Windows into Addiction
Billy wrestled with a full frontal attack of vague and paranoid fears. The pressure grew so intense he had to go home and avoid the things he had set to accomplish that afternoon. Once there, he found relief masturbating and watching porn. Afterwards he felt better – but also in his comfortable self image as someone who is not quite right. His shame as a flawed being was intact. The next day he was OK again and carried on with life. He never questions these cycles of procrastination, body tension and addictive behavior that rears its head from time to time. Just putting it out of mind helps him feel sane. We carry unconscious and misunderstood pain and inner addictions that we are not capable of dealing with at this time. Some are stronger than any drug addiction. Our body and mind contain pain killers much stronger than any morphine available on the market. These kick in as needed when our emotions threaten to break through certain barriers we have been trained to believe secure our survival. We are able to continue our current way of life by numbing the pain that is still there. The spiritual critic inside each one of us say’s this is “wrong” and something to be fixed (it also judges a great deal that's in this book!). What is needed is first to recognize that in those areas where we behave strangely in seemingly self destructive ways, great tenderness and compassion are required, along with whatever self discipline may or may not be appropriate to function. Certain tensions in our body, adrenaline, crisis and various other things keep the cycle going and reveal the presence of these cycles of energy. The most important response is gentleness and asking for help. Bringing the patterns into the light so that trusted friends and healers can help – and so that you can begin to first feel – and subsequently love the parts of yourself that are in so much pain they require drugs more powerful than morphine just to reach a threshold of feeling shitty, let alone OK.Action: Watch with compassion the parts of your self that cope in seemingly self destructive ways. Know that the pain these patterns hide is greater than you can deal with at this time, which is why you can never seem to break the pattern. Give yourself gentle love and self care in this terrain. If you need to beat yourself up because you are so scared you get angry at the thought of being gentle, let that be OK too.
Cresting the Waves:
A guide to sailing through life on
Relation-Ships
Dane E. Rose
