Facing Codependence

I'm reading a really great book right now called "Facing Codependence" by Pia Mellody. In it, she gives not only her professional view as a consultant at a treatment center for addictions, but also her personal views as a recovered co-dependent. It's insightful and very educational.

She recommends an exercise very similar to one that I teach during the Elemental Cleanse for honoring and releasing your past. My exercise is more general and encompassing of situations outside of co-depenedency. Her's is more focused for co-dependency. Honestly, though, I think everyone could benefit from her recommendation.

Pia asks that you sit down pen and paper and write about each year of your life from age 1 to 17. As you go through each year, you are to identify and focus your attention on what shaming acts were received and who participated in the shaming act. You are not to focus on whether the person who did the abuse intended to cause harm. You are simply to get your history down. You may hold your abusers accountable, but you are not to blame or judge. Just get your history down and acknowledge what really happened.

Do not compare your history to another persons history. This will make you feel that your story is not as valid and important. It is important and valid. Do not shift your attention to your own parenting of your own children. Do your own work first.

When writing your history, simply describe behaviors as dysfunction. There are five levels of abuse...physical, sexual, emotional, intellectual and spiritual. Label the dysfunction in one of these five areas.

The purpose of this exercise to to allow you to specifically see how the parenting you received affected you. To recover, you must release these feelings from your physical and subtle body. Finally, and most important, as a co-dependent adult, you tend to surround yourself with people who recreate the dysfunction. You need to be able to clearly see your life in the past to clearly see your life now.

I would recommend this as a book to buy if this issue is up for you. I've given here the short version of her exercise to get you going and thinking. See you in the studio! Pam

I'll show you, I'll get me

Last Week, during the Elemental Cleanse, I spoke about unconscious choice making, specifically co dependency. It’s one of the big “sleeping dragons” as I call them. Many others call unconscious choice makers shadows, your shadow self, the wounded healer and the wounded child.

Unconscious choice making happens because there are thoughts that naturally arise in your consciousness that you are unaware of. These thoughts stem from the mistreatment of a person as a child. Typically, the child is from an alcoholic or abusive family. The child uses the thoughts to survive trauma, lack of love, abandonment and abuse. In yoga, we call these patterns Vasana.

Vasanas are bits and pieces of experience stuck in your subtle body. These are habits and patterns that drive your life. They are very hard to discern. You don’t even know you do these things and you don’t know there is a better way. The vasanas are quiet subtle choice makers that are your thoughts. Your thoughts drive your desires and your desires drive your deeds. Your deeds become your life.

The issue of co-dependency is near and dear to my heart. Having grown up in a home of alcohol abuse and abandonment, my child mind certainly learned to protect itself. It’s been a lifelong battle to identify and begin the process of changing these thought patterns. The patterns in my mind have not allowed me to have successful and loving relationships. It’s recent experience for me to come to terms with co-dependency. It’s something I am actively working on myself.

Common behavior and patterns of thinking for a co-dependant include the following:

Feelings of Shame: You feel that you are not enough just the way you are so you pretend that everything is okay with you all the time. You will not ask for help because asking for help would make you appear weak and you need for everyone to believe that you are fine. You cannot handle criticism and yet you constantly criticize yourself. You have a need to be perfect, to outperform, to outshine and to outwork everyone else.

Feelings of Fear: You tend to analyze all situations intellectually. You do not listen to or trust your heart. You are always thinking and planning ahead to avoid what you believe to be your inevitable failure and demise. You self-destruct or destroy others to maintain control of situations. You are so frightened of loss that you create the loss so that you can simply get it over with.

Black and white thinking: You cannot see the grey in others. You assume that when any one person says any one thing, they must mean exactly what a past bad experience was and you assume the worst. You judge yourself very harshly. You believe there is a right and wrong and anything in the middle is not good enough.

Have to/Should: You have a never-ending list of things that you HAVE to do or SHOULD do. The list never gets shorter no matter how hard you work. You work all the time. You do not feel that you have permission to play and you do not know how to play. If you have down time, you create more work for yourself. You feel worthy when you produce and work, but otherwise you do not feel worthy.

Worry: You constantly worry that people are judging you…that people will leave you...that people are pretending to like you. You have no basis for this worry other than past experience. You assume that people are just pretending to like you, that they are not genuine and inside you don’t really believe that anyone really values you or wants to be with you.

Sabotage: You are out to get yourself. When someone else has bad behavior, you turn on yourself and begin the process of destroying yourself. You surround yourself with needy, critical, controlling and often times alcoholic and abusive people. For some reason, they make your child mind feel at home and you gravitate to them. They are all you know so that's where you go.

It’s sad really that we can’t see the beautiful person that we really are…that we don’t tangibly know unconditional love. Unconditional love is learned as a child and if you grew up with “conditional” love, then you are wired to believe that you are not perfect, not worthy and quite frankly, unlovable.

This is not true.

You are lovable.

If you want to begin the process of breaking free from these Vasanas, start with education. Read some books on co-dependency with an open mind and simply ask yourself if you are exhibiting those behaviors. If the answer is yes, go to mantra or affirmations as a tonic to your thoughts. Monitor your thoughts and notice when you are thinking those subtle thoughts. When you go off into negative fantasyland, use mantra to interrupt it.

This process is not easy. You are going to become supersensitive to this situation and probably drive yourself a little crazy at first. You may find that the Vasanas tighten their grip and your behavior becomes even more co-dependant as you try to destroy yourself and your relationships. I don’t know why it gets worse before getting better. Just be aware and stick with it.

Be gentle with yourself, the people around you and your life. This is a time when it is easy to drive everyone away. Be aware and allow yourself to gently unfold.

“I am light, I am love, and I am perfect in this moment”

Occupy Your Body, Mind & Spirit

Be where the problems arise.....


What do you do if you are a person who is doing everything "right" in their life and still suffering?

How do you answer the complicated questions and subtle challenges in your life when you are doing things right...or are things just slightly off?

How do you consistently choose the more "right" thing and what does that mean?

How do you transform problems in your life that relate to health, love and financial security?

Check out the November session of the Elemental Cleanse™. This seminar answers those pressing questions and so much more. It gives you a toolbox of transformation.

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How does it do all that? it doesn't. YOU do. You will receive a program that holds you accountable for doing the hard work of life that you don't really want to do. You will establish a meditation practice, you will establish a movement practice, you will understand how your food choices are affecting your health, your weight and your emotions. You will learn to make better choices. You will become aware and once you are aware...there's no turning back.

A lot of people worry that this program is a lot of work. It is. It is FUN though. In fact, I can't think of a more fun way to shift than in a group environment full of love, compassion and loads of laughter.

Speaking of work...suffering is work. Learning to embrace joy and health...that's not work.


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A yoga retaliation...

A friend of a friend sent me a link to an article about yoga in the New York Times. LINK>>> They wanted to know what I thought and this was my reply. I wrote is passionately and with much to learn, but I was surprised by my passion and my journey. Actually, I was surprised that my journey has taken me back to a very simple place.

George, all debate for yoga is good for me so it makes me very happy to see that people are curious.

Yoga is a technology when properly used will facilitate the attainment of happiness. The purpose of yoga is to create happy homes. Yoga encompasses the whole person when practice appropriately and with a proper teacher.

Ayurveda is the nutritional science of yoga. If you are only practicing yoga and meditation and not taking in the proper nutrition, you will not balance. It is conceivable that your metabolism would slow and you could gain weight. However, given the nature of yoga, a yogi organically begins to make better choices as the psychology behind the sugar, caffeine, food, alcohol and other abuse is revealed. Your choices become more "sattvic" or pure and you naturally begin to consume less meat, processed foods and other not so healthy items.

Hatha is the physical movement of yoga that also includes Tantra. Tantra is not the sexually abusive form of yoga that has been popularized in the West, it is the psychology of the mind. Through Hatha and Tantra you unite the opposites in body and mind. You embrace your duality and you learn to sit in your divinity. The search for something to make you happy is relinquished as you realize that "this is that, and that is that and that is all that there is". Your love and devotion to your family grows as you begin to accept them as they are and see their beauty. You learn to meet yourself in the mirror with your own limitations. You meet others with their limitations as well.......this is just life. It is all just life.

This takes discipline (tapas), non-violence in thought, word and action (ahimsa) and belief in something greater than yourself. It is done in a devotional daily practice called sadhana. The devotional practice and the path are as many as there are people walking the planet.

In essence the physical posturing of yoga is limited on its own independent of Ayurveda and Tantra. A yoga practice should be tailored to the unique individual. Most people over the age of 35 should not be practicing headstand. People with certain conditions like high blood pressure should not be practicing headstand. All poses of yoga are dangerous when done incorrectly and in an unprescribed manner.

The awakening of what we call Kundalini energy can bring psychosis if the psychology has not been worked through. Kundalini energy is the spiritual energy depicted as a serpent coiled at the base of your spine. As Kundalini begins to awaken, it arises through your spine and nervous system to mate with the Divine. Kundalini energy is feminine and represents the ego. It is depicted as a snake with 3 coils. Each coil represents a "guna" or a chain that is binding us to our reality...the illusion of separation. The gunas are purity, action and deadness. Deadness is obvious to be avoided. You need a little action to manifest desires. Purity binds you to your illusion with knowledge and happiness so that sounds pretty good. The lesson is to be non-egoic. That doesn't mean to lose yourself, it means to make choices that benefit you and others. It means to stop harming others with your own personal needs and desires.

As the gunas fall away, this Shakti energy begins to unite with the Shiva energy. Moon/Sun...Cool/Hot....Feminine/Masculine... It's your duality. Reality/Spirit. You begin to sense that you are one with all, yet apart. You begin to respect the 5 elements of air, fire, water, earth and space. You make better choices for all and the planet. You have a tangible working relationship with Spirit that is very rewarding. It's like having a best friend...no more, no less.

Some people become very sensitive and intuitive. Magical powers called Siddhis develop. I have experienced many of these that I have set aside as distractions because I am a very practical Ohio girl with two kids to raise and I like reality. People with Siddhis that are uncontrolled become psychotic as they cannot maintain their duality.

Yoga is sitting in the duality.
Yoga is loving your family and serving your family without exception.


So that's what I think! : ) Pamela.