This is directly relates to what I said in part 1 about the great and mighty lessons I have learned from having a car that is on the verge of breaking down.

" . . . . . The car breaking down is a life event - not punishment because I have done something wrong.  My inner child feels like it is punishment for being shameful, my self before codependence recovery (Rob) would rage about how unfair it was as a defensive reaction against how painful it was - and both of those reactions still get triggered today, but they have very little power relative to the charge they used to carry.  My initial reaction now is out of my recovery paradigm.  My consciously programmed response is to look first for the silver lining.  Then my mature adult perspective, my detached recovery control observer self, takes action to deal with the reality of the situation - call a tow truck or whatever - and a little later I honor the feelings of the child and my human self by crying and giving my Higher Power a good cussing out.

Life events rock my emotional boat - my emotional balance in the moment - but my response out of the Spiritual belief system I have integrated into my inner programming keeps me from swinging to wild extremes.  I do not let the feelings of my inner children, the reaction of my codependent ego programming, dictate and define my life today.  That is so cool!  It is such a miracle!"

Chapter 10  Attack on America - A Call for Higher Consciousness

One, because it demonstrates how important and powerful it is to integrate Spiritual Truth into my emotional relationship with life.  When I go out of town on a trip now (even if it is just 20 miles south to the next bigger town for something not available in my little town), I send up a little prayer asking my Higher Power for a safe and successful trip.  I ask that with the understanding, that though my definition of successful trip is one in which I get back home without any unpleasant surprises - like a breakdown - my Higher Power's idea of successful that day may very well include a breakdown.  I hope and ask for the best and am willing to accept - what to my human perspective looks like - the worst. 

I have great faith these days.  My experience in recovery has taught me that it is safe to trust the Divine Plan.  I do not have to trust me - I just need to trust the process, trust my Higher Power.

In the beginning of recovery I had to pretend I had faith - act as if, fake it till you make it - because I certainly did not trust any version of God that I had ever encountered.  I worked long and hard to find a Spiritual belief system that worked to help me live life in a way that was more enjoyable.  I committed myself to finding a way of life that was functional - because I was sick and tired of what I had been experiencing.  My intuition, my spirit, guided me to a Spiritual belief system that works very well for me.  I happen to believe that is also The Truth - or at least The Truth as far as it is humanly possible for me to understand Spiritual Truth.

My Spiritual belief system includes a Higher Power who is so powerful that everything happens for a reason in alignment with a Loving Divine plan - no accidents, no coincidences, no mistakes.  I believe that life events are opportunities for growth - not punishment for being unworthy.  That who I really am is a Spiritual Being - who is a perfect part of the ONENESS of the God-Force / Goddess Energy / Great Spirit - having a human experience.  I am here going to boarding school, not condemned to punishment.  Life is a journey of growth, a process of learning.  Life events are part of the lesson plan.

The human part of me would much rather get to happily every after - and forget all this growth crap.  The human part of me wants everything to come easily - and thinks I have done plenty of growth already, thank you very much.  My human idea of successful does not include opportunities for growth, or unpleasant life events.

"Our ego craves safety and security, and fears change.  Our ego likes ruts.  On the level of ego self we are very happy to find a rut and furnish it - move in for the duration.  On some level the rut is comfortable, because we are not having to put too much energy into being conscious, and we are not having to risk facing the unknown. . . . . . 

. . . . . . Human beings are like water in this regard, we seek out the course of least resistance, the easier softer way."

Newsletter 2 - May 23, 2001 Joy2MeU Update

The human part of me always wants the easier, softer way.  Recovery is a process of teaching my human self that recovery is the easier, softer way.  It does not work for me to try to control life.  It is ultimately much easier for me to align with the healing process than to resist it.  Trying to force the Universe to do things my way does not work.  Surrendering to my Higher Power's plan always works out better in the long run.

This healing process works.  It works miraculously because in aligning with Truth we come into harmony with the universal laws of energy interaction.  We learn to go with the natural healthy flow instead of being at war with it.  We learn to Love and accept ourselves instead of being at war within.

Resisting growth is not bad or wrong or shameful - it is human.  It is also dysfunctional.  It does not work.  Aligning with growth and healing is what helps me to learn to let go of "my way" and be able to relax and enjoy life to a degree I never dreamed possible.

I was really upset when I was told in early recovery that I had to surrender.  I equated surrender with losing.  It helped when someone told me that I wasn't losing, I was just joining the winning side.  What I have learned - gradually, in itty bitty increments - is to stop fighting the losing battle of stuffing my feelings and shaming myself for being human, to stop giving power to the illusion that I can control life and know what is best for me.

I cannot control life.  I am powerless to control outcomes.  I need to accept that I am not in control - that I am not writing the script.

Surrendering my way of doing things made it possible for me to start changing my experience of life - to stop allowing the unconscious reactions of codependency to rule my life.  It is much less painful in the long run - and much more fun - to surrender and joining the winning side.  To surrender to the Force that has all the power, is the path to empowerment and Love.  The Force is with me - and you.

When I became willing to surrender the old attitudes and beliefs, to surrender to feeling the feelings, to surrender trying to control things over which I had no control, then I accessed the power to change myself and my relationships.  I became empowered to change my life into an experience that was defined by Joy, Love, and Peace instead of fear, anger, and pain.

"The areas over which I do have choices - and therefore also have responsibility - include these:

. . . . .The attitudes, definitions, and beliefs that I allow to define me and my relationships.

My own emotions to a great extent. . . . . 

. . . . . Most importantly, I have some control over, and therefore responsibility for, the quality of my life experiences today. The quality of my life experience is directly related to the kind of Spiritual belief system that I choose to empower.  By choosing to believe in a Loving Higher Power / Universal Force, I have been able to change my relationship with myself and life into one that is not defined by shame and fear.  By choosing to empower the belief that everything happens for a reason in alignment with a Loving Divine plan, that there are no accidents, coincidences, or mistakes, I have accessed the ability to be more Loving to my self.  To - some of the time - be accepting and patient and compassionate towards my human self.  By choosing to have the faith to believe that there is a Loving meaning and purpose to life - despite all the seeming evidence to the contrary - I have dramatically changed the quality of my life experience from a hell to be endured to one that includes a great deal of Joy."

Discernment in relationship to emotional honesty and responsibility ¹

So, I do my part, plant or water or whatever I can do today - and then I let go of the future and focus on being alive today, on being present for my journey in the moment.  I do not focus on the future, I do not ignore the future.  This is called maturity.  This is where we find balance.  Worrying about the future is codependent.  It is defense against being present in our own skins.  Worry is not a feeling.

"Worry is negative fantasizing.  It is a fantasy that is being created in reaction to feeling fear.  It is not real - it is something that is being created because my mind has slipped into the old familiar rut of right and wrong thinking.  Worry is not a feeling - it is a reaction, an negative emotional state, that is created by the perspectives of a belief system that empowers illusions like failure.  The sooner that we can pull ourselves out of that rut and start seeing the situation as part of a learning process - shift back into a recovery perspective - the less negative emotional response we will generate in relationship to the situation."

Discernment in relationship to emotional honesty and responsibility ²

I have to take responsibility for my part, for the things I have power over - and then let go of the outcome.  The outcome is what I need to accept because I am not writing the script, I am not in control of my life.  Through my recovery, I have learned that I do have some power in regard to my relationship with life, and can have some Loving control over my inner process - in my relationship with myself.

Back to the car again. I do have responsibilities in relationship to the car.  I need to make sure it has oil and water and air in the tires, etc.  I also need to take action, plant seeds, that give me a chance to be prepared for whatever life event might occur.  In relationship to the car, that includes having a roadside assistance program that can provide a tow truck (some of my great and mighty lessons came when I had no such protection.)  It also includes trying to maintain some balance financially - for instance, by keeping enough room on a credit card to cover emergencies.

I need to take care of my side of the street, the things I have some power over, and then let go of the outcome - move forward with the faith that whatever happens will be a perfect part of my lesson plan somehow, someway.  I would prefer that my car not break down, but I know what valuable lessons I have learned in the past from such life events - so I have the willingness to surrender to accepting reality as it presents itself.  I don't worry (this is of course not a black and white thing - worry of course comes up, I just do not give it anywhere near the power it used to have), I pay attention.  I follow my intuitive guidance - which is the reason I ended up homeless a few years ago.

Part of the reason I ended up homeless in 1999, and that I have enjoyed a nice place to live in the last 16 months, was that I planted some seeds (went to the expense of getting my own domain for this web site, and getting a merchant account with credit card processing) that took awhile to grow.  After planting the seeds, life events occurred that changed my financial position in a way that gave me the opportunity to experience being homeless for awhile.  That did not happen because I made a mistake or did anything wrong - though it sure felt like it to my inner children at the time.  It was an incredible "opportunity to demonstrate the faith of a Master" - a phrase I heard at that time in a Unity Church Service (which was really annoying to me - and felt a little on the sadistic side - as I was sitting there), and another one of those details of the path that I was not at all happy about, even as I was working on accepting reality as it was unfolding.

Accepting wherever we are at in the moment is one of the very difficult parts of this recovery process.  Not giving so much power to the shaming messages from the damaged ego / critical parent voice is how we start to create the space to change our ego programming.

Recovery is a process of learning to develop the wisdom and clarity to discern between the things we cannot change and the things we can change.  The way we develop that wisdom and clarity is to reprogram our ego defenses to align with Spiritual Truth instead of the fear and shame based programming that resulted from the emotional trauma we experienced growing up in dysfunctional environments.  I can not change life, or other people - I can change my attitudes toward the things I cannot change, and make changes in my relationship with my self.

I have been able, through doing the inner child healing / Spiritual integration work, to reprogram my ego defenses so that my first response, my conscious choice, is to look for the silver lining.  That is such an incredible, miraculous gift.

Doing the healing work has empowered me to have some freedom from dysfunctional reactions.  To have some choices in regard to the quality of my life experience today.  I do not have to let the feeling of being victimized by life events - the reaction of the little boy inside who feels like he is being punished for being bad, or the dysfunctional intellectual programming that tells me that something is wrong with me that is causing life events and other people's behavior - dictate my experience of my life today, or how I feel about myself today.

I have some responsibility in what is happening in my life.  I am a co-creator in my life.  In my life before codependency recovery I was co-creating in reaction.  I was co-creating in alignment with a black and white, polarized - right and wrong - perspective of life that gave me the message that I was shameful because I was human.  The reason that being able to detach, to observe, ourselves and life is so vital, is because that is how we can start taking the toxic shame out of our relationship with being human.  We cannot see our self or life with any clarity as long as we are reacting to the feeling and belief that being human is shameful.

Who we are, are transcendent Spiritual Beings who are part of the ONENESS that is the God-Force.  We always have been and always will be.  We are perfect in our Spiritual Essence.  We are perfectly where we are supposed to be on our Spiritual Path.  And from a human perspective we will never be able to do "human" perfectly - which is perfect.

We have been trying to do "human" perfectly according to a false belief system in order to "get Spiritual."  It does not work.  It's dysfunctional and backwards.  It is not bad or wrong or shameful - it is the best we have known how to do life until now.

All any human being in the history of the planet has ever done is the best that she/he knew how to do to survive in the moment. 

Humans have always been looking for a way home.  For a way to connect with our Higher Consciousness.  For a way to reconnect with our creator.  Throughout human history, human beings have used temporary artificial means to raise their vibrational level, to try to reconnect with Higher Consciousness.

Drugs and alcohol, meditation and exercise, sex and religion, starvation and overeating, the self-torture of the flagellant or the deprivation of the hermit - all are attempts to connect with higher consciousness.   Attempts to reconnect with Spiritual Self.   Attempts to go home.

I mentioned at the very beginning of this update that I have experienced tremendous growth in my personal process in the last 3 years.  I am so grateful for this web site - and the internet reality that makes it possible for me to Truly reach out and touch people around the world.  The power of this means of connection and communication has stimulated me to do a tremendous amount of writing since 1998 when I launched my first crude web site.  That writing process has facilitated, and accelerated, my personal growth process in Truly amazing ways.

One of the most fascinating aspects of my writing - to me, anyway - is that I am writing about the same basic dynamics that I have been focused on for more than 10 years.  The basic dynamics of codependence - of the disease / the wounding process and the recovery / healing / Spiritual awakening process - are something I have seen clearly for quite awhile.  There is nothing in my book - though the final draft was written in 1995 - that is not aligned with what I believe and know today.  (A remarkable, amazing fact to me - and certainly nothing I take credit for.  I mention in my August Update that I feel like I am just now reaching, on a personal level, the level of consciousness that the book was written out of. )  What is happening though, is that I keep writing - and understanding - on deeper, more sophisticated levels.  The layers are more subtle, but each one I peel leads to a clearer, more refined understanding from a higher perspective.  I would never have guessed two years ago that I would find so much more to write about - and there are already enough new writing projects waiting in line to keep me busy for this year.

In writing this Newsletter, I wrote some absolutely fascinating paragraphs about the evolution of the human condition - and the disease of codependency - that is opening up a new petal of the Lotus blossom of consciousness for me.  I have set that aside to explore in the Journal writing I am going to be doing because exploring that stream of consciousness would not have served my goal of finishing this Update so that I can get onto my next writing adventure.

Another surprising place that this writing has taken me, is to seeing a shift in focus for my recovery process that is the next thing in front of me in my personal evolution and growth.  This occurred because of this writing, and my processing about this writing, in combination with some things I heard myself saying in a couple of recent counseling sessions.  That is something else I mentioned in the first portion of this Update, which I thought I was going to share about here - but I can see now that it belongs in the personal journal in my Joy2MeU Journal.  I will probably mention something about it in my next Update.

I started writing this Update on January 3rd - the anniversary that marks 18 years clean and sober for me, the beginning of my recovery adventure.  I thought it would take a few days to say what I wanted to say - and then I could get to the writing for my Journal that I had planned to do back in September before life as we knew it was so rudely interrupted.  It is now January 14th, and I hope to post these Newsletters later this morning - and send out announcements to my e-mailing list.  So, I am going to wrap this up by getting back to what I wanted to say about the book I just finished - that I felt compelled to write and publish online as I wrote it. 

I started writing this online book on September 14th of this incredible year of 2001.  On September 11th, I was going through my morning routine of checking my e-mail and went to one of the home pages I use to see what was happening in the world.  There was a headline about some attack in New York City.  I switched on the television and watched the smoke billowing out of the World Trade Center Towers - and knew that life had just changed in some irrevocable way.

I also knew that the reason I had been blocked from doing any writing for the several weeks prior to the terrorist attack, was because it had not yet been revealed to me what I was going to be writing about.  As has happened so often in my path, I got to let go of my expectations - my picture - of how I saw the immediate future unfolding (I no longer waste too much energy on trying to see beyond the next few weeks.)  I knew that I was going to be writing about the events taking place, and their impact upon all of us watching in horror and shocked disbelief as our perspective of life as we know it shattered and collapsed in dust along with those towers.

After a few days of watching events unfold while observing the many thoughts and ideas that were boiling and leaping to the surface in the churning, effervescent river of words and images flowing through my mind - and watching the fission and fusion of those mental images with each other, and with the emotional energy created by, connected to, spawning them;  I sat down to start writing on the morning of the 14th.

I sat down with some apprehension because I knew momentous events were unfolding - and that I was being called upon to take some risks.  As soon as I saw where this writing was heading, I got scared.

Chapter 7 - Attack on America:  A Call for Higher Consciousness

I think it is pretty good.  I think it is important.  And I knew from the beginning that it's importance would probably not be reflected in how many people read it.  It has been a little disappointing that very few people have actually read it - but on other levels it has been kind of a relief.  I talk about some pretty advanced perspectives of recovery in this online book - and share some very advanced interpretations of the metaphysical levels of this process.  I also disclose some things on a personal level to a degree that I have heretofore reserved for my Joy2MeU Journal in it's password protected web site.  And some of the opinions and interpretations that I share are controversial - to say the least.

For all of these reasons, I am strongly considering transferring the bulk of the online book to my Joy2MeU Journal.  I have tons of information on my web site already, and I am afraid that this online book might confuse new visitors - and distract, or block them, from getting the benefit of the more basic information on the site.  My writing - both in style and length - is kind of an acquired taste I think, and this online book fits more easily into my Journal site for reading by the people who resonate strongly with my message and like my style of writing. 

I probably will not make that decision for several weeks.  I need to take care of some January type business stuff (inventory, state sales tax, etc.), and then want to focus on the personal journal portion of my Journal to get some more clarity in my personal process.  I have not reread this online book as a continuous work to see what I think of it yet.  I wrote it and published it as I wrote it - because I was compelled to do that.  Sometime later this month I will read it.

It is possible that I may decide to make an e-book out of it - once I figure out what an e-book is. ;-)  What feels more likely right now, is that I will be combining much of what I wrote here with what I have been thinking of as my next book:  Codependency Recovery: Wounded Souls Dancing in the Light.

I started to write that process (how to) level book about my approach to the inner child healing work over 2 and a half years ago, and then became stalled.  I wasn't actually stalled so much as I didn't have a clear vision of how it was going to come together.  In retrospect I know now, that I needed to write the Recovery Process for inner child healing and Emotional Honesty and Emotional Responsibility series of articles, as well as other individual articles and the pages for the Journal, in order for my personal recovery to go through a tremendous transformational period, and to facilitate a deeper understanding of the process.

It was also very important for me to learn some important lessons from doing telephone counseling (which I started in March 2000) that are going to impact the structure and approach of that book.  As usual, more will be revealed to me when it is time for me to know.

So, I will read my book when it is time.  And then I will make any decisions I need to make.

My book Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls is a work of mystical Truth - in my belief.  I believe it is one of the most important books of our time.  It is also a book that was ahead of it's time - may still be ahead of it's time.  I may never see any widespread recognition of it in my lifetime.  I am very accepting of that today.  I wrote something in the spring of 2001 on my investment opportunity page that kind of summarizes my journey to acceptance of that possibility and explains my Karmic mission as I understand it.

What I believe, is that the September 11th terrorist attack was a milestone in the Transformational Healing Process that is unfolding on the planet.   The dynamics that caused this life event are explained in Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls.  In Attack on America:  A Spiritual Healing Perspective & Call for Higher Consciousness I have expanded and explained in more detail my understanding of those dynamics - which are the cause of the human condition - and shared my perspective of what is happening on multiple levels. 

Polarity is the key.  Polarized thinking is what has caused the human condition and the disease of codependence.  We have been presented with an incredible opportunity to heal that condition of polarity.  That is what my online book is focused upon - healing that condition individually and collectively.  I think that I did a pretty good job of contributing to that goal.  I know that I feel like I have been of service to my mission and done what I needed to do for me.  Hopefully, some of you will find it helpful also.

Our experience of life has been screwed up because we have been doing it backwards - looking outside for answers instead of within.  We have not only been playing this holographic human game by reversed rules that don't work - we forgot that we are not really the wounded imperfect human who is in the game trying to get it "right" so that we can earn our way, transcend, to the next level.  We are part of the Creative Source who imagined, who is dreaming, this game.  On another level we are Spiritual Beings who exist within the game on a higher vibrational plane - and have projected ourselves downward vibrationally to see what it feels like to experience the game.  The small part of us that actually manifested in the lower vibrational Plane to experience being human in a physical, polarized holographic illusion of physical reality and individual identity got so caught up in the game that we started feeling disconnected from our True Spiritual Self, our higher vibrational Self - and thus from our Spiritual Source.  Feeling disconnected caused us to assume that we must have done something shameful and were being punished.  Feeling separate from the Source and from other humans is what made violence possible.  That is how the dance of wounded souls started.

There is a reason that we never felt at home here.  It is because we have felt disconnected, and then when we made all those attempts to reconnect, we were dialing the wrong number.  We were looking outside for the answers.

This is not home.  This is also not a prison. This is boarding school and we are getting ready for graduation.

Polarity caused the illusion that the flesh and the Spirit were separate, which led to the illusion of disconnection, which led to the pain of feeling separate - which when judged by a polarized belief system created shame about being human.

There is nothing shameful about being human.  We are Spiritual beings who are awakening to Truth, who are reconnecting with our Spiritual Source.  It is an exciting time to be alive.  The Second Coming of the message of Love is in progress.  Through learning to manifest Love internally we are manifesting Love into the world and changing the human condition.  Work for World Peace: Heal Your Inner Child.  So be it.  Blessed Be.

In writing the last section of this Newsletter, I actually wrote the end of the book.  I didn't realize that until yesterday.  I have now added the appropriate passages above to the end of Chapter 11.  I am going to end this January Update by sharing with you a motto that my Higher Self communicated to me some years ago.  It was some of the intuitive guidance that I got along the way that helped me in transforming my relationship with life.  It helped me to start focusing on taking life less seriously - on stopping giving so much power to the shame and the false beliefs.  Maybe it will help you.  I know it helps me to remember it.

Don't worry - be silly.

"The adventure of recovery keeps getting different.  The dance of balance is continuously changing, shifting, expanding.  One of the most important things we can do for ourselves, is to not take it all so seriously, not take ourselves so seriously.  Don't worry be silly, is a motto my Higher Self communicated to me many years ago.  Instead of worrying about doing it right, instead of empowering our fear of consequences, instead of trying to force outcomes - it is much better to lighten up (dark to Light, heavy to light) because that helps us see with more clarity.

The inner child healing process is a journey from dark to Light, from serious to silly." 

The Recovery Process for inner child healing - through the fear

With Wishes of great Joy and Love in 2002 to all of you - and of course to Me 2. ~ Robert  January 14, 2002

Go to Update for April 2002