Introduction

" Who am I ? "
" Why am I me ? "
" Why aren?t I that other person ? "

These questions I'd often ponder as a young child, but would dismiss them as silly, un-answerable and definitely not as much fun as fishing for crabs at the local jetty.

Now that I look back with an adult and refined spiritual viewpoint, I can see that those questions were indeed quite profound for a little boy.

From this reflection, I make no claim or desire to call myself an enlightened master or such, it's simply an acknowledgment that such questions can only come from a pure space. That space being a 'spiritual space' and is common in uncomplicated childhood.

Such questions are fundamental philosophical inquiries, which have been asked time and time again by countless individuals, all expressing the strange need to find an answer to the seemingly unanswerable mysteries of life.

What Influences & Shapes the Sense of Self?

Thru the various stages of a persons human, social, spiritual development, the sense of WHO a person is (that is? ,the inner identification where self-fulfilment & the recognition of self worth emanate from), should progress to new meanings as the individual experiences life more completely.

I purposefully use the word "should" to indicate that many people do not necessarily progress to a more refined view of their existence beyond a basic sense of self identification aligned with the physical or mental levels.

Table 1: Exploring the Sense of Self.

From the table above, we can examine each level of being & see how the human psyche matures in life. Each level of existence re-defines & matures the sense of self thru relative experiences, associations, comparisons & other qualifications.

This can all serve us by ultimately allowing a revelation, that one-day we can cast aside the need for external qualifications & rest in the knowledge that we exist because we exist.

Such an attitude is devoid of comparisons & analogies, since we can then see ourselves as forever being complete. Our true self is a spiritual being & to paraphrase "we're spiritual beings on physical journey".

The levels making up the pysche

1. Physical: In various stages of life, a person can derive a sense of personal power as well as feelings of fulfilment & competency from positive physical achievements like sports & athletics.

On the other hand, a negative use of physical attributes like? Bullying? may also bring about a sense of personal power or self.

However, to continue the use & cultivation of ones personal power in this way will lead to problems, as one day such a person may encounter someone stronger & more assertive. Here the persons personal power or sense of self would be taken away.

Achievements like sports & athletics are healthy & positive in defining a sense of self, but they to must be considered vulnerable as to fall into ill health or injury could rob a person of the source of their sense of self.

4. Spiritual: Here the sense of self is allowed to bloom or unfold & be known as it truly is. Such a degree of self-knowledge is attained thru the nurturing of spiritual philosophies, principles & practices, along with tolerance & self-love.

Upon attaining such a sense of self, the recognition of all personal power & fulfilment as coming from within liberates one from the limitations of worldliness & the interpretation of a world that is harsh & lacking compassion.

It allows the establishment of a viewpoint that defines the world as neutral & that previous methods of judging the world have all been based on inner perceptions based on individual experience.

"Perceptions aren't knowledge", is the new catch-cry for the enlightened.

The True self doesn't need or require:

• Rationalization

• Justification

• Belief systems

...& even to say the phrase; "your True Self", is incorrect because it implies that the True Self belongs to, or is tied to the small self. The small self is an illusion, an imitation of the real thing. To finally come to know & experience the true self is to forever cast aside the pale imitation of the identity you thought was you.

Living in the experience of the true self will allow the natural attributes of the true self to emerge into daily life.

These are:

Vision: The ability to see deeply & with wisdom

Clarity: that comes from vision. The mind enhanced by its own stillness

Peace: that comes from clarity. The experience born of stillness.

Confidence: that comes from peace. Thru lack of confusion.

Courage: that comes from confidence. Thru being armed with truth.

Who is the "Inner Child"?

The "Inner Child" is the: 

• Little child you were who desired to be nurtured, cared for & loved. This child still resides within you as an adult.

• Free spirit, pixie & elf you've tamed & controlled, yet who resides within you.

• Emotional & sensitive you whom you've channeled, controlled & silenced & who is still living within you.

• Creative, imaginative & artistic you who's been molded, structured & organized; who still resides in you & is needing to be set free.

• Hurt, pained, neglected, frustrated, abused & ignored you whom you have masked, hidden from view & denied the existence of. This child is always just below the surface, causing you to be anxious, worried & fearful of mistreatment.

• Fun loving, happy, frivolous, joyful, humorous you when you were young & unsophisticated; that person you've replaced with a sophisticated, mature, serious, task oriented demeanor.

• Childhood you've lost or forgotten; yet it still resides in you, dwelling in your subconscious.

• Person who knows how to have fun & play for play's sake; who can help you prevent burnout & manage the stress in your life.

• Person you could be as an adult if you lightened up, let go of your seriousness, overcame your fears & accepted flexibility & change in your life.

• Person within you who needs healing, support & reinforcement thru a variety of Tools for Coping activities. Thru this you can be given new life, health & a chance for personal growth.

How did the "Inner Child" get there?

What is the unfinished business of the "Inner Child"?

From growing up in a dysfunctional family, emotional maturity was stunted. This failure to mature left the "Inner Child" unfinished because we:

• Grew up too fast.

• Became small adults; little "moms'' & "dads.''

• Were either over responsible or overachievers.

• Were emotionally vulnerable.

• Weren't given a chance to grow & mature in a normal sequence of events.

• Put on a public "mask'' or image to stifle our child-like needs.

• Repressed joy, vision & feelings.

• Still have a "inner child'' waiting to grow up & take its proper place.

How does the "Inner Child" come into being?

• Not always "serve'' others.

• Accept others "serving'' you.

• Be in charge of your life & not let others dictate to you.

• Be honest with others about your thoughts & feelings.

• Take risks & to suffer the positive or negative consequences of such risks.

• Make mistakes, laugh at them & carry on.

• Let your imagination & creativity be set free & to soar with the eagles.

• Cry, hurt & to be in pain as long as you share your feelings; do not repress or suppress them.

• Be angry, to express your anger & to bring your anger to some resolution.

• Make decisions for yourself.

• Be a problem solver & come up with solutions with which everyone may not agree.

• Feel happiness, joy, excitement & pleasure about living.

• Feel down, blue, sad, anxious, upset & worried, as long as you share your feelings.

• Love & be loved by someone whom you cherish.

• Be your "Inner Child'' & to let it grow up, accept love, share feelings & enjoy pleasure & play.

What are the signs of activity of the "Inner Child"?

What messages did the "Inner Child" need to hear, but which went unsaid?

What are the negative consequences of suppressing the "Inner Child"?

What nurturing messages can you give your "Inner Child"?

What are some steps by which you can help heal your "Inner Child"?

Activity 3: Learning How to Play

The following tips can help you learn to play:

Step A. Let go of any guilt feelings you might have about indulging yourself in "play'' activity. Redefine the role of "play'' in your life. Restructure your life activities & include some play time.

Step B. Define some "acceptable'' play activities you'd be willing to experiment with over the next year.

Step C. Be spontaneous & let go of the need for "rigidity'' in the ways you play. Let your "child'' out & freewheel thru your playtime.

Step D. Don't stifle your "child-like'' responses to a "play'' activity. Loosen up & let go of the need to be "mature.''

Step E. Don't worry about your "public image,'' as long as what you're doing harms no one. Vent gut-level frolic responses to your play activity.

Creativity & the Inner Child - By Jane Rowan

Getting in touch with the inner child is a process. There are both terrible & wonderful things that the child needs to tell us about childhood feelings.

Much of what the child needs to tell us is buried in the unconscious. We were scolded or told to “forget it!” Our needs & hurts were made unacceptable & shoved into the darkest recesses of our minds. It’s often not easy to find out what’s been so long hidden & made untouchable, unthinkable.

Art & other creative activities are great ways to access unconscious material. Whether it’s making a visual representation of a monster that came in a dream (thus giving it shape & validating the experience) or messing around with clay to see what emerges, art provides a medium that goes beyond words & allows more metaphorical, less logical, processing.

You can use pastels or crayons & just start out messing around -scribbling, making shapes, drawing anything that comes to mind. Listen to any intuitions that come about color, shape, texture. Or you may start with a feeling you already have (sadness, anger, joy…) & see how the child inside you wants to express it.

I use art both to attempt to represent things I’ve “seen” inside - as images, mythical figures, colors & shapes & also as a free-form way to see what might come.

When I attempt to show something I’ve seen inside, it almost never comes out the way I see it, but I might get something that comes close. In any case, the trying brings me closer to it & I get to see how it changes as I work.

When I begin drawing without an image in mind, it’s scarier for me. What will happen? Is there anything there?

It’s just messing around, a waste of time. The critical voices come up & I need to stave them off by saying, “This doesn’t have to be great, it’s just for me.”

“I set aside a half hour; just leave me alone that long,” & so on. Color may start me off - does this mood feel like green or purple or orange?

A gesture or physical movement - zig-zags, spirals, loops, or the need to fill in a whole area. Once there is something there, it often calls for something else - a pink feeling to offset the gray, an enclosure for the wild zig-zags, or a wilder color to accent them & make them harsher.

Sometimes your art work may tell you something directly - Oh! I guess I was angry - look at those zig-zags. Other times you might not get a clear message, but have sense of satisfaction that something was expressed.

Over time you may develop a set of symbols or patterns that have special significance for you. And remember - this isn't art to be judged by anyone else. It’s just for you & the child. The other great thing about it is that it can be fun.

Soothing Your Inner Child - By Jane Rowan

Getting in touch with our inner children isn't always easy. At first it might seem that they just want to cry & cry. That’s natural. The parts of us that were split off at a young age had to go away for good reasons:

• abuse
• fear
• neglect
• misunderstanding

These young parts weren't allowed to express their overwhelming feelings, so they took the feelings away with them.

When we invite these lost inner children back into our lives, we have to be ready for them to express a lot of distress. But what do we do then? How do we soothe the inner child?

First of all, it’s a process & it won’t get done all at once. You need to learn how to parent your own particular inner children. They'll teach you what they need as time goes on. You'll have to be just as patient as if you'd adopted a real child with a troubled background.

2nd, you need to take those feelings extremely seriously. “Soothing” the child doesn't mean saying, “There, there, dear. It’s OK. Stop crying.” You may have heard voices like that in your past, but your job is to be a different kind of parent, one who really listens to the child’s feelings.

So the first part of soothing is to hear the feelings. The child might not be able to tell you why she or he feels sad or angry or scared. Your job is to pay attention to the feelings.

If you can, find a safe a quiet place where you can literally sit down & listen. Let the feelings emerge. Accept all of them, even though it's painful. If you can’t bear all of it at once, tell the child that you'll listen for 10 minutes, or 5, or 2 minutes.

Then promise the child to make another time later to listen some more.

As the feelings emerge, focus on loving the child who is entrusting you with these valuable & vulnerable emotions. Tell the child that you're proud of her or him for coming forth. Sometimes you may feel completely & inside the feelings, like you're being the child. That’s OK.

If you can manage to stay in that place, try to do so. See if you can detect any shift where you might feel a little more like a grownup holding the child.

Here’s where the soothing comes in: 

• Value all those difficult feelings & validate them. 

• Let your body express the love you have for this child by holding a pillow or stuffed animal, rocking, humming, stroking, doing anything you’d do to comfort an actual child. 

• Trust your instincts on this. Let the child tell you what feels good to her or him. 

• Don’t let any critical voices tell you that it’s silly to rock & hum a lullaby. It’s not silly - it's valuable practice in loving yourself.

• You'll need to do this practice over & over as your inner child gradually learns to trust you.

Over time you'll learn to be the caring parent that this child never had. You'll share your future with the wonderful, free & loving spirit that's your inner child.

source site: soothing your inner child

Dr. Phil's Take .... straight from his website!

Defining Your Authentic Self

Reclaiming the Self: Recovering from an Eating Disorder - By Marion Bilich, Ph.D.

Little did I know as I began therapy for my eating disorder in early 1973, that I'd be embarking on a life-long spiritual journey. What began as an attempt to stop the bingeing & purging (there was no such term as bulimia back then), was the first step in healing not only my mind & body, but my spirit as well.

All I knew was that I was miserable. My whole life revolved around dieting, bingeing & purging & obsessing about how fat I felt. I wanted so much to live without the constant obsession about food & my body, but I had almost lost hope.

I'd been in Overeaters Anonymous (OA) for a while, but that approach only served to intensify my focus of food & weight. Then I heard about 2 women who were doing groups with a “non-diet” approach - Susie Orbach & Carol Munter.

They advocated giving up dieting & learning to listen to the inner signals of body hunger & fullness, letting the body determine what, when & how much food it needed.

Back in those days no one had heard of their non-diet approach. No one had yet heard of Carol & Susie, for that matter (though they were soon to become very well known). To my OA friends, the notion of giving up outside controls over my eating was considered absurd at best - & dangerous at worst.

But give up those controls I did.

Over the next few years, I learned to listen to my own body’s voice. I was surprised to learn that it knew exactly how much food it needed if I was willing to listen to that voice. In fact, the more I listened, the stronger that voice became.

Whereas I'd been able to eat a gallon of ice cream in my bingeing days, after a year of working on my eating problem, I'd become uncomfortably full eating more than a dish of ice cream.

Evidently, during my binges I'd missed those faint signals of fullness. When I learned to pay attention to those signals however, they became stronger - literally screaming at me to stop eating.

As I began to trust that body wisdom regulate my food intake, I learned that it spoke to other body needs as well. My body wisdom told me whether I needed to rest, exercise, sleep, or just meditate. I started to live my life less dependent on outside authorities for guidance, as I relied more & more on that inner body wisdom to guide me.

And then, over time, a strange thing began to happen to me. I realized that my awareness of the inner voice of wisdom had slowly expanded to the point that the inner guidance was always there. When faced with life struggles, I could now “go inside” & ask my inner wisdom (what I call my guide), what I needed to do. That inner guide helped me understand my thoughts & feelings & time & again she's pointed the way out of troubles & pain.

I've grown spiritually thru my attention to that inner voice of wisdom. I live that way more & more every day. “She” is always there & always wise. She is my connection to my higher self.

My life has become more centered & peaceful over the past 20 years, despite many difficult times. That voice of inner wisdom led me out of my eating disorder. It helped me deal with my daughter’s brain tumor & it helped get me thru a serious illness & kidney transplant. Now it leads me to a more fulfilled life in every way.

Getting over an eating disorder can be the 1st step in an ongoing spiritual journey.

For me, recovery wasn't just about getting over bulimia & reclaiming my body, it was about reclaiming my self. This inner voice motivated me to share my experience with others & subsequently write Weight Control From The Inside Out.  I've been quite pleased with the positive response it's received from people seeking an effective approach to weight control.

A Bird's Eye View of THE ENCHANTED SELF & what it means to YOU! - By Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein

The Rebbe Nachman of Breslow often said, “Always remember - Joy is not merely incidental to your spiritual quest. It is vital.”

As the years have gone by & I’ve been in the practice of psychology over 20 years, I've become more & more convinced that he was so right, that joy isn't an option.

When we take away joy & we take away a sense of well-being, a sense that we're thriving, we allow ourselves or seem to find ourselves in circumstances that seem to drain, tire & weaken us. We're no longer the whole human being that is our birthright!

THE ENCHANTED SELF is a positive psychology approach to mental health that works both in the treatment room & out. I teach people the techniques they need to start to think in positive ways about themselves & their world.

Thus I teach them how to see what's right about themselves, rather than what's wrong. I also teach them to appreciate their own life story, its ups & downs; the roller coaster ride that we all go on. I teach how to value our potential even if in childhood we were put down or criticized, as so many of us are.

I have the belief & I teach the belief that inside of each of us we know when we're on track & we know when we're living a wholesome life that fits with the integrity of our particular spirit. I call this sense of well-being ”The Enchanted Self” & I teach people how to find their "Enchanted Selves" again & again - how to recognize & celebrate the states of well-being that signify they're in touch with the best of themselves.

I stress the positive benefit of recalling memories about one's life in a fashion that permits us to discover & rediscover our own talents & resources. I also emphasize how to find in our past the kernals of pleasure & reservoirs of strength, that we can come home to again & again, even if we need to reshape these facets of ourselves to suit new circumstances.

Basically, this learning involves listening to yourself & reviewing your own past to see what worked for you, what really gave you pleasure. What aspects of yourself and your life can you identify as necessary to experience a state of well-being?

What do you need to feel whole? For example, if you loved to play the piano as a child, then you may not really enjoy watching football games as an adult. You may much more enjoy listening to classical music.

However, in order to live a full life, you may also enjoy football games because your son loves them or your husband loves them. Thus there's also an accommodation to someone you care about & a resulting interest develops.

I think you can begin to see that what's going to work for each person is so unique to that individual! It involves a review of our history & it involves analyzing the circumstances currently in our lives. If we have a handicap we may not be able to become a ballerina. Even if we have severe arthritis, we may not be able to become a ballerina at 40.

However, the love of dance since childhood may easily be converted into wonderful yoga stretches that help arthritis & feel 'dancy'. So often, there's a creative turn in the road, thinking out of the box, that the Enchanted Self person develops.

You find you have become an ENCHANTED SELF when you havethe courage to put together using your mind, heart, body & spirit new inventive ways of bringing pleasure & meaning into your life.

The steps I teach people are rigorous but they're no harder then all the habits we learn that keep us in bad moods & keep us depressed.

For example, if I teach someone how to review at the end of the day everything that's gone right in their day, that it's no harder than listing what went wrong. In fact it soon becomes easier than listing everything that went wrong.

The reason it becomes easier is that you don’t build up some of the rage & some of the anger that one can build up when we review the problems in our lives. Now we're encouraged rather than discouraged & even may end up sleeping better & feeling better leading to much less energy drain.

I've found the most effective way to teach people how to access their Enchanted Self, i.e., to find & hold onto feelings of joy & a sense of well-being is to share the Seven Gateways To Enchantment. It's a quick way to catch your Enchanted Self.

So let’s explore the Gateways & then try an enchanted assignment!

Envisioning Your Ideal Self - By Kimberly Fulcher

In my work as a professional coach, I've had the opportunity to interact with hundreds of individuals.  I've found that people who are successful & fulfilled share common characteristics.

Nurturing Self in the New Age - by Robert Burney M.A.

“By the way, the hardest part of unconditional Love is accepting wherever we're at in the moment no matter how uncomfortable. The hardest part of acceptance is not the difficulty of allowing others their process (although Lord knows that can be very hard); it's allowing ourselves our own process without shame judgment. I can do that now most of the time. I know now that when it feels like crap it isn't punishment, it isn't because I'm bad or wrong or defective. . . What I know now is that when it feels like shit that means that I'm being fertilized to help me grow.”

Codependence: The Dance of Wounded Souls by Robert Burney

Spring is the time of birth & rebirth - of new beginnings. And all new beginnings need nurturing.

This is true not only in nature but also for people who are involved in the very natural process that's healing & recovery. The Spiritual path is our natural path, is the reason we're here in these bodies on this planet.

And in order to walk a Spiritual path, it's necessary to reprogram the mental perspectives of life that we learned growing up in a Spiritually hostile, shame-based society.

Perhaps the first & certainly the most nurturing, thing we do when starting to walk a Spiritual path is to start seeing life in a growth context - that is to start realizing that life events are lessons, opportunities for growth, not punishment because we screwed up or are unworthy.

We're Spiritual beings having a human experience - not weak, shameful creatures who are here being punished or tested for worthiness. We're part of / an extension of an ALL-Powerful, unconditionally Loving God-Force / Goddess Energy / Great Spirit & we're here on Earth going to boarding school - not condemned to prison. The sooner that we can start awakening to that Truth, the sooner we can start treating ourselves in more nurturing, Loving ways.

The natural healing process - like nature itself - regularly serves up new beginnings. We don't reach a state of being that is “happily ever after.” We're continuously changing & growing.

We keep getting new lessons / opportunities for growth. Which is a real pain in the derriere sometimes - but is still better than the alternative, which is to not grow & get stuck repeating the same lessons over & over again.

This human experience is a process that involves inherent conflict between the continuously changing nature of life & the human ego’s need to survive.

In order to insure survival (which is the ego’s appointed task) the human ego needs to define things.

• What is food?
• What is friend or enemy?
• Who am I & how do I relate to them?
• What can hurt me & what brings me pleasure?

It also learned that it's healthy to have a fear of the unknown (it was important to check an unknown cave for saber toothed tigers before strolling into it.) As a result, the ego fears change & craves security & stability. But because life is constantly changing, security & stability can only be temporary.

The way it works is that the ego’s definitions put us in a box - this is who I am & how I relate to them - & the life process keeps breaking up our box.

Every time our box breaks we have to let go of some of our ego-definitions in order to grow. The time when we break out of the box is the time we're the most scared & confused - because we have just had to surrender some of our old definitions & we don’t know yet what's going to replace them - & the time we most need to nurture ourselves.

But because we were taught that if we're doing it “right” we shouldn’t be confused or scared, that is the time when we beat ourselves up the most.

We're the least nurturing to ourselves when we're growing the most, at the time of a new beginning.

Those times when we feel like we are “falling apart,” “losing it,” going to pieces,” are the times when we're growing the most. In a little while (little is a relative term, how fast we recover depends on how much we're judging ourselves, the more we're shaming & abusing ourselves the longer it takes) we start to get a feel for our new expanded psychic environment.

We find some new definitions & built ourselves a bigger box.

We start to feel safe & secure again. We've grown & broadened our horizons - & it feels like we're finally “getting it together.” We get comfortable with the new dimension of consciousness we've entered.

That's when it's time to break out of the box again - to fall apart, let go, process some more issues.

The more we understand that this is the way the process works; the easier it becomes to not judge & shame ourselves; the more capacity we have to Love & nurture ourselves.

Life is constantly changing. There are always going to be endings & new beginnings. There's always going to be grief & pain & anger about what we have to let go of & fear of what's to come. It isn't because we're bad or wrong or shameful.

It's just the way the game works.

So there's good news & bad news. The good news is that a New Age has dawned in human consciousness & that we now have tools, knowledge & access to healing energy & Spiritual guidance that has never before been available.

We're discovering the rules of the game that we've been playing for thousands of years by rules that don’t work.

The bad news is that it’s a stupid game - or at least it feels like it some of the time. The more we understand that it's a game, that this is just boarding school, the easier it becomes to nurture ourselves by not shaming & judging ourselves.

We're going to get to go home. We don’t have to earn it - that’s what unconditional Love means.