Behavior wounds no matter how good intentions are
I want to begin this section by saying, that I have no doubt that Dr. Harley
has the best of intentions - and is a good person. I also have no
doubt that he is severely codependent - or at least he had no consciousness
of it when he wrote the article in question, and he still has it posted on
his web site in April of 2002. The nature of codependency is that we
unconsciously relate to life out of the programming that was adapted by our
ego in early childhood - until we get into recovery from codependency and
start awakening to consciousness.
It was wounded people who had the best of intentions that most wounded
us. There is a very telling statement in the Big Book of Alcoholics
Anonymous that was really a cover puller for me in early sobriety.
It was a statement that said something like: "I always judged myself on my
intentions, while other people judged me on my actions." The fact that
I always intended to be a nice person and do the "right" thing was really
immaterial - it was my actions, my behavior, that other people experienced.
It was the behavior of other people that wounded us - it doesn't really
make any difference what their intentions were. In fact, knowing that
they had the best of intentions sometimes makes it harder for us to own and
honor our wounds - to own our self.
It is necessary to own and honor the child who
we were in order to Love the person we are. And the only way to do that
is to own that child's experiences, honor that child's feelings, and release
the emotional grief energy that we are still carrying around.
(Text in this color is used for quotes from
Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls by Robert Burney)
We are all Magnificent Spiritual Beings who have been wounded by coming
into human body in emotionally dishonest, Spiritually hostile environments.
We were wounded in childhood and the defenses we adapted (our codependency)
caused us to wound other people in our lives by the ways we reacted to protect
ourselves.
Codependency is a form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (Codependence as Delayed Stress Syndrome)
which was adapted in early childhood to survive the emotional pain we experienced.
(Loving the Wounded Child Within)
Since we did not have the tools and knowledge we needed to heal our wounds,
we were forced to use denial and unconsciousness to deal with the pain of being human.
Codependency can be described in a variety of
ways - looking at it from different levels, different perspectives (What is codependency / codependence
?) - but the one I just referenced in part above is a good one.
Codependency is a compulsively reactive condition which is the result of growing
up in an emotionally dishonest, Spiritually hostile, shame based environment.
Spiritually hostile in my definition meaning: based upon belief in
separation (from our Source, from other people, from nature) - instead of
connection to everyone and everything. Shame based meaning: founded
upon the belief that humans are inherently flawed and defective, shameful.
The Magnificent Spiritual Being who is inhabiting
the body of Dr. Willard F. Harley, Jr. in this lifetime, exhibits his shame
programming with his statement that we do not have worth just because we
exist. He believes that a human has to earn worth. I strongly
disagree.
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.
Beliefs dictate relationships
And there in lies the crux of our differences. The underlying belief
systems are completely different - are in fact polar opposites. In
my book Codependence:
The Dance of Wounded Souls I use principles of Quantum Physics
and Molecular Biology to try to impart some understanding of the Planetary
Conditions that caused the condition of codependency - which I believe is
the human condition as we have inherited it.
"Due to the planetary conditions, the human ego developed a
belief in separation - which is what made violence possible and caused the
human condition as we inherited it. The reflection of that human condition
on the individual level is the disease of Codependence. Codependence
is caused by the ego being traumatized and programed in early childhood
so that our relationship with ourselves and the God-Force is dysfunctional
- that is, it does not work to help us access the Truth of ONENESS and Love.
It is through healing our relationship with ourselves that we open our inner
channel and start tuning into the Truth."
The foundation belief system - the intellectual paradigm - we are empowering
is what determines our perspective of life.
"Our intellectual paradigm
- mental attitudes, definitions, and beliefs - determine our perspectives
and expectations, which in turn dictate our relationships and emotional
reactions. If our intellectual paradigm is limited - if we cannot imagine
a larger perspective of life - than what we perceive is limited, is out of
focus. If we cannot use our imagination to open up to different
interpretations of what we are seeing, then we are wearing blinders - and
can only see what we expect to see.
As an example: A traditional
therapist / psychologist / psychiatrist has a limited perspective that restricts
them to labeling behaviors - that are symptoms and variations of codependency
- in such a way that they fit into the boxes their intellectual paradigm dictates."
Attack on America: A Spiritual Healing Perspective
& Call for Higher Consciousness Chapter 8
Our definitions and beliefs about any concept / idea dictates and determines
our relationship with it. The framework / context / perspective with
which we are viewing anything, determines how we relate to that person,
place, or thing.
Perspective is a key to Recovery. I had
to change and enlarge my perspectives of myself and my own emotions, of other
people, of God and of this life business. Our perspective of life dictates
our relationship with life. We have a dysfunctional relationship with
life because we were taught to have a dysfunctional perspective of this life
business, dysfunctional definitions of who we are and why we are here.
It is kind of like the old joke about three blind
men describing an elephant by touch. Each one of them is telling his
own Truth, they just have a lousy perspective. Codependence is all about
having a lousy relationship with life, with being human, because we have
a lousy perspective on life as a human.
We learned how to view, and relate to, life in early childhood from
people who were wounded in their childhood. We learned how to
relate to our self and other human beings as children.
We learned about life as children and it is necessary
to change the way we intellectually view life in order to stop being the
victim of the old tapes. By looking at, becoming conscious of, our
attitudes, definitions, and perspectives, we can start discerning what works
for us and what does not work. We can then start making choices about
whether our intellectual view of life is serving us - or if it is setting
us up to be victims because we are expecting life to be something which it
is not.
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.
I not only disagree with Dr. Harley on the definition of codependency,
I disagree with him about the meaning and purpose of life. I am going
to touch on some different aspects of our differences in the course of this
web article. I am going to look at it from different perspectives,
on different levels. I am going to discuss some fundamental differences
in our definitions about some very basic concepts, including: codependency,
marriage, divorce, love, right and wrong,
I do not just have some different opinions and definitions than Dr.
Harley, we have completely different world views. I live in a completely
different world than Dr. Harley lives in because my relationship with life
is so different. I am not writing this web article as an attack on
him - although as codependent as he appears to be, he will no doubt take
it personally. This does not really have anything to do with
him personally - I am simply using him as a symbol for both the arrogant
ignorance of the white male patriarchy and the dysfunctional nature of the
traditional mental health system in this society. Since he is using
the internet to expose his ignorance and limited intellectual paradigm, I
am using him as a symbol to expose the dysfunction in the system he represents.
It is most likely that the majority of therapists and counselors out there
live in Dr. Harley's world. I want to warn people seeking help about
counselors and therapists like him - and hopefully maybe even encourage some
people in the helping professions to expand their consciousness and break
out of the limited beliefs that plague our dysfunctional civilization.
The Concept of Codependency
The description of the Marriage Builders web site states: Dr. Willard F. Harley, Jr. has saved thousands of marriages
from the pain of unresolved conflict and the disaster of divorce.
The first two paragraphs of his article state:
"Those of us in the business of trying to save
marriages struggle daily with cultural beliefs and practices that make our
job difficult. The sudden surge of divorces in the 1970's, that has made America
the country with the highest divorce rate, has a great deal to do with changes
in our basic beliefs. More to the point, it has to do with a major shift
toward self-centeredness. Beliefs that encourage self-centeredness destroy
marriage.
One of these is the belief that co-dependent behavior
is self-defeating and that we should rid ourselves of it. It's a wolf in
sheep's clothing and a marriage wrecker. I'll try to explain why I feel so
strongly about this issue."
He then goes on to sarcastically pick apart a questionnaire that was
included in the article he is using to define codependency. After
using sarcasm to demolish the list and prove it inaccurate because he - a
healthy person with a wonderful marriage - fits this definition which just
goes to prove how mistaken the codependency movement is, he then concedes
that the questionnaire fits people in relationships with someone who is addicted/alcoholic.
He concludes:
"In my judgment, the co-dependency movement, which
began with such valuable insight, has become a monster. In over-reaching,
it has subjected healthy people to the same norms as unhealthy people, and
in so doing, has caused much more harm than good. Married couples should
be on guard from the ruinous effects of the co-dependency movement on marriage,
especially if one of them suffers from anxiety or depression."
I was kind of shocked to see this article was still posted on his web
site as an example of his beliefs. I would have hoped that he had
learned some things in the years since he wrote this article.
The perspective of codependency that he is condemning is in fact, a
reflection of a very early understanding of the phenomena, which did
more accurately apply to someone who is in a relationship with an alcoholic/addict.
The word codependency, and the codependency movement, has grown and evolved
since that early understanding.
Here is a quote from my book that is included on my web page about The
Evolution of the Term "Codependence":
The expanded usage of the term "Codependent" now
includes counterdependent behavior. We have come to understand that both
the passive and the aggressive behavioral defense systems are reactions to
the same kinds of childhood trauma, to the same kinds of emotional wounds.
The Family Systems Dynamics research shows that within the family system,
children adopt certain roles according to their family dynamics. Some of
these roles are more passive, some are more aggressive, because in the competition
for attention and validation within a family system the children must adopt
different types of behaviors in order to feel like an individual.
The term - which started out as co-alcoholic - has come to mean something
quite different than what it was originally coined to describe. In
fact, the word codependency or codependence is actually a lousy word to describe
the phenomena that it has led us to discover.
Actually the term "Codependence" is an inaccurate
and somewhat misleading term for the phenomenon it has come to describe.
A more accurate term would be something like outer-dependence, or external
dependence.
When I speak of someone being codependent, I am describing a phenomena
where a person gives power over how they relate to self - allows their self
definition and feelings of worth to be dictated by - external or outer conditions
/ forces / stimuli. We formed our core relationship with life
- learned how to relate to self, to other people, and to life - in early childhood
from people who were wounded and shamed in their childhood. Our relationship
with self and life is dictated by the subconscious intellectual and emotional
programming adapted by our egos in childhood. Until we become conscious
of this basic human reality and start recovering from it - healing our emotional
wounds and changing our intellectual programming - we live life reacting
to our core programming.
We survived the environments we were raised in by adapting defenses
to protect ourselves. The ways in which these defenses manifest behaviorally
can look very different on the outside. Descriptions of these defenses
can vary greatly depending on what they are being described in relationship
to - but the underlying emotional dynamics are the same for all human beings.
In my article Roles
In Dysfunctional Families I describe one way of looking at them (family
hero, scapegoat, etc.) - while in the excerpt from my book on the page just
quoted The Evolution of the Term
"Codependence", I describe them in relationship to the terms aggressive
and passive (ranging from bulldozers to martyrs.) The bottom line however,
is that the different varieties of codependency are reactions to the same
basic emotional wounds from childhood. They are defenses designed to
help us survive. They are the ways we learned to try to control and
manipulate our environments to protect us from emotional pain that felt life
threatening.
"Attempts to control are a reaction to fear. It is what
we do to try to protect ourselves emotionally. Some of us (classic
codependent behavior) tried to control through people pleasing, being a chameleon,
wearing a mask, dancing to other people's tunes. Some of us (classic
counterdependent behavior) protected ourselves/tried to be in control by
pretending that we didn't need other people. Either way we were living
life in reaction to our childhood wounds - we were not making clear, conscious
choices. (If our choice is to be in an abusive relationship or not
to be in a relationship at all, that is not a choice - that is reacting between
two extremes that are symptoms of our childhood wounds.)
Both classic codependent and classic counterdependent behaviors are
part of the condition/disease of codependency in my definition. They
are just two different extremes in the spectrum of behavioral defense systems
that the ego adapts in early childhood."
The definition Dr. Harley wrote his article in reaction to, is a very weak
attempt to describe what I refer to as classic codependent behavior.
Counterdependent behavior is just as much a part of the larger definition
of codependency as the classic people pleaser, caretaker variety.
The levels, varieties and permutations of codependency are also greatly
influenced by another facet of the phenomena that very directly relates
to Dr. Harley's perspective of codependency. This involves the differences
in the way society has traditionally treated men and women. This is
something that I described in the very first column I wrote for a local monthly
alternative newspaper in February of 1996.
"Traditionally in this society women were taught to be codependent
on - that is take their self-definition and self-worth from - their relationships
with men, while men have been taught to be codependent on their success/career/work.
That has changed somewhat in the past twenty or thirty years - but is still
part of the reason that women have more of a tendency to sell their souls
for relationships than men do. Codependence is all about giving outside
or external influences power over our self-esteem. Everything outside of
our 'self' - rather that is people, places and things or our own external
appearance - has to do with ego-strength not self-worth. We all have equal
Divine worth because we are transcendent Spiritual beings who are part of
the ONENESS that is the Great Spirit/God-Force - not because of anything
outside of us."
The reason that Dr. Harley betrays his codependency in his statement about
the need to be productive, is because that is how codependency has manifested
in dysfunctional civilization - men were taught that their worth comes from
being human doings, not human beings. Men are defined - and determine
their worth - by what they do, their work, fulfilling their role as provider.
A man can be a lousy father and husband - can be a really unpleasant and nasty
human being - and still be considered successful and worthy of admiration
in our dysfunctional society.
The traditional view of a male - female relationship is that:
the male has worth because he does (brings home the bacon), and the woman
has worth because she serves the male. Is this why Dr. Harley believes
his marriage is such a success? I can't know that. It is possible
that his wife is independent enough to have carved out a role for herself
in their marriage that doesn't conform to the traditional model - and that
he could be still be unconscious enough, his ego could be fortified enough
by the feeling of superiority/worth he gets from what he does (being an
"expert" marriage counselor), to have not integrated lessons learned in the
evolution of his marriage into his fundamental belief system. Denial
is an incredibly powerful survival tool. When someone is heavily invested
in being right, they wear blinders that keep them from seeing any other possibility.
What I do know is that an unconscious acceptance of traditional dysfunctional
definitions dictates the way one relates to life, to women, and to the institution
of marriage.
As I said above, the my differences with him in terms of our perspective
of the concept of codependency, is a symptom of differences in the underlying
belief systems. He believes that some people grew up in functional
homes and are normal healthy people. I believe that all families are
dysfunctional to some degree - because civilized societies are emotionally
dishonest and dysfunctional.
In this society, in a general sense,
the men have been traditionally taught to be primarily aggressive, the "John
Wayne" syndrome, while women have been taught to be self-sacrificing and
passive. But that is a generalization; it is entirely possible that
you came from a home where your mother was John Wayne and your father was
the self-sacrificing martyr.
The point that I am making is that our understanding
of Codependence has evolved to realizing that this is not just about some
dysfunctional families - our very role models, our prototypes, are dysfunctional.
Our traditional cultural concepts of what a man
is, of what a woman is, are twisted, distorted, almost comically bloated
stereotypes of what masculine and feminine really are. A vital part of this
healing process is finding some balance in our relationship with the masculine
and feminine energy within us, and achieving some balance in our relationships
with the masculine and feminine energy all around us. We cannot do that if
we have twisted, distorted beliefs about the nature of masculine and feminine.
When the role model of what a man is does not
allow a man to cry or express fear; when the role model for what a woman
is does not allow a woman to be angry or aggressive - that is emotional dishonesty.
When the standards of a society deny the full range of the emotional spectrum
and label certain emotions as negative - that is not only emotionally dishonest,
it creates emotional disease.
If a culture is based on emotional dishonesty,
with role models that are dishonest emotionally, then that culture is also
emotionally dysfunctional, because the people of that society are set up
to be emotionally dishonest and dysfunctional in getting their emotional
needs met.
What we traditionally have called normal parenting
in this society is abusive because it is emotionally dishonest. Children
learn who they are as emotional beings from the role modeling of their parents.
"Do as I say - not as I do," does not work with children. Emotionally dishonest
parents cannot be emotionally healthy role models, and cannot provide healthy
parenting.
Positive Co-Creation
I will address those traditional roles, and beliefs about the "institution"
of marriage, in other parts of this article when I look in more depth at
the masculine/feminine dynamic as it has evolved in patriarchal civilization.
I want to wrap up this page by emphasizing how vital it is to start becoming
conscious of how our early childhood experiences have dictated our lives.
"When we were 3 or 4 we couldn't look around us and say, "Well,
Dad's a drunk and Mom is real depressed and scared - that is why it feels
so awful here. I think I'll go get my own apartment."
Our parents were our higher powers. We were not capable of understanding
that they might have problems that had nothing to do with us. So it
felt like it was our fault.
We formed our relationship with ourselves and life in early childhood.
We learned about love from people who were not capable of loving in a healthy
way because of their unhealed childhood wounds. Our core / earliest
relationship with our self was formed from the feeling that something is
wrong and it must be me. At the core of our being is a little kid who
believes that he/she is unworthy and unlovable. That was the foundation
that we built our concept of "self" on.
. . . . . . . It is not only dysfunctional, it is ridiculous to maintain
that what happened in our childhood did not affect our adult life.
We have layer upon layer of denial, emotional dishonesty, buried trauma,
unfulfilled needs, etc., etc. Our hearts were broken, our spirit's
wounded, our minds programmed dysfunctionally. The choices we have
made as adults were made in reaction to our childhood
wounds / programming - our lives have been dictated by our wounded inner
children."
We were forced to disassociate from our self in early
childhood because of the emotional pain. This is true rather we came
from an overtly dysfunctional family or from what appeared to be a healthy,
loving family. Those of us that came from families that looked good
on the outside - and didn't have some overt, easily identified dysfunction
- often have a much harder time getting a handle on our wounding because
it was much more subtle. That does not make it any less damaging.
Dysfunctional cultural beliefs and emotional dishonesty wounded our parents
and they wounded us with their behavior - no matter how wonderful their
intentions were.
On an emotional level the dance of Recovery is
owning and honoring the emotional wounds so that we can release the grief
energy - the pain, rage, terror, and shame that is driving us.
That shame is toxic and is not ours - it never
was! We did nothing to be ashamed of we were just little kids. Just as our
parents were little kids when they were wounded and shamed, and their parents
before them, etc., etc. This is shame about being human that has been passed
down from generation to generation.
There is no blame here, there are no bad guys,
only wounded souls and broken hearts and scrambled minds.
Our ego adapted emotional and behavioral defenses
to help us survive. We constructed ourselves a defense system that
by necessity was built on unconsciousness and denial. As long
as we are not in recovery from our codependency, we are not making conscious
choices, we are reacting to our childhood programming.
When Dr. Harley says, "I feel good about the choices I make and what I can do."
that is Truth - we can feel good about the
action we take. An important part of recovery is learning to take responsibility
for the things we have some control over. It is vital to start learning
how to make choices that allow us to behave in alignment with our intentions
and highest beliefs - how to "be" honest with ourselves and others,
to "live" our lives with integrity, to walk our talk. If we are
reacting to childhood emotional wounds, then what we say and how we behave
will be contradictory and self defeating - which throws us into the codependent
dilemma of having to come up with some rationalization that makes it someone
else's fault, or plunge into the emotional abyss of shame and self hatred
within us. Codependents dance through life to the music of dissonance
and strife - recovery allows us to start achieving some integration and
balance, some peace and harmony in our human dance.
As long as we are reacting out of a limited, polarized,
shame based belief system then the choices we make are dictated by the limitations
of that belief system. If we are reacting out of our childhood intellectual
programming and emotional wounds then we are powerless to be a positive co-creator
in our lives - we are only able to react and co-create out of emotional dishonesty.
If we are reacting, we are not making conscious, enlightened, mature choices.
Owning our power of choice is the key to empowerment.
It is vital to start owning our power to choose the beliefs that we are
allowing to define our relationship with self - and dictate how we live our
lives. In order to start manifesting Love into the world it is vital
to start seeing with more clarity - and understanding our own inner process
with more objectivity and compassion. It is essential to become conscious
so we can stop reacting blindly out of the dysfunctional programming from
our childhood.
"We all observe ourselves, but we do
it from the perspective of the critical judge. It is our critical parent
voice that provides the witness perspective in our lives. . . . . . .
The critical parent voice is rooted in the subconscious
intellectual paradigm that is defining and dictating our life experience.
It is the play by play commentator that is providing running commentary
on how well we are playing the game of life - and it is judging our
performance based upon false beliefs about the nature and purpose of life,
based upon a black and white perspective that dooms us to be the victim of
being imperfect humans. It dictates how we react to life and then judges
us for those reactions.
It is very important to start learning how to
take power away from that critical parent voice so that we can start developing
a witness perspective with a compassionate level of consciousness.
So that we can start learning how to be our own best friend - instead of
our own worst enemy."
