This new post is one of the most enlightening and joyful stories I have heard in recent years. Posted 14 March 2008

Thank you Gregory for sharing your very personal story of your growing self-awareness and self-empowerment. Let Gregory tell you the story:

"I rang John one morning recently in a very blue mood because I had forgotten Wendy's birthday – again!. It had happened so many times in the past in various situations, and somehow it has kept on happening year after year.
The remarkable thing was that this year (I was so determined not to forget this time) that I had spent my lunch hour the previous day choosing several beautiful gifts, a special card for her birthday and another card for our 30th wedding anniversary which was the following week (and which I also usually forget).
I woke up the next morning in total oblivion, the card unsigned, the gifts un-wrapped and once Wendy realised I had completely forgotten her birthday the morning was ruined (once again).
That’s when I phoned John.

John and I analysed the preceding few days, and it seemed fate had conspired against me - we had just had a narcissist as a house guest for a few days, I had just missed out on a promotion, and Wendy had been awake late into the night waiting for an overseas birthday call from one of our children.

Nevertheless John said that the significant thing was that the repetitive pattern was being driven by something within me (not those external events outside me) He felt that whatever it was, this was a biggie, and suggested there could be an exiled or disowned character missing from my inner village.

After a bit more exploring I was able to identify the exiled (disowned) character as my “Inner Celebrator.” We guessed that he was somewhere out in the Deep Dark Forest where the exiles live, waiting and hoping for the day they can return.

The first thing though, was to identify the most probable opposite, a strong primary very active A type character my "Scheduler/planner "who with the best of intentions, had exiled the Celebrator. As I thought back about my childhood there were lots of reasons why “celebrating anniversaries” in my family was considered egoistic, and disrupted the strict scheduling and planning in our house. It was made clear to me early on that I should be grateful for and celebrate having my wonderful parents, not the other way around. That explained why my Inner Celebrator, at that time, needed to be exiled by my Scheduler/planner. Suddenly it all made sense.

John first dialogued with my Scheduler/planner and gained his support. He agreed that there was no need any longer to continue disowning my Inner Celebrator. With my Inner father, Inner mother and Little Gregory, we went past the old inner village into the old inner forest and started looking for my lost Celebrator. He was whooping for joy when he heard us coming! We brought him back and he took over for the rest of the day. he sent me (Grown-up Gregory) home complete with roses and gift boxes for the gifts. With his encouragement I also booked a fancy restaurant for dinner, and made sure I was home early to welcome Wendy.

The day was saved.

Wendy and I talked about this later and became aware that my Celebrator was part of the energy of another somewhat disempowered protector character (inner self) my Inner Romantic, who has certainly found it hard to operate under a tightly planned schedule as he always seemed to be expected to do. He too has now become stronger and more active and more spontaneous.
Since then I have experienced other spin-off benefits that I couldn't have foreseen. My children are enjoying my (less scheduled and more spontaneous) company more, I'm more at ease at work, I have set more goals at work and at home, but I also get more done, and I am less controlling. That tells me that my Inner Scheduler/Planner is now more balanced, more integrated, can relax more and can happily share the work with its spontaneous opposites the Romantic and the Celebrator

I also remembered our wedding anniversary the next week and we celebrated that too in fine style at a nice hotel, with some jewellery shopping at the end. My Inner Romantic persuaded my Inner Scheduler/Planner not to even try to keep a running total of the cost.

The power of the fable imagery to turbo charge the benefits in Voice Dialogue is amazing.

I give permission for the following to be published on Growing Awareness websites

Gregory in Kyeemagh

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A wonderful story from Ray in Minnesota, USA Posted 5 March 2008

I consider myself very fortunate to have discovered this website. I knew I have had strong negative beliefs about myself for a long time, but I did not understand how they started and why they have so strongly influenced my life. After reading the many great links on the site that discuss what core beliefs are, where they come from, why we have them, and why they are not easy to recognize, I feel like I have turned on a light switch inside of me. It almost seems like fate that I discovered the site; I really felt like it was talking to me.

I have discovered recently through therapy that I had triggers that caused me to automatically react when I was exposed to certain people and circumstances. I did not know yet exactly when this happened and I certainly did not know why this happened. I can tell you that I frequently did not like the results. I constantly remember asking myself after the fact:

Why did I say this?
While I am a very gentle person, why did I feel such anger?
Why do I feel so powerless?
Why do other people seem so together and I am a mess?
Why can’t I get people to accept me?
Why do I even care about what this person said or did?

These feelings have caused me to isolate myself my entire life. After a while when I could not stand feeling so lonely, I would try again to form new relationships in a new job or in a new club or in a new city and yet this triggering pattern would keep repeating itself no matter what I tried to do to feel and act differently. I could never understand why nothing I tried to do to feel better worked for very long. I felt like I was destroying my life.

Working through the exercises has really helped me to reflect on past events, to discover the response patterns I had, and to examine the feelings I had at the time. I now understand what I was doing and why I was doing it. I can now clearly see the consistent negative patterns and I have discovered the core pain I have inside me. At times, this has been a very painful process.

You can’t help asking yourself, why couldn’t I see what was happening at the time and why couldn’t I see the damage I was doing to my relationships? However, as I have started to recover from this examination, I now feel much better. As I math teacher, I constantly tell my students that you can’t solve a problem until you know what the problem is. I now really feel like I know what my problem is, so maybe now I can finally solve it. I now genuinely believe I am on the road to having a much happier and fulfilling life.

I will tell you that if you are serious about trying to change, the worksheets will require you to do real thinking and work and it will not be easy. They will help you collect and organize your thoughts and you will see the patterns emerge.
I know that if you try it you will see the rewards too.

Ray
Minnesota, USA Posted 5 March 2008

This confirms my permission for the feedback to be published on the Growing Awareness Series website www.core-beliefs-balance.com

I received the Core Belief worksheets a couple of weeks ago, and I have spent hours already going through them. Wow! What a powerful, albeit at times painful, experience this has been! They require you to describe and analyze specific experiences, and from there to describe your feelings and specific patterns of behavior.
From this process I have discovered triggers that activate my negative core beliefs, and I have begun to discover the consistent, uncontrollable reactions I have used to distance myself from people when some event challenges these beliefs.

These responses are known as F reactions and the worksheets help you to discover your own personal F reactions and help you to see how and when they are triggered. Once you understand your F reactions, which I never have before, you can begin to employ new ways to react when a core belief is triggered. What an exciting possibility!

I have already begun to see some rewards. Just starting to understand what my elusive problem is has already made me feel much happier and more confident.
Ray Minnesota, USA Posted 1 March 2008

This confirms my permission for the feedback to be published on the Growing Awareness Series website www.core-beliefs-balance.com

Reading the article on 'When selves try to deal with abandonment and
engulfment', I was shocked at how accurately it captured my
relationship with my partner. I had felt for a while there was a
problem but couldn't identify it, which caused me to feel quite
frustrated. This article was a relief, and gave me hope that someone
out there understands!!! Best of all, by identifying the problem I am
now able to set about resolving it!-

Izzy-London UK

This confirms my permission for the feedback to be published on the Growing Awareness Series website www.core-beliefs-balance.com

This confirms my permission for the feedback to be published on the Growing Awareness Series website www.core-beliefs-balance.com

I stumbled across this website and ended up sitting in front of my
computer for hours. Everything I was reading rang true and clear for me.
Kathleen, Florida