IVISD Fundamentals of Relationships

• Two or more persons united for a common purpose based on mutual respect and supportiveness.
• A union of two or more persons marked by a sense of commitment and fulfillment.

• Two or more persons consenting to a union for a common goal or good.
• A commitment of time, energy and resources for a mutually agreed upon purpose.
• A demonstration of willingness to engage in authentic and honest communication.
• Requires a consistent demonstration and commitment to personal integrity, responsibility and conscious choice.
• An opportunity to create, strengthen and maintain personal boundaries.
• An opportunity to heal mental and emotional imbalances.
• An opportunity to dismantle and re-create conscious and unconscious behavior patterns.
• Demonstration of and opportunity to share mutually.
• Can only exist among equals.

• The absence of conscious participation, conscious choice and the willingness to heal.
• Unions in which the partners agree, overtly or covertly, to remain unhealed and dependent.
• The participants support each other in remaining loyal to their destructive behaviors and patterns.
• All entanglements are a function of co-dependent behavior which is based on the inequality of the participants.

• Conception, womb and birth
• Early life experiences (parental disapproval syndrome)
• Other specific negative experiences
• Unconscious Death Urge - anything that does not support physical immortality
• Past Lives - ancestory, family traditions

• The negative influencing factors of our birth experience.
• The struggle to be born that many experience during the birth process generate mental and emotional trauma that could convince one to believe that life is a struggle.
• The trauma associated with birth (sound, duration of labor, invasive medical procedures, etc.) has a profound impact on the quality of our lives.

• various conditions related to conception, size and energy of the womb, and birth experiences (e.g. forceps, anesthesia, induced labor, etc.) are important because of the conclusions we make about life at that moment.
• The particular birth experience is a life-long imprint, that is deeply imbedded in the psyche.
• This will often determine how and why we respond to chang and relationships in negative ways, long after we know better.

• Normal - loss of security; feeling abandoned; feeling ordinary; nothing special
• Accidental - being in the wrong places at the wrong times; prone to accidents; social awkwardness or shyness; unwanted; illegitimate - the need to defend or justify.
• Anesthesia - Disconnected feeling; absentmindedness; selective memory; abuse of mood-altering drugs; vagueness and difficulty in making decisions; short attention span or focus; apathy.
• Breech - Do things backwards; fight support; do things wrong.
• Cesarean Section - Difficulty with completions; looking for rescue.
• Cord around neck - blocks in speaking, throat problems; cut off from feelings.
• Fast birth - feeling rushed or rushing others; hyperactive.
• Forceps - feeling forced to participate inlife; difficult to receive support without fear of being trapped or hurt; headstrong, independent attitudes; compulsive busy-ness.
• Incubator - look but don't touch
• Held back - difficulty with initiating or finishing projects; obstacles to life.
• Induced - rebelliousness; compulsion about or aversion to schedules; headstrong behavior; trapped feelings.
• Late birth - timing problems; often late or early for appointments; struggle in completing projects (long, drawn out)
• Multiple birth - competition for food, love or attention; oversensitivity to others; difficult to set and sustain boundaries.
• Premature - feeling unprotected, vulnerable; feeling out of sync with others.
• Previous births, abortions or miscarriages - life is dangerous; feeling unwanted or like an outsider; anger from having to fight for life.
• Transverse lie - often at odds with close people; resent being manipulated.
• Wrong sex - feeling not good enough; life is never enough.

• The attitude of self-distrust we learn from our parents and primary care-givers.
• Since what we feel about ourselves is the standard by which we judge others, if we do not like ourselves then we will: not like others around us and assume they will not like us.

• Attitudes from our early experiences are internalized most strongly in the first 5-6 years.
• One prevalent pattern concerns openness. Children begin as open and accepting until he/she learns what it takes to get parents' approval. This is where we learn to disconnect from what we really feel in the moment. We believe we will be reprimanded or abandoned if we are open and loving.
• The work is to unearth the old attitude(s) that led us to believe life is not safe or that punishment awaits us if we express our true feelings.
• The particular qualities from our parental relationships are the patterns we repeat until we start dealing with them consciously.

• These are experiences that leave deep emotional imprints on the individual consciousness.
• Fear of speaking in public may have come partly from negative criticism from a third grade teacher as we gave an oral exam.
• Whether or not the comments made to the young, developing mind were true is less important than the effect of believing they were true.

• criticism by teachers
• cultural messages about being a woman
• death of a parent before we leave home
• divorce and/or remarriage
• birth of other siblings

• Conscious and unconscious attitudes and behavior that reflect the belief death is inevitable.
• A belief in all those ideas, behaviors and beliefs that are limiting to our lives, including a belief in the inevitability of death.
• It shows up in many kinds of compulsive, destructive behaviors.
• The source of the death urge comes from choosing to cut ourselves off from the unlimited love of God.
• Anything in our lives that creates the experience of failure, struggle, disappointment, separation, anger, or sadness is the result of the unconscious death urge.
• This is the part of us that would rather die than know, experience or express the truth of our feelings.

• Talents are a result of accumulated past lives.
• Challenges and unfinished lessons can carry over to present life.

• Physically, CCB is a simple breathing technique with the emphasis on deep, chest centered inhale and a relaxed exhale. The inhale and exhale are connected in a circular breathing rhythm.
• Emotionally, CCB begins to dissolve emotions that have been suppressed in conscious and stored as energy in the body. This energy is often the source of habitual and compulsive behaviors.
• A normal breathing rate is two-three breath cycles in 10 seconds.

• Breathing: pulling the inhale high in the lungs, dropping the exhale and keeping each inhale connected to the exhale connected to the inhale, etc.
• Awareness: simply be aware of what you are feeling and thinking; there is nothing to do except keep breathing.
• Acceptance: accept without judgment whatever comes up in the session as a part of ourselves; no resisting or suppressing; ceasing to deny the truth of any memory, perception, insight or feeling about self.
• Relaxation: could also be called forgiveness; relax on the physical level too
• Integration: completion of a session when we feel relaxed but not sleepy and energized but not wired; inward and outward balance.

• Necessary and appropriate limits on our actions and beliefs, and on the effect the actions and beliefs of others have on us.
• Limits provide the structure for emotional and mental health, well-being and safety, which support authentic expression and the manifestation of full potential in relationships and other interactions.
• The way to create clear personal boundaries is to accept responsibility for all personal experiences and the quality of life. This requires a willingness to be held accountable for all thoughts, emotions, and actions without blaming others.
• Maintaining boundaries is an exercise in balancing personal opinions and beliefs with those of others.

• Any belief, habit or expectation that leads to difficult relationships.
• The underlying themes of a co-dependent relationship are feelings and the experience of not enough or not good enough.
• Co-dependent relationships are often experienced as a burden based on obligation, rather than conscious choice and participation.

• It is a relationship that is built and exists on a foundation of guilt.
• Obligatory relationships impose duties and an experience of false responsibility that impede and often eliminate the possibility of conscious choice and/or decision.

• Impede and constrict the free flow and exchange of information, communication, choice and intimacy.
• Impose or thrive on a foundation of guilt and/or a false sense of responsibility.
• Support the existence of co-dependence.
• Undermine and diminish personal integrity and power.
• Breeding ground for dishonesty and experiences of betrayal.
• Promotes inequality among participants.

• Self-gratification
• complacency
• tolerance
• pampering
• Allowing old beliefs and expectations to override healthier ones, and it is a result of not making the effort to hold the line on that temptation.
• Part of thoughts like, "what's the use?" "it doesn't matter anyway."
• A sibling of urgency in that both are a function of slippage (i.e. giving in to the death urge, which is reflected in inappropriate impulses- thoughts, words or actions that are ultimately damaging to self or others.)

• A re-claiming of one's boundaries and a revision (tightening up) of tolerance.
• Telling the microscopic truth (and acting in accordance to those boundaries) and practicing spiritual purification are the antidotes to the slippage of indulgence.

• Exaggerated importance
• insistence
• pressure
• A form of anger that stems from a lack of self-confidence.
• Urgency is frequently a projection of lack (of time, money, skills, etc.) or an assumption of failure.
• The experience of urgency is using "extra" effort, attempting to make things go faster - driving faster, talking faster, typing faster, etc.
• Urgency is an unconscious death urge in action.
• It is the deceptive intelligence saying there's never enough time, money, and/or love.

• Urgency calls for a calm, measured response: facing the fear(s) and purposely doing nothing about them.
• Telling the microscopic truth (and acting in accordance to those boundaries) and practicing spiritual purification are the antidotes to the slippage of urgency.
• Antidote is patience and stillness.

A projection manifests as a judgment, criticism or indictment of another person for the character traits one is unable to see or unwilling to accept within themselves.

• Focusing on others that which is believed to be unacceptable in self.
• Resistance to self-awareness.
• Focusing "out there" that which is resisted, denied, avoided within.

• A victim is one who readily blames other individuals or circumstances for their choices and the effects those choices may impart on their lives.
• A victim is never responsible for what is happening or what has happened.
• Vicitims find it difficult, or do not accept, that all experiences are a function of conscious choice.

• Function of blame.
• Resistance to personal responsibility.
• An act of dishonoring self and others.
• Function of co-dependence.
• Attempt to avoid conscious choice.
• Self-deceipt and lack of self awareness.