HEALING AND
CREATING
LOVING RELATIONSHIPS
One of the major lessons in our personal human development is learning how to create and
maintain loving, supportive relationships with ourselves, others beings, and with all
other life forms. What comes to mind in the word relationship is RELATIVITY,
(as defined in Webster's dictionary): "The state of being dependent for existence or
determined in nature, value, or some other quality by relation to something else".
When we look at the definition of relativity, the first thought that comes to mind is 'a
state of change', of mutability and flux, adapting, and ad-justing to the various aspects
and interactions with other forms of life. There is also the aspect of interdependence and
how each one of us is affected by the other life forms around us. How we define our own
boundaries and per-sonal identity and how we develop our awareness in rela-tion to the
life around us, and the society in which we are part determines the quality and depth of
our interaction with others.
As our sense of Self starts to grow and develop, all the impressions we have received from
our mother while in the womb have a profound effect on the personal development of the
infant. The infant will absorb and take on the emotional imprints of the mother's
experiences, i.e. her fears, worries, health concerns, as well as her joy, love, and
nurturing aspects. If the mother is depressed a lot during her pregnancy, this also
greatly affects the infant. The conflict and pain we experience from separation,
aban-donment, denial, rejection, and projections by any parent or person raising us also
greatly affects our emotional and personal development. Often, these abrasive emotional
catalysts propel us to new levels of growth as we learn to develop healthier values of
self-worth, self-love and self-acceptance. It also allows us to look deeper into our own
emotional and physical needs, dependencies, and addictions. If the conflict and pain is
not faced or healed, our subconscious mind will repeatedly program our emotions to react
to this limiting, negative pattern. Until this pattern is consciously broken, we will
continue to internalize our 'victim' role and carry with us the burden of a bitter
at-titude toward life.
Being able to take a magnifying lens and look into our re-curring patterns of self-abuse
in relationship to others, allows us to see the belief patterns we took on to shield and
isolate ourselves from others, to protect ourselves from be-ing hurt again. Our innermost
human desire is to have love and intimacy, yet our conditioned emotional patterns recreate
recurring, subconscious, 'sabotage' programs that shield us from the vulnerability and
intensity of human in-timacy. This is an unconscious, dysfunctional, mental-emotional
pattern that causes us to create shileds and artificial, defense barriers around ourselves
that do allow others into our own personal 'inner space' for fear of being rejected. In
order to avoid becoming 'too close' to others, we create even greater ambition for more
successful careers that will take up most of our time, or we drown our-selves in
television, alcohol, drugs, sex, work-oholism, or other distractions in order not to face
or expose our own vulnerability.
We protect ourselves from others by not showing certain parts of ourself. There are places
within us that we wish others not to see. Usually this is an aspect of ourself that we
have not accepted or one we do not feel good about. So we conveniently create multiple
levels of distraction which turn into obsessive and addictive behavior patterns that keeps
others at a 'safe' distance. We are afraid that if we show this side of ourselves, we will
not be loved, and therefore rejected. Yet this very fear and avoidance creates a form of
self-rejection that destroys any potential for a deep level of human intimacy. Being able
to see your-self as you are, in your exposed, vulnerable and defense-less state without
judging and criticizing yourself, is to learn unconditional love and total
self-acceptance. This is your key for healing all self-abuse and abusive patterns in all
relationships. When you learn to be totally honest with yourself and your true feelings,
by not hiding how you feel, you create a safety valve for others to feel more comfortable
and open around you. This allows them the safe space to accept and express their own
feelings without holding back. Anytime you hold something back, others automatically and
instinctively feel this psychically and energetically, and the automatic reaction or
response is to withdraw or pull away. This can be and usually is interpreted as rejection,
by the person internalizing their feelings and not communicating or expressing them. On
the other hand, the opposite can also be true. There are times when you are really honest
and open with how you feel and others can be intimidated by your freedom and ease if their
self-acceptance is not at an equally developed level. This phenomena creates fear,
judgment, rejection, and criticism that can be projected unto the person who is being open
and sincere. In the long run, your honesty and self-acceptance really helps the other
person communicate with a part of himself or herself that is held back and eventually will
trigger some form of emotional and mental release.
Communication is the key for developing any form of relationship. Learning to communicate
your feelings and thoughts with an open heart and an open mind will always facilitate new
possibilities for a loving relationship.
Learning to trust all parts of yourself as you get in touch with, feel, and express anger,
jealousy, frustration, lack, etc. without making yourself wrong, or blaming others for how
you feel, is the first step toward acknowledging and accepting yourself in unconditional
love. This develops greater compassion and understanding of your human na-ture, and
accelerates the healing of your feelings and emo-tions. Learning to be REAL
with all parts of yourself is the key to a healthy life and loving relationships. It's not
that certain emotions are 'good' while others are 'bad'. The crucial point is how we
relate to and express our own personal feelings and emotions without allowing them to
sabotage our manifestation of love and fulfillment. If we are in denial or conflict with
any of our emotions, we will attract conflict and denial from others that will mirror back
to us those parts of ourselves we have not loved and accepted. Each being has his or her
own personal challenge in this area. Life sets up these confrontational challenges as a
catalyst for our growth and evolution. The challenge and conflict is in direct proportion
and is relative to the level of self-healing and transformation that a person is capable
of at a given time. No person on this earth is immune from this challenging process of
inner growth. We are all in this growing cycle together, and once we start to understand
that each one of us faces our own degree or level of challenge, we can begin to dissolve
our illusory 'projection' of an 'ideal' person that will fulfill all our needs. As we
accept each other's human-ness by embrac-ing both each other's strengths and weaknesses, a
space of safety, trust, and freedom is created in which we are free to love one another
unconditionally. This nurturing, un-conditional love and acceptance creates the foundation
for true intimacy in a relationship. The challenge is not to try and 'reform' the other
person to fit your own personal projection of perfection and an 'ideal', but to
acknowledge the perfection and love that already exists, even if it is not always
expressed or shown. Every time you experience a conflict with another person, use that
opportunity to love and acknowledge yourself more, with-out projecting a judgment on the
other person or yourself. This is one of the most difficult things to do in any
rela-tionship. Be aware that knowledge and perception is rela-tive to the limited nature
of the mind, so it's wise to focus more on love and forgiveness, instead of 'getting
stuck's with what we perceive or 'know' about each other. This is a major key in
developing loving, true friendships and intimate relationships.
DEFINING YOUR PERSONAL BOUNDARIES
Getting in Touch with your Emotional Needs
I recently attended a men's workshop on healing sexual abuse. Almost every man present had
a major issue of 'control' in relation to being violated. I learned much through observing
and listening carefully to the personal testimonies and experiences of all the
participants. In-variably, 95% of the men felt that they were somehow a 'victim' of some
form of abuse, either mental, emotional, sexual, sphysical or a combination of the four.
Naturally they had to set some defined boundaries in their relation-ships in order to
establish a degree of emotional safety, setting up limits in order to protect themselves
from the fear of further abuse. Learning to be receptive and sensitive to other people's
emotional and psycho-sexual capacity and limits is an important factor in creating a
founda-tion of trust and intimacy, as well as respect.
As you heal your own issues of control and self-abuse, you will reach a point where you
will know and feel that you can no longer be violated or abused by anybody. This
realization and self-acceptance releases you from all fear, as you complete the healing of
even the tiniest issue within yourself that syou have not loved or accepted. If there is
still a small fragment of yourself that has not been fully loved, accepted and set free,
it will manifest itself and be reflected back to you in a relationship. For example, you
may have encountered a partner, lover, husband, wife, or parent shout at you out of
control, "You're no good! You'll never amount to anything. Why don't you just give
up?" As harsh and frightening as this may sound, the person who is expressing this
rage, may be mirroring a part of yourself that you may not wish to look at or see. Do you
have any feelings of not being good enough? Any doubts about your ability to achieve
something truly mean-ingful in your life? Feelings like, "What's the use anyway? I
should just give up." Even though these may be very small, subliminal and
subconscious doubts that you are not even consciously aware of, a person close to you will
probably amplify and 'act out' this self- embrace all parts of ourselves, our shadows and
fears, our pain, conflict, as well as the beautiful sunny places, rainbows, flower, and
butterflies. The raging storms we experience inside, is the direct manifestation of our
subconscious patterns of denial in the form of self-judg-ment, self-punishment, and the
conflicting illu-sions/projections of unhealed duality within our mind and perceptions.
What is harmful to human health is not so much the emotion itself, but the suppression and
denial of our feelings and emotions, no matter how basic, raw, dense or refined they are.
If we focus on keeping our heart open, and our mind free from judgment, we are helping to
facilitate our own healing as well as develop greater com-passion for the suffering of all
living beings.
REDEFINING LOVE
IN A HEALTHY RELATIONSHIP
At times we feel like we are "pushed into" a relationship, or we encounter a
relationship with someone who really "pushes our buttons". This could be a
husband, wife, parent, sister, brother, or most likely a partner or lover. When you start
to feel that your "buttons are being pushed" by someone, it is helpful to look
at whether or not that person is actually treating you in a similar manner as your parents
or a primary caretaker did during your childhood. This defensive reaction usually arises
from an unhealed part of yourself that was wounded from some form of abuse either from a
parent or a primary caretaker. When somebody "pushes your buttons", be a
detective and know that this could be a clue for you to some part of your childhood that
needs attention and healing. Try to go back in time. If you are able to recognize a
repetitive, consistent, emotional pattern of abuse that repeats itself in your intimate
relationships, then you KNOW that you have a specific childhood pattern of abuse that
needs healing and clearing. Our intimate partners or lovers will continue to play out this
unconscious unhealed abuse, un-til we get in touch with the original pattern of abuse and
are able to heal it. For example, there was a young woman who met an attractive man during
a seminar. They both felt a doubt until you become aware of your denial. We unconsciously
recreate rejection over and over again until we have learned to accept and very strong
attraction and magnetism to one an-other. After the seminar was over, he promised her that
he would get in touch with her within a week and they would get together. When after a
week, he did not call or contact her, she was emotionally devastated, and did not
understand why she had such a strong personal and emotional reaction to a situation with
someone she hardly knew. When I started asking her about her father and how he treated her
as a child and as an adult, she suddenly realized that he repeatedly promised her love and
affec-tion but never really expressed or manifested it. One day when he was in town
lecturing at a university, he said he would call her and spend some special time with her,
and take her out to dinner so the two could become closer. Again, the promises were made
but never kept. So this psychological and emotional pattern of abuse manifested in all her
intimate relationships with men, until she finally got in touch with the original pattern
of abuse, and was able to forgive her father and set herself free to love again.
Many times as children, what we experienced as love, was not really love, but a
dysfunctional pattern of attention. For example, someone who never experienced attention
or validation as a child except when they were being sex-ually abused, would then learn to
associate and equate love with sex or with a form of sexual abuse. Another example,
someone with a controlling parent who received approval and validation only when they were
being told what to do would then take on an unconscious pattern of thinking or equating
controlling behavior by another person as a form of love. These dysfunctional patterns of
reinforcement become the only frame of reference the child has, and so as an adult we are
magnetically drawn to that same, abu-sive, unconscious pattern in our intimate
relationships. When we meet someone who is controlling, we immediately have some feeling
of being in love with this person which comes from our unconscious dysfunctional pattern
of what we experienced as love during our childhood. Another example, a person that was
sexually abused as a child will unconsciously choose a partner who is sexually abusive in
some way or who is sexually dysfunctional. They will be very attracted to this person.
THE QUESTIONS WE NEED TO ASK OURSELVES IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO SEE, HEAL AND
TRANSMUTE ANY ABUSE:
1. What does love mean to you as an adult?
2. What are your patterns of association with love that you experienced as a child?
3. Are these two answers the same or are they very different?
If these two definitions of love are distinctly different from one another, then you will
know that what you ex-perienced as love during your childhood, is most probably a
reinforced dysfunctional pattern of abuse.
HOW TO HEAL AND RELEASE
YOUR PATTERNS OF ABUSE:
1. Create a new personal definition of love based on the things you've learned, read, or
experienced with healthy people, i.e. friends, teachers, therapists, business associates,
etc.
2. Then compare what you knew or experienced as love during your childhood to your
personal definition of love as an adult. If you meet someone with whom you are interested
in having an intimate relationship, DO A REALITY CHECK of this potential
relationship by the following:
a. Consulting with a therapist, counselor, or a neutral per-son who is not emotionally
involved with you.
b. Give clear, specific examples of interactions with this person in whom you are
interested, and then ask the counselor or friend to compare these to the definition or
information you have of either healthy, nurturing love, or the illusory love you
experienced in dysfunctional patterns in your childhood.
Appyling this process will help you to get a clearer and more objective picture as to
whether you are breaking the old dysfunctional pattern and attracting healthy,
support-ive, nurturing love into your life.
INTERACTING IN AN INTIMATE RELATIONSHIP
There are times when we feel powerless and feel like we have no choice as we interact in
some of these relation-ships. Many times we contract, and pull back, without really
communicating our true feelings. The first step is to acknowledge to yourself that there
is a challenge or conflict in your interaction with this person. Get in touch with what
feelings are coming to the surfac, and take a closer look at how these feelings are
affecting you. It may not be appropriate for you to open up a more intimate part of
yourself until you are clear that the person you are interacting with is ready, open,
willing, and capable of connecting with you on the same level of integrity, clarity and
openness. Using your discernment, ask yourself if this relationship has a true and lasting
potential for a healthy, balanced, and trusting interaction that is loving and
sup-portive. The reverse can also be true. Do you trust yourself enough to be open with
someone who may not have the same boundaries as you? Are you able to match or aspire to
the same level of honesty, clarity, and integrity as your partner? Do you feel good and
secure about yourself in re-lation to your partner, without putting them up on a pedestal?
Those of us who deal with major issues of setting up limits and boundaries in our close
relationships, and always have to consider how much to allow someone into our personal
space, are the people who have suffered and experienced some form of abuse in childhood
and/or in an intimate re-lationship. Maybe there was a time, when we felt really
vulnerable and needy and just couldn't say "NO", and so we compromised our
integrity and self-worth by surrender-ing to a situation that we later regretted. There
are times when we feel such a strong human longing for love and acceptance, that at times
we lose our perspective and personal values, as we act out of need rather than love. This
is also a form of self-abuse. When we deny a certain feeling we are afraid to show or
express, and judge it as bad, low, ugly, or shameful, we invite shame, criticism and
repeated abuse into our lives. This form of denial and suppression creates even a greater
split and polarization within our subconscious mind as our self-judgment is acted out and
amplified through our intimate relationships.
Being honest and real with your pain by facing and accept-ing it fully, and being able to
show and express this pain with a close friend or partner by saying, "This is where I
hurt" is perhaps the first step to creating an honest and healthy relationship. By
not qualifying or judging your pain as either good or bad, you neutralize and dissolve the
old subconscious emotional-identification patterns, and a new space is created for your
your own loving self-acceptance and healing. REMEMBER: When feeling or experiencing
emotional pain, BE FULLY PRESENT WITH YOURSELF. Be completely honest about how you really
feel, without judging or putting yourself down. De-velop greater trust and compassion for
yourself, by follow-ing the seven step program for healing emotional abuse.
When someone else is opening up to you and sharing their most vulnerable parts and
personal experiences with you, even though it may not be in harmony with your standards of
perfection or beliefs, are you still able to love them unconditionally in a nurturing
gentleness without judging them or 'putting them down' in some subtle way? This is
probably the greatest challenge that we as human beings face in all our interactions and
relationships. This is one of the most important lessons that the earth plane has to
offer. How your care for your own level of self-worth and integrity, loving yourself for
who you are and being loving and kind toward others, regardless of their personal beliefs
or lifestyle, is an extension of your own level of self-acceptance and self-mastery. What
makes this earth so unique is that it has such a variety and diversity of beings whose
soul evolutions have such varying degrees of personal and spiritual development. Learning
how to get along with one another, honoring another being's personal reality in a
'smorgasbord' of languages, beliefs, boundaries, tastes, habits, and addictions that
differ from one another like night and day is the training ground for the development and
evolution of the human soul. It is the training ground for universal love. These human
chal-lenges provide us with tremendous opportunity for per-sonal growth as we strive to
evolve from the cocoon of a 'separate individual identity' to a 'collective,
transpersonal' consciousness, intoONE GOD SELF, into ONE GLOBAL FAMILY united in Love.
Learning to adjust and relate to the mutable nature of human development, is to learn
flexibility and the art of self-detachment. We let go of old beliefs and concepts in order
to open the loving space that enables our wholistic integration within the world and
enables loving interaction within all the myriad forms of human relationships in which we
are a part.
THE PERSONAL SELF,
THE TRANSPERSONAL SELF,
AND THE UNIVERSAL SELF
In studying human relationships, I have become aware of three distinct patterns of
identity that interweave with one another through our various interactions and
communication with others. The personal self is the first and primary stage of our human
development. It is concerned with our basic needs for survival, how we relate emotionally,
mentally, sexually, and how we express ourselves in the physical world. The personal self
is a direct extension of the development of the human ego. Its limitations and boundaries
are defined in direct proportion to its percep-tions and interactions with the external
world. What creates our own personal identity, or our personal self are the influences of
people around us. It starts at the moment of conception. During the time the fetus is in
the mother's womb, it absorbs a lot of emotional patterns of the mother. As the child
develops, parental influences, social envi-ronment and the culture in which the child is
raised, all contribute to the development of the child's personal identity. A personal
identity is formed by how the child is able to relate to its home environment as well as
external stimuli. To include even deeper levels of soul memory, there are multiple
sub-personalities from other lifetimes that interface with the soul's present personal
experi-ences and development.
How you interface with other people emotionally and personally is influenced by your
belief systems and your personal perception of reality. This includes your habits,
addictions, fears, traumas, pain, as well as positive rein-forced experiences, how you see
and feel about yourself, and the quality of validation you received from parents and peers
during your childhood years. Another impor-tant aspect that contributes to the development
of your personal identity is how you respond to your own self-imposed limitations, whether
these are conscious or uncon-sciously imposed. How you personally handle life's many
challenges also determines the strength and power of your personal choices which in turn
help develop your iden-tity.
THE TRANSPERSONAL SELF
During any process of our personal transformation or heal-ing, we learn to take a step
back and become the witness and observer of our personal emotional process. To facilitate
our transformation and healing, we learn to detach ourselves from our reactive mind by not
identifying with, or personalizing our mental and emotional experiences as the only
reality that is available to us. This accelerates our personal growth and allows us to
process through challenging situations more quickly and effectively.
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