The Crazy Ups and Downs of Friendship

During this past year I have experienced what I am sure many of you have and that is serious disappointment with friendships and relationships and all the craziness that can ensue.

There is no getting around it, there will be times that we will let down the people we care about and they will let us down as well. There are deal breakers that come up that are unacceptable but the smaller things seem to have become big things for so many people and I will try to shed some light on these other things and give a spiritual outlook on all of this.

I think the first thing would be for each person in turn to define clearly what friendship is to them and what you expect. This would be an eye opener for you when you find that in a lot of cases you may simply be expecting too much perfection from another person when you aren’t perfect yourself. None of us are!

With me, this perfection is expected more than most because I am a spiritual teacher and a member of the clergy. This puts me in a precarious position when it comes to befriending people and allowing them into my private space and daily life. Too many times I am put on some kind of pedestal and I do not want to be there. I do not insist on someone using my title of reverend and in fact do not make it a big deal at all. It is other people who make it a big deal. I am not a celebrity nor do I wish to become one.
As a child, my family moved around a lot and as a result of that I never had any close friends. I was always hungry for a friend that I could be with to share who and what I was. So, in retrospect I realized when I became an adult that I was Not very selective when it came to picking a friend, if they befriended me that was enough.

Through the earlier years I had some real weird friendships. I also had some extremely hurtful ones. Looking back I arrived at the conclusion that most of them were co-dependant just like my mother and father. They were all I had as role models. I learned at the heavy knees of serious dysfunction. Monkey see, Monkey do!

I have grown a lot on discernment but I, like everyone else needs a friendship that is sustaining and real. I came to a realization that life being what it is, that this would be one of the biggest challenges of all. I thought it would be death, judgment or betrayal, etc. What I have come to know is all the other challenges are tied to relationships in all its many forms and definitions.
For a while it was starting to feel as though I was detoxing from negative relationships/friendships. Are there any Friendship Anonymous Groups out there? Maybe there should be!
Now don’t get me wrong I have had some wonderful friendships along the way but I have also learned that not everyone in your life is supposed to be there for the rest of your life.
It would be real crowded at the dinner table if this were true.

People keep showing up and doing exactly what they are supposed to do to show you something, teach you something and point the way back to the purest essence of self. All my relationships that I had previously labeled bad were not in fact bad at all. They were a blessing and what had happened was for my greatest and highest good and theirs but it is my journey and not theirs I concentrate on.

Now, when something happens that breaks my heart and drags down my spirit instead of retaliating and becoming angry, I retreat into myself in prayer and meditation and ask the question, “What am I supposed to know about me and for me?” I ask to see the blessings that are there. I want to do this as fast as possible and not arrive to a conclusion years later. I simply don’t want to drag around all the hurt for years. Talk about living in the past. I want to live, learn and move on and become a better, wiser and more enlightened soul. I want to embrace my power. I do not want to be bitter and full of resentment at something I feel has been done to me. I see it spiritually as something that happened for me, not to me.

I utilize the spiritual tools of introspection, solitude, meditation, prayer and allow myself to look inward to carry me forward out of any darkness and into the light. I do not want to fuel a negative situation with more negative energy. It takes practice and a commitment to the process to just “Let Go,” after you know what you need to know. Accept it and move on.

This is the way to your higher self and God. This is the road to what is called Mastery.
Becoming the master of your life is something that when started…one step leads to a more powerful one and so on. It is addicting in a peaceful sense. You are then no longer a wonderer but rather a “Knower.”

Visualize with me for a moment and imagine a train trip that you are on. You start in a place that is dirty and dark with almost no scenery that brings you joy. The train takes off and as you watch the scenery out the window it gets gradually more beautiful and full of life with clear blue skies and thousands of trees and waterfalls. Occasionally it goes through a dark tunnel and pops out the other side and the scenery gets more incredible, as your eyes drink it all in, your heart swells with happiness. Soon another tunnel ahead and maybe this one is darker and scarier for a bit and then just as before it pops out very quickly to the other side blasting you with beauty and peace and knowledge of what you just experienced.

I am describing the spiritual journey of a committed seeker. If this is not you then this is something to think about. WWW.MAKEACHOICENOW.COM

You don't need to stand in the corner any longer

Sometimes an inner struggle takes on the proportions of a war, creating literal inner hell. These conflicts can generate considerable internal damage and lead to emotional problems like depression or the physical breakdown we know as disease.

Your inner child is not being contrary. It is just that she holds a different perspective on life than you do. If as child you felt unloved for example, she will hold a view of herself, life and the world that is skewed. A child does not have the capacity to sort out that her mother has repressed sexual issues and that her father was never encouraged to openly express his emotions or her grandmother is an alcholic. All a child knows is that she hurts and that the love that she needs isn’t there. And then, she makes what I call THE FATAL STEP, which every child takes. She says, “The love that I need isn’t here, there must be something wrong with me.” The safety zone is gone and carries over.

In that moment, the downward spiral begins.

She has come to believe that the difficulties were either created by her or that they were created in response to her. She will not realize that she is just an innocent child caught in a dysfunctional situation. All she knows is that something – and she won’t know what – is wrong with her. Instead of remaining with the family situation where it was created, the dysfunction is now a part of her. She has come to believe that the problem was at least in part, created by who she was. Since she was in some way responsible for what happened, she will then carry her defectiveness with her wherever she goes. Thus she will be driven to compensate for her failings as she grows up and moves out into the world.

This will inhibit her ability to be free in life and requires that she take defensive measures in order to protect herself. She will be isolated from her passion, from her power, from her self-confidence. Making the situation even more difficult is that the injured inner child who holds the defective attitudes is hard-wired into the adult’s power. She can pretty much do as she pleases and there isn’t a lot the adult can do about it.

So today, you want to take a risk and she panics. You want to become intimate with someone and she is overwhelmed by the fear of being rejected. You want to deal with your inner pain and she fears the kind of overwhelm that she felt when she was a child.

You want to be successful in your business and she cannot permit that kind of public exposure so as the adult you have a fear of success. And as if that weren’t enough, she has the power to totally dominate your life. You have your wit, wisdom and intellect, but when it comes to emotionally charged situations, the child takes over. That is her domain. And the person who takes over is a powerless, vulnerable, scared, defective, unloved, hurting, emotionally challenged child. Back then, the world was dangerous. Big people could not be trusted. Guess what is going to happen today? You try to run your life and she keeps pulling the rug out.

It is vital that you work at understanding and healing that inner child so you can become a fully functioning adult. If you are struggling this just may be all you need to be whole. Where there is knowledge there is the absence of fear.
www.makeachoicenow.com ladydiannia!makeachoicenow.com