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Devoted to Loving
by: Margaret Paul, Ph.D.
The following article is offered for free use in your ezine,
print publication or on your web site, so long as the author resource box at the end is included. Notification of publication would be appreciated.

Title: Devoted to Loving
Author: Margaret Paul
E-mail: mailto:margaret@innerbonding.com
Copyright: © 2003 by Margaret Paul
Web Address: http://www.innerbonding.com
Word Count: 991
Category: Emotional Healing

DEVOTED TO LOVING
by Margaret Paul, Ph.D.

I have counseled individuals, couples, families and business partners for the past 35 years and authored eight published books. All this experience has resulted in the development of a profound healing process, called Inner Bonding, which anyone can learn and use throughout the day (free course available - see resource box at the end of the article).

If you were to become aware of your thoughts throughout a day, you might discover that much of the time you are either judging yourself and others, or you are thinking about how you can get what you want and avoid that which you fear. The wounded, fearful part of us, whose purpose is to create a sense of safety, spends much time and energy trying to figure out how to have control over being safe. To this frightened wounded part of us, being safe means attempting to have control over our own feelings, over others and over the outcome of things.

If you think about how often you have truly felt safe in your life, you will see that most of your beliefs about how to create safety are false. All the addictive ways we try to control to create safety - our blaming anger, withdrawal, compliance, resistance, as well as substance and process addictions such as food, drugs, alcohol, sex, TV, gambling - not only alienate us from others, but also disconnect us from our spiritual guidance. Our only true sense of safety lies in knowing that we are not alone, that Spirit is always with us and always guiding us in our highest good.

How can we create a true sense of inner safety? One way is to practice the 6-step Inner Bonding healing process. The purpose of the Inner Bonding process is to create a loving Adult self – an aspect of us that is connected with a personal source of spiritual guidance. This powerful Adult self can heal the fears and false beliefs of the wounded part of us, our wounded inner child, and allow our creative and loving essence – our core Self – to emerge.

While part of the job of the loving Adult is to create a sense of safety for the inner child, this is not the primary purpose of the loving Adult. The primary purpose of the loving Adult is stay open to learning about what is loving to oneself and others. In being focused on what is loving rather than on getting what we want and avoiding our pain, we naturally create safety as one of the outcomes. If you were to spend your thinking time asking how you can give to your inner child and to others, and then taking loving action in your own behalf, you would feel very safe. When our focus is on giving instead of on getting or avoiding, then we consistently discover ways to give to ourselves and to others. When we are giving to ourselves, bringing the love, wisdom and strength of Spirit down to the level of our feelings, which is our inner Child, we are no longer dependent on getting love from others in order to feel safe and lovable. When we are giving to others, we do not alienate them. Instead, we create a loving environment that invites others to share love with us. Thus, the outcome of thinking about and taking action on how we can give to ourselves and others is that we feel safe within and safe with others.

For example, if you are going to a party where you do not know anyone, and you are thinking, "What if no one talks with me? What if no one likes me? What if I end up alone? How can I get people to like me?", you will likely feel anxious. But if, instead, you think, "What can I give? I can give my smile, my acceptance, my caring, my understanding," you will likely feel empowered.

We each have a choice each moment to think about taking and avoiding, or about giving to ourselves and others. Which choice we make determines how we feel. The moment we choose to give, Spirit comes rushing into our heart and we then know God. Until loving is more important than whether or not we are rejected or controlled by others, we will not be truly devoted to loving.

The Inner Bonding process is based on the concept that there are only two intentions possible in any given moment: the intent to learn or the intent to protect. The intent to learn means that we want to learn about what is loving to ourselves and how to take full responsibility for our own feelings of pain and joy. The intent to protect means that we want to avoid responsibility for our own feelings through some kind of controlling behavior – controlling others or ourselves through the various addictive behaviors mentioned above.

In Step One of Inner Bonding, we choose the willingness to feel our pain and take responsibility for it. In Step Two, we move into an intent to learn about how we may be causing our difficult feelings and what false beliefs we are operating from. In Step Three, we dialogue out loud or in writing, as a loving Adult, with our inner child to learn about our fears and false beliefs and about how we are treating ourselves that may be harmful to us. In Step Four, we open to learning with our personal spiritual guidance, asking for the truth about the false beliefs and the loving action toward our inner child. With practice, you can learn to access the guidance that is always available for all of us. In Step Five we take the loving action we are being guided to take, and in Step Six we evaluate how we are feeling as a result of the loving action.

Practicing these six steps will eventually transform your life through the development a powerful loving Adult self.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the best-selling author and co-author of eight books, including "Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You?", "Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By My Kids?", "Healing Your Aloneness","Inner Bonding", and "Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By God?" Visit her web site for a FREE Inner Bonding course: http://www.innerbonding.com or mailto:margaret@innerbonding.com

 


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