I DON'T DESERVE LOVE

This is the most insidious love block. This underlying pattern - often unconscious - contaminates all the possibilities of feeling loved. Whenever someone offers love in any one of its myriad forms - praise, affection, help, commitment … - our client is unable to receive it. On the surface they may appear to be receptive, but they are psychologically unable to take the love in at a deep level. Because at some level of consciousness they feel unworthy of what is being offered to them.
The deeply engrained belief that they don't deserve to be loved, that they are unworthy of a good rich life undermines and sabotages all relationships, any positive feelings about work success and all the gifts of love.
The initial task of psychotherapy with my clients is to help them become more consciously aware of this pervasive pattern of being unable to simply take in love in all its myriad forms. I say to them,"Of course it doesn't make any rational sense that you would block love, but at some level of consciousness it makes emotional sense. There must be some reasons why that happens. From my experience these patterns start in childhood. What about growing up in your family may have contributed to this inner belief that you are unloveable?" This begins the process of exploring the historical roots of the love block.
Jim, a dynamic 48 year old successful businessman had been experiencing episodes of sadness about what's missing in his life - primarily a loving relationship with a woman. Whenever a potentially good relationship starts to become more intimate Jim either ends it or sabotages it so that the woman decides to break it off. Through our exploratory work it became clear to Jim that the physically and psychologically abusive relationship with his mother, who was depressed and addicted to pain killers, had made him feel unlovable. In her addicted state she would scream at him that he was "evil, a devil child". These frequent tirades occurred for years and had a devastating effect on Jim's feelings about himself. Because these feelings of unlovability are usually so deeply engrained for everyone with this love block a lot of work between sessions was essential.
I gave Jim two index cards. On one was written "YOU ARE LOVABLE" and the other,"YOU DESERVE A GOOD LIFE". I suggested to Jim that between sessions he periodically look at these cards, say the words and then notice what happened. Of course this was hard and painful. He would complain to me "those damn cards" reporting the painful memories they evoked and his ever deepening awareness of how hard it was for him to believe those simple phrases. Gradually, as Jim understood the roots of this inner belief - including the epiphany that he was the target for his mother's own self-hatred because of her history of abuse and shame about her addiction - he was able to be more receptive to love. It was particularly meaningful - since Jim was in recovery for his own alcoholism - for him to think that the source of the voice that was saying "You" in the phrase "YOU ARE LOVABLE" was his own personal Higher Power. He liked thinking that his own Higher Power was doing the work of helping him to feel lovable that his parents were unable to do.
One of the benefits of a heart-centered approach to psychotherapy, wherein our genuine caring is more overtly expressed, is that their love blocks get more quickly exposed. Clients with the "I don't deserve love" block have a lot of trouble simply receiving our praise and other acts of caring for them. They react with disbelief,"You're just doing your job which is to make me feel better." Or like Sara said,"When you get to know what I'M really like you won't think that I'm such a good person. Whereas my parents really knew me." Her parents were members of a very conservative Christian sect. They responded to her free-spirited nature and acts of disobedience as her being a "black sheep" a "sinner" and "damned to hell."
My approach to Sara was three-pronged. The first prong was to discredit the sources of her deeply rooted belief that she was unlovable by repeatedly raising the question whether her parents really knew her. It became increasingly clear to Sara that they were absorbed in their own lives. Sara was a target for their anger about their own unhappiness and their projections of very low self-worth.
The second and most important prong was to deliberately not be in the role of the neutral professional , but to make it clear that I really valued and appreciated her as a person. Over a period of time my genuine praise, warmth, consistent encouragement, welcoming attitude, celebrations of her moments of growth and laughter at her jokes made Sara feel that she was a lovable human being.
The third prong was self-forgiveness. Because of the parental implant of this inner belief that she was a "sinner"Sara made a number of bad choices and done things for which she was ashamed. She was relieved to hear that the techniques that I was using to help her forgive herself grew out of my own experience of needing to forgive myself. I will not describe the process in this blog entry because I've written about it extensively In my book "Working From the Heart" and described it in a youtube video.
With Sara and Jim, as with most clients with this love block, the work was intensive and only gradually impactful. And very meaningful for myself as well as my clients.


This blog is based on the LOVE BLOCKS chapter of WORKING FROM THE HEART: A THERAPIST'S GUIDE TO HEART-CENTERED PSYCHOTHERAPY

I DON'T NEED ANYONE, I'M STRONG

So many of our clients have difficulty asking others for help and/or are unable to receive help, even when someone who genuinely cares about them offers it. Why is this? In this brief blog entry I will discuss just two underlying dynamics that I have witnessed in my 40 years of private practice as a psychotherapist. One is a survivor mentality developed because of childhood experiences; the other is the underlying "measuring stick" of masculinity that is prevalent in american culture.

SURVIVORS

By not being able to ask for help or not receiving help when it is offered we block ourselves from a powerful source of love -even when we most need it. To understand how this pattern gets established it is essential to look at the childhood experiences of our clients. What children need the most - a sense of safety, affection, warmth, kindness, valuing of their uniqueness - was is short supply for many of our clients. For some, in addition to neglect, they experienced physical/psychological/sexual abuse wherein their bodies and souls were under attack. They were living in a psychological war zone and often feeling emotionally alone.When they recall these childhood experiences our clients remember thinking,"How do I get out of here? How do I get through this?" at some point they realize that their main task is to survive,to somehow keep their bodies and souls alive until they can leave. So, because they feel that others cannot be trusted to take care of their needs, they become emotionally reliant only on themselves. They develop a strong self-protective inner wall. They don't ask for help feeling,"I'm strong. I can handle it myself, I don't need anyone's help." They are unable to receive help when it is offered feeling,"If I open myself to help from someone I'm putting myself in their hands and they are either unreliable or they will hurt me."
Working with this block is a profound therapeutic challenge. With these clients it is especially important to provide a warm and welcoming environment wherein they can begin to feel safe and know that they can rely on our compassionate caring presence.Simple acts of loving kindness are important. For example, having a welcoming attitude,personally offering them a tissue when they are tearful, offering water/tea/coffee as a symbol of nurturance, praising them for some small act of growth etc. Of course ,these clients often have trouble receiving these acts of kindness. These are very important moments in the therapeutic relationship. It provides us with an opportunity to explore more deeply why they have so much difficulty in receiving these simple acts. More of the childhood history will be uncovered. These moments also lead to another aspect of their relationships that these clients don't usually consider - how their rejection of human kindness affects the person who offers the help. These exchanges within the therapeutic relationship often are the turning points. As they gradually learn to accept help from us, our clients become more open to receiving help from others who genuinely care for them.

INNER MEASURING STICK

Most of the men that I've worked with struggle with this difficulty in being able to ask for help and/or receive it when it's offered. At some level of consciousness they have internalized as a "measuring stick" of their feelings about themselves as a man the archetypal American image of a "real man". A "real man" is someone who can do everything, who accomplishes everything on his own and needs no one. Even though in recent decades this definition of what a man should be is changing, at an unconscious level this old ideal still holds psychological power. What happens for most of my male patients is that whenever they are unable to live up to this totally unrealistic "measuring stick" they feel inferior, smaller than other men. That internal "measuring stick" makes it very difficult to ask for help and/or receive it when offered.
I spend a lot of time in sessions continually bringing this cultural implant into conscious awareness. In addition, I help my patients to look at what aspects of their personal story have contributed to this internal image of what a man should be. I suggest to them is not that they are inferior, but rather that they are using the wrong "measuring stick." the one that has been implanted does not fit who they are. They need to develop a different "measuring stick."
I have written extensively(the "Men" chapter in "Working From the Heart: A Therapist's Guide to Heart-Centered Psychotherapy") about how,within the therapeutic relationship, we can further help our male clients with this issue.

Working From the Heart:A Therapist's Guide to Heart-Centered Psychotherapy

    I love my patients. I know that some people will criticize me for being unprofessional in saying that. I know that others will encourage me to use some word or phrase other than love such as "non-judgmental" or "compassionate" or "unconditional positive regard". These are aspects of what I am describing, but insufficient. What I am discussing more is a way of being with clients - a kind of presence that can be integrated into any theoretical perspective of psychotherapy or counseling. I think that a big part of the problem is in our culture using the word love evokes images of sexual, romantic, or sentimental love. That's not what I am talking about. Indeed those forms of love would be harmful to my patients. what I am referring to is a broad spectrum of expressions of love that include: acts of kindness, compassion, encouragement, welcoming, open-hearted warmth, consoling touch,valuing,and celebrations of growth. I would wager that most readers do at least some of those things. And would probably do more if they didn't feel it was unprofessional, harmful or unnecessary.
   Most of the psychotherapists,counselors, pastoral counselors and life coaches that I have met originally entered this work because of a heartfelt desire to help people. Yet their training focused on theories,techniques and maintaining professional distance. Developing a compassionate presence. increasing our capacity for empathy, being a kind and caring person or a carrier of hope were infrequently or rarely mentioned. The message inherent in the focus upon theories and techniques is that genuine heartfelt expressions of love are unnecessary, unprofessional,perhaps even harmful.
   Here is the paradox and dilemma. Throughout the literature exploring what is effective in psychotherapy, consistently the most common response from clients is"My therapist cared about me as a person". Increasingly brain imaging research reports that a consistent and sustained loving presence can produce positive shifts in brain patterns. Apparently those moments when we genuinely move beyond the strictures of a professional role are healing and very meaningful to our clients.
   I am not saying that all our clients need is love. They need our minds and our hearts. The most effective psychotherapy and counseling occurs when we are both professionals using our theories and techniques and loving human beings. What I am advocating in a heart-centered approach is for us to return to our original intentions and bring our compassionate caring more into the foreground of our work.
   Opening our hearts makes us more vulnerable. How we respond will depend on what has happened to our hearts in the past when we allowed ourselves to be open and also in our current lives what are our possible unmet emotional needs. In the Wisdom of the Heart chapter I describe the personal issues that I had to work through as I evolved from a traditionally trained psychoanalyst to a more expressively open-hearted therapist. For our patients their primary issue will be of being receptive - how able are they to take in love when it is offered to them. This is the area of "love blocks" that I will discuss in a future blog and is discussed thoroughly in the Love Blocks chapter.

 The ideas discussed here are based on the Wisdom of the Heart chapter of my book: Working From the Heart: A Therapist's Guide to Heart-Centered Psychotherapy