Accepting our Path

The release of our past conditioning is a powerful and yet scary process. As it requires us to let go of our co-dependence on the most treasured part of ourselves, our childhood beliefs. It takes tremendous courage to face and process the feelings involved with the changes that enter our lives as we do this work. As we begin to discover it is ourselves that have to change in order for our environment to change, we often retreat from the feelings that are involved, effectively shutting down the process and returning to dysfunction and co-dependence.

In order to truly change and grow we have to trust "OUR PATH" and embrace it. (Of course we also have to find it, a challenge in itself as it often has been pounded out of us) Once we do find it, we have to accept and embrace it. The work is in trusting that the path is ours, (the heart knows the path) and allowing it to expand and flow, using discernment and wisdom. For many (including myself) accepting our own path has been challenging as our conditioning tells us that we don’t deserve to have our own path. Deciding to find and follow my own path was and is a large part of my own journey.


The following are excerpts from Robert Burney's website, he has done a lot of work on co-dependency and the wounded soul/child. His work has helped me tremendously.





http://www.joy2meu.com/

"There is an old joke about the difference between a neurotic and a psychotic. The psychotic truly believes that 2 + 2 = 5. The neurotic knows that it is 4 but can't stand it. That was the way I lived most of my life - I could see how life was but I couldn't stand it. I was always feeling like a victim because people and life were not acting in the way I believed they "should" act.


Excerpt from Joy to You & Me Newsletter II 8-98

Learning how to let go of my "shoulds," surrender my picture/idea/plan of how my life is supposed to work or other people are supposed to act, and be willing to accept reality as it is, are the Principles of the Twelve Step Program at work. They are ancient Principles that are an invaluable part of both empowerment and finding some peace within.

If we are in a power struggle that we are losing (with trying to control someone, or with how our life is unfolding - trying to force things, or with the God/Goddess Force - something I tend to want to do a lot) then the best strategy is to surrender that fight and find a way that is going to work for us to meet our needs. I spent most of my life with my insides churning, feeling frustrated and angry, because life wasn't what I wanted it to be. (I can remember the first time in recovery that I was aware of feeling serenity - it was like, ick, what is this? I feel empty inside - because there was no turmoil or conflict going on.)
It is so much easier to accept life as it is and make the best of it - there is a catch however. When we accept reality, and let go of trying to force our will on life and other people, there are feelings to deal with. One of the reasons we keep trying to control someone else (to get an alcoholic to stop drinking for instance) is because with all that frustration and anger, mental obsession and rumination, we don't have time to stop and feel how much is hurts, or how scared we are, or feel the grief of letting that other person go. The reason we try to control other people is to protect ourselves from our feelings - and it is important to admit that. Of course we want what is "right" for them, what is good for them - but we don't know what their "right" path is. Some people are supposed to die of Alcoholism - that is their path.


"This dance of Codependence is a dance of dysfunctional relationships - of relationships that do not work to meet our needs. That does not mean just romantic relationships, or family relationships, or even human relationships in general.
The fact that dysfunction exists in our romantic, family, and human relationships is a symptom of the dysfunction that exists in our relationship with life, with being human. It is a symptom of the dysfunction which exists in our relationships with ourselves as human beings."