Learning To Love Ourselves

[Guest guest]

I looked up some information today on healing and grief..again being

so aware that I am grieving so much more than just my sister's

death. I thought this article was interesting. (FULL ARTICLE BELOW)

The parts that really stood out to me were about growing up in

emotionally dishonest, shame based environments - an how we grew up

either trying to do everything " right " or rebelling against what we

were taught was " right " (neither of these entail learning to truly

be who we are).

I also like the part about the FIRST STEP ( I usually want to cut to

the chase and avoid all the steps). The first step being learning to

set INTERNAL boundaries - first by learning to stop the conditioned

thinking of judging and shaming ourselves internally.

It seems to me that this is what Edith refers to as nada living rent

free in our heads.

And wow! What a hook for nada - to hook into that part of ourselves

that already judges us.

So...off to work on the first step some..... which will probably be

learning to not be ashamed of the part of me that is ashamed of me

and not judging the part of me that judges me.

Free

FULL ARTICLE

http://www.havoca.org/Inner%20Child/Inner%20Child%20learning%20to%

20love%20ourselves.htm

Learning To Love Ourselves

Codependence is a dysfunctional defense system that was built in

reaction to feeling unlovable and unworthy - because our parents

were wounded codependents who didn't know how to love themselves.

We grew up in environments that were emotionally dishonest,

Spiritually hostile, and shame based. Our relationship with

ourselves (and all the different parts of our self: emotions,

gender, spirit, etc.) got twisted and distorted in order to survive

in our particular dysfunctional environment.

We got to an age where we were supposed to be an adult and we

started acting like we knew what we were doing. We went around

pretending to be adult at the same time we were reacting to the

programming that we got growing up. We tried to do

everything " right " or rebelled and went against what we had been

taught was " right. " Either way we weren't living our life through

choice, we were living it in reaction.

In order to start being loving to ourselves we need to change our

relationship with our self - and with all the wounded parts of our

self. The way which I have found works the best in starting to

love ourselves is through having internal boundaries.

Learning to have internal boundaries is a dynamic process that

involves three distinctly different, but intimately interconnected,

spheres of work. The purpose of the work is to change our ego-

programming - to change our relationship with ourselves by changing

our emotional/behavioral defense system into something that works to

open us up to receive love, instead of sabotaging ourselves because

of our deep belief that we don't deserve love.

(I need to make the point here that Codependence and recovery are

both multi-leveled, multi-dimensional phenomena. What we are trying

to achieve is integration and balance on different levels. In regard

to our relationship with ourselves this involves two major

dimensions: the horizontal and the vertical. In this context the

horizontal is about being human and relating to other humans and our

environment. The vertical is Spiritual, about our relationship to a

Higher Power, to the Universal Source. If we cannot conceive of a

God/Goddess Force that loves us then it makes it virtually

impossible to be loving to ourselves. So a Spiritual Awakening is

absolutely vital to the process in my opinion. Changing our

relationship with ourselves on the horizontal level is both a

necessary element in, and possible because we are working on,

integrating Spiritual Truth into our inner process. It doesn't have

to be a religious higher power. It can be your own inner self. The

life force within you that lets you breathe, gives you thoughts and

lets you sparkle! Unlocking that inner self is the key.)

These three spheres are:

1. Detachment

2. Inner Child Healing

3. Grieving

Because Codependence is a reactive phenomena it is vital to start

being able to detach from our own process in order to have some

choice in changing our reactions. We need to start observing our

selves from the witness perspective instead of from the perspective

of the judge.

We all observe ourselves - have a place of watching ourselves as if

from outside, or perched somewhere inside, observing our own

behavior. Because of our childhoods we learned to judge ourselves

from that witness perspective, the " critical parent " voice.

The emotionally dishonest environments we were raised in taught us

that it was not ok to feel our emotions, or that only certain

emotions were ok. So we had to learn ways to control our emotions

in order to survive. We adapted the same tools that were used on

us - guilt, shame, and fear (and saw in the role modeling of our

parents how they reacted to life from shame and fear.) This is

where the critical parent gets born. It's purpose is to try to keep

our emotions and behavior under some sort of control so that we can

get our survival needs met.

So the first boundary that we need to start setting internally is

with the wounded / dysfunctionally programmed part of our own mind.

We need to start saying no to the inner voices that are shaming and

judgmental. The disease comes from a black and white, right and

wrong, perspective. It speaks in absolutes: " You always screw

up! " " You will never be a success! " - these are lies. We don't

always screw up. We may never be a success according to our parents

or societies dysfunctional definition of success - but that is

because our heart and soul do not resonate with those definitions,

so that kind of success would be a betrayal of ourselves. We need to

consciously change our definitions so that we can stop judging

ourselves against someone else's screwed up value system.

We learned to relate to ourselves (and all the parts of our self -

emotions, sexuality, etc.) and life from a critical place of

believing that something was wrong with us - and in fear that we

would be punished if we didn't do life " right. " Whatever we are

doing or not doing the disease can always find something to beat us

up with. I have 10 things on my " to do list " today, I get 9 of them

done, the disease does not want me to give myself credit for what I

have done but instead beats me up for the one I didn't get done.

Whenever life gets too good we get uncomfortable and the disease

jumps right in with fear and shame messages. The critical parent

voice keeps us from relaxing and enjoying life, and from loving our

self.

We need to own that we have the power to choose where to focus our

mind. We can consciously start viewing ourselves from the " witness "

perspective. It is time to fire the judge - our critical parent -

and choose to replace that judge with our Higher Self, who is a

loving parent. We can then intervene in our own process to protect

ourselves from the perpetrator within - the critical parent/disease

voice.

(It is almost impossible to go from critical parent to compassionate

loving parent in one step - so the first step often is to try to

observe ourselves from a neutral position or a " scientific observer "

perspective.)

This is what enlightenment and consciousness raising are all about.

Owning our power to be a co-creator of our lives by changing our

relationship with ourselves. We can change the way we think. We

can change the way we respond to our own emotions. We need to detach

from our wounded self in order to allow our Spiritual Self to guide

us. We are Unconditionally Loved. The Spirit does not speak to us

from judgment and shame.

One of the visualizations that has helped me over the years is an

image of a small control room in my brain. This control room is

full of dials and gauges and lights and sirens. In this control room

are a bunch of Keebler-like elves whose job it is to make sure that

I don't get too emotional for my own good. Whenever I feel anything

too strongly (including Joy, happiness, self-love) the lights start

flashing and the sirens start wailing and the elves go crazy running

around trying to get things under control. They start pushing some

of the old survival buttons: feeling too happy - drink; feeling too

sad- eat sugar; feeling scared - get laid; or whatever.

To me, the process of recovery is about teaching those elves to

chill out. Reprogramming my ego-defenses to knowing that it is ok

to feel the feelings. That feeling and releasing the emotions is

not only ok it is what will work best in allowing me to have my

needs fulfilled.

We need to change our relationship with ourselves and our own

emotions in order to stop being at war with ourselves. The first

step to doing that is to detach from ourselves enough to start

protecting ourselves from the perpetrator that lives within us.

Inner Child Index

Home