It's all about me!

Living for self is a psychological tragedy.

Detachment in Recovery Counseling

Many of the 12 step recovery programs and counseling teach detachment from situations and other peoples stuff as a means of letting go of control and surrendering outcomes.  This is a powerful tool in the recoverer's arsenal against insanity.  I am realizing though that, so far, in my experience the program has not taught how to identify and heal detachment from myself.  I am realizing how profoundly destructive this character trait (detachment from self) is and the profound role it plays in the process of thwarting healing.

Detachement Questions

Do you struggle with not knowing how you feel or not knowing how to feel?  Do you struggle with identifying your emotions, your needs, or wants?  If you can identify can you communicate that to anyone? Do you often feel robotic in work, home life, or social interactions?  Do you have a tendency to fixate on someone or something and the majority of your attention goes there? Do you try to intellectually figure everything out but cannot seem to put that knowledge into useful practice?  How about going a bit deeper.  Do you ever experience the feeling that you are sort of watching yourself/what you are doing through your own eyes?  Do you ever experience the feelings or perceptions that others only exist in the environment you see them in, like they are 2D cardboard cut-outs without a sense of person hood?  Do you struggle with experiencing within, a lack of empathy for others or a hardness when confronted with suffering?  Do you tend to deny your internal state and instead present masks to people around you?  Do you tend to lose yourself in tasks and lose track of time?  Do you tend to be very judgmental of others and demanding about who they are?

Defining Detachment

These questions above allude to some common symptoms of detachment, depersonalization, and derealization. These three characteristics, in my opinion, exist in every humans life to some degree.  I say that because from my personal and professional experience we are all learning to become truly connected to ourselves; being able to feel empathy and a full range of emotion and human conditions while bringing this state to our higher power for strength and support.  Detachment becomes a problem when we detach from ourselves (the most vulnerable self, our truest self) to any degree.  Detachment is not surrender.  Surrendering parts of me or surrendering me to my higher power is healthy.  Detaching from parts of me that threaten fear or overwhelm is not healthy.

Detachment from self (my truest self) exists on a continuum, from low level detachment (daydreaming a few seconds, compartmentalizing) to high level depersonalization/derealization/dissociation (multiple personalities, memory loss, experience of life not feeling real, the continual experience of watching me through my own eyes).  With most of us existing somewhere in between the two extremes.  One way to know if you have a dangerous level of detachment is to look at the root motivation for what you do.  If you trace your choices backwards do you find "self" or "self-protection" at the root of your choices?  Do you find conscience, a higher power's will, the greater "good" at the root of your choices?  This may seem counter-intuitive but, if many of your choices are motivated by self-protection that may show a strong tendency to detach from your true humanity or your most truest sense of you and a feeding of your nature where self-protection reigns supreme. 

Changing Detachment

Where self-protection reigns, love and connection are blocked out.  They are walled out.  Change cannot happen very deeply because I am blind to me.  I cannot hear my own inner voice let alone hear the voice of my higher power speaking to me.  I have in a sense rejected myself or parts of me so deeply that I have silenced the voice that communicates to me the needs of that part of me.  It as if it no longer exists.  I have not seen it or felt or heard it in so long its no longer there or part of my awareness.  It would be quite literally like lopping off an arm or leg and letting go of all need or memory of it.  In some cases people reject their own gender, sexuality, body parts, body size, and begin to feel estranged from the very body they live in.  Dissociation can be quite destructive on the extreme end.

So, how about you?  Do you disconnect from yourself at any level?  Are there areas of you that are too dangerous to feel, look at, deal with?  Unless you are willing to take an honest look there your growth will stay blocked because higher power is not welcome there to lovingly take inventory and fill that with love.  Connect with your truest you and you will be more able to connect with your higher power and receive his healing.   

If you're experiencing detachment and ready to step into hope and healing, I'm here to help. Get started by scheduling a complimentary initial phone consultation.  This initial consultation is not therapy, but an opportunity to get to know each other and decide whether my style and process are a good fit for your unique personality and situation.  

 

If I'm Honest

If I'm honest I'll admit that I cling tightly to the blessings that are and have been mine. If I'm honest I would admit that I believe at most times that I know many things, enough, and believe that I know myself for the most part. If I'm honest I will admit that what I have and who I believe that I am is what comforts me each day.

But when I stand in the presence of God long enough, broken enough, with enough longing for answers, tolerating the discomfort of my emotions and my circumstances without running or avoiding, I inevitably come face to face with a God who demands my full attention, my full surrender, my full embrace, my full loyalty, my full commitment to Him and Him alone.

When that inevitable moment comes and I receive the call to let go of my firm grasp on who I believe I am through my stuff, my knowledge, and my relationships that's when I connect with my soul sickness. My deep constitution within that is permeated with self. And I know, at that moment, being honest, I have no power over that level of freedom from self. Only God can do that deepest work in that place of me, My core.

If I'm honest.

Disappointed in Life

     So many people I speak to are cynical about the negativity they see and feel and about pain they observe in the world, loved ones, and friends.  People often struggle with the observation of injustice and feel disappointed with life.  Why do some evil people prosper and good people struggle?  Why do evil people get away with injustice and a good person is persecuted?  Why are children starving and victimized? Why is there so much violence?  Those are the very tough questions we all have at one time or another.  Those are the doubts that threaten to take hold of the heart of the person of faith and render them powerless.  Those are the questions the atheist, agnostic, or nihilist ask to test our faith in a loving God and test our obedience to a Higher Power.  

     What if, the world, the creation (a creationist premise there) was not cursed or broken?  What if, when the fall happened God had only banished Adam and Eve and disciplined them but had not placed the curse on the rest of creation (the earth and all creatures)?  So, essentially humans keep their internal struggle but externally the blessing is still on all of the creation and the external struggle is not there.  The ground easily produces food, the elements remain perfect for habitation, the animals don't attack or destroy one another and remain herbivores, life is plenteous.  Well, my first response is humans having a nature of self protection and self reliance would then make the earth and all its resources a type of heaven and would be satisfied getting all their sensual needs met right here.  There would be no further need for the creator because we are provided for on our own, without Him.  That is our nature.  

     God did strike the earth and the animals with a death sentence and struggle and turmoil.  We all experience this struggle in our everyday life.  Family life is trying and takes hard work and is never free of disappointment. Work can/may be hard, exhausting, and sometimes/often lacking enjoyment.  Getting along with neighbors can/may be exhausting and trying.  Cooperating in organizations, groups, churches, schools, etc can/may be very testing.  And as we all know, picking leaders, managing our neighborhoods, cities, states, and nation can/may be very trying and disappointing.  If you have your hands in all of these areas at once and for some of you maybe more areas of life than this things can get very difficult, complex, frustrating, and then disappointing.  Why?  Because it seems there's always conflict!  Things get going good and you're bopping along and then BOOM!  Conflict is present again. Why can't it just stay fixed?

The Journey of Life

We all seem to expect to some degree ease and comfort in this life.  And if we will press ourselves deeper we probably expect a lot more than that.  It seems like some sick joke when we wake up every day to conflict or struggle when we expected happiness and comfort.  Its like being asked to go out to eat to a nice restaurant and your driven to some cheap drive through food.  You eat the burger but leave psychologically wanting.  The expectation of the "nice restaurant" still calling for fulfillment.  You may feel lied to, cheated even.  You may even drive to the fancy place down the street later in an attempt to fix or quiet the unfulfillment.  Being human is much the same as this illustration.  Being human, we expect to be treated fairly, justly.  We expect to be loved, needed, valued.  We expect to prosper, get what we want, have pleasure and live in peace. And we expect to watch others live the same.  When life takes us to the proverbial McDonald's or garbage can for dinner we react with, WHAT?  This cannot be.  Did I do something wrong?  Did someone else do something wrong? This is not right!  I demand answers! I demand justice!  I demand this to be fixed!  All this in an attempt to create a sort of comfortable environment. My or your personal garden of Eden.  

Facing Disappointment

Sometimes these demands take up an entire lifetime.  Attempting in many ways to force life to be seamless, placid, comfortable, peaceful, fair, just, etc.  This only exhausts and consumes those of us who attempt any one of these impossibilities.  That's because when we strive for "Eden" we are striving against a law set in motion that will not be undone by any human.  Realistically admitting, facing, and accepting the experience of being disappointed by life may be very freeing.  It also may allow the mind to finally realize, "Why do I have this demand for perfection or perfect peace and comfort and justice?"  Admitting your disappointment with life may also assist you to connect with your thirst for a REAL place of perfection, Heaven.  In fact, I believe that is the purpose of the curse on the creation.  To keep us longing for the "more" of heaven and for God himself, a very real place and person.  It is not an error in God's computer system that things are dysfunctioning down here!  I believe His intention is to allow need so that we will look beyond this world and its chaos for our needs and we will find the possibility of safety, love, and peace in Heaven.

     I am not attempting to explain all evil.  That's definitely another blog.  I am merely contending that disappointment in life is inevitable and so is the human struggle to extinguish it.  It's not possible.  Life is never going to stay, Le Bernardin NY.  God does not promise freedom from struggle and He doesn't promise heaven on earth living.  He does promise His love and His presence no matter what and the hope of a future living with Him.

"Against its will, all creation was subjected to God's curse.  But with eager hope, the creation looks forward to the day when it will join God's children in glorious freedom from death and decay" (Romans 8:20-21, NLT).  

Facing disappointment in life can be one of life's biggest challenges. I help individuals and couples face disappointment and find hope through my Christian Counseling Services. 

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Do the 12 steps lead a person to a specific religion?

The quick answer to that question is no. The 12 steps are a spiritual program developed through Bill W and others’ own experiences of being in the grip of alcoholism. Bill W. was not the first, but was himself the beneficiary of another recovering alcoholic’s testimony of the power of working a spiritual program for recovery from alcohol. Bill W. explained in the Big Book that before recovery he was not an atheist and did not believe many people really were. It was his assertion that atheistic belief would mean, “...blind faith in the strange proposition that this universe originated in a cipher and aimlessly rushes nowhere (Big Book, 2001, p.10). In fact, his scientific heroes of the time even “...suggested vast laws and forces at work....I had little doubt that a mighty purpose and rhythm underlay all. How could there be so much of precise and immutable law, and no intelligence? I simply had to believe in a Spirit of the Universe, who knew neither time nor limitation” (Big Book, 2001, p. 10).

The 12 steps of recovery

You see the 12 steps of recovery have one goal in mind: to bring those who become entirely willing to obediently choose honesty and humility 24 hours a day to a spiritual awakening not just once but again and again, each and every day that the steps and relationship with a power greater than themselves are practiced and applied through faith. Not blind faith, but faith that the steps combined with power from our higher power sought out in prayer and meditation consistently and daily WILL produce sobriety for sure! Then on top of sobriety the steps will build strength, endurance, hope, direction, maturity, self-control, the power to deny destructive selfishness, openness, community, belonging, accountability, self-respect, freedom through the gift of forgiveness, the reordering of behavioral choices, inner peace, mental clarity, joy in living and pleasure in serving others.

            Bill W. taught that he had a sort of profound awakening in which past memories aligned with the present testimony that was being shared with him such that God was able to remove his unwillingness to believe in a power greater than himself. The question from his friend, “Why don’t you choose your own conception of God?” (Big Book, 2001, p. 12), led to the realization, “It was only a matter of being willing to believe in a Power greater than myself. Nothing more was required of me to make my beginning” (Big Book, 2001, p. 12). 

Freedom in the 12 steps

You see, in the 12 steps there is a beautiful freedom given to each participant. Come as you are, where you are, and know that if you will acknowledge where your beliefs stand today and obediently and fully commit to working the steps that the God of your understanding will bring you to the faith you need to live the program successfully. This was called moral psychology by William D. Silkworth, M.D.; a doctor who worked with many alcoholics and whose writing is included in the Big Book. In Silkworth’s experience, alcoholism was a death sentence of sorts. He had not witnessed successful life change or recovery until he witnessed Bill W. share his story and his steps with those in the then institution for alcoholics. What Silkworth reports is that through what he terms “moral psychology”, Bill W. and the men he led out of alcoholism were able to achieve “unselfishness...the entire absence of profit motive...community spirit...[belief] in themselves, and still more in the Power which pulls chronic alcoholics back from the gates of death” (Big Book, 2001, p. xxvii).

            Dr. Silkworth had been convinced that emotionalism, merely focusing on behavioral band aids, or psychological tricks was not enough to help alcoholics. He said, the approach had to have, “depth and weight” (Big Book, 2001, p. xxviii). Silkworth testified of his own experiences of powerlessness when faced with healing an alcoholic and how he innately felt deep down that there had to be a power greater than the alcoholic sickness to heal it because human medicine/psychiatry had no cure. This has also been my clinical and personal experience with addicts of all kinds. This includes anyone that has a compulsive pattern, an addictive cycle, a “bad habit” they seemingly cannot overcome and it is bringing any level of brokenness into their life, their relationships, or their social/vocational functioning. The experience of powerlessness when attempting to help the mastered is quite profound. It is not until I, even I, surrender control of the healing to my higher power can I be of any assistance to my broken client. Many people, many addicts, are skeptics of the 12 steps and its programming. If that person is reading this, in the Silkworth tradition, I would encourage you to read the AA Big Book front to back, slowly and carefully with your ears open to hear and receive.  As Silkworth said, “perhaps [you’ve come] to scoff, [but you] may remain to pray” (Big Book, 2001, p. xxxii). The 12 steps will not lead you to a certain religion but they will lead you to a relationship; a relationship with a Power greater than yourself that is the power you need to change your life for the better.                       

Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. Big Book. NY: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.,         2001.                      

If you're ready to step into recovery counseling, I can help. Learn more about my recovery counseling services here. 

His Way or Your Way

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

It is in the middle that human choices are made; the beginning and the end remain with God. The decrees of God are birth and death, and in between those limits man makes his own distress or joy.  Shade of His Hand, 1223 L

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My Way vs God's Way

Recently, in a clinical session an image came alive.  Since then, this image has continued to communicate very deeply with me to explain so many struggles I see in most of my clients lives, my loved one's lives, and in areas or circumstances in my own life.  I would like to share it with you.

Reflecting on childhood

Remember your favorite playground from childhood?  There were so many fun places to play.  One favorite for most children is, the slide.  And oh, how slides have gotten more exciting right?!  Slides now are child safe, curly, and held by a massive pile of wood chips or bouncy mats.  Kids now have it very nice.  Think back to that time, childhood.  Maybe even a beautiful fall day, running through the cool breeze and sunshine, wearing your favorite sweatshirt, swinging, sliding, and going round and round on the merry-go-round and then, how children would congregate at the slide.  Everyone wanted to go again, and again, and again.  Some children would just naturally run to the stairs, climb, slide, and back to the stairs as fast as they could for another go!  Other children would naturally run to the bottom of the slide and attempt to climb up the actual slide-slipping, grasping, getting a couple feet, slipping, grasping harder, getting slidden into and then flying down to the bottom (and maybe onto the ground), with the current slider.  Laughing, wrestling, or maybe even arguing about who did it wrong or who hurt who.

Typically, kids as a group will either join the "slide-climber" or they'll join the "stair-climber" because cooperation and group-think make social time much easier, serene, and more enjoyable.  Order.  Eventually, we all learn that taking the stairs is just easier and more safe.

Rules and Creativity

Of course there's always that mom who would re-direct that kid who just would not stop climbing the slide backwards no matter how many times he/she was knocked down by a slider.  That's the kid who is a true creative!  Maybe even a true rebel, at heart.  However, maybe that is the child who has learned that there are no rules because mom and dad cannot be trusted, do not care, are distracted, or do not approve of anything I do anyway.  So rules (made by parents and thus adults), become irrelevant and the new rule that can be trusted is, "I can trust in me.  I wont let me down."  But there's that mom who cannot sit back and watch the slide climbing and steps in to redirect. She has accepted that truth that the stairs are clearly easier and more safe, plus IT'S THE RULE!  WE MUST KEEP THE RULES!  Right?

The belief of the broken child above is the base belief that exists in those who struggle to submit to life's rules.  Consequently, a person with this belief regularly experiences being up against an oppressor, blocked by a wall, opposed by loved ones, kept out of their dreams and just shy of a goal/s.  See, there are hidden or dynamic rules that play out between humans.  There is not even a requirement of actual relationship for these rules to apply.  They apply small scale in such interactions as with a retail clerk or behaviors out in public, medium scale as with co-workers or in employment relations, and large scale in our homes between spouses, parents and children. The rules seem to be universal, innate, divine, and unshakable.  They are bound to the way we want to see the world operate: with order, not chaos.

Finding Order

In order for order to exist, people must function within a particular continuum of behaviors, cognitions, emotions, perceptions, choices, etc.  This does not mean they do not experience the aforementioned characteristics that land outside the particular continuum.  But in order to keep order in every area of their life they withhold their extremes of self and funnel them into other more positive activities or expressions.  A great sublimation, as Freud would say!  To put this thought into image, look to the childhood slide again.  Do you see it in your mind?  Where are you standing? Are you standing away from it but looking at it?  Are you standing at the bottom or climbing from the bottom?  Are you standing at the stairs or climbing the stairs?

Rule keepers tend to go to the stairs every time without error.  They may consider the bottom but will thwart themselves from such trouble-making curiosities in order to not make waves.  This is the safer option of the two as order is created and maintained, but individuation is smothered with unquestioned or little-questioned rule keeping.  Rebels or those who heavily rely on themselves tend to go to the bottom of the slide every time or most of the time because no one is going to tell me what is right for me!  And no one is going to control me, no matter what!  The self and its evaluation of faithfulness to its natural inclinations is valued over relationship with others.  

Rule Followers and Rule Breakers

Where did you see yourself in relation to the slide?  This may be your innate or root self speaking to you about your own tendency towards being a rule follower or a rule breaker.  Do you think that never deviating from the stairs, no matter what comes is orderly?  Most likely this would create disorder or chaos in the face of a need for individual expression, crisis, loss, disaster, or change.  To counter that thought, do you think that always taking the bottom of the slide to climb up is honoring yourself or being true to yourself??  To the contrary, it will become imprisonment to all the demands within yourself and all the emotions, thoughts, and impulses a person can and when fed, will experience. 

Again, some of us learned early that the rules were not fair, did not make sense, and maybe even caused us harm.  And so to counter that harm, rules (with many being societal, relational, spiritual, and unspoken but expected), became something to be challenged, defied, resisted, and ignored.  Sadly, this consequently causes blindness over time.  See, the consequences of consistently ignoring or defying these types of "rules" is that of growing and burgeoning emotional pain.  Having used denial to counter the anxiety over defying or breaking these "rules" we then become blind to the "hows" and "whys" of our negative internal condition. We forgot to follow ourselves, watch ourselves because we told ourselves what we were doing was right!!  Now, we may have a tendency towards anger, selfishness, self-sabotage, isolation, blame, hardness, and being emotionally unavailable.  

Powerful Questions

Ask yourself:  Have I never realized that its more work to climb the slide from the bottom??

Ask yourself:  Have I never realized that I exist too and I can climb the ladder my way and                                          sometimes a different way?

It's all about the combination of heart condition and disciplined actions.  In-other-words, order is supremely more important than chaos, but it takes a wee bit of chaos to make order sweet!!  A person must make sure that they are an individual in their world, but remember individuality is not defined by rebellion or resistance or even defying order.  In fact, individuality is most often found when willingly submitting to a higher power, service to others, a shared value system, virtue and its behavioral framers, sacrificial love, and universal human values.  Individual expression is healthy chaos to totalitarian order.  But individual expression is not destructive to the self or others in any way.  It will build you, your personality, your relationships, and your ability to function peacefully in your world.  There is a strongly submissive element--an acceptance of what "works" but, there is also freedom to make what "works" my own. 

Stepping Out

So, step out from the place you have been stuck in.  Step out and consider the other option.  What scares you about making that choice?  Confront those fears with Gods love and His ability to protect, provide, and care for all your needs.  Where have you been unwilling to obey God?  Most likely in the things/ways hidden or more difficult for others to see or talk to you about.  But you know!  And that is what counts.  Break free from ambivalence and start the process of growing your motivation to obey your higher power and do what's been nagging your heart!!  God will meet you there.  He has been patiently waiting for this moment.

"Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin, to see the plumb line in Zerubbabel’s hand” (Zechariah 4:10, NLT).

If you're ready to step out and are not sure what that looks like, Veritas Counseling is ready to help.  I offer an initial consultation so we can get to know each other and confirm we're the right fit.  Learn more about my Christian counseling services.