Abundant Spirituality + codependency recovery + inner child healing + Love = Joy2MeU Joy2MeU Home Page
This is the Update Newsletter of the Joy2MeU web site of codependency therapist, inner child healing pioneer, Spiritual teacher Robert Burney - who is the author of the Joyously inspirational book of Spirituality: Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls.
These Update Newsletters are posted online 4 times a year at about 3 month intervals. (This year there are only going to be 3 Updates.)
A short announcement e-mail is sent out notifying people who sign up for the Joy2MeU e-mailing list when a new Update is posted.
(Links within the text will open in a separate browser window, while most of those in right hand column will take you away from this page.)

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Joy to You & Me and Joy2MeU Update Newsletter

"So, have a happy, merry, sad, Joyous, painful, peaceful, scary, cheerful in the moment Holiday season experiencing what it feels like to be alive in human body.  Whatever your celebration: Christmas, Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, Kwanzaa, New Years, etc. let it be about the new beginning; the rededication to: the recommitment to: the rebirth of; life.  But most of all, let it be about Love by first of all Loving yourself enough to tell the critical parent voice in your head to shut up with all the comparisons and shame and judgment." - Happy Holidays, Sad Holidays Hello to all of you Magnificent Spiritual Beings who are in body this Holiday Season. The Holidays can be a very difficult time emotionally for many of us.  For that reason I have in the last few weeks used my New page to focus some attention on some seasonal articles that I think can be helpful this time of year.  One of those articles is the one quoted above entitled Happy Holidays, Sad Holidays.  Another is from my series on the Serenity Prayer: Intellectual Discernment - "have to" and the Holiday Season.  A few weeks earlier I had called attention to a Thanksgiving article on the importance of owning our power to choose to focus on the positive instead of allowing the disease to cause us to focus on the negative.  The two day workshop I did in Ontario Canada in October - as well as the 2 hour workshop I did at a CoDA miniconfernce in the Bay Area also in October - went very well.  One of the exciting things on the Horizon for 2005 is several appearances that I have scheduled.  The most exciting of those is that I am leading a weekend retreat on the Spanish Mediterranean Island of Ibiza on the weekend of April 9 & 10th - and possibly workshops in Nice and/or Monaco the week prior.  That is exciting!  I am also going to be speaking at a CoDA Speaker Meeting in Cuyahoga Falls Ohio in the morning and doing a workshop in the afternoon at the University of Akron on May 14th, 2005.  Information about these appearances can be found on my Workshop page. Unfortunately I also had to turn down an invitation to do a workshop as part of a CoDA retreat in England because the timing did not coincide with the appearances in Spain and France - and there was not enough expense money offered to make the trip to England by itself.  Both the appearances in Spain and France, and the one in Ohio, are being organized by people there locally who feel my work has been very helpful to them.  If anyone out there is interested in organizing a workshop of some sort in your local area, or knows of an organization that might sponsor one, check out the Workshop page for details and conditions, and send me an e-mail.  I added 3 articles to this site that were originally published on Suite101 - and 5 more page to my personal journal within the Joy2MeU Journal since the last Update.  And I am adding a handout page to the site at the same time I post this Update. I am not sure how many of you are even aware of the pages that I have on the site that include some literature handouts that I have picked up over the years that I have found value in - they are listed on the New page and Siteindex page but not real prominently.  One of them - Handout page 1 - includes handouts entitled: The Ten Commandments of Self-Esteem, The Rules for Being Human, and Risking.  The other one I have had on my site for awhile Handout page 2  - includes: Three versions of the Serenity Prayer, The Personal Bill of Rights,  Characteristics of Adults Shamed in Childhood, and Some possible signs of Hidden Anger.  I actually had noticed some weeks ago that the handout entitled Characteristics of Adults Shamed in Childhood that I had posted was incomplete - and that the last 2 items on the list were missing for some reason.  I just added them because they were both important ones - one having to do with how Adults Shamed in Childhood tend to build up walls, and the other is one - that almost always gets a strong response when people hear it read - that states: Adults Shamed in Childhood . . often have caseloads rather than friendships.  A very insightful handout is that one on the results of being shamed in childhood.  At a CoDA meeting I was at last week, one of the handouts that was read - Twisted Codependent Thinking - particularly resonated with me at this time because of some recent behavior that I have been subjected to that was a perfect example of the kind of twisted codependent black and white reactions that fit those listed on the page.  This is a handout that I have had for years - and that I have meant to add to the site for some time.  (And yes, it is permissible in CoDA meetings to read non CoDA approved literature. Also when I talk about the codependent reactions listed on that page - I have not just been subjected to them, I was guilty of some of the ones on that list in the relationship experience I had earlier this year.  Fortunately I was able to clean up my side of the street the last time I interacted with the person - something I talk about in my November suite101 article - unfortunately the other person acted out almost everything on that list.) When adding this third handout page I got a little carried away.  On that page Handout page 3 is the list I mentioned Twisted Codependent Thinking - along with a list entitled: As a Person I have the Right to.  I also included a short quote on One Day at a Time that comes from Melody Beattie's great daily meditation book The Language of Letting Go.  I was trying to figure out a 4th handout to put on that page - and then thought of a chart that I had used in my Joy2MeU Journal that I think is valuable in helping people to understand the growth process a little bit better so they don't judge themselves as much.  When I went to the Journal to find that chart, I ended up including a long section from the page in my personal journal that I had used that chart in.  The section is entitled The Individual Growth / Recovery Process - and includes the chart as a visual aid in understanding some things I share about metaphysical levels of the growth process. One of the new links I recently added to my recommend links page is to a great movie: What the Bleep Do We Know!?  It is a movie about quantum physics - and I didn't just like it because they sounded like they were quoting from my book at times.  It is really quite fascinating stuff.  One of the things that was especially gratifying to me had to do with the neural pathways in the brain.  I have been telling people for quite a few years that it was possible to reprogram the neural pathways in our brains by doing the inner child healing work - but that was an intuitive Knowing on my part.  It was something that I Knew to be Truth - even though I wasn't real clear on exactly what neural pathways were.  In the movie they have some wonderful animation - that among other things shows how the neural pathways can be programmed either negatively or positively depending upon what attitudes and perspectives a person chooses to empower.  You can find out where the movie is playing in your area by checking the web site. News:  I have had a new version of my bumper sticker made up.  I will mail one of these new bumper stickers to anyone who has bought my book or tape set, is a Journal subscriber, a phone counseling client, or has made a donation to the cause, if they will send me a self addressed, stamped #10 business type envelope.  I am also going to include a bumper sticker in any orders for 2 or more book and/or tape sets through the Holiday season (and beyond) for anyone who wants to give my book or tapes as a Christmas present.  See Special Offers page.

Additions to the web site since the  August 2004 Update include: Five pages added to my personal journal in the Joy2MeU Journal. Three articles originally published on suite 101 were added as pages on this site: Emotional Incest = Sexuality Abuse Setting Internal Boundaries in relationship to Romantic, Sexual Relationships Taking self worth out of the equation in Romantic Relationships Seasonal articles of value: Happy Holidays, Sad Holidays Intellectual Discernment - "have to" and the Holiday Season Thanksgiving Column Major news: I am conducting a weekend retreat on the Spanish Mediterranean island of Ibiza the second weekend in April and a Workshop in Ohio on May 14th. In addition: More feedback and testimonials were added to Phone Counseling Testimonials page. Two new batches of wonderful Testimonials for the book, tapes, and web site. Some feedback about the Journal pages added to the Journal Testimonial page New resources have been added to the Referral to local Therapist / Counselors page in Arizona, Canada and Virginia.  A new selection of diversified and interesting looking links were added. Most Recent articles published on my Suite101 page also listed on my page Suite101 Articles page: August 2004  Codependent Defenses - Part 1 The Gatekeeper September 2004  Codependent Defenses - Part 2  disassociation vs healthy detachment October 2004  Codependent Defenses - Part 3 My Gatekeeper November 2004  Codependence Recovery - Taking Responsibility  Part 1 Links to past Update Newsletters for the Joy2MeU site (launched February 4, 1999) can be found on the Information index page.  Links to the Newsletters of my original Joy to You & Me web site (launched February 28, 1998) can be found on the Joy to You & Me page which list pages from that site not moved to Joy2MeU.

On January 3rd of 2005 I will celebrate 21 years of being clean and sober.  A True miracle - that was made possible for me because the 12 step recovery process taught me to live life in a Spiritual Growth context.

"The reason that the twelve step approach works is because it is aligned with Spiritual Truth.  The meaning and purpose of life is Spiritual.  Life is not is about sin and punishment.  It is not some meaningless accident."

In October I did some reorganization of my site index page to move that online book out of the Codependence section of that page to a place below the inner child healing section.  I added this explanation for that move to that page:

"In October 2004 I am reorganizing this page slightly to reflect that the following online book is an advanced look at the phenomena of Codependency.  It is titled Book 2 because Book 1 will include the information above about the inner child healing process."

I am going to be quoting from some different chapters of that work in this Newsletter section of this Update.  I have decided that since it is the Holiday Season, since Christmas is upon us, I would share these excerpts here as part of an explanation of what I believe is the True Spirit of this time of the year - and what I believe is the True essence of the message, messenger, and symbol that was/is Jesus Christ.

Christmas, like almost every other Christian Holiday, is a celebration that was usurped from Pagan religions that preceded Christianity.  The early Christians obviously included some people who were very good at marketing, because they made Christianity more palatable to the people they were trying to convert by stealing Pagan celebrations and making them Christian Holidays.

This early pragmatism of Christianity laid the foundation for Christianity to become the state religion of Rome.  That state religion then became very dogmatic in using Christianity to conquer, subdue, and control the masses.

As I explain in my book, and repeatedly point out in my writing, one of the defining dynamics of codependency is black and white thinking.

One of the core characteristics of this disease of Codependence is intellectual polarization - black and white thinking.  Rigid extremes - good or bad, right or wrong, love it or leave it, one or ten.  Codependence does not allow any gray area - only black and white extremes.

Life is not black and white.  Life involves the interplay of black and white.  In other words, the gray area is where life takes place.  A big part of the healing process is learning the numbers two through nine - recognizing that life is not black and white.

This black and white thinking - which as I explain in my book was caused by the polarization of the Energy Field of Collective Human Intellectual Consciousness / lower mind - has been the single most destructive force in the history of humanity.  It is the cause of war and violence around the world today - us vs them.  Reacting to black and white extremes within one's own personal process is self destructive - as well as a major block to relating to one another in healthy ways.

Black and white thinking is also the reason that the Christian religion has historically been one of the most destructive single entities in the history of the planet.

Even the messages of the Master Teachers who managed to stay aligned with Truth, and were put to death for it, did not survive.  Their messages became twisted and distorted by their followers or people claiming to be their followers - so that religions and groups formed in their names ended up serving the darkness in the name of those Master Teachers and the messages of Truth that they had carried.

Because everything was reversed it makes logical sense that the teachings of one of the most important Master Teachers in the history of humanity would be the teacher whose name has been most abused.  Actually most of us know very little of what this very important Master Teacher really taught because his teachings were so completely twisted and distorted shortly after his death.

The man who was primarily responsible for distorting those teachings was not even a follower of this teacher, nor had he ever met him - but he was successful in using this teacher's name to form the biggest multi-national conglomerate ever to serve evil.  The corporate religion that was formed in the name of this Master Teacher - though it also did much good and even in serving evil was a perfect part of the Divine plan - has been the single most enduring and obstructive organization to serve the darkness in the name of Light and Truth that has ever existed.

Up until this very day this Master Teacher's name is being taken in vain by bigoted, racist, small-minded people - very sick, controlling, Codependents with very terrified, very wounded inner children - who act in ways that are the very reverse from this man's teachings.

The coming of this Master Teacher 2000 years ago was a milestone in the journey that marked a great acceleration in the process of moving back to alignment with the Light within.

This Master Teacher was known as Jesus the Christ.  The man Jesus was a perfect child of the Goddess and God energy - just as we all are perfect children of the God-Force!

This messenger added the most powerful ingredient to the process.  He brought us our secret weapon. He taught Love.  He carried the message of a Loving God.

The Winter Solstice marks the shortest day of the year - and the beginning of an increase in the light shining into human lives.  So too, the birth of Jesus (which did not occur in December) was a milestone in accelerating the process of a returning Human Collective Consciousness to alignment with the Truth of Light and Love.  That transformational process is happening on the planet now - despite all the seeming evidence to the contrary.  And everyone who is involved in this healing process is having an impact on that transformation.  By learning to Love our self in a healthy way, we are healing the planet.

As I say in the quote from my article Happy Holidays - Sad Holidays that I used at the beginning of this Update: ". . . . let it (this Holiday Season) be about the new beginning; the rededication to: the recommitment to: the rebirth of; life.  But most of all, let it be about Love by first of all Loving yourself enough to tell the critical parent voice in your head to shut up with all the comparisons and shame and judgment."

This season of the year is about rebirth, about new beginnings on multiple levels.  And since we celebrate it as the birth day of Jesus, I am going to share my perspective of Jesus in hopes that you are open to seeing some options in the gray area instead of the black and white / polarized, distorted perspectives that have warped some versions of Christianity over the years.

"We all have available to us - within - a direct channel to the Highest Vibrational Frequency Range within The Illusion. That highest range involves consciousness of the Glory of ONENESS. It is called Cosmic Consciousness. It is called Christ Consciousness.

This is the energy that Jesus was tuned into, and he stated very plainly, "These things that I do, you can do also." - by atoning, by tuning in.

We have access to the Christ Energy within. We have begun the Second Coming of the message of Love."

(All quotes in this color are from Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls)

Jesus, in my opinion, was the most important Master Teacher in the history of humankind. The reason he was so important was that he taught Love. He carried the message of a Loving God-Force.

Jesus was a perfect Spiritual Being, a direct extension/manifestation from the ONENESS that is the God/Goddess Energy, having a human experience - just as we all are perfect Spiritual Beings having a human experience." - Jesus & Christ Consciousness - A very Special Messenger

Before sharing the excerpts from Chapters of Codependency Recovery: Wounded Souls Dancing in the Light  Book 2: A Dysfunctional Relationship with Life here is a quote that is referred to in the excerpt just below, and contains elements that are referred to in some of the excerpts to follow.

"(I need to make the point here that Codependence and recovery are both multi-leveled, multi-dimensional phenomena. What we are trying to achieve is integration and balance on different levels. In regard to our relationship with ourselves this involves two major dimensions: the horizontal and the vertical. In this context the horizontal is about being human and relating to other humans and our environment. The vertical is Spiritual, about our relationship to a Higher Power, to the Universal Source. If we cannot conceive of a God/Goddess Force that Loves us then it makes it virtually impossible to be Loving to ourselves. So a Spiritual Awakening is absolutely vital to the process in my opinion. Changing our relationship with ourselves on the horizontal level is both a necessary element in, and possible because we are working on, integrating Spiritual Truth into our inner process.)" -  Learning to Love our self - Inner Child Healing / Codependence Recovery

"I have gotten to a point in my writing (and I feel obligated because of what I believe is happening in the Spiritual evolutionary process of human beings on this planet) where I am not going to put in a lot of qualifiers and explanations to try to soften my words for people who are not open minded.  There is a saying that I heard some years ago, that I include at the bottom of some of my pages, that:  Religion is for people who are scared of hell - spirituality is for people who have been there.  If you have experienced what a hell life can be like living according to dysfunctional belief systems, then the most Loving thing you can do for yourself is open up to considering some new perspectives.

I am now going to include a quote from a page of the site where I define spirituality in a context different from my Spiritual beliefs - and include a quote from my book that gives a very short, sweet version of my belief.  And I also want to emphasize - what is said in the disclaimer at the bottom of this page - that Alcoholics Anonymous has not approved any deviation from their approach to the Twelve Steps and any reference I make to the steps is not meant to imply otherwise.

"My own personal Spiritual belief system is one form of spirituality.  It is certainly not the only one.  Mine works for me very well in helping me to have a relationship with life that allows me to be happier today.  It is not necessary for you to accept my belief system in order for you to use the tools, techniques, and perspectives that I have developed for emotional healing / codependence recovery / inner child integration.

For the purposes of this discussion of spiritual integration, I would now define what I refer to as a Spiritual Awakening in the quote above (the one about horizontal and vertical), as:  being open to a larger perspective - awakening from being trapped in a limiting perspective.  In this regard, spiritual would be a qualifier, an adjective, that describes the quality of one's relationship with life.

This adjective, spiritual, would be (in my definition) a word describing an expanded level of consciousness.  A level of consciousness, of awareness, that is expansive and inclusive and facilitates personal growth - as opposed to limited, exclusive, rigid, and inhibiting growth, development, and alternative view points.

By this definition, any religion that claims to be the chosen one, that excludes alternative perspectives or certain people, is not spiritual." - The Recovery Process for inner child healing - spiritual integration

Life is not some kind of test, that if we fail, we will be punished.  We are not human creatures who are being punished by an avenging god.  We are not trapped in some kind of tragic place out of which we have to earn our way by doing the "right" things.

We are Spiritual Beings having a human experience.  We are here to learn.  We are here to go through this process that is life.  We are here to feel these feelings." - Chapter 14 Spiritual Manifesto

Comparison = empowering belief in separation

"One of the ridiculous aspects of the condition of codependency, of the human condition as it has been dictated by planetary conditions, is that it has caused human beings to focus on differences between us and fear those differences, instead of seeing all that we have in common and celebrating our connection to each other.

"We are all more connected than we are different.  As human beings, we share a basic emotional process that is the same for all of us.  We share connections with other human beings that can allow us to feel on the same wave length with any human being in the right circumstances.  We can watch a television show about someone who is completely different from us in terms of race, culture, language, etc. - and still resonate with them emotionally in a moment of tragedy, or triumph.  Someone from our home town, who we might pass on the street without a second thought in the normal course of daily life, becomes a kindred spirit when we meet them in a foreign country.

Our relationship with a certain subject can cause us to feel a connection to someone else - because of their similar relationship with that concept or group or thing.  Some examples: fishing or dogs or skiing or an athletic team or a specific cause or a certain philosophy, etc.  Every human being on the planet is someone who we could feel connected to - feel on the same wave length with - in the right circumstances in relationship to some shared feeling, interest, and/or experience.

We are all kindred spirits in terms of our humanity - in terms of our relationship to the horizontal human experience.  We are all kindred spirits with more connection than differences without even taking the vertical - the Spiritual relationship - into consideration." - The True Nature of Love - Twin Souls, Souls Mates, and Kindred Spirits

Simply as human beings we are all connected in our experience of physical existence - are more alike than we are different in this horizontal dance we are doing.  The outer / external dependence of the condition of codependency causes us to focus externally and fear the unknown - which means fear and judge other people based upon what we see of them externally.  At the same time we are judging others based upon external appearances / conditions, we are trying to determine our own worth based upon external observation - and we are wearing masks and trying to hide the feeling of shame we are carrying deep within ourselves.  A ridiculous, dysfunctional dance without even taking our Spiritual connection into account.

The reason that we have not been Loving our neighbor as ourselves is because we have been doing it backwards.  We were taught to judge and feel ashamed of ourselves.  We were taught to hate ourselves for being human.

We are here to learn to Love ourselves so that we can Truly Love our neighbors.  We've been doing it backwards:  hating our neighbors like we hate ourselves.

It is kind of a cosmic joke, see.  We have been taught that we are human and that it is bad and shameful, and that we have to somehow earn the right to be Spiritual.  The Truth is that we already are Spiritual and there is nothing bad or shameful about "being human."

We are Spiritual Beings having a human experience.  We are here to experience feelings and touch and Love.  The goal of the healing process is not to reach someplace where we are above all the human experiences and feelings. We are here to feel these feelings.

When we become willing to feel the pain, then we become capable of feeling the Joy.  The Joy of doing this healing is incredible!  Our job is to heal and enJoy.  Our job is to be.  We are here to be human beings, not human doings.

Our job is to follow the Joy to the Truth.  Our job is to feel in the moment.

As long as we are reacting to old wounds and old tapes we cannot respond to the now.  The more we heal, the more responsibility we have - that is, ability to respond.  The ability to respond in the moment.

The mystical Truth (which has now also been scientifically proven by Quantum Physics) that we all spring from the same Source - that we all are ONE with everyone and everything - makes this dance of codependency truly a tragically sad farce as long as we are still stuck in our codependency.  Once we start to awaken and recover, then we can start to lighten up and not take this cosmic joke so seriously and personally.  Then we can start accessing moments of Joy in our journey instead of always comparing how we feel to how the lives of others look on the outside.

Looking outside of ourselves for self-definition and self-worth means that we have to judge people in order to feel good about ourselves.  There is no other way to do it when you look outside.

We were taught to have ego-strength through judgment - better than, prettier than, smarter than, richer than, stronger than, etc., etc.

In a Codependent society everyone has to have someone to look down on in order to feel positive about him/herself. This is the root of all bigotry, racism, sexism, and prejudice in the world.

True self-worth does not come from looking down on anyone or anything.  True self-worth comes from awakening to our connection to everyone and everything.

The Truth is that we are like snowflakes:  Each individual is unique and different and special and we are all made from the same thing.  We are all cut from the same cloth.  We are all part of the Eternal ONENESS that is the Great Spirit.

When we start looking within and celebrating the Truth of who we Truly are, then we can celebrate our unique differences instead of judging them out of fear.

Buying into the belief that outer or external circumstances are a measure of any human being's worth makes the determination of self worth a competitive issue.  In our codependency we look outside and compare our self to others to feel good about self - to gain ego strength.  But as long as we are looking outside in comparison, there will always be people that we feel less than as well as people we feel better than." - Chapter 13: Changing the Music: Love instead of fear and shame

"The bible is not some sacrosanct document that presents an accurate account of events that happened 2000 years ago.  It is a hodgepodge of writing (unknown individuals writing about what they had heard happened 50 to 100 years prior to their time) by different writers that were chosen to be "The Bible" because of political factors within the early church (up to 590 AD or CE is considered the early years.)

In fact the declaration that Jesus was God was made in 325 AD by the Council of Nicea.  It was not a concept that was taught by his disciples after his death. It was the church founded by Paul (who never met Jesus) among the gentiles that started teaching that Jesus was Divine.  This was a raging debate in the early church that led to riots (after Christianity was legalized in the Roman Empire in 311 AD) between different factions and led to Emperor Constantine calling the Council of Nicea to decide the matter. . . . . .

. . . . . . Jesus was declared divine by a close vote in a highly politically charged atmosphere.  These don't sound like the types of information that would indicate that the Bible is a reliable source of information.

It is so important to realize that what is being taught in Christian Churches now is not what has always been taught there.  That the bible has changed, been translated, modified to fit the needs (often political and economic) of the church at the time. . . . .

. . . . . . (I also want to note that any "hodge podge," any "chosen because of political factors," any "unknown author writing down rumors," any "accidents or coincidences" ultimately serve Divine Plan.  The Bible is the inspired Word of God (so is Shakespeare for that matter) - but not taken literally.  When translated in Metaphysical terms there is great Truth in the Bible.) " - Jesus & Mary Magdalene - Jesus, sexuality, & the bible

"The meaning and purpose of life is Spiritual.  Life is not is about sin and punishment.  It is not some meaningless accident.

We are here for a reason.  And that reason is not to subdue and conquer.  It is not to amass material possessions.  It is not to lead lives of quiet - or loud - desperation.

We are here to awaken to Spiritual Truth so that we can integrate it into human life.  We are here to learn to Love our neighbors as our self - but we have to focus on learning to Love our self first.

There is a Loving Higher Power.  There is a Universal Force - a God, Goddess, Great Spirit - in whom we are all connected.  The Western Civilization concept of god is dysfunctional.  Believing that god is judgmental and punishing does not empower Love.  That old testament god is not a Loving god.

"The basic beliefs underling Islam come from the same source as the beliefs that underlie Christianity and Judaism - the Old Testament.  It is the Bible that is at the foundation of the belief systems of Western Civilization.

As one example of this, I am going to discuss the Bible for a moment, because it has been such a powerful force in shaping the attitudes of Western Civilization.

The Bible contains Truth, much of it symbolic or in parable form because most of the audience at the time it was written had very little sophistication or imagination.  They did not have the tools and the knowledge we have access to now.

So the Bible does contain Truth - it also contains a lot of distortion.  The Bible was translated many times.  It was translated by male Codependents. . . . .

. . . . . . The twisted, distorted beliefs of the Old Testament - with it's angry, judgmental, vengeful male vision of God - are at the foundation of the beliefs, the intellectual paradigm, that humans in Western Civilization have used to define reality.

One of the reasons that our perception of, and relationship with this life business has been so out-of-balance is that we have lacked the ability to discern between different levels.  The twisted, distorted perspective of life that humans have evolved is, in part at least, the result of trying to apply the Truths of one level to the reality of another. . . . . .

Human beings have also tried to apply realities of the physical level to the Spiritual level with the disastrous result that humans have come up with an image of the God-Force that fights wars.  This image of the God-Force, with the characteristics of a war-like male, is completely out of balance because it is not the image of a balanced male warrior - it is the image of a male with no feminine side.

Is it any wonder that Western Civilization has lacked a True heart connection?  That violence and genocide and conquest by Western Civilization has dominated the history of the planet? . . . . . .

. . . . . . It is the fundamental concept of a judgmental, vengeful male God - taken from an unsophisticated tribal people living in a very harsh environment - that is a foundation belief of Western Civilization.  That unbalanced patriarchal Father is not Loving, does not represent connection and Unity.  One of the reasons that I believe that Jesus Christ was probably the most important Master Teacher in history, is because the message of Love he symbolizes brought some Feminine Energy into the equation - but still the underlying belief system is based upon separation, shame about being human, and judgment." - Attack on America: A Spiritual Healing Perspective &  Call for Higher Consciousness  Chapter 2

So, that is what I wrote when I thought I was writing an introduction to that article.  As you can see it is direct and doesn't mince words.  Another part of the reason my articles get long at times, is that I try to state things in ways that won't scare away people who are just beginning the process and haven't opened up to seeing traditional beliefs in a larger context.  I am sorry if what I have to say causes anyone discomfort - but I do not apologize for saying it.  It is my Truth.  My mission in this life involves standing up in public and stating my Truth.  It is what I need to do to settle Karma and fulfill my mission.

As anyone who has read my Daily Prayers and Affirmations (which I share in the premier issue of the Joy2MeU Journal) knows, I refer to Jesus as my friend and brother. The name and significance of Jesus Christ carries great metaphysical power because of the importance of the message of Love carried by this Master Teacher.  People who are not practicing discernment and still viewing life from a black and white perspective, often resonate with the Truth of Love symbolized by Jesus and don't know how to separate the feeling of connection and Love associated with Christ Consciousness from the distortions and lies that became a part of Christianity because it was a state religion being used by governments - beginning with Rome - to control and manipulate the masses.

The teachings of all the Master Teachers, of all the world's religions, contain some Truth along with a lot of distortions and lies.  Discerning Truth is often like recovering treasure from shipwrecks that have been sitting on the ocean floor for hundreds of years - the grains of Truth, the nuggets of gold, have become encrusted with garbage over the years.

I have a powerful personal relationship with Jesus - and also have great anger at how Christianity has been perverted over the centuries into an institution used to rationalize genocide, rape, and plunder.  As you can tell from another excerpt from my book about the terrorist attack that I am going to share now, it outrages me when I hear the name of Jesus being taken in vain - being used to rationalize bigotry and hatred, being used to reinforce belief in separation and fear of differences - the Us vs Them polarized mentality that has made violence an unavoidable part of human history.  Any version of Christianity that teaches Spiritually abusive, shaming concepts - that claims to be the only path to the Divine - is in my opinion promoting a message that is the opposite of what Jesus taught." - Chapter 14 Spiritual Manifesto

"We are all manifestations of the Feminine and Masculine Principles - and we each have masculine and feminine energy that makes up our being.  The imbalance that has been part of the human condition has been in our relationship with those energies within us.   And the imbalance in our relationships with the masculine and feminine energies within has reflected outward to produce imbalance in our relationships with each other - and with the concepts of masculine and feminine. . . . . .

. . . . . The imbalance that has existed between masculine and feminine in the evolution of human civilization on Earth is at the heart of the dysfunction in the Human Condition.  It is one of the core causes in world events - not just historically, but in the events we are seeing unfold in the world today.  As I mentioned in the last chapter of this online book Spiritual Manifesto: . . .

"The Western Civilization concept of god is dysfunctional.  Believing that god is judgmental and punishing does not empower Love.  That old testament god is not a Loving god. . . . .

. . . . . . It is the fundamental concept of a judgmental, vengeful male God - taken from an unsophisticated tribal people living in a very harsh environment - that is a foundation belief of Western Civilization.  That unbalanced patriarchal Father is not Loving, does not represent connection and Unity.  One of the reasons that I believe that Jesus Christ was probably the most important Master Teacher in history, is because the message of Love he symbolizes brought some Feminine Energy into the equation - but still the underlying belief system is based upon separation, shame about being human, and judgment." - Attack on America: A Spiritual Healing Perspective Chapter 2

. . . . . . And I could have been more clear in communicating that I didn't mean Jesus brought feminine energy into the human equation, but rather into the higher power equation - that is, added feminine qualities to the human concept / perspective of God.

The message of Love taught by Jesus helped people to have more access to the feminine energy within them that was already present but blocked because of attitudes caused by planetary conditions.  The message of Love taught by, and symbolized by, Jesus Christ helped humans start getting more in touch with their feminine energy and becoming more open to Love because the equation for the concept of a Higher Power was expanded to include the feminine energy of nurturing and compassion, of forgiveness and Love.  The idea that God could be Loving enough to forgive humans somewhat softened the old testament image of God - which made that concept of God a little more accurate reflection of the Feminine and Masculine Principles of Creation than it had been.

One of the results of the multiple levels of reality that are involved in this human dance we are doing, is that life is paradoxical.  Things that are good news on one level can be bad news on another - every cloud has a silver lining and vice versa.

It is by recognizing that we are powerless to control our life experiences out of ego-self that we can access the power out of True Self, Spiritual Self.  By surrendering the illusion of ego control we can reconnect with our Higher Selves.  Selfishness out of ego-self is destroying the planet.  Selfishness out of Spiritual Self is what will save the planet.

It is because there is more than one level of reality that life is paradoxical in nature.  What is True and positive on one level - selfishness out of Spiritual Self, can be negative on another level - selfishness out of ego-self.  What a caterpillar calls the end of the world, God calls a butterfly.

Humans have always had expressions that describe the paradoxical nature of the life experience.  Every ending is a beginning.  Every cloud does have a silver lining.  For every door that closes, another door does open.  It is always darkest before the dawn.  Every obstacle is a gift, every problem is an opportunity for growth.

The good news in this instance, was that the message of Love taught by Jesus Christ brought some feminine energy into the God equation in Western Civilization - the bad news is that the harsh, vengeful warlike God of the old testament was still part of the equation and was used to justify violence, genocide, and war.  The good news is that many people resonate with - and have found hope and forgiveness for self in - the Truth and Love inherent in the message and symbol of Jesus.  The bad news is that a lot of those people - up to present day - have not had the discernment to separate the Loving message from the shaming ones - have not had the ability to get past the black and white perspective enough to separate the baby from the bathwater.

The teachings of all the Master Teachers, of all the world's religions, contain some Truth along with a lot of distortions and lies.  Discerning Truth is often like recovering treasure from shipwrecks that have been sitting on the ocean floor for hundreds of years - the grains of Truth, the nuggets of gold, have become encrusted with garbage over the years.

The bible contains Truth in the form of parables and statements of Spiritual Truth / metaphysical law.  It contains much Truth when interpreted metaphysically.  Taken literally, it can be twisted and distorted in to interpretations that are the very opposite of what Jesus taught.

So the Bible does contain Truth - it also contains a lot of distortion.  The Bible was translated many times.  It was translated by male Codependents.

The more we heal / recover - and start to more clearly tune in to the Truth of who we are as Spiritual Beings - the more access we have to the feminine energy within us and the more we can tune into the Love energy generated by the Masculine and Feminine Energy of the Universe.  Spiritual integration allows us to manifest feminine energy into this illusion of life in human form - not because it has never been present but because we are uncovering, accessing, and tuning into it.  One of the major factors in the dawning of the new Age of Healing and Joy is that we now have greater access to the feminine energy of healing, and to our feminine intuitive guidance, because of a change that has taken place in planetary conditions.  By accessing that feminine energy within and taking action (masculine) to consciously integrate it into our lives, we become more balanced and start having some inner peace.

"The goal in the Spiritual evolutionary process we are involved in, is integration and balance.  We are not here to get Spiritual - we are Spiritual Beings having a human experience.  We are here to integrate Spiritual Truth and Love into the human experience.  We do that by achieving balance on the horizontal.  Balance between rational and intuitive, between mental and emotional, between masculine and feminine. . . . . . .

What I found, is that every time I let go of how I viewed some aspect of self, other people, and/or life, and surrendered to my intuitive guidance - a process that I found described in the Runes, in a phrase I very much resonated with, as the 'empty handed leap into the void' -  I was led to a larger intellectual paradigm in which to view life.  By trusting my emotional, intuitive side, I was led to a larger perspective of life, a higher level of consciousness.  And I found - when the dust of my old shattered definitions had settled, and I started looking around and exploring the new dimension of reality - that everything made perfect sense in a logical rational way.  I could not get to the new level through logic, but once I had trusted my intuition to guide me to it - it was perfectly rational.  The pieces of the puzzle fell into place because I was looking at the puzzle of life from a larger perspective." - Attack on America: A Spiritual Healing Perspective & Call for Higher Consciousness  Chapter 4

Growth and change comes about through a combination of, and balance between, masculine and feminine energy.  Enlightenment is perfectly logical and rational, but we cannot become Truly enlightened through logical and rational thought.  That is, we can intellectually become enlightened, but until we integrate Spiritual Truth into our emotional relationship with life we will not behave in enlightened ways in our intimate relationships.  We cannot change our core relationship with self through intellectual knowledge and Spiritual enlightenment alone - because our behavior patterns are driven by our emotional wounds, and our codependent defenses are the most powerful in relationships that involve opening our heart to another human being.  That is why it is so vital to do the emotional healing and learn to be emotionally honest with our self.

As we release the grief energy and subconscious attitudes that are blocking our inner intuitive channel to Truth, we can tune into the intuitive messages more clearly.  As we integrate the Spiritual Truth of Unconditional Love and Grace into our inner process, we learn to forgive ourselves for being human and rid ourselves of the toxic shame at the core of our relationship with self.

It is surrendering to the feminine intuitive emotional guidance that helps us enlarge our intellectual paradigm so that we can see life (or other people, or life situations) in a larger spiritual perspective which then makes sense in a rational way.  By learning how to stop being stuck in a myopic focus on one or two pieces of the puzzle - out of shame and blame, from a victim perspective - we can open up to seeing the puzzle in a larger perspective which helps us see how the pieces fit together.  In my recovery process, I needed to access my masculine energy of action to do the work necessary to access my feminine intuition which helped me to start understanding how irrational and illogical the way I had been living my life was - and in the process I became aware of how dysfunctional human civilization has been on this planet." - Chapter 15:  Masculine and Feminine

"When I was working on these two chapters focused on codependency and the New Age Movement, I got an e-mail from someone who had recently ordered my book that said the following:

"Dance, Dance, wherever you may be.  That's what the Lord of the Dance said He.  Dance, Dance, wherever you may be and I'll be with you in the Dance said He."

The trick is to change the music!  I got it!  The trick is to get free, so you can dance to a different music.  The freer you get the more you hear, or should I say feel or see the music.  You did a great job - Thanks

"The dance of life for humans has been grounded in shame and fear, empowered by belief in separation, lack, and scarcity.  These are lower vibrational emotions and beliefs based on the three dimensional illusion that humans experience as reality.  As long as the dance of humans harmonizes to music - vibrational emanations - that are rooted in shame, fear, and separation the only way to do the dance is destructively."

"It is on the Spiritual Plane that the highest vibrational frequency range naturally available to human experience is generated (by the Souls). This frequency range is the transcendent Emotional energy of Love. This Love frequency range also contains frequencies which are experienced as Truth, Joy, Beauty, and Light as well as sometimes being called; the God within, the Goddess within, the Christ within, The Holy Spirit, etc."

The later two quotes are from my page: The True Nature of Love - part 3, Love as a Vibrational Frequency.  The second one in a different color because it is a quote from my Trilogy that I used on that page.  I believe that the first part of the person's e-mail - up to "I'll be with you in the Dance said He." - is from a song called Lord of the Dance.

What is important about this e-mail I received is that the person did "get it."  We need to change the music we are dancing to - and in order to do that we need to change the subconscious intellectual paradigm that is dictating our emotional reactions.  And we cannot do that without doing the deep emotional healing.

"We grew up in dysfunctional families living in dysfunctional societies that were part of dysfunctional civilizations.  The definitions we learned in childhood about who we were, how life works, and how to relate to other people were false, distorted, and twisted.  Because the definitions, attitudes, and beliefs we were programmed with in childhood were false, they set us up to have emotional reactions to life that gave us inaccurate information.

Our experiential reality is determined by the interpretations of our mind - by the intellectual paradigm which we are using to define / determine / translate / explain our reality.  The attitudes, definitions, and belief systems which we hold mentally dictate our emotional reactions.  Attitudes, definitions, and beliefs determine perspective and expectation - which in turn dictates our relationships.  Our relationships to our self, to life, to other people, to The God-Force / Goddess Energy / Great Spirit.  Our relationships to our own emotions, bodies, gender, etc., are dictated by the attitudes, definitions, and beliefs that we are holding mentally / intellectually.  And we acquired those mental constructs / ideas / concepts in early childhood from the emotional experiences, intellectual teachings, and role modeling of the beings around us.  If we have not done our emotional healing so that we can get in touch with our subconscious intellectual programming then we are still reacting to that early childhood programming / intellectual paradigm even though we may not be aware of it consciously. - The True Nature of Love - part 4, Energetic Clarity

Our emotions are what drive us, what propel us, through life.  Our emotions tell us who we are.  If our relationship with our own emotions is messed up, we cannot see reality clearly.

If life is a dance, then our emotions provide the music.  Dancing in the dark according to rules that are dysfunctional is not much fun.  Dancing through life believing that we have responsibility for the feelings and behaviors of others, doesn't allow us to relax and enjoy life very much.  Believing that we have to earn love by doing the dance "right,' by being perfect, in order to reach the destination where we will get to live happily-ever-after - sets us up to be unhappy and blame ourselves for being unworthy and unlovable." - Emotional Honesty and Emotional Responsibility Part 2 - codependence recovery

It is through doing our deep emotional healing and changing the subconscious intellectual paradigm - changing the music that we are dancing to - that we can start having discernment internally that allows us to more clearly hear / feel the messages of our intuition.  There is a huge difference between our emotional truth - the feelings that are triggered by our emotional wounds and/or created by the perspective we are viewing life from - and intuitive Truth that is coming from our Soul.  As long as our emotional truth - what we feel - is being dictated by childhood emotional wounds and the perspectives of self and life learned in childhood, then our relationship to this human dance will be dictated by music provided by our damaged ego self rather than the intuitive Truth that is coming from our Spiritual Self.

Truth, in my understanding, is not an intellectual concept.  I believe that Truth is an emotional-energy, vibrational communication to my consciousness, to my soul/spirit - my being, from my Soul.  Truth is an emotion, something that I feel within.

It is that feeling within when someone says, or writes, or sings, something in just the right words so that I suddenly feel a deeper understanding.  It is that "AHA" feeling.  The feeling of a light bulb going on in my head.  That "Oh, I get it!" feeling.  The intuitive feeling when something just feels right . . . or wrong.  It's that gut feeling, the feeling in my heart.  It is the feeling of something resonating within me.  The feeling of remembering something that I had forgotten - but do not remember ever knowing.

In this dance of life that we are doing there are different levels - even of Truth with a capital T.  There are ultimate Truths, and there are relative Truths.  The ultimate Truths have to do with the eternal, everlasting reality of the God-Force, the Great Spirit.  The relative Truths have to do with each individual's own intuitive guidance.  These are the messages we receive individually to get us from point A to point B on our individual paths.  The guidance we get from our Souls that tells us what the next thing in front of us is.

Our individual, relative Truths expand and grow as we expand and grow.  We each have our own unique path to follow - our own individual inner guidance system.  No one can tell you what your path is!  Your Truth is a personal thing.  Only you can know your Truth.

It is through following and being True to our individual Truths, as they relate to our path through this physical experience, that we reach balance and harmony with the ultimate Truths.

(Text in this color is used for quotes from Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls)

We have been dancing through life in disharmony and imbalance - in dis-ease.  It is by clearing up our relationship with our own internal process - so that we can change our core relationship with self and life - that we can start to dance with some balance and harmony to the music of the ultimate Truth of Love and Joy." - Chapter 13: Changing the Music: Love instead of fear and shame

"Christmas is about Love and birth, new beginnings. The Winter Solstice is the time of the longest darkness and marks the point of increasing light just as the birth of Jesus is a milestone which marked the time of the acceleration of the return to Light in the evolution of Human Consciousness. This Christmas we can celebrate, resonate with, the vibrational Knowing of the Truth of ONENESS and the new beginning the Second Coming of the message of Love - that has begun." - Jesus & Christ Consciousness - A very Special Messenger

The prologue to Richard Bach's Illusions contains a story about a colony of creatures clinging to the bottom of a stream.  Here is a paraphrasing of that story.

One day one of those creatures became bored with the life of clinging and decided to see what would happen if he let go and got swept up into the stream.  He wanted to see where the stream would carry him."

All of the other creatures laughed at him and made fun of him. "You can't let go of the rocks, you'll just get battered and bruised!"   "It's insane to let go of the rocks!"

This creature, though, wanted more out of life than just clinging to the rocks. He wanted to find out where the stream went.  So he let go of the rocks - and sure enough he got battered and bruised and had to grab ahold again.

All of the other creatures ridiculed and laughed at him.

But he said, "I am going to try again. I believe that the stream knows where it is going.  I want to see where the stream will take me."  So he let go again - and he got battered and bruised again.   And then he let go again, and again, and again.

Each time he got a little less battered and bruised.  Each time he got a little closer to being swept up in the stream.

Then finally one day he had let go enough times that he did get swept up into the stream.  He was caught in the flow of the stream and swept forward.

He was flying!

As he flew along with his heart full of Joy and excitement he passed over another colony of clinging creatures that was downstream.

They looked up at him and cried, "Behold!  There is a creature like us and he is flying!  It must be the Messiah!"

He looked back at them and shouted as he was heading down stream, "No!  You don't understand. You can fly, too, all you have to do is let go.   You are as much messiahs as I am."

That is what this is all about!  The second coming has begun!  Not of "The Messiah,' but of a whole bunch of messiahs.  The messiah - the liberator - is within us!  A liberating, Healing Transformational Movement has begun.  "The Savior' does not exist outside of us - "The Savior" exists within.

We are the sons and daughters of God.   We, the old souls, who are involved in this Healing Movement, are the second coming of the message of Love.

We have entered what certain Native American prophecies call the Dawning of the Fifth World of Peace.  Through focusing on our own healing the planet will be healed.

We all have available to us - within - a direct channel to the Highest Vibrational Frequency Range within The Illusion.  That highest range involves consciousness of the Glory of ONENESS.  It is called Cosmic Consciousness.  It is called Christ Consciousness.

This is the energy that Jesus was tuned into, and he stated very plainly, 'These things that I do, you can do also." - by atoning, by tuning in.

We have access to the Christ Energy within.  We have begun the Second Coming of the message of Love.

The dawning of the Age of Healing and Joy is the dawning of the Fifth World of Peace when humans will learn to walk in balance and harmony.

Now that is some pretty wonderful news, wouldn't you say?

2004 has been a very exciting year for me - because I learned to open my heart to Love in a way that I had never before been capable of.  But the year was also very emotionally painful.  I have gotten very battered and bruised this year - have had my heart battered by rocks of black and white reactive codependency.  I am here reminding myself that it is necessary to let go in order to be able to Fly - and that it is only possible to Fly in tandem with someone who is willing to do the work, and is able to recognize and admit when she is allowing black and white reaction to run her life.

I believe that this past year was very painful - and sometimes felt insane - for most all of us who are doing this healing, who are following our Spiritual Path.  What I am reminding you of here, because I am reminding myself - is that, that battering and bruising is part of the process of learning to Fly again.  We all are perfectly where we are supposed to be on our Spiritual Paths - and we are being guided Home.  We are learning to heal our broken wings and open our hearts to Love - we are remembering how to Fly. ;-)

So, when the critical parent voice in your head hits you with "shoulds" and judgments and comparisons this Holiday season, tell it to shut up and do some positive affirmations and Loving self talk to counter the negative messages coming from the disease.  When the wounded inner child places within you get triggered so that you are feeling desperately alone and lost and are really hurting - be compassionate and Loving to your self, and be the Loving parent to those wounded children within.  Here are some positive affirmations for you this Holiday Season:

And I am going to add a personal prayer for myself here - one that may also fit (with slight modifications) for many of you out there who are trying to find some sanity in an insane world - who are trying to find your way Home to Love.

God / Goddess / Great Spirit,
Thank you for the incredible gift of being allowed the experience of opening my heart to Love this year.  Thank you for the incredible woman being who came into my life a year ago to be the catalyst that triggered the transformational experience that allowed me to get in touch with my own capacity to Love.  Bless her on her path to learning how to open her heart to Love.

Help me to remember that it is better to Love and lose - better to open my heart and get it broken and battered - than to hide from life and Love because of the pain involved in losing the one I opened my heart to.  Help me to recognize, and embrace, the next opportunity that presents itself to open my heart to Loving another being in an intimate romantic relationship - to keep having the courage and faith to move forward towards Love despite the fear and the pain.  Help me also please, to continue to be willing to open my heart to myself and to increase my capacity to be willing to live my life in a way that is Loving to me.

And if you don't mind me saying so, though I Know that my path is unfolding perfectly - the details of how the plan unfolded this year really stunk from my perspective.  I respectfully request that the year of 2005 be much more about Joy and Love manifesting in my life, than all the f---ing pain I experienced in 2004.  I am really tired of grieving - and would Love to have the opportunity to Love and be Loved by my soul mate or Twin Soul or whomever it is that you put me through all this fertilizer in 2004 to prepare me for. (12/25/2010 It turned out that it was not just one person I was being prepared for, it was two people Susan and Darien.)   I know that I have called you some pretty choice names this year as I raged about how the plan was unfolding - but hey, you deserved it.  I do thank you for all the wonderful things in my life that I have to be grateful for, but I also believe that it is high time to kick down some reward here - in the person of a partner to share my path - for all the work I have done, am doing.

That said, I do repledge my commitment to following my path wherever it leads me - and do invite you to bring on whatever lessons I need to accelerate and facilitate my quest to reconnect with Love.  I believe that I am ready to Fly high and far - and I would prefer to not do it alone.  As usual however, Thy will not my will be done.  I Know and have Faith that a Loving Divine Plan is unfolding perfectly, even when I am in fertilizer up to my eye balls - even if it means I won't be united with a partner until my next lifetime.  So, bring it on Goddess - whatever it takes, wherever it leads - my life for you.

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Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to quote from: Illusions  "The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah" by Richard Bach.  Copyright 1977 by Creature Enterprises, Inc.   Reprinted in Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls by Robert Burney by permission of Bantam Doubleday Dell, New York, NY.