We are a nice little uncomplicated trio:-) For now it’s working well.


CJ

Why are We Afraid?

SIMPLE

We’re afraid because there appears to be no truth ... except in the most superficial way.

No one can agree on what “the realities” of any situation are or on just where meaning and importance lie.

One voter sees a truth about a particular politician, yet to another voter the reverse is true. An obvious truth for one city or nation is not true at all for a neighboring city or nation. Within families, merely discussing what is true or important about the smallest of issues can cause deep division. During televised games, not only do fans and commentators disagree about what just happened, but, in addition, each camera angle reveals a different “point of view.” And in a trial, a witness will swear in the name of God that he saw something different than another witness. This apparent absence of truth makes “getting at” the truth a world-wide obsession, despite the fact that we feel a nagging doubt about almost any pronouncement we make or hear someone else make.

An Old Man and His Heart

One day a young man was standing in the middle of the town proclaiming that he had the most beautiful heart in the whole valley.

A large crowd gathered and they all admired his heart for it was perfect. There was not a mark or a flaw in it. Yes, they all agreed it truly was the most beautiful heart they had ever seen. The young man was very proud and boasted more loudly about his beautiful heart.

Suddenly, an old man appeared at the front of the crowd and said, "Why, your heart is not nearly as beautiful as mine."

The crowd and the young man looked at the old man's heart. It was beating strongly, but full of scars, it had places where pieces had been removed and other pieces put in, but they didn't fit quite right and there were several jagged edges. In fact, in some places there were deep gouges where whole pieces were missing. The people stared. How can he say his heart is more beautiful? they thought.

The young man looked at the old man's heart and saw its state and laughed. "You must be joking," he said. "Compare your heart with mine, mine is perfect and yours is a mess of scars and tears." Yes," said the old man, "Yours is perfect looking but I would never trade with you. You see, every scar represents a person to whom I have given my love - I tear out a piece of my heart and give it to them, and often they give me a piece of their heart which fits into the empty place in my heart, but because the pieces aren't exact, I have some rough edges, which I cherish, because they remind me of the love we shared. Sometimes I have given pieces of my heart away, and the other person hasn't returned a piece of his heart to me. These are the empty gouges - giving love is taking a chance. Although these gouges are painful, they stay open, reminding me of the love I have for these people too, and I hope someday they may return and fill the space I have waiting. So now do you see what true beauty is?"

The young man stood silently with tears running down his cheeks. He walked up to the old man, reached into his perfect young and beautiful heart, and ripped a piece out. He offered it to the old man with trembling hands.

The old man took his offering, placed it in his heart and then took a piece from his old scarred heart and placed it in the wound in the young man's heart. It fit, but not perfectly, as there were some jagged edges.

The young man looked at his heart, not perfect anymore but more beautiful than ever, since love from the old man's heart flowed into his.

They embraced and walked away side by side.

Author Unknown