What is the Purpose of Our Relationships?

Every relationship arrives in our lives to give us the opportunity for healing. What we do with that opportunity is our choice. If we waste it trying the same old behaviors that didn't work for us in the past, we can repeat the same old mistakes and get the same lousey results.

If we decide to do our recovery work and begin the journey within, we may find that we have been presented with the same lesson again and again. Our Higher Power has the patience and all the time in the world to teach us the lessons we need to improve our lives. If we don't learn our lessons, they are repeated over and over again until we finally get it. Once we learn the lesson, the next one is presented.

Each time we have a choice... it's okay to lose, just as long as we don't lose the lesson.

Here are some of my lessons...

I learned patience, tolerance, forgiveness, wisdom, kindness, generosity, and letting go from my relationship with my son's Dad after we no longer lived together.

I have learned tenderness, love, gentleness, loyalty, respect, acceptance and that change can be safe in my relationship with my partner.

I have learned to let go and allow my son to become his own person, a capable adult.

These were all difficult lessons. Some hurt a great deal, some left me with scars that remind me of the difficulty of the lesson every day. But all of them are lessons I needed to learn to be the person I have become. I regret none of them.

The most important lesson of all I saved for last... trust... I learned that from my Higher Power

Have Another Cookie Sweetie

We are four years old. We have just come home from the playground where a bully has pushed us off the swings and we have scraped our knee. We are crying. Our Mom is sitting with us bandaging our knee. She smiles up at us and says, "It's okay sweetie pie. You're all right." She finishes the bandage and wipes away the tears. She crosses to the cabinet and retrieves a cookie. "Here you go. Have a cookie, you'll feel better." We eat the cookie and moments later feel the rush of energy from the sugar. We don't feel better about the incident with the bully, we haven't even processed what has happened and no one has chosen to talk it over with us. We do, however, feel energized by the sugar. We get up off the chair, receive a hug from Mom and go play. We ignore our feelings, just like Mom.


What have we learned from this experience?

We have learned several lessons. In our four year old mind we think as follows: first; injuries cause us to receive cookies we might not be allowed to eat otherwise. Second, being bullied by another child and the hurt feelings that follow are not discussed. Third, our feelings are unimportant. Four, adults know best what to do and how to react to what is happening to us, therefore we model ourselves after them.

From an adult perspective we have been taught the following: when we are upset, injured, traumatized or uncomfortable we should look for something to ingest to make ourselves feel better, whether a cookie or a pill. Dealing with feelings is difficult, unnecessary and complicated. Processing what has happened to us, which requires the assistance of an adult, is not going to happen. Overall, we are not important enough to be taken seriously and we don't have the voice to express our needs.

As we progress in life we carry this lesson with us. It is a powerful lesson. We may transfer the lesson from cookies to alcohol, prescription drugs or illicit drugs. Regardless of what choice we make we are still using the lesson of the cookie. Rather than facing our feelings or proactively dealing with situations we choose to anesthetize both the feelings and situations.

What happens when we have spent a great deal of our lives anesthetizing ourselves from our feelings? How do we come back to life again? We use our tools, practice self care, work on our recovery increasing our self esteem one day at a time until we once again begin to feel.

Why Are There Sooo Many Lessons!!!

There are times when we all wish we could hit Ctrl - Alt -Del and reboot ourselves. Would it be useful to be able to wipe out our memory of painful past events? There are times when we might wish for the ability to delete portions of our past. Part of the recovery process is accepting that all of our past has combined to make us the person we are becoming. We cannot yet know the outcome of our combined experiences. Like the tree that has lost its shape, we may need pruning to regain our inner beauty.

Each of our experiences, whether pleasant or otherwise has been purposeful. It has presented a lesson to us. Whether we choose to learn the lesson is up to us. Lessons that we need are presented to us repeatedly until we acknowledge and learn from them. Many times we may ask why a particular situation seems to occur again and again in our lives. We are being presented with a lesson that is important for our growth and balance as healthy persons. It is acceptable for us to lose, just don't let us lose the lesson.

As we grow in our recovery and study our past we may notice a pattern emerging. An example of what might happen: a moderately uncomfortable lesson may be presented to us early in our lives. We are unaware and miss the point of the lesson. The next time that same lesson presents itself, it is more difficult. We struggle against the path placed before us and again miss the teachings of the lesson. A third time the lesson is revealed. This time the pain demands our attention. We can no longer ignore the point of the lesson.

Early in our lives we may not have had the tools to identify and learn from the lessons we faced. If we lived in a dysfunctional environment we may not have had examples from our caretakers regarding challenges and how to learn from the lessons they teach. We can forgive ourselves for missing our earliest lessons.

As we become aware of our path and notice the subtle lessons presenting themselves, we can choose early on to accept the teachings. If we are diligent in pursuing our lessons, we may avoid some of the more painful experiences that may come from ignoring the challenges along our path. Life is a series of lessons to be learned as we progress along our path of recovery. This is what creates wisdom. As we gather wisdom it is our choice to integrate what we have learned into our self image. The more adept we become at learning our lessons the greater our self esteem.

As we walk the path set before us we practice forgiveness toward ourselves and others for the lessons missed. We can relax and trust in our higher power knowing that those teachings that are necessary for our continued growth will be repeated.

Letting Go

To say that letting go is difficult is an understatement. Letting events flow as the universe intends goes against the human instinct. We all strive to control outcomes. But is that really effective? When we move against the current, the ebb and flow of universal synergy, we set up a peculiar energy that others can feel. They may not be able to put their finger on what they sense, but they certainly sense that something is not right. Controlling outcomes may cause harm. Someone we love may be suffering the consequences of prior behaviors or acts. If we try to control outcomes to minimize their pain, should we succeed, what have we accomplished? We have failed to let our loved one learn their lesson. Instead we have taught them that when they make a mistake we will step in and save them from the natural consequences of their actions. This will eventually force the universe to cause them to experience a more severe consequence that even we cannot fix. So, have we helped? No. We have stepped in, and in our effort to provide a false bottom for them, have delayed them learning their lesson, actually causing them greater harm in the long run. Letting go means that we trust that we, and others, are exactly where we are supposed to be in the moment, and that there is a greater plan that we cannot yet see. When an artist paints he sees each individual brush stroke as he creates his masterpiece. He has a greater plan in mind. If we see only the brush strokes, we miss the masterpiece. We must step back and view the completed painting, seeing it in its entirety. Only then do we really understand the master plan. Our lives are like a painting. We cannot easily step back and view the path on which we walk. Only when time has passed and we have the opportunity to look back in retrospect can we appreciate the art of the universes plan.

Stimulus

I watched C-SPAN today as the Senate debated the Economic Stimulus package. I was engrossed by the lesson I was seeing played out before me. In this country we have citizens who's opinions differ substantially, often polar opposites, yet we all live in peace. The Senate is a microcosm of this fact. Each Senator devotes his time on the Senate floor to arguing his position on the Stimulus package, which he believes is a reflection of his constituents desires. Here is the lesson is perfection... no Senator will be satisfied with the completed package once the debate is over. All have compromised. Yet, the bill will be passed. This is a tool we can use in our daily lives as we find ourselves in conflict with others. Many times communication and compromise are the keys to finding an acceptable solution to our difficulties. If we accept that no one person in the conflict will be completely satisfied, then compromise becomes an acceptable solution, and communication becomes the means to achieve a satisfactory end. As one wise woman said, "The hardest part about life is accepting reality when you don't like it."