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Page 1 of 2 "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.
The more we enlarge our perspective, the closer we get to the cause instead of just dealing with the symptoms. For example, the more we look at the dysfunction in our relationship with ourselves as human beings the more we can understand the dysfunction in our romantic relationships.
As was stated earlier, our perspective of life dictates our relationship with life. This is true for all types of relationships. Our perspective of God dictates our relationship with God. Our perspective of what a man or a woman is, dictates our relationship with ourselves as men or women, and with other men and women. Our perspective of our emotions dictates our relationship with our own emotional process.
Changing our perspectives is absolutely vital to the growth process."
Spirituality is a word that describes relationship. How one defines the word controls one's relationship with the word. If one defines spirituality as one's relationship to god - then the relationship is dependent on how one defines god. If one defines spirituality as one's relationship to the spirit - then the relationship is dependent on how one defines spirit. The thing that is so important in regard to healing and recovery, is to realize that you have the right to chose definitions that work for you. No one has to accept any one else's definition - no matter what any religion contends.
This was what was so revolutionary about the twelve step process introduced by Alcoholics Anonymous. It is based on the premise that each individual can develop a personal relationship with a Higher Power of their own understanding. I find it really amusing that so many 12 step meetings meet in churches whose religion would brand this belief heresy. As I state in my book, the twelve step process started a revolution in spiritual consciousness.
In order to be open to looking at the concept of spirituality from a new perspective, it is vital to be willing to look at our definitions, at the beliefs that dictate our relationship with the word/concept. On an intellectual level, it is very important to be willing to look at our mental attitudes, beliefs, and definitions - both conscious and subconscious - in order to get clear with ourselves about what the word/concept means to us individually and personally. Until we do that, we are reacting to what the word meant to them. Until we become willing to look at how our intellectual paradigm is dictating our relationship, we are giving power to the very institutions and people who wounded us.
As with any other issue in recovery there is an intellectual/mental level of healing and transformation that is important, and there is also an emotional level - which is separate from, but intimately interrelated with, the intellectual.
One of the greatest blocks to communication is that some words are emotionally charged. They are words that trigger an automatic emotional reaction within us. To use a trigger word in an argument - a word such as controlling or manipulative - can turn a discussion into a battle instantly. When someone flings a trigger word at us, or we at them, it is like we have just shot an arrow into them. It usually causes them to go on the defensive and start flinging some arrows back at us - or perhaps go into some other defensive mode, such as crying or walking out.
Using trigger words blocks communication. And we usually use them consciously (although we certainly may not be honest enough to admit it at the time - or even later, depending on the level of our recovery.) We use them in reaction - because we have been hurt or are scared, because we are trying manipulate and control the other person. (Using a word like manipulate or control to describe someone else's behavior to them, is almost always an attempt to control and manipulate the person we are accusing of that behavior.)
For the purposes of this discussion, what is important is to realize that trigger words fall into realm of cause and effect. We are born with a certain personality - we are not born with certain words programmed as emotional triggers. Emotional triggers fall entirely in the province of experience. We have an emotional charge attached to certain words because of our life experience. In other words, we have a relationship to that word that is a result of emotional experiences in our life.
Spirituality is a trigger word for some people. God is a trigger word for many people. Religion is a major trigger word. That these are trigger words is not bad or wrong or abnormal. What is important is to realize that these are emotional trigger words for a reason - there is a cause that has produced this effect, and it is emotional. We do not have emotional trigger words because of intellectual disagreement. Trigger words carry emotional charge because of emotional wounds. As long as we are not willing to look for the cause behind our emotional relationship with a word we are still giving power to our past and whatever circumstance caused our emotional wound. Giving power to past emotional wounds causes us to not see reality clearly today - and that is what is dysfunctional, allowing the past to interfere with the present in such a way that we are not open to all possible choices.
So, we have emotional relationships with certain words. (This is also true of many other things: gestures - someone pointing a finger at you, tone of voice, sounds, smells, etc.) As I mentioned, there are also words that describe relationship. When a word that describes relationship is also a trigger word, it dictates our relationship with whatever concept, idea, dynamic, etc., that word describes.
When we have a powerful emotional charge associated with a word, it affects our relationship with any other words which we see as directly connected to that word - concept, idea, dynamic, etc.
Having a powerful and negative emotional charge associated with the concept/word god, caused me to also have negative reactions to anything I saw as being associated with that concept I was emotionally abused with in childhood. Because of that shaming, abusive concept of a god the father who might send me to burn in hell forever - I did not want anything to do with: religion, Christianity, Jesus, etc. I also saw the evil actions that were perpetrated in the name of that god/religion in the course of history - which gave me even more reason to reject the concept out of hand and completely.
By rejecting the concept, and allowing it to pollute my relationship with other words/concepts, I was limiting myself and my personal universe. I talk about this emotional trigger in the article Jesus and Mary Magdalene-Jesus, Sexuality, and the Bible.
"I was severely Spiritually abused growing up in a very shame-based religion that taught me that I was born sinful and that there was a God who loved me but might send me to burn in hell forever for being human (i.e. getting angry, making mistakes, being sexual. etc.) I still have some very tender wounds about the effect those teachings have had on my life. As I write this my eyes filled with tears of sadness about that little boy being taught what I believe are such abusive and spirit destroying concepts. I still have a great deal of anger that this abuse was perpetrated on me, and that so many other children were, and are, being abused by these types of teachings - which are in my belief the very opposite of the Truth of a Loving God-Force.
I have done a lot of healing around these wounds and they don't have nearly the power they used to have only a few years ago. In fact, the only thing which I might even consider changing in my book "The Dance of Wounded Souls" is the tone which I use on one page in talking about the abuse which has been perpetrated in the name of Jesus by people who were acting the very reverse of what I believe Jesus taught. I absolutely believe what I say in my book but now, with a few more years of healing of those wounds, I might say it a little less stridently, in a little softer manner
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