Healing Exercise for Self, for Healthier Relationships, AND for Healing Neediness

I want to share one of my current fave self-healing techniques, called "Re-Parenting." It’s awesome. Super healing for self AND for relationships, particularly useful for attracting healthier relationships. I have been using it for a couple of months now and really love it (and so do the clients who have tried it). Really you could JUST focus on Re-Parenting for months and do a lot of healing in so many areas and make a huge, deep difference in your life.... I got this exercise from Katherine Woodward Thomas, who rocks.

So Re-Parenting is a technique where you take full responsibility and control of the things you didn't feel you received during childhood (cause hey, everyone is human and growing, including your parents). Even the best parents in the world may have been lacking in certain areas, sometimes for reasons beyond their control. Alternatively/additionally, you can also choose to take full responsibility and control for things you feel like other people/past lovers don’t/didn’t give you. And you commit to providing these things for yourself now. This is really awesome because I run into so many people who can list off all the ways they’re traumatized from childhood and why, and while they can now pinpoint why they have this or that issue, they haven’t been able to heal it yet, and this exercise shifts you from blaming others, to actually taking full responsibility. And full responsibility means you have your POWER back. And on top of that you’re nurturing yourself. As is popularly known, the way you treat yourself sets the pattern/standard for how others treat you. So when you give yourself what you want/need, you are now establishing the energy you wish to receive from others (I’ll have a p.s. on this point at the end for people who aren’t as familiar with this concept). I’ll go over the exercise step by step, give my example and then add the P.S.

Exercise:

Sit down with a pad of paper and pen, and write down everything you feel was missing in your childhood (or in past relationships).

Some examples to get you started include:

-Nurturing (soothing you when you were disappointed, regular touch, kindness)

-Consistency and Dependability (kept their word, you knew you could count on them, were able to earn a living),

-Basic Life Skills (managing a check book, keeping up with the bills and home),

-Encouragement of Your Talents (recognizing them and supporting them to grow),

-Attention (spending time with you, noticing and responding to your moods, listening to you),

-Protection (from hostile behaviors of others, other kids bullying you, from danger, etc.),

-Respect of Boundaries (honoring your privacy and your right to say no, right to stand up for yourself),

-Basic Hygienic Care (washing of body, doing laundry, caring for your teeth, clean home),

-Unconditional Love (loving you without needing you to “perform” in return, etc.).


So you make your list of the things you feel were missing and then you go through your list and you write and say out loud for EACH of the things you listed:

"I, _________ release and forgive ___________ for failing to __________. I give up failing to _________ myself. I promise to do my absolute best to begin _______ myself from this day forward, and I claim ________ as mine fully and completely."


To fill in the blanks for example, let’s take consistency, stability, and dependability, it would read like this:

“I, Jaycee release and forgive my parents for failing to provide me with consistency, dependability, and stability. I give up failing to give myself consistency, dependability, and stability. I promise to do my absolute best to provide myself with consistency, dependability, and stability and to be dependable to myself from this day forward, and I claim consistency, dependability, and stability as mine fully and completely.”

I would write that down and say it out loud for each thing on my list. In doing so you're basically taking complete power over these things. They're now yours to give yourself and you release others from it. So you’re not only claiming these things for yourself and taking back your power, but you’re fully forgiving others and releasing blame. This is SUPER powerful and very healing.

In my case, I'm currently focused on the example I used above. My parents were absolutely awesome and did the best they could. But they were teenagers when they had me, didn’t speak English, and we lived in very poor conditions. Because my father was always trying to find work, we were constantly moving to wherever work was and I went to 13 different schools before age 12. So I think it’s fair to say that despite my parent’s best efforts I didn’t have a lot of stability or consistency when I was a child, and they weren't always dependable. Twenty-year-olds don't always realize the importance of keeping their word and don't always make the best decisions. Even when they wanted to keep their promises, sometimes they couldn’t. So I did the exercise above and claimed these things as my own and am focused on providing them for myself. I’m focused on keeping my word to myself and on being consistent. For example, if I say I’m going to work out every day for an hour, I do it (and am consistent about it!). I’ve been showing myself just how dependable and reliable I am for me. I don’t have to worry about suddenly getting lazy, not working out, and gaining weight because I know I can count on myself to be dependable. I sign up for a few dance classes a week and volunteer work, and I make sure I keep these promises to myself and that I’m consistent. I do the things on my to do list. I make commitments and keep them. I do what I tell myself I'm going to do. And that’s just one of the examples. I’m doing multiple ones, but that’s my been my focus.


Safety was also a big one for me. Having grown up in dangerous neighborhoods at the height of the nightstalker/Richard Ramirez thing (he was caught like a block away from my house- my mom/grandma lived in a state of fear during that time), and coming from a loud/dramatic Cuban family, there were always huge screaming scenes about how I was going to get killed or kidnapped anytime I forgot to padlock the door or set foot outside my yard. And you can imagine the type of screaming scenes that would take place when my "big kid" parents were exploring their new environment and would do things like light a Roman Candle INSIDE the house, not knowing what it would do and then the couch would catch on fire. So I grew up feeling pretty unsafe and like my parents/adults couldn't protect me because they were scared themselves. Now I’m giving myself affirmations about how safe and protected I am and how everything is OKAY, and come up with creative ways to make myself feel safe.

Those are just a couple examples. Funny thing is that I've always been such a free spirit and love being spontaneous, so I hadn't even realized these were things I needed. I only started there because it was the thing that was definitely missing back then. And after starting, now I realize how great and peaceful these things make me feel.

Re-parenting yourself and nurturing yourself feels GOOD. You can have all those things you felt you were deprived of in some way, or that you’ve always wanted. It’s now ALL in your hands.

Katherine gives this exercise in order to heal people’s hearts, and their neediness, before they enter into an adult, romantic relationship. She says, “’Neediness’ is a state of inner deprivation based upon unmet dependency needs in early childhood. When we are needy, we are trying to get from others what was denied us in the past. Unfortunately, though, many of these childhood needs cannot adequately be met in present-time, and particularly not with people we barely know...... It’s not that our needs are wrong. It’s that we’ve been going about trying to get them met in the wrong way.... Even when someone else wishes that he or she could provide what was missing for us in our childhood, unless the original wounding has been sufficiently dealt with, it’s like water through a sieve. Until we are healed, it doesn’t matter how much someone loves us.” And concludes, “You cannot get what was missing in your childhood from another person, until you are actively engaged in doing all that you can to give it to yourself.” And then she introduces the re-parenting exercise. She states, “We aren’t going into romantic relationships as adults, but rather as children posing in adult bodies. It’s like giving a 4-year-old the keys to the car: You can pretty much count on a wreck.”

So this exercise is also very beneficial for healing your romantic relationships and breaking old, negative relationship patterns. Super useful. :-)

Now the promised P.S.:

It’s often stated that your relationship with yourself defines your relationships with others, and the relationships you attract in your life. A typical line of questioning when someone complains about others not appreciating them is, “Well, in what ways don’t you appreciate yourself or what ways could you appreciate yourself more?” And then you have them make those changes. This shifts their relationships. Or "He doesn't listen to me!" "Well, in what ways don't you listen to yourself?" I’ll now just cut and paste my own channeling on this subject from about a year and half ago (sorry for the spelling, I had to copy from my Twitter because I couldn't find the file! So it was in 140 character blocks):

"Wondering how many people have the kind of relationship with themselves where they give themselves pleasure but not respect.....? i.e. you eat something that is horrible for u because it brings you pleasure but u are disrespecting your body and health at the same time. Or you buy something expensive cause it brings you pleasure. But you're disrespecting yourself by putting yourself in debt to someone else.

And in turn how many people who give themselves pleasure but not respect, attract romantic partners who give them pleasure, but not respect? i.e. they'll sleep with you, but wont give you the relationship you want. Or they'll sleep with you, but are cheating on you, lying to you, etc.

You teach other people how to treat you. And it ALL starts with how you treat yourself. Make sure you give yourself what you want others to give you. Your relationship with yourself sets the pattern for the rest of your relationships.

If you don't keep your commitments to yourself , how can you expect someone else to commit to you? (New Year’s resolutions anyone?)

Think about how others treat you and be honest with yourself about how you do the same thing to you. Then start changing it.”