Status Updates From How to Do the Work: Recogni...

There is a deep intrinsic value in expressing how we feel and how we view the past. If you can find this value and you’re able to tolerate and hold space for whatever reaction may come, you are ready to take part in a dialogue.

اگر آن آدمِ «بد» آن کارِ «بد» را انجام داد، پس من آدم «خوبی» هستم که هیچوقت آن کار را انجام نمی‌دهم. به همین خاطر است که قضاوتِ دیگران خیلی اعتیادآور است. باعث می‌شود از تحمل درگیری داخلیِ ایگو با شرم خلاص شویم.

I don’t have one memory of my mother playing with me as a child. Not one. That’s sad for me, of course—and sad for her, too.

show up for ourselves. ❤️

The ways we can regulate our emotions are all practices you are likely well versed in by now: deep belly breathing to regulate our stress response, nonjudgmentally witnessing changes in our body’s sensations, and noticing patterns in our ego-based narratives that are connected to those emotional activations.

With the help of the wise inner parent, you can learn how to validate your reality and feelings by witnessing them, rather than instinctually judging or ignoring them. Your wise inner parent cultivates acceptance while honoring the needs of your inner child—to be seen, heard, and valued for the authentic parts of yourself. You become the priority.

Many of us may find that in adulthood, we often embody the critical inner parent, denying our reality, rejecting our needs, and choosing the perceived needs of those around us over our own. Guilt and shame replace our intuitive voice.

It’s our responsibility to teach ourselves the tools to meet our own needs. When we reparent, we begin by learning how to identify our physical, emotional, and spiritual needs and then we practice noticing the conditioned way we’ve gone about attempting to get those needs met.

the way we heal these wounds is to give ourselves all the things we didn’t get as children. The way we move forward is to have the awareness that we can become the wise parent to ourselves that we did not have as a child. This is a process called reparenting, and it enables you to relearn how to meet the unmet needs of your inner child through daily, dedicated, and conscious action.

Their adult children often live from that protected and familiar space of their ego (with all of its stories) and often have an intense need to be “right,” rejecting other people’s opinions and making others feel just as small and insignificant as they once did.

emotionally immature parent-figures—parent-figures who can’t identify their own needs, who betray themselves to receive love and validation, who live in a state of resentment because they believe others should “just know” what they need.

understanding your parent-figures’ level of emotional maturity (or lack thereof) “frees us from emotional loneliness as we realize that their negativity wasn’t about us, but about them.”

Emotional immaturity results from a lack of emotional resilience, the ability to process emotions, communicate boundaries, and return our nervous system to balance.

It’s a painful process—a shedding of old skin, becoming aware of yourself in a way you’ve never been before. You have to see yourself to love yourself—and you have to love yourself in order to give yourself what you weren’t able to get from others.

The critical difference is that people who are engaged in consistent spiritual practices activate and even expand the size of their prefrontal cortex—the site of the conscious mind—while those who struggle with depression and negative thoughts decrease activity in the same area.

Awakenings show us that who we think we are isn’t necessarily who we are. Often, we gain these insights through suffering, living through confusion and sorrow on our way to finally becoming conscious. An awakening is a rebirth of the Self that involves tearing down parts of who you were when you lived in an unconscious, autopilot state of existence.

Creating boundaries is some of the hardest work that you’ll encounter on your healing journey. It’s also probably one of the most important steps in reclaiming a connection to your authentic wants and needs, while honoring and respecting those you love. This is what the work is all about: making space to allow each of us to be seen, heard, and authentically expressed.

Boundaries are essential to all healthy relationships. Think of them as an act of service.

It’s best to avoid “you” language as much as possible, as it can activate the defensiveness of the other person’s ego.

Mental/emotional boundaries enable us to separate ourselves & our emotional world, while allowing others to have their own separate world. With boundaries, we can more easily access our intuitive voice & better regulate our emotional states. In this place of emotional safety, we feel comfortable sharing our thoughts, opinions, beliefs with others. We don’t feel compelled to please or agree with others all the time

Always meeting the needs of others is an unattainable goal and ultimately results in a neglect of our own needs.

When we give and give, it’s typically out of a belief that the more selfless we are, the more love we will receive

It is an action we take for ourselves regardless of how the other person reacts. That the other person may change in some way is a secondary gain. An important aspect of setting boundaries is allowing others to have their own limits and boundaries and respecting and honoring theirs while you maintain your own.

the boundary is not for others, it’s for you. It is not an ultimatum to make another person behave a certain way. An ultimatum is a statement that assigns a consequence to someone else’s behavior as a means of trying to effect a change in it. A boundary, rather, is a personal limit that is expressed so that your need will directly be met.

When boundaries are in place, we feel safer to express our authentic wants and needs, we are better able to regulate our autonomic nervous system response (living more fully in that social engagement zone because we have established limits that cultivate safety), and we rid ourselves of the resentment that comes along with denying our essential needs.

Boundaries protect you. They keep you physically balanced. They help you connect to your intuitive Self and are critical to experiencing authentic love. Boundaries provide a necessary foundation for every relationship you have—most importantly the one you have with yourself. They are the retaining walls that protect you from what feels inappropriate, unacceptable, inauthentic, or just plain not desired.

Over time, feelings of worthlessness, joylessness, and depression often emerge. Over time, as our core needs continue to be consistently unmet, we may grow angry and resentful. All of this is intertwined with the guilt and fear of abandonment, keeping us emotionally addicted and stuck in a vicious cycle.

classic example of the enmeshed child grown up: she is a people pleaser, in many ways a martyr, who sacrifices her emotional, psychological, and spiritual well-being without asking for anything in return, because that was what was required of her to receive love in childhood.

Because we don’t have a secure relationship with ourselves and have actively denied our own needs, we don’t know what our needs are, let alone how to communicate them clearly. Instead, we look to others to draw our limits.

true closeness, as you will come to find, involves mutual sharing with clear boundaries and the freedom for separate realities to exist at the same time.