Health

No Longer in the Shadows

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

For over four years attending meetings of Codependence Anonymous ( http://www.coda.org/ or  http://coda-tulsa.org/ ) has been a consistent personal commitment. Going to these two weekly 12 step gatherings has been a big help in coming to understand Codependecy issues that created havoc in my life and working past them.  Here on this blog previously were listed all the afflictions I got into recovery for, but for the subject of today’s blog only one is being brought up: sexual compulsion.  While there are arguments going on today about whether people actually can use sex in the same manner an addict uses a substance, I can assure you from personal experience a person can.  I did.  I hated myself every step of the way, but that hatred did not stop me from “medicating with my habit of choice”.   

I wish there was a local chapter of Sexual Compulsives Anonymous, but am grateful local meetings for groups related to SCA are in town.  I have attended meetings of Sexual Addicts Anonymous (SAA) and Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous (SLAA).  The former was down right scary to me and seemed to be populated by people whose dysfunction had growth way beyond anything I could imagine (my heart goes out to them).  The meetings of the latter group were helpful but not targeted to my needs.

Contemplating trying to start a local chapter of Sexual Compulsives Anonymous, I have been reading material from the organization on their website http://www.sca-recovery.org/compulsive.htm .  There I found:  Members of SCA have learned through sharing their experience, strength, and hope with each other that sexual compulsivity is a disease.  This disease has three dimensions: physical, emotional, and spiritual.  Physically, we engage in sexual behaviors that we know are not healthy for us or that place us in legal, physical, or spiritual jeopardy.  Emotionally, we experience a “high” in contemplating and engaging in the “acting out” behavior, followed by an emotional let-down after acting out has concluded.  Spiritually, we feel disconnected from others, especially from relationships we want to be “healthy” ones. 

Clearly I can relate to all three dimensions described and have been greatly disappointed in the past when people thought my behavior was a choice.  I assure one and all it is not something a person makes a conscious choice to do.  The compulsions were so strong resisting them seemed impossible until I got into recovery, understood the dysfunction, where it comes from and overtime developed healthy behaviors  Just like beating drugs or alcohol, it was difficult, especially at first.  Taking it one day at a time, one step at a time as the recovery programs suggest brought me in time to be a healthy being, sexually and otherwise.  Looking back my past behavior looks so insanely crazy, but that viewpoint today is from a point of healthfulness.  A person lost in craziness has a very difficult time focusing and seeing the amount of crazy they are practicing.  When I was lost in the storm I could not see outside of what swirled around me.

A substantial part of my recovery was to find a long period of sexual sobriety.  As an alcoholic gets the shakes without his drink, I got the mental shakes from my not giving in to my unhealthy desires.  However, once the moment arrived when I knew I HAD TO HAVE a different life, a normal life, I gained the strength to bear the “mental shakes” without giving in to them.  Those who doubt the presence of a Higher Power have never been to the low depths I was down to.  It took being broken down to the point of helpless for me to find a willingness to accept help beyond myself.  But I did, and with assistance from my Higher Power I began to move forward to where I am today.  If I try to define “God” I get lost in the attempt.  The simple knowing there is a power beyond me is enough.  

Where am I?  Love has come into my life and for the first time I don’t find myself feeling strongly about a woman and lusting after others in my mind at the same time.  She is all I need.  Being in recovery herself, she “gets me”.  There is no reason to hide anything.  The realization still amazes me of how wonderful love and sexual expression can be when focused on one person.  I have never known such peace before.  With 100% of me in the relationship while deeply in love, everything about my life has gained a sparkle never experienced previously.   

The paragraphs above were written to get to a single point of immense gratitude.  Last evening there was a Codependents Anonymous meeting attended by seven attractive women and me.  While there are other examples in recent times, none was as striking as last evening when the realization hit me of how far my recovery has come.  I was able to be at the meeting and completely comfortable with a room full of women while just being myself.  There were no inappropriate thoughts running through my head distracting me and focus on the meeting itself was easy.  To many my realization may seem like no big deal.  Well aware I am that one does not get awards for becoming a functional human being who can be called to some extent “normal”.  But I am giving myself a big pat on the back anyway, for to think of myself as somewhere near the realm of “normal” used to feel impossible.

Today I am grateful the storm within no longer rages.  I am very glad my life has ceased to be lived in part as a secret and my sexuality is no longer lost in the shadows.  There is much thankfulness for the peers who I have shared recovery with.  My gratefulness for the love in my life humbles me.  Yes, without a doubt… gratitude truly is one of the great secrets to a good life.   

That which does not kill us, makes us stronger.
Friedrich W. Nietzsche

The Road Less Traveled

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

There is someone who lives about 200 miles away who has become a good friend over the last five years.  The common ground for us has been our struggles with life including depression, broken marriages, shame and regret.  When I hit my crisis point in 2007 she encouraged me, often emailed and sometimes called to see how I was and generally gave me support.  Now it is my turn.  Through the lessons of difficulty she is potentially at a new starting point.  Great discomfort can encourage a person to change and open the gateway to growth.  My pain was the catalyst for my growth and I hope hers can be turned into a positive force in a similar manner.   
   
In this current period of difficulty she has come face to face with herself and her past and truly wants to grow beyond it all.  She reached out for advice in an email last evening and what I sent her were some borrowed words below from the book “The Road less Traveled” written by psychiatrist, M. Scott Peck, M.D.

Life is difficult.  This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths.  It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it.  Once we truly know that life is difficult – once we truly understand and accept it – then life is not longer difficult.  Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters.
 
Most do not fully see this truth that life is difficult.  Instead they moan more or less incessantly, notably or subtly, about the enormity of their problems, their burdens, and their difficulties as if life were generally easy, as if life should be easy.  They voice their belief noisily or subtly that their difficulties represent a unique kind of affliction that should not be and that has somehow been especially visited upon them…
 
Yet it is in this whole process of meeting… problems that life has its meaning.  Problems call forth our courage and our wisdom; indeed, they create our courage and wisdom.  It is because of problems that we grow mentally and spiritually.  When we desire to encourage the growth of the human spirit, we challenge and encourage the human capacity to solve problems, just as in school we deliberately set problems for our children to solve.  It is through the pain of confronting and resolving problems that we learn.  As Benjamin Franklin said, “Those things that hurt, instruct”. 
 
…when we avoid the legitimate suffering that results from dealing with problems, we also avoid the growth that problems demand from us.  It is for this reason that in chronic mental illness we stop growing, we become stuck.  And without healing, the human spirit begins to shrivel.
 
 Problems do not go away.  They must be worked thorough or else they remain, forever a barrier to the growth and development of the spirit.  We must accept responsibility for a problem before we can solve it. 
 
Self-discipline is a self-enlarging process. 
 
What are these tools… these means of experiencing the pain of problems constructively that I call discipline?  There are four: delaying of gratification, acceptance of responsibly, dedication to truth and balancing.  

Delaying of gratification is a process of scheduling the pain and pleasure of life in such a way as to enhance the pleasure by meeting and experiencing the pain first and getting it over with.  It is the only decent way to live.  

We cannot solve life’s problems except by solving them.  …we must accept responsibility for a problem before we can solve it.  We cannot solve a problem by saying “It’s not my problem.”  We cannot solve a problem by hoping that someone else will solve it for us.  I can solve a problem only when I say “This is my problem and it’s up to me to solve it.” (You can only solve YOUR problems.  You can not solve a problem that belongs to someone else). 

Truth is reality.  Our view of reality is like a map with which to negotiate the terrain of life.  If the map is true and accurate, we will generally know where we are and if we have decided where we want to go, we will generally know how to get there.  If the way is false and inaccurate, we generally will be lost. 

Balancing is the discipline that gives us flexibility.  The essence of this discipline of balance is “giving up”.  …as we negotiate the curves and corners of our lives, we must continually give up parts of ourselves. …personality traits, well-established patterns of behavior, ideologies and even whole life styles. 

Dr. Peck’s book was good reading when I first got through it a decade ago.  Now down the road in my growth his words speak to me much more strongly now.  I am grateful for the help I received from Dr. Peck through his book and thankful now I can offer a little of its wisdom to someone I care about.

You can’t run away from trouble.  There ain’t no place that far.  Uncle Remus

And Then the Day Came….

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

Be moderate in order to taste the joys of life in abundance.
Epicurus

Looking back I can see lacking moderation burned brightly through the majority of my life.  Only a few years ago I began to see how out of control my behavior was.  That awareness was a shock at first but over time became my personal catalyst for growth and evolution.  
 
Gone are the days of believing I was earning some sort of merit badge to be one of the very last people to leave work each day.  In hindsight what I was trying to prove with that behavior escapes me.  Was I trying to make others think more highly of me because of my hardcore work ethic?  Was I attempting to prove worth to myself?  Was I avoiding things outside of work?  Correct answer:  all three!
 
Once upon a time the home life I cultivated contained even more mania.  Always there was a consuming interest that filled my time away from work.  Learning to fly and owning an airplane filled my spare time for around a decade.  Then came my photography studio for ten years where I worked on average of two nights per week and a day and a half each weekend in addition to my very demanding full-time job.  These and other “interests” were “blocking tools” to avoid dealing with things that needed attention.  Each was a sort of madness I used as something to run away into.  As long as I kept running away I did not have to deal with things. Oh, did I say I was married and had a son in school while I was lost in this craziness?

From the book “Now Is the Time” by Patrick Lindsay
Life rushes between the mundane and madness.
Contentment is often found in moderation.
Balance is elusive.
But simply seeking it allows you to avoid excesses.
Don’t make it a contest:
Allow things to happen naturally.
You’ll be surprised how often they center themselves
And open up vast possibilities.

Running away and living a relentlessly manic life eventually became tiring.  Under the weight of accumulated regret and sheer exhaustion what I was running away from caught up with me.  My junk from childhood tackled and took me down.  My only escape was to finally deal with it all.  And then the day came when the desire to remain the same was more painful than the risk to evolve.
 
Last evening I spent time looking carefully through a notebook and other materials I saved from the five weeks I voluntarily choose to spend at The Meadows http://www.themeadows.com/.  In 2007, it was there I sought treatment for depression, compulsion and childhood trauma.  Until last night my notes from that time had not been touched for over 4 years.   There is no way to have known in advance what an emotional experience reading and looking back would be.
 
Looking through the materials, readily apparent was how far I had come in the fifty months since my recovery began in earnest.  It did my self-image good to see all those baby steps taken day by day since then had accumulated into great positive personal growth.  It was also clear how screwed up I was before my work began in earnest to have a better life. 
 
In a notebook I found there is this I wrote about sexual compulsion:  I came to the Meadows to learn how to learn to manage my addiction; to find a way to keep from damaging my life.  I have been celibate for almost eight months, but I know it was just a matter of time like it has always been in my adult life before eventually I got triggered again.  Most of all my addiction has hurt me, damaged me and caused me to carry a pile of unnecessary shame.  I am tired of it, sick to my bones of the addiction.  There is no peace in my life that I need so badly. 
 
Hand written a few pages later was: By giving in I already have found some relief to my chronic pain from my addiction.  It gives me joy to know that with my Higher Power I can move forward with my life:  one life, not two.  Not one in the open and one secret like before.  I just need to use what I have learned, accept help and stop trying to do it all by myself.  I need to remember I am enough, to love myself and keep my faith in my Higher Power. 
 
Just below I wrote:  I’m 54 years old and I want peace, I need it and will do whatever I can to attain it. 
 
That is exactly what happened.  In the four years since those passages were written a good measure of peace and balance has come into my life.  Truthfully the words “I am happy” can come from my mouth.  And for the first time I have fallen in love without all the noise and dysfunction within me.  I am  very grateful for how far I have come.

Healing may not be so much about getting better, as about letting go of everything that isn’t you – all of the expectations, all of the beliefs – and becoming who you are.  Rachel Naomi Remen

The Problem is not the Problem….

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

Professionally my job is to manage a small business.  On Wednesday’s I have a “first thing in the morning” meeting with seven department heads and I try to leave them with something positive and thought-provoking.  This week it was a two-minute video from the “In Search of Excellence” guy, Tom Peters: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFZA2rWUjxI

In the video Mr. Peters says:
1) The problem is never the problem.  The response to the problem is almost always the problem. 
2) The way you deal with a problem is frankly so much more important on many dimensions than the problem itself.  
2) Perception is all there is.  There is no reality.  There is only perception.
 
Out of the blue while I was eating lunch yesterday the line “The problem is never the problem…” came up in my mind.  In that moment I realized the statement was just as true for personal life as it was in Mr. Peter’s frame of reference regarding commerce, trade and industry.  Clearly I was able to see the majority of my troubled life experiences did not come from the “codependence” I learned as a child.  My problems came from my response to “codependence”.

That moment of crystal clear thought resonated to be a universal truth I will carry forward.  I’ll remember “the problem for me is not my dysfunction.  The problem is my response to that dysfunction: codependence’.

“Codependence” was originally used to describe one in a relationship with a substance abuser, and is co-dependent with the addict. In that context, the codependent is the person who counts drinks, makes excuses, and is hyper vigilant of the addict’s moods in an attempt to gain some control over something they have no control over….the substance abuser’s behavior.

“Codependence” today has come to mean any person who focuses on another person in order to gain some kind of control. For example, a codependent who lives with a violent man watches him to assess his moods, walks on eggshells to keep from upsetting him, is cautious about what she says so he won’t get mad, etc.  A codependent boyfriend might keep his needs to himself. He doesn’t voice an opinion until he sees what his girlfriend believes, so he won’t come into conflict with her.

The basis of codependence is about having a dysfunctional relationship with my self.  Because I had a dysfunctional relationship internally with myself, I choose dysfunctional relationships externally. The impetus was to take care of others with all I had and to love them without boundaries so they would do the same in return to me.  It was crazy thinking to believe by saving someone I would get saved.  Such action is how a person trying save someone drowning ends up getting pulled under by the drowning person.

In reference to Mr. Peters train of thought “the problem is not the problem, the response is the problem” it is clear to see now my response to codependence was to follow without questioning the conditioning of childhood.  It never occurred to me a big part of the problem was me by choosing those who were not able to have a healthy relationship. Things began to improve when I became aware of my codependence which over time drastically altered my behavior and greatly improved my life.

Examples of “OLD Reactions”
Examples of “NEW Reactions”

Find needy people to take care of
Find healthy people good at self-care
Try to please others instead of myself
Try to please me first instead of others
Feel victimized by the “selfishness” of others
Don’t associate with “victim” players
Try to be all things to all people all the time
Realize I am just me & that is enough
Have difficulty saying “no”/setting boundaries
Set good boundaries and say “no”
Try to prove I am good enough to be loved
I’m good enough to be loved just as I am
Try to be perfect and expect others to be perfect
I am ‘perfectly imperfect’
Have self-blame and put myself down
Rarely put myself down & spot it when I do

My natural and previous reaction to codependence was a tangle of dysfunctional relationships that did not meet my needs.  Romantic relationships, family relationships, work relationships: all my relationships were affected.  But life is different now.  The old behavior is not gone completely.  Decades of habitual response is not eradicated by a few years of awareness.  Every day that I side step my codependent tendencies, the less volume the noise of codependence booms within my life.  I am HUGELY grateful for my improved perception and awareness that guide me to react to my problems in ways that ARE NOT the problem.

Most of the problems in life are because of two reasons:
we act without thinking
we keep on thinking without acting.
Anonymous

Anger is a Curved Blade

/ James Browning / 4 Comments

Holding anger is a poison…It eats you from inside…We think that by hating someone we hurt them…But hatred is a curved blade…and the harm we do to others…we also do to ourselves.  Mitch Albom “The Five People You Meet In Heaven”

A lot of my life I spent being angry at people and holding grudges, especially for the ones I felt I could hang the conditions of my life on.  I became expert at blaming others.  To a large degree I was an animosity collector and used my compilation of grudge and anger as justification for my behavior.  I reasoned why I behaved in an incorrect manner was because I had been hurt and wronged.  With those words typed out on my screen now, it is so simple to see such thinking goes compoletely against reason and logic.  Yet, in my thoughts I had no problem creating and accepting fake facts created out of nonsense and living in a self-created sort of survivable insanity.

If a person hurt me, given some time the anger simmered into a thin, but strong thread of feeling within.  When someone else wronged me, the fiber of that hurt was spun into another thread.  A “fabric” of negative emotion was created when these threads were combined and over time woven tighter and tighter together.  That emotional ‘clothe’ became a blinder that shrouded a good deal of my view of life.  What colored the fabric I created?  Fear!

Wikipedia says Fear is a distressing negative sensation by a perceived threat; a survival mechanism occurring in response to a specific stimulus, such as pain or the threat of danger. In short, fear is the ability to recognize danger leading to an urge to confront it or flee from it.  This description fits well how I was able to keep old wrongs done to me so fresh and alive within.  I would not let them go.  Fear became the sustenance that fed my anger and grudges which I was constantly either fighting or fleeing.  No wonder I lived in a constant inner emotional storm.

Psychologists say “fear is anger turned inward”.   Today that resonates true with me.  From experience I can readily see who it was that suffered most for bitterness I held within for others.  It was me!  I hurt myself by keeping other’s wrongs so alive within me.

Looking back I can see the steps I had to take to bring healing to old wounds I had kept infected, sometimes for decades.

1 – Acknowledge:  The beginning of healing was bringing the grudge and anger to the surface and expressing it.  I had to move past just thinking about it.  The beginning of healing was to relieve the pent-up pressure by writing about the wrong done to me or speaking about it to an understanding person.  Usually I did both.

2 – Acceptance:  Just writing or speaking about my anger did not cure it; those actions served only to bring the pain to the surface.  To move on I had to accept my feelings, and see more tangibly the depth of my emotions.  Letting myself accept that is was OK to have felt what I did was a beginning.

3 – Letting go of expectations:  Coming to realize that expecting remorse from others was a waste of time was a big step.  I had to come to know an expectation like that was one of the ways I kept old pain alive in the present.  Some things never make sense no matter how long they are pondered.  To stop expecting logic to make sense of things was another giant step in the healing process.

4 – Forgiveness:  Forgiving someone didn’t exempt them from their actions. It didn’t change the facts. I came to know that even though I had been legitimately wronged, forgiving did not mean I had to forget.  It did mean that I had to acknowledge the humanness of life, that all people make mistakes and do wrong things.  In the process came the discovery I needed to forgive myself just as much as others.

5 – Stop feeding the fire:  Once a fear/wrong/grudge was acknowledged and accepted, expectations had been let go of and forgiveness found, a personal commitment had to be made to not “feed the fire”.  I had to move on and stop thinking or talking about what happened.  When an old wound surfaces I mentally change the subject. If someone brings it up, I explain that’s in the past and I didn’t want to dwell on it any longer. While I will never be perfect at that type of self-control, it has improved greatly the more I have practiced it.

The storm that once raged within is mostly a gentle breeze these days, and only rarely more than that.  To get better emotionally it took living one day one day at a time and trying to take baby steps forward during each one.  Sometimes I moved forward and at others I took steps backward, but by consistently applying myself I moved onward and gained momentum that brought me to today where I am happy and content.  It took years, but all the effort was worth it!  To all I have learned and to all I have learned from, I am deeply grateful.

 Your problem is how you are going to spend this one and precious life you have been issued. Whether you’re going to spend it trying to look good and creating the illusion that you have power over circumstances, or whether you are going to taste it, enjoy it and find out the truth about who you are.  Anne Lamott

Thanksgiving for One

/ James Browning / 4 Comments

 “Thanksgiving for One” Menu for Thursday, November 22, 2007
Turkey Breast
Stuffing
Corn
Green Beans
Mashed Potatoes
Gravy
Rolls
Butter
Cranberry-Jell
Milk

Four years ago those items were what I prepared for myself on Thanksgiving 2007; one of the loneliest days I have experienced.  Before then I have no memory of a major holiday spent fully alone and certainly never a Thanksgiving.  In 2007 there were two invitations to join others for dinner that day, but I declined knowing the self-prescribed time alone was a dose of the remedy I needed to swallow; the bitter cure I had to ingest. 

At the time I was about a year into serious recovery from depression, trauma and compulsions.  There was a very painful divorce I was still grieving over and was only beginning to become accustomed to my own company.  Previously my “me-alone-time” was limited to no more than a day or two and frequently a few hours was all I could stand.  Any more was usually acutely uncomfortable.  Why?  Because so much of how I felt about myself came from outside me in what psychology calls “other-esteem”. 

When the majority of esteem came outside myself I had limited control over how I felt about “me”.  I gave control away to the things and people I relied upon for “other-esteem”. Like a puppet on strings and someone or something else was always pulling them and controlling me.  What a wild ride it was to be so in pain and yet not know how to take responsibility and control for myself.  

When esteem inside was lacking, the strong tendency was to fill in the void with people, things and whatever would temporarily give me a “fix” and help me feel better.  Those were the days when “other-esteem” came from money, possessions, sex, accomplishments, relationships and things I could “possess”, or at least thought I could.  Such things outside me made me feel better for a little while, but only temporarily.  My need was never sated for long and another fix was needed…then another… and another.   Constantly I needed more and more and yet got less and less from all those external things.

The killer of self-esteem is self-loathing and it is something like a virus.  If exposed to low self-esteem in our families, we catch it from them as we grow up.  My parents caught it from the people who raised them and before them this way of living was likewise passed down from generation to generation.  There is no fault to place today on my parents.  They did the best they knew how.  As an adult there is nothing good to come from the blame game.  Rather, better emotional health comes only when I shoulder the responsibility for me as all mine.    

Low self-esteem is a stage of grief that has not healed.  The message to myself was I did not deserve better and as a grown up I subconsciously undermined me.   It was the thinking I used to keep me from ever having what was wanted and needed.  My thinking always flashed “UNWORTHY” in big red letters.  Being deprived and undeserving is a downward spiral I spun in for years until I finally hit bottom and decided things had to change.    

Quick definitions for Clarity’s Sake
Self:  unique being; individual.
Other: contrary; alternate; reversed.
Esteem: regard; value.

Using those meanings:
What I used to have:   A contrary, alternate and reversed regard and value of myself (Other-Esteem).
What I needed:  An individual regard and value of myself as a unique being (Self-Esteem).

My esteem today is mostly of the “self” variety, but being a work in progress there is still plenty of the “other” variety I do battle with here and there.  The slow but consistent progress I have made has allowed the happiness I enjoy now.  What is won with the greatest difficulty is usually valued most.  Attaining a corrected view of my self turned me inside out and was a highly painful process, but worth every ounce of discomfort.   I am grateful!

Only as high as I reach can I grow,
Only as far as I seek can I go,
Only as deep as I look can I see,
Only as much as I dream can I be.
Karen Ravn

For a quick indication of where you stand with your “self-esteem” go to the link below and take a short ten question quiz that uses the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale developed by Dr. Morris Rosenberg.   http://www.wwnorton.com/college/psych/psychsci/media/rosenberg.htm

My Child Within

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

Carl Jung called it the “Divine Child” and Emmet Fox called it the “Wonder Child.” Some psychotherapists call it the “True Self” and Charles Whitfield called it the “Child Within”.  My Inner Child is my emotional self. It is where my feelings live. When I experience joy, sadness, anger, fear, or affection my Child Within is coming out. When I am being playful, spontaneous, creative, intuitive and surrendering to the spiritual self, my Genuine Authentic Self, my Devine Child, is being welcomed and encouraged to be present. 

There is abounding joy in my heart to know you, my Inner Child, are able to come out into the light more often these days from where you hid in the dark for so many, many years.  Much regret that things were as they were for so very long has turned into tenderness I joyfully embrace you with. 

Dear Little One,
The parents who barely noticed you are not around.  You do not have to fear hearing “go get my belt”.  There’s no need for a little boy to wonder what the adults are doing in the dark with their clothes off.  Begging to go to the dentist because a tooth hurts and not getting to go no longer needs to make you sad.  There are no more welts on your legs from a willow “switch” you were whipped with. The Father who never came to see you is gone now.  Sacking coal outside in the rain is no longer your chore to do in the winter cold after school.  The bruises are gone.  You can walk through a room without the man your mother married exploding into a rage over the least little thing.  Seeing your little brother sad and lost while crying where his “Daddy is” has faded.  

Gone are the days of wondering why your mother won’t protect you.  “He” can’t hurt you any longer.  Why your father got another woman pregnant and left you, your brother and mother behind is not a haunting riddle any longer.  Feeling in the way and unwanted is something you don’t have to bear any longer.  Being embarrassed about where you live and the clothes you had is behind you.  You can have friends over now without the stepfather being mean to them or saying things that shame you in front of them.  Gone are the days when you wet the bed.  The wounds on your leg from the barbed wire you ran into while running from “him” in the dark are healed.  No longer do you have to work every day after school and on Saturday in “his” store without getting even a little praise for what you do.  

You don’t have to steal any more to have money for your school lunch.  Gone is being made to feel guilty about the cost when you got hurt and had to go to the doctor.  Who your parents are no longer affects if a girl is allowed to go out with you.  Feeling like an outcast is no longer necessary.  The grades of an honor student, the science fairs you won and other awards at school really did matter even if those at home did not care.  No longer do you have to swallow bad “food” that almost made you throw up every time you were made to eat it.  Those who always made you feel never good enough are no longer around.  I’m glad you don’t bite your fingernails now.  No longer are you “slave labor” for a mentally sick man. You don’t have to be afraid any more.

* You can be a child now.
* It’s OK to make mistakes.
* Laughing and having fun is a good thing.
* You can have friends.
* There is love you are allowed to feel.
* I love you, I care about you and I accept you just the way you are.
* I am so proud of you and all that you are.
* You are so beautiful and attractive.
* You are so bright and talented.
* You are so artistic and creative.
* You are “perfectly imperfect”.
* You are such a good worker.
* I am sorry I let you get hurt.
* I am sorry I neglected you.
* I am sorry I forgot you.
* I am sorry I ignored you.
* I am sorry I took you for granted.
* I am sorry I made you grow up so fast.
* I am sorry I had to rely on you so much.
* You can trust me to take care of you.
* You can trust me to be there for you.
* You can trust me to do my best to protect you from hurt or pain.
I love you,
James

 I found my child within today,
For many years so locked away,
Loving, embracing, needing so much,
If only I could reach in and touch.
I did not know this child of mine,
We were never acquainted at three or nine,
But today I felt the crying inside,
I’m here I shouted, come reside.
We hugged each other ever so tight,
As feelings emerged of hurt and fright.
It’s okay, I sobbed, I love you so!
You are precious to me, I want you to know.
My child, my child, you are safe today,
You will not be abandoned, I’m here to stay.
We laughed, we cried, it was a discovery,
This warm, loving child is my recovery.
“My Child Within” by Kathleen Algoe

Lucky to Have Suffered

/ James Browning

The old adage goes you can only love someone else as much as you love your self.  While there is some obvious truth in that statement, I learned a lot from others about love between a man and a woman.  My greatest teachers have been a few special women who have loved me deeply.  In spite of having beneficial self-forgiveness today, I will always lament that I was unable to love them with the same depth they loved me. Emotionally a child within, the ability to return the love received was just not possible then.  My gratitude is deep for those women who schooled me in how to love in a deep and profound way that I benefit from today.  No amount of positive self-talk could have replicated this experience and the wisdom gained.  It was a gift of intimacy, not of will-power.  I will always be grateful.

I remember other women who met my vulnerability with disinterest when I was in my late teens and 20’s.  In memory strongest from then are those who said they loved me deeply when the statment was grossly untrue.  Something tender shriveled within me and I thought I might never be able to share the real me again.  My response thereafter was to create an exterior that matched what I thought others wanted me to be.  This came from just being myself and feeling it did not work.   So I created a false self that let me feel safe and accepted—but at significant cost. Psychoanalytic theorist Donald Winnicot said, “Only the true self can be creative and only the true self can feel real.” Consequently, the person women fell for was, at least in part, my projected false self; the one that could not honestly love fully in return.  And there is my flaw and dysfuntion that then prevented me loving adequately in return.

In an article on www.psychologytoday.com Ken Page, a New York author and psychotherapist wrote:Imagine taking a pet you love and putting it in a yard with an invisible electric fence. When it tries to move outside its allowed space, it gets stunned by an unexpected shock. It will only take a few jolts before your pet gets the message: if it goes too far, punishment will be instantaneous. In a short period of time, your pet won’t act as if the borders even exist; it will simply avoid them. If pushed closer to the danger zone, it will exhibit increasing signs of anxiety. The world outside the fence just isn’t worth the pain.

Now imagine turning off the charge from the invisible fence, and then placing a bowl of food outside its perimeter. Your pet might be starving, but it will still be terrified to enter into the newly free space. And when it finally crosses the line, it does so with trembling; anticipating the pain of new shocks. It is the same with us; even though we yearn for the freedom of our true self, some deep reflexive instinct still tries to protect us from being hurt again.

Yep, for most of my adult life I was that much like that poor, frightened pet in the example.  The lack of love in childhood, seeing almost nothing but dysfunctional relationships then and picking troubled women who hurt me in my early adult life all worked together to condition me to be like the pet example.  I became part real and a partially “put-on” person to avoid being hurt.  I ended up not only being unable to love intimately,I got hurt anyway.

Being anything but what one truly is never works in the long run.  With the education of being loved in the past, especially by the two women I was married to, and years of recovery from codependent and love avoidant issues I am so very different now.  I can really love! Today my heart is open fully and I am in love with all I am for the first time probably in my entire life.  The questioning of whether I should or not is gone.  My doubts about myself are greatly diminished.  The shame I feel about my past is healing.  And most of all, I feel truly worthy of being loved.

My ability to love fully was learned in large part through relationships that instructed me in the worth of my most vulnerable self.  My gratefulness for the love shown me by those exceptional women is great.  I only wish I would have had the ability to have reciprocated what I was being given.   A., B., R., K. and A. … from the bottom of my heart, thank you for loving me.

Dean Ornish, MD in “Love and Survival. The Scientific Basis for the Healing Power of Intimacy” wrote: love and intimacy are at the root of what makes us sick and what makes us well… I am not aware of any factor in medicine — not diet, not smoking, not stress, not genetics, not drugs, not surgery—that has greater impact on our quality of life, incidence of illness and premature death from all causes.

In less than four lines just above is a simple explanation why I am the happiest today I have ever been.  With the tempest of self-loathing inside gone except for a little short-lived and controllable storm once in a while I am psychologically and physically the best I have even been.  I could mourn all the years behind me when I was not so, but instead I choose to live my life with gratitude “in the now” with belief in the good that is ahead.

I believe that I was lucky to have suffered. Some people don’t realize that in suffering there is great potential, because if you are deprived for any reason… and if you set your mind in the right direction, you will find that the only way to survive is for you to excel, by being better… Talal Abu-Ghazaleh

A New Lease on Life

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

Yesterday I emailed a friend I felt like I had a “new lease on life”.  That is one of those catch phrases I have used without ever knowing its specific root meaning.  That idea caught my attention and I did a little on-line research.  “A new lease on life” means“a fresh start, renewed vigor and good health.  This term with its allusion to a rental agreement dates from the early 1800s and originally referred only to recovery from illness. By the mid-1800s it was applied to any kind of fresh beginning”.

Often when poking around on-line I will find a side track from the original search and the same happened with “new lease on life”.  It took me to wikihow.com and “the meaning of life” defined as “Seek without purpose.The universe will unfold and become clear when you seek knowledge without prejudice. Knowledge is not a destination, but a journey. Human knowledge is also imperfect. But don’t despair; we know enough to come to firm conclusions. A ‘fact’ can only mean ‘confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent.’  

Being in one of my ‘thirsting to know’ mindsets I stayed on a pursuit pertaining to “a new lease on life” + “the meaning of life”.  Intellectually well footed in the momentary subject I continued forward until I found myself reading about the Greek stoic Epicurus and his teachings about the “greatest good”.  This wise dude of about 2300 years ago believed the “greatest good” came from seeking modest pleasures, to attain tranquility and freedom from fear via knowledge, friendship, and virtuous, temperate living.  That all sounded good, but when I got to the part about Epicurus believing in complete abstention from sex, I left old “Mr. E” behind.

In recent times sex has been only a memory and the cause was intentional.  My promise to self was never again would I just have “sex” and should the opportunity for physical closeness come once more (which I hoped it would) its form would be “making love” and no other.  For a time I needed a cleansing period and a chance for the “dirt” I mixed into my past life to fall away from me.

Immediately around growing up it seemed every adult was trying to bed another adult and marriage more often than not did not contain faithfulness.  It did not matter that the good in me believed otherwise.  Such thinking was fragile, and as with most “kids”, I learned more from what I saw than what I read or was told.  I became an adult akin to the ones I grew up around, most pointedly, my Mother and Father.

Finally coming to comprehend my path of destruction to others and even more so to myself, I got into recovery four years ago and yesterday was the fourth anniversary of when I finished my five-week stink at The Meadows treatment center.  There I began my recovery in earnest from a diagnosis of P.T.S.D., survivor of childhood trauma, codependency, moderate depression, love avoidance and sexual compulsiveness.  Those without deep issues or not in recovery might be a little shocked I would lay my dysfunctions out so publicly.  The ability to openly express myself this way without fear is a sizeable piece of getting better.  Simply I am no longer afraid of it all and further, none of it is much of a factor in my life any more (and I maintain awareness so it won’t!).  I can not tell you how pleased I am about that!  My life is good and getting better rapidly.

At this point dear reader you must be curious about where a piece is headed that starts with thoughts about a new lease on life and the greatest good then continues to a written monologue about my sex life, dysfunction and recovery.  So go ahead and say it:  “Where the heck is he going with all this?”

Here’s where:  Last night I sat and lay on the couch with the one I love listening to music in a way that was wholesome, sweet and pure.  In an innocent way, she and I “made love”.  We mostly just held each other and enjoyed being close.  We had all our clothes on and desire beyond was never a driving force or one yielded to.  In my present life such a thing is not only possible, it is easy!  In my previous life such an occurrence would have been near impossible as being close to a woman was almost always dominated by sexual meaning.

There is a time and place for everything and last night was appropriate for the moment.  No one’s boundary was surpassed and this morning I am filled with joy and wonder to be able to practice with a woman I love what I worked so hard to learn. I love you K. and am so very, very grateful for your presence in “my new lease on life” and the appearance of the “greatest good” I have ever known.

Life is a journey, not a destination.  Ralph Waldo Emerson

Every Day, In Every Way…

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

A long time ago I read that if a person repeated aloud the same statement each day for thirty days he or she would begin to believe what was said to be true even if the statement was a bold-faced lie. Imagine how much more engrained something can become if it actually is possible or true to start with!

The term ‘affirmation” is thrown around so much today the meaning can be cloudy. A short, but clear definition of affirmation is: to declare or assert.

Emile Coue was a French psychologist who lived from mid 1800’s through the first quarter of the 20 century. He is regarded as the person who introduced the basis of how positve affirmations can have effect through his work in self-improvement and optimistic auto-suggestion. His most famous affirmation is “Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better”. His method centered on repeating such a statement(s) at the beginning and at the end of each day or more frequently.

Science now knows that every thought we think and every word we say is a stream of affirmations. We are continually affirming subconsciously with our words and thoughts.  This flow of affirmations helps to create our life experience. Beliefs are learned thought patterns we have developed since childhood. Many of these thoughts work well for us, but others may now be working against us. Thinking may at times be dysfunctional and may even be sabotaging us. Every affirmation we think or say is a reflection of our inner truth or beliefs.

By choosing to think and say positive affirmations as true, the subconscious is forced into one of two reactions – avoidance or reappraisal. The bigger the issue the bigger the gap between the positive affirmation and the perceived inner truth and the more likely that one is going to experience resistance. This is where the subconscious finds it easier to stay with its perceived inner truth and avoid the challenge using any means at its disposal to keep from examining the issue. One can recognize this reaction by a strong negative feeling inside as positive affirmations are stated. Equally if one experiences a sense of joy and well-being, the mind is instinctively responding to something it believes to be true.

I began using positive affirmations regularly while I spent five weeks at The Meadows in the fall of 2006. I was there learning how to deal with reoccurring moderate depression and related issues. At first my opinion of saying positive things aloud to improve my life was that it had to be BS. Yet, I was determined to change my life for the better and was willing to try most anything to achieve that. So I began the practice of getting up before sunrise and while standing on my dorm balcony I’d watch the sun rise each day over the high Sonora Desert as I read aloud a list of affirmations. Results did not come the first day or even the first week, but within two weeks the affirmations begin to have a positive effect. As time went on I began to look forward to my sunrise time and my belief in affirmations has grown stronger and stronger since.

Here are a few examples of affirmations I like:
Loving my self heals my life.
My body heals quickly and easily.
The more grateful I am, the more reasons I find to be grateful.
I know I deserve Love and accept it now.
I give out Love and it is returned to me multiplied.
When I believe in myself, so do others.
I am my own unique self – special, creative and wonderful.
I am at peace.
I trust in the process of life.
I am proud of myself.
I am whole, complete and perfect just as I am.
I clearly see lots to be grateful for in life.
Through gratitude my world expands.
Happiness exists where I choose to look for it.
I release all negativity and hold joy in my heart.
I accept the good that is flowing into my life.
The warmth of love surrounds me.
I release myself from my anger and let the past go.
I live in the now each moment of each day.

Affirmations are not a magic spell or potion. They are simple exercises for the psyche to improve mental health similar in fashion to how working out at a gym can create better physical health. Affirmations gain their power from repetition in the same manner as repeated physical exercise yields results. The more often I say them, the more they will impact my reality. This morning I am grateful for the power of affirmations. Beyond a shadow of doubt, I know for me they work!

No matter where you go or what you do, you live your entire life within the confines of your head.
Terry Josephson