When I think of the state of our country, one phrase comes to me over and over again.  Knock it off!  And I think most of us, adults and children alike would agree.  To all those who have put the addiction of greed before the wellbeing of others and even themselves, it’s time to knock it off!  To all those who have allowed their lives to be run by solely their brain as opposed to also their heart, it is time to knock if off!   To those who have never questioned their own impulses, desires or even what they were taught as children, it is time to knock it off and become just a bit more self aware.  And to all those who are afraid of making healthy choices for fear of losing what you believe is power, KNOCK IT OFF!

Those who are operating in this way are playing a very immature game.  A game centered in and driven by the ego.  If you play from the ego, you will ride the rollercoaster of highs and lows, adrenalin and depression, winning and losing, and here your only hope is to win the next battle.  This is an addictive never ending game.  You will keep chasing your tale, looking for the next fight so that you can win.  When you win you will feel a momentary, very brief rush and then you will crash and need to look for another battle.  When you lose you will fall even farther downward and believe you are next to worthless so you will again look for the momentary boost of winning.  Winning whatever you can, who ever will play with you, what ever battle you can find.  In this game, you will always want to compete, conquer, grow bigger, become the “best, greatest, most winningest.”  

There is another game to play and it is much more satisfying.  It is driven by the heart.  You should try it on the other side.  Over here we can experience a calm, loving presence, no winning necessary.  Collaboration rather than competition.  Both/and rather than either/or.  And offer to others by sharing rather than hoarding all resources for armageddon.  If you haven’t realized it by now, we are all going to die.  Why not take a deep breath and share like you were taught in kindergarten.  Why not experience joy, laughter and love before you check out.  It’s not really that hard.  Man up senators, congressmen and women.  Take a breath, question why you are choosing what you are choosing.  And if it is to maintain your power, the status quo, win your own tiny little battle to prove you are better than the other, take a risk, take a breath and make a healthier choice.

In other words, Knock it off!

Projection, blame, shame, judgment, aggression, defensiveness, these are all tactics of avoidance.  And we all use them when we bump up against a part of our selves that we do not like, a part we do not understand, a part we fear.  We use these tactics so that we do not have to face the unknown shadow side of ourselves.  I have done it, we all do it.  And it is time to stop avoiding.

The co-dependent partner wakes up to the awareness that she is codependent.  The veil has been lifted.  Wonderful.  Now the hard work begins.  Now the codependent  begins the journey of showing up for the neediness that she experiences inside.  Rather than asking the partner to show up and soothe the neediness - which is an activation of codependence - she needs to actually face the shadow within.  The wounding, perhaps the original abandonment, whatever it is, that brought her to a position of codependence.  The antidote is facing the pain within, showing up for it, bringing compassion to yourself and with this compassion listening to and being present with the pain you hold.  Our ability to simply be present with our pain is crucial.  It can seem miraculous, the change that occurs when we are able to simply be present with our pain, stay with it, feel it, let it move through us so that it can shift and move on.  Healing our pain is our responsibility, healing is an inside job.

I can liken this process to what is unfolding in our country.  This election, whatever side you are on, has made us all step into awareness.  The veil has been lifted.  It has become quite clear that we, as a country, are in pain.  And we must shift the way we have been operating.  We can not afford to engage the tools of avoidance, projection, blame, or judging the other.  We cannot afford to do this internally and we cannot afford to do this externally.  We must learn to sit in the uncomfortable space and show up for the other who is in pain, whoever they are.  We must listen to and show up with compassion for the pain of the other, whether the other is our own shadow, or the person down the block from us.  

Any part that is cast off in an effort to avoid, whether inside or outside ourselves will begin to be seen as a threat.  But this is not true.  We have created the threat through the lens of fear, and that fear grows through the mechanism of avoidance.  I am not saying there are not real threats in this world.  But I am saying many things we perceive as a threat are held in this position due to our own inability to feel, our inability to face our fears and our pain.  We must be courageous enough to listen with compassion to the pain of the other.  The internal other, the shadow part of our own nature, and the external other, our neighbor who holds different beliefs than our own.  We must show up with compassion and be willing to feel the the things that make us uncomfortable.  We must stop casting those things out, we must listen and feel if we want to become a healthy, whole organism.   
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I hope we may all begin the journey of feeling more deeply.  Healing is an inside job.  A job whose time has come.  We must each take up the mantle and become responsible for how we handle our own fear and our pain.  It is time.  

We all have issues.  After 25 years of working on myself, I still have issues, just ask my family.  If you’re alive, you have issues.  And they can be an opportunity to help us grow if we honor what is coming up for us rather than invalidating it.

Today I heard a person say, “but my issues are so much less than my friend’s, he’s going through the same thing only ten times greater than me.”  This person held a belief that she did not have a right to experience pain around said issue, she was invalidating her own experience because it was, in her mind, less than that of her friend’s.  She was invalidating due to a judgment she placed on the situation. 

I have come across this often in the work that I do.  We use many mechanisms to invalidate our issues, guilt, shame, empathy and compassion for other but not for self, we can create many defenses against feeling pain.  Whatever the mechanism, it is an invalidation of the self, and it is not appropriate.  All of our issues are valid, no matter how big, no matter how small, even if they are the size of a hang nail.

When we experience an issue with someone or something, we usually experience some form of emotional pain.  Pain is an indication that something within our system is out of alignment.  This is a warning system, saying look over here, pay attention!  Our issues and our emotions and pain around those issues are all part of a system of information helping us to know when we are out of alignment. It is our job to honor our experience, feel our feelings and face whatever the issue is that has come into our awareness, so that we can move back into alignment.  And so, no issue is invalid, it is simply information helping us stay in a healthy position.

Also, our pain is our pain.  It is no one else’s.  It may be true that someone you know has been through so much more than you.  This should in no way invalidate your experience.  You are experiencing your pain as a guidance system for you, it has nothing to do with anyone else and vice versa.  Telling ourselves we won’t listen to our pain because someone else has had a more difficult time than we have is like not watering our potted plant because our neighbor owns an entire garden. Telling ourselves we won’t listen to our pain for any reason is like looking at the “check engine” light on our car and ignoring it until our car breaks down.  Sorry to mix metaphors but hopefully this makes sense.  There is never a reason to invalidate your own pain or ignore an issue, no matter how big or how small.

Let me take a moment to say, there is a difference between validating an issue and working on it so that you can come back into alignment and using an issue to gain attention or sympathy.  Using an issue to gain sympathy is simply another issue indicating that we are out of alignment.  This issue also deserves to be honored and validated, so that it can be addressed and worked on, rather than judged.  Judgment serves only to shut the entire system down causing us to stay in a position of misalignment and keeping the issue in place.

So no matter what the issue of the day, try to soften any judgment you have around it.  Accept, with all the self-love you can muster, that this is worthy of attention, feel the feelings and begin working through it so that you can shift back into a healthier alignment, even if it’s just a hang-nail. 

Most of us are pretty good at showing up for our children, our loved ones, our pets… and yet not so good at showing up for ourselves.  When we offer ourselves the same unconditional love we offer our children, transformation can occur.

A few years ago I started out on a journey to try to love myself unconditionally.  I did not know what I was getting myself into.  It has been a wild ride of deep pain coming to the surface.  And that pain needs to be met with love.  It is always wonderful when a partner or a friend, sibling or  parent can show up for us in our pain.  But that is not the transformational element.  That is important, but not transformative.  When we show up within ourselves for the deep emotional pain that surfaces in our lives, that is transformative.  

I use an exercise when this deep pain shows up.  I speak to my inner wounded child from my healthy adult self.  This is simply a construct that allows us to send love to the deep pain we are holding.  Rather than avoiding it, rather than reaching to another to soothe it, rather than blaming another for causing it (all things I have done) allow yourself to sit and breathe and feel this deep emotional pain.  This is not fun, but it is important and you will survive it.  Then, with all the love you would give to your own child or pet or friend, speak to this wounded part of yourself.  It will sound weird, feel bizarre, but do it anyway.  It may sound something like this,  “I know you are in pain.  I want you to know, I am here for you and I love you.  I will always love you.  And I will never leave you.  There is nothing that you could do that would make me stop loving you.  I am here for you and it is ok for you to feel this pain.  I am here with you and I am not leaving.”  Yep, sounds weird to have this conversation within yourself, but no one has to know, so maybe just let yourself be weird.  

I have experienced the transformations that this can help bring about, and so have some of the clients I work with.  It helped me release levels of codependency that were hanging on after years of therapy.  It helped me stop blaming my partner for my own pain.  It brought me to a sense of deep trust and relaxation that allowed me to be more compassionate to those around me.  

It’s not rocket science.  It’s just love.  And it is transformative.  Give it a try and see what happens.  

Working with a client recently, I was reminded of how important it is for us to allow ourselves to be with and in our present state of existence before we try to “change.” 

When we are in pain, whether it is emotional or physical, anger and fear simply fuel the pain.  In order to shift into a new position, in this case, a place of less pain, we must allow ourselves to be in the present and accept what the present moment is giving us.  It  may sound counterintuitive, but to breathe and allow yourself to fully feel what is happening within you is the path to allowing it to shift. 

I have had much experience with this in my own life, certainly on an emotional level and most recently on a physical level.  And the principle is the same.  I have recently gone through a two year period of undiagnosed pain.  Many doctor visits, much money and many tests later my doctor’s frustration led him to ask me to go on prozac for a third time.  And although I believe the mind and body are connected, I did not believe that an anti-depressant was going to address my physical symptoms.  So I worked with my body as I have learned to work with my emotions.  And that is, I accepted my state of being without fear or judgment.  This took a lot of work in meditation and in comforting my internal state of fear about what was happening to my body, but I was able to relax my fear.  I was able to allow my body to be where it was without anger, fear or judgment.  And from this place, I was able to allow it to shift.  From this place of acceptance and listening to my body, I was able to shift the pain (as well as other physical symptoms).  And this experience is just one example of how important it is to start where you are.

Most often I am working with others on an emotional level, and so many people defend against what the present moment is bringing.  In our defensive position we often hold the breath, put up a wall and clench the body without even being aware of it.  And this is what keeps the pain firmly in place and sometimes exacerbates it.  It is the acceptance of the pain, allowing ourselves to fully feel it that brings movement so that it may shift.

Many of us, myself included in my younger years, are so fearful of our feelings.  We believe we cannot survive them.  If we open the floodgates we will never stop crying, “the pain will never stop, it’s been so long I can’t start now, if I let the door open the pain will just get bigger,” are some of the reasons I hear for stopping the flow of emotions within.  But we can survive, we can allow for the deepest of pain to move through us and as we do this it will move on and we can then shift into that easier place we have been holding our breath and praying for.  So, for today, answer your own prayer, breathe and allow yourself to feel what ever you have been avoiding and see what happens.  

As I was working on myself in my early 20’s I hit a wall.  One of many, by the way.  But the one I’m speaking of now is about my parents.  I had a hard time reconciling that my parents were good people who loved me, but also caused me pain.  It was hard to allow myself to know that both things could be true.  As I went through therapy I would zip back and forth between defending them because they were loving, good parents and tearing them down to my therapist for all the things “they did to me.”

My parents never did anything malicious.  And I was very fortunate to have healthy enough parents so that my brand of trauma was minimal compared to many.  But they, like all of us were wounded in their childhoods and when those wounds are not tended to by the individual who holds them, they are passed down to the next generation.  

As I grew and worked on myself and then began working with others, I learned.  I came to know that we can hold compassion for those who hurt us, because they are (most often) not doing so with malicious intent.  They are acting out because they are holding incredible unhealed pain within themselves.  And they don’t know how to shift it.  And this causes people to act out in an effort to release their pain.  

So back to the parents.  I began to realize that we can understand the truth of what happened without blame, but rather with compassion.  We can recognize that another person is responsible for word or deed that causes us pain and still have compassion for them.

Two things to know - 1.  It is our response to the other person, our perception of what they have done, the meaning we place on the event that has occurred that causes us pain.  So if we tell ourselves the other person is hateful, malicious, does not love us… we will suffer in pain longer than we have to.  If we understand, the other person has issues of their own that are informing their actions, that they actually do care for us, love us, but are not able to shift their behavior, then we can have compassion, and our pain lessens.

2.  Having understanding and compassion for the other is not a free pass to treat us poorly.  It is a healthy way to frame the situation so that we can respond in a healthy way.  A healthy response often means, addressing the issue with love and compassion, expressing to the other how they have hurt us and setting a boundary.  (It is another story, but yes, sometimes people don’t respect our boundaries no matter how many times we have set them.  If this occurs, at some point, we must consider distancing from the other.) 

Now as I work with others I simply say, we can hold compassion for the other even while we are holding pain, anger, frustration… for their actions or words.  We can discuss the situation and set boundaries from a place of compassion and love, rather than a place of blame. 

So, whether it be your parents, sibling, friend, boss, life partner, allow yourself to practice holding compassion even when you are angry.  It may take practice, but it is helpful and healthy.     
Still every once in a while I have to say - Oy, my mother…!

I have a tendency to shield myself these days from the news.  I work internally, work with others to help them shift internally and try not to allow myself to be bombarded by the negative messages that come from the media or our culture.  Also, I recently married into a beautiful family that responsibly pays attention to all things prejudice, unfair, not-right with the world.  To me this is beautiful.  So, I find myself in the midst of a lot of pain and anger within my beautiful new family over what is happening in our world today.  Rightfully so.  

The pain and anger we all hold, no matter what side of the line you are on, is valid, and it needs to be transmuted, not acted upon.  We do not know how to allow for pain and shift it in this society and we need to learn, quickly.  It actually happens over and over, the victim of a crime forgiving the perpetrator.  I believe Jesus was big on this.  The end of Apartheid is an example, 
truth and reconciliation, building a bridge between the oppressor and the oppressed.  Every once in a while you will see a news story of parent or spouse of a victim going to the jail to confront and yes, forgive the perpetrator.  

This is not airy-fairy stuff my friends.  This takes courage.  And to me this is the way through.  The only response to violence is love.  There I said it.  I have felt this for a long time.  I felt it with 9/11, I feel it when others act out against me personally and I believe it is called for here.  My family will probably respectfully disagree with me.  That is ok, because we love each other.  Love.  It is more powerful than hate or blame.  

Allow yourself to sit with your pain, your anger, your hatred and breathe and let yourself feel it.  Feel it burning deep within you.  This is actually painful, but it is the only way.  Allow yourself to feel it without adding to the story.  Each time you notice you are feeding the story inside your mind, “oh, he did this and that was wrong and he needs - a, b, c, or d…” catch yourself and lovingly bring yourself back to simply feeling the feelings that the event and this story brings up in you.  You have a right to be angry.  You do not have a right to act out on that anger.  It is your responsibility to feel it and transmute it.  You and you alone can do this.  We must all do this.  There is no other way.  

When I do this in my personal life the affects are sometimes miraculous.  Rather than yelling at the other as I would like, I sit with my pain for as long as it takes, breathing in and out, feeling it, stopping the storyline in my head.  At some point I shift into understanding that the other, no matter what they have done, the other has done their deed because of all they have been taught, and all they have not been taught.  We are products of our conditioning.  And we need to stop acting out.  We can shift into compassion and love for the perpetrator no matter what the deed.  It is the only way.  I cannot say it enough.  It is the only way.  This other, this perpetrator was acting out on his own pain, conditioning, using the information he or she was taught throughout their life.  This is not an excuse to allow anyone to continue violent behavior.  It is a call to stop ourselves from doing the same.  Understand the other is conditioned, taught unhealthy mechanisms, ideas and is in great pain and is incapable of doing anything other than acting out.  And sit with the pain that informs you it would help you to do the same.  This is not true.  We have been conditioned erroneously too.  It will satisfy your ego for a very limited time to act out.  And then the cycle continues.  It never stops.  The only way to stop it is to shift into understanding, compassion and love for the perpetrator.  Breathe in and out, feel the anger, then breathe in and out and feel love.  It is possible.  It is possible, it is possible.  

When I was a young girl I used to be called many names.  Bush-head, because I had really unreasonable, bushy hair, stupid and various forms of this, and I was mistaken for a boy all the time.  In the midst of this it is understandable that I was depressed and thought poorly about myself.  I did not have any friends and I retreated to the solace of my bedroom where I would listen to music for hours to help me shift out of a very dark place.  

Music was a very helpful tool.  I also happened upon one other technique that was helpful to me.  I looked in the mirror, mostly to determine how ugly the acne and bushy hair made me.  But one day, I looked into my eyes and I felt something other than the heavy depression I was constantly experiencing.  When I looked into my eyes, I connected with another part of myself, a part that did not follow the story that was being told by the bushy hair, acne, and barrage of negative words being thrown my way.  When I looked into my eyes, I knew there was a part of me that was good.  Even if it was buried deep underneath the surface.  I knew it was there.  And this saved me.

As I work with people now, I run into this all the time.  Young and not so young identifying with the thoughts they have about themselves.  And these thoughts have been taught to us, conditioned within us by others who are looking at us and telling a false story about us.  This happens because of the pain that other person is holding within, but that is another story. We hear these things and we start to inflate the story.  We pile more onto it and we spiral downward.  

Two things to know - our feelings are very loyal, they will follow where ever our thoughts lead them.  So if you are telling a negative story about yourself you will experience negative feelings.  If you are telling a positive story about yourself you will experience positive feelings.  Also, we humans with our big brains experience about 60,000 thoughts per day, 80% of which are not true.  We have erroneous thoughts all the time, so we have to be careful, just because a thought pops into our heads, does not make it true.

So, back to 13 year old me looking in the mirror.  I had a constant story running inside of me that said, "you are ugly, worthless, stupid, you were supposed to be a boy, you couldn’t even get that right," and on and on….  Imagine how this would make a person feel.  Oy!  Not a fun bunch of years!  But as I looked into my eyes, I started to slowly chip away at this erroneous story.  I started to identify with another part of myself.  A part that had nothing to do with my appearance, my gender, my intelligence or my abilities in any way.  I began to know and feel, even though I could not have said it this way at the time, that I was not only made up of the negative thoughts and feelings I was identifying with, they were a part of me, but they were not me.  I began to know that I was so much more.  And I slowly shifted my identification with all the negative stories coming at me from others and from within myself.  This was a process.  It took time, especially because I was doing it alone.  

I have clients who insist they were born bad, that there is just something inherently wrong with them.  They hold fiercely to the belief that for them, life is just different, and not in a good way.  And when I speak to them and say, this is a conditioned belief, this is not the truth of who you are, they never believe me - at first.  It takes time.  You may not find the whole of you by looking into your eyes as I did.  But perhaps you can try an experiment.  Allow yourself to imagine that there might be more to you than what you currently think and feel.  Allow yourself to imagine that what you believe to be you is just a part of you.  A painful part, but only a part.  Even if you have no evidence to the contrary, allow yourself to imagine that your pain and the events causing this pain are simply part of a greater whole.  And within that greater whole, you too are good, loving and lovable.  Even if you don’t believe it, try it as an experiment.  And try reaching out to someone you trust and revealing your pain.  It may take time, but the pain you are experiencing is not you, and you do not have to stay in your pain forever.

Getting hurt in a relationship is a common experience.  And so it is very important that we maintain a healthy perspective on what is happening.  One reason we engage in relationships at all is so that we can learn more about ourselves.  Our partners, whether it is an intimate relationship, a friendship, a working relationship, our partner in the relationship is there as a reflection for us to see who we are.  And when we are hurt, it is because they have triggered something that is unresolved within us, something we are holding, most often from our childhood.  

I have heard more that one client say to me, I did it because he/she did it to me.  This is the aching, painful cry of the wounded child within.  And at the time of such a hurt, we need to show up for that wounded child from our own healthy adult.  We do not need to begin to make decisions and act out in retaliation from that wounded, hurt child.  The wound, the pain, needs to be addressed and understood before we make any decisions, before we act out in anger or begin to relate to our partner from within our own pain.

One of the best ways to do this is through an exercise, a meditation that is very helpful. 

• First, find a safe, quiet space where you will not be interrupted. 
• Close your eyes, if that feels comfortable, and allow yourself to fully feel the pain that you have experienced.  This may be difficult, you may cry, you may get angry… just allow yourself to feel whatever feelings come, without having to do anything about them.  It’s ok to feel these things inside your body.  Your body will process them and eventually the feeling will pass or shift into something else. 
• Sit with the feelings for a little while; this could be 5 or 10 minutes if you can tolerate that.
• Next, allow yourself to imagine that all that pain was coming from a younger version of you.  Perhaps the type of pain you just experienced brings a picture of you as a teenager or a five year old.  Whatever age you perceive, just allow that. Most likely you will get a picture of an age from your youth that resonates with the kind of pain you just experienced.
• Finally, allow your imagination to shift and envision you as a healthy, loving adult.  And from this part of yourself begin to speak to the child version of yourself.  Let the child know that you love her (or him), you will always be there for her and that you are the one who will carry the responsibility of this situation.  And what ever the specifics are, address that.  For example, if you got triggered into a fear of abandonment, assure your child that you will never leave her.  And let yourself feel the safety and security in this idea.  Another expample, if you got triggered into feeling trapped or cornered, assure your child that you are here to protect her and you will never allow anyone to take advantage of her.  And again, remind the child that you are always here for her, that you will never leave and that you love her unconditionally.

Breathe deeply as you are having this conversation so that you can begin to feel the feelings connected to these thoughts.

There are many ways to describe what is happening here.  But generally, I would say, as adults it is our job to address and heal our wounds of childhood, rather than looking to our partners to do this.  Whoever we were with when the wound got created is most likely not the person who is triggering it now.  So it is inappropriate to ask them to heal it for us.  They are not the perpetrator.  They are simply a person who has agreed to show us a reflection of ourselves, and in this case, they are showing us, there is work to be done to heal this wound.

There is no need to take anything personally.  Absolutely nothing.  That judgment that you feel coming from the other person is often a projection you have placed upon them and is not true.  And if by chance the other actually is judging you, it is there issue and has nothing to do with you.

This is where many people get tripped up.  “But what do you mean it has nothing to do with me?  They think I’m stupid!  How can I let that go without being hurt by it?”

There are many responses to this.  An energetic response might say that you have been holding that perception of yourself for such a long time (not your rational adult mind, but your wounded inner child mind) that you are sending out that signal and it is then being reflected back to you.  The other person has nothing to do with it other than being a mirror for your life. 

The psychological perspective might say that the other person comes to this (erroneous) conclusion based on all the experiences they have had in their life, and based on how they think about, perceive, interpret and/or frame those experiences.  I would add that for most of us, the way we perceive the world around us was taught to us by our parents in childhood.  We learn their belief systems, their values, and we continue to take in the world around us based on those beliefs, even as adults.  This is why it is so important for us to examine how we think and what we feel and believe.  Without this examination, we are merely living our lives through the lens of our parents.  And so, when we are judged by another, it is a perception that comes from an amalgam of their interpretations often based on unexamined thoughts and beliefs.  And the other’s judgment of me really has nothing to do with the truth of who I am, but has everything to do with the perception the other person has of me based on their life experiences.

I am not saying to never look at what another person offers you as reflection about yourself.  Take it in, think about it, but decide for yourself if you have anything to learn from this.  If needed speak with a trusted friend to help you with a level of objectivity around it.  But through all of this processing, do your best not to take the information personally.  If there is something to learn from the information,  this is an opportunity to grow and there is no need for you to be in pain.  If the information is a judgment that offers no truth about you, let it go.