I Promise Myself: Making a Commitment to Yourself and Your Dreams - Brossura

Reilly, Patricia Lynn

Brossura

ISBN 10: 1573241784 ISBN 13: 9781573241786

Casa editrice: Red Wheel/Weiser, 2002

Riassunto

<p>A vow of faithfulness is a sacred assertion, a positive declaration expressing a woman's intention to remain loyal to herself, to preserve allegiance to herself even when challenged or opposed. And such a vow, according to Reilly, is the necessary first step to achieving balanced, rich, and reciprocal relationships with others.</p><p>Women of all ages, from all walks of life, are vowing loyalty to their own lives. And the results of these womanaffirming ceremonies and rites of passage are life altering: they unleash positive life energy and uncover unexplored gifts and talents. Drawing on stories of many women and their personalized vows, <i>I Promise Myself</i> features a writeyourown vow section and provides stepbystep guidelines for composing your own vow of faithfulnessa process that invites you to reassert your commitment to yourself and begin an adventure of selfdiscovery and selfcelebration.</p>

Su questo libro

Informazioni sull?autore

<div> Patricia Lynn Reilly, M. Div., is the author of <i>Image a Woman in Love with Herself, A God Who Looks Like Me, I Promise Myself, Words Made Flesh</i>, and <i>Be Full of Yourself!</i>. A wellknown retreat facilitator, she is a popular presenter on woman's empowerment and spirituality issues at national workshop venues. The founder of Imagine a Woman International, she holds a Master's of Divinity degree from Princeton Theological Seminary and lives in western Michigan. </div>

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I Promise Myself

Making a Commitment to Yourself and Your Dreams

By Patricia Lynn Reilly

Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

Copyright © 2000 Patricia Lynn Reilly
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-57324-178-6

Contents

Foreword by Sabrina Ward Harrison
An Invitation to Be True to Yourself
ONE Something Old, Something New: Refashioning the Wedding Vow and 
Ceremony
TWO Growing in Knowledge and Love of Yourself: The Essential Vow of 
Faithfulness for All Women
THREE Remaining Loyal to Yourself: Composing Companion Vows for All 
Seasons of Life
FOUR Remembering Yourself: Composing a Vow to Prepare for Marriage and/or 
the Birth of a Child
FIVE Gathering the Gifts: Composing a Vow to Support Conscious 
Transitions
SIX Discovering the Way Home: Composing a Vow to Reclaim Your Natural 
Resources
SEVEN Descending into the Richness: Composing a Vow to Reclaim Your 
Natural Capacities
About the Author

CHAPTER 1

Something Old, Something New:Refashioning the Wedding Vow and Ceremony

Caught in the swirling actions, thoughts, and journeys of others, we lose touchwith our breath, our bodies, and the grounding center within us. All who havelost their way, come. Serenity awaits you here. Rediscover the way home.

Several high school and college-aged young women told their stories on Oprah!the other day. Caught in the life-threatening swirls of possessive, jealous, andcontrolling boyfriends, these women represent, according to statistics, one outof every four young American women. Whirling in a chaos not their own, unable toget their bearings, some had lost years of their lives—important, irreplaceableyears. While their classmates were testing the limits of their intellectualcapacities and exploring their interests and curiosities in order to discern adirection, a calling, a career, a focus for their astounding life energy andpotential, these young women lost all interest in themselves, their friends,their studies, and their futures. They told us about the contraction of theirlives to meet the demands, fulfill the expectations, and obey the dictates oftheir jealous lovers:

"He tells me whom I can see and whom I can't see."

By the time they are seventeen many young women have surrendered their ambitionsto a growing need for affection and their autonomy to an emotional dependence onthe approval and good will of others. At seventeen the young woman is well onher way to being a formula female.

—Madonna Kolbenschlag, Kiss Sleeping Beauty Good-Bye

"I have to check in with him on the hour or he gets angry."

"He broke my pager so no one else can contact me."

"He wants me to dress a certain way based on his preferences. I have no choicein the matter."

"If another boy talks to me, he holds me responsible. He is very jealous. Ican't have male friends."

I was horrified as they told their stories. How can this happen in 1999, whenMadeleine Albright is negotiating humanitarian interventions and peaceagreements around the world, when the players of the Women's National BasketballAssociation are inspiring a generation of Title IX young women, and when Oprahherself is offering women and girls transformational resources daily on nationalTV? How can this be in so-called postfeminist America, where we're told all thebattles have been won and true gender equality is at hand? Oprah asked theresident "expert" my question. The expert reminded the audience that one out offour adult women is in an abusive relationship—like mother, like daughter. Moreprofoundly, young women in our culture are convinced by the age of twelve thatthe pursuit and maintenance of a relationship with a man should be their numberone life priority, a priority that can easily turn into an obsession with life-threateningconsequences. How can this be? And yet there it was, poignantlyportrayed on national TV—out of four young women were facing the same oldchallenges in 1999 as there counterparts had in 1969, 1959, 1949.

I posed my question to three young women in high school: "Hasn't anything reallychanged for you? Were all our efforts to make your way less turbulent, moreself-respecting, in vain?" They reminded me of the magazines they read, the adsthey see, and the music they hear daily—words and images proclaiming withgreater tenacity and effectiveness than the images of women in the StateDepartment, on basketball courts, and yes, more loudly even than the woman-affirmingprogramming of Harpo Productions, that girls need to be saved and thatboys are the saviors. Hannah spoke for all of them: "If we became as powerful asMadeleine Albright or as smart as Oprah Winfrey, what man would ever want us?Boys like girls who don't have it all together, girls who know they need to besaved."

It's important for girls to explore the impact the culture has on their growthand development. They all benefit from, to use an old-fashioned term,consciousness raising. Once girls understand the effects of the culture on theirlives, they can fight back. They learn that they have conscious choices to makeand ultimate responsibility for those choices. Intelligent resistance keeps thetrue self alive.

—Mary Pipher, Reviving Ophelia

I asked Hannah, Juliet, and Jennifer if the words of a woman who attended highschool forty years ago in 1959 described their experience today: "I expected mento save me from loneliness, social disapproval, boredom, failure, and mechanicalbreakdowns. I have treated men as godlike. This never seemed wrong to me sinceI've been surrounded by women who go to extremes to please their men at allstages of life." Yes, they told me, young women today expect their boyfriends tosave them from the same things. They added "being homeless" and "harassment fromother boys" to the list and then laughed nervously. Jennifer explained,"Sometimes the savior becomes the harasser. All of us have friends whose liveshave been threatened by their boyfriends." I asked why girls don't leave whenthe relationship becomes abusive. Juliet answered, "Respectability comes fromhaving a boyfriend whether he's nice or mean. To leave is shameful and sometimesdangerous. And it's not all that different for our moms. I asked my mom to leaveher second husband over and over again. It's obvious he's using her and I don'tfeel comfortable around him. She really doesn't believe she can survive withouta man. I've stopped asking."

Any transitional time in a girl's life is a delicate opportunity for growth, atime of heightened vulnerability which signals the emergence of a potentialstrength. Ritual affirmation at these critical junctures helps her cross thenext developmental threshold.

—Virginia Beane Rutter,Celebrating Girls

One young women didn't make it to Oprah! that day to tell her story. Instead herfather told viewers about the night she was picked up by her boyfriend. Theydrove to his apartment for a "breaking up" ritual, returning each other's CDsand other valuable items exchanged during their relationship. This sweet youngwoman believed they could remain friends, right up until her final breath. With"If I can't have you, no one else will," her life was taken by a possessivelover. Her precious spirit lives on in her father's ministry among young womenand men. He tells his daughter's story. He hopes some lives are saved in memoryof her.

Imagine our young women growing in knowledge and love of themselves. Young womenvowing faithfulness to their own lives and capacities. Young women remainingloyal to themselves—regardless. Imagine an adolescence in which our daughters,granddaughters, and nieces deepen their relationship to their natural vitality,resilience, and sense of self. Imagine a girl-affirming rite of passage, aceremony of commitment to themselves, culminating with these words of self-blessing:"This is it. This is my life. Nothing to wait for. Nowhere else to go.No one to make it all different. What a relief to have finally landed here ...now. Blessed be my life!"

Caught in the Swirls

Why do precious women of any age surrender so completely to another that theylose themselves? Why did I? My story is typical. In my twenties, I became awareof a pattern in my relationships with food and men, and with my own inner worldof memories, thoughts, and feelings. I noticed that these relationships had aswirling quality about them. It was as if I had no solid ground to stand upon. Iwas forever swirling in someone else's life or caught in the tangled web of myown swirling inner life.

A single affirmative act between a woman and a girl, on behalf of the feminine,ripples out to larger and larger groups of girls and women in our culture.

—Virginia Beane Rutter,Celebrating Girls

My first swirling relationship was with my alcoholic parents. I had no choicebut to get caught up in navigating within the swirl of their addictions. Itbecame an all-consuming task. Little life energy was left over for my ownhealthy development. In addition, I, as a girl-child, was encouraged to getcaught up in the actions, thoughts, feelings, and journeys of others. As aresult, I assumed inappropriate responsibility for the cause, modification, andoutcome of the choices, behaviors, and actions of others, and I carried thisineffective behavior into each relationship.

As a young adult, I married and continued the patterns of childhood by becomingcaught up in the swirls of a newly sober alcoholic. I felt responsible for hissobriety: If only I was a good and loving enough wife, he would not drink.Focusing on his actions, thoughts, and feelings distracted me from attending tomy own challenges, concerns, and recovery. Needless to say, my overinvolvementin his life became intolerable to my husband. And because I had lost track ofmyself, I was no longer available for true intimacy. The marriage ended.

After the divorce, I avoided alcoholics, but became involved in the swirls of aseries of men whose temperament was similar to my father's. Dan was the first.We met at the card catalog in the graduate school library. From the moment wemet, I knew my heart had attached to him in a way that was both exhilarating andfrightening. I wrote in my journal that evening: "My heart, persistent in itsways, has been drawn again to a man with Daddy's energy—a familiar energy. Willthis man of passion leave as Daddy did? Will I ever experience passion'spermanence with such a one?"

Instead of planting our solitude with our own dream blossoms, we choke the spacewith continuous music, chatter, and companionship. When the noise stops, thereis no inner music to take its place. We must relearn to be alone.

—Anne Morrow Lindbergh,Gifts from the Sea

Although aware of the pattern and its potential danger, I persisted: Dan, thelost one who must be found; Dan, whose brilliance must be uncovered and fannedto life. Soon we were eating every meal together and studying together at thelibrary, usually at my initiative. My life became completely absorbed into hisdreams, his pain, his journey. One day Dan left, just as my father had done manyyears before. Six months after his dramatic departure, I wrote these words in myjournal: "I must understand why I gave up a year of my life to him. Why would Iallow another to swallow me up so completely that it's taken six months torecapture myself? I am frightened to see him because he symbolizes my lost yearcaught in the swirl of his pain, choices, and dreams. God, please don't let thishappen to me again. I need time to firmly grasp who I am, my dreams, my life, myfuture, so I will never give myself away again. I'm petrified of becoming lostin someone else's life; yet, I'm just as afraid of holding onto my life. Havingno home of my own and petrified of diving into the uncharted territory of my owninner life, am I destined to wander from one swirling man to another? Will Iever find rest within myself?"

In the pauses between relationships, I ate compulsively. I literally hid inclosets to eat and dropped out of life for months at a time. Without someone'sswirl to engage in, I was at a loss. In the pauses, I was reminded of myswirling inner life of unexpressed feelings, unacknowledged memories, anduntapped potential. I ate to quiet the feelings and to eradicate any remindersof the past. To live the life of another made perfect sense. The prospect ofliving my own life frightened me. I ate to avoid the awesome responsibility ofcoming home to myself.

Pause for a moment and consider this definition: "A swirl is any relationship orperson; religion, cause, or dogma; food or drug; or activity or project outsideof oneself that becomes the controlling or organizing focus of one's time,energy, and attention." What was the controlling or organizing focus of yourtime, energy, and attention in childhood? Your parents' moods or addictions? Thecare of your siblings? Receiving adults' approval and validation? What is thecontrolling or organizing focus of your time, energy, and attention today? Yourpartner's moods? The dramas of your siblings? The addictions of your adultchildren? Your boyfriend's demands? The "body-beautiful" expectations of theculture? The quest for a savior?

In the Fullness of Time

During a chaplaincy training seminar, we were told this story: A camper noticeda moth pushing, straining, and struggling to get out of its cocoon. It was adisturbing sight to the camper, and when she could take it no longer, sheextended the tiny slit-opening of the cocoon. The moth was freed. It fell to theground and died. The camper was devastated. Her intention had been to help.

Inspired by the story, I investigated the moth's life. Its life cycle from eggto adult moth is orchestrated by a remarkable inner mechanism of "right timing"that leads to each new transformation. This inner timing allows for theemergence of the larva to coincide with an adequate food supply, for theoutgrowing of each of its skins, and for the location and creation of thecocoon, where it will remain in a state of lethargy until the conditions areready for its survival as a fully formed adult moth. The struggle against thewalls of the cocoon supports the moth's metamorphosis by strengthening its wingsand releasing fluids to enhance its coloring. The camper, unaware of theimportance of timing and the sacredness of struggle in the moth's cycle, cutopen the cocoon. This premature release led to the moth's death. Swirling in herown discomfort, the camper had arrogantly intruded in the moth's life process.Yet the moth was content in the midst of its own trustworthy process, a processessential to its development.

Like the moth, each of us is an emerging healthy adult whose process isorchestrated by a finely tuned inner timing. In the fullness of time, when abehavior begins to hamper, press, and squeeze us, we twist and turn until weburst out of the old skin and are freed into a deeper level of our existence.Each time a memory or feeling is ready to be acknowledged after decades ofdenial, it gnaws its way to the surface through a dream or a sensory memory,through a movie, or by reading the stories of others. In the fullness of time,it is remembered or felt. The trustworthy timing of our Inner Wisdom leads us toeach new transformation when we are ready.

In my desperate attempts to manage the swirls of others and to quiet my ownswirling inner world of childhood memories and emotions, my energy was depleted.And yet my swirling didn't stop until it was ready. Swirls have a life andpurpose of their own. They are held within a trustworthy process. In thefullness of time, I became dizzy. This dizziness was essential. Unable to eat orsleep, fragile and shaking, I became willing to journey home to myself and totake full responsibility for my own life and its rich potential.

In the fullness of time, I entered Al-Anon, overwhelmed by the swirls of mynewly sober husband's recovery. Years later, swirling in the "familiar energy"of daddy-shaped lovers, clutching the few remaining pieces of my life, I reachedout to a circle of women. In the fullness of time, exhausted by the swirls ofcompulsive overeating and bingeing, I enrolled in yet another support group. Inthe fullness of time, caught in the swirl of my family history intruding in mypresent life, I contacted a counselor. I was tired of my unacknowledged pastsilently affecting the present. I was ready to listen to my childhood memoriesand to heal into the present.

Dizzy, I stumbled into the counselor's office, the circle of women, andcountless self-help meetings. I was offered information, insight, and tools ofsupport. I was inspired by the experience, strength, and hope of women who weredetaching from the swirls of others and turning toward their own lives. I becamewilling to journey home to the feelings, memories, and inner life that had beenclamoring for my attention. I was being drawn inward to reestablish arelationship to myself, yet I had forgotten the way home.

Pause for a moment and acknowledge the "dizziness" that prompted you to seek outa support group, a women's circle, or a therapist. How did you experience thedizziness in your body, breath, and inner life? Did you ignore your body'shealth and well-being? Was your breath shallow, seldom reaching into yourabdomen? Were your personal projects set aside due to frantic-ness andexhaustion? Have you become willing to journey home to yourself and take fullresponsibility for your own life and its rich potential?

(Continues...)

Excerpted from I Promise Myself by Patricia Lynn Reilly. Copyright © 2000 Patricia Lynn Reilly. Excerpted by permission of Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

Dettagli dell'edizione

• Editore: Red Wheel/Weiser
• Data di pubblicazione: 2002
• Lingua: Inglese
• ISBN 10: 1573241784
• ISBN 13: 9781573241786
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 204
• Contatto del produttore: non disponibile
• Persona responsabile: non disponibile