Tian Dayton

Panic

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:21:17 +0000

I will work with my feelings of panic today. Rather than swing into emotional action by shutting the feeling down or by projecting my own panicky feeling onto someone else, I will first identify it as a feeling within me. When I project the feeling, I do not experience it. Then I do to another person what I am doing to myself. I distance myself from the emotions that make me uncomfortable in order to manage my anxiety. Why not try something different? When I experience the feeling of panic that makes me want to run from or shut off a particular emotion, rather than try to get rid of the feeling, I can allow myself to be with it, to explore it, to look at it from a variety of angles. In this way I can use my emotional problems for spiritual growth. I have the strength to sit with and move through my panicky feelings. In this way, my emotions offer me an opportunity to grow and become intimate with my inner self.

I can own and experience a panicky feeling.

Be happy alchemy of mind. They turn to pleasure all they find.

Matthew Green

Being Open

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:20:09 +0000

Today I feel open to whatever is going on, recognizing that it is the quickest way to process repressed material, the fastest way to grow and the most fun way to live my life and feel alive. In recovery I process
years, even decades of material in a condensed time. There are moments when I feel like a time traveler through my own interior space. It’s okay, I won’t go anywhere I can’t handle. Facing my insides is my ultimate spiritual challenge. I will not be hard on myself for not all at once achieving and holding my desired result. Growth is messy. I am unearthing and clearing all that is in my way. I am cleaning house, cleansing my soul. This is a process.

I will appreciate and be patient with myself.

But play no tricks upon thy soul, O man; Let fact be fact, and life the thing it can.

Arthur Hugh Clough

A Full Human Being

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:19:17 +0000

I am willing to pay the price of personal and spiritual growth. Confronting the situations both within and outside that frighten me is not easy-it can feel terrifying, sometimes almost life-threatening. But today, rather than bemoan my fate, I will reach deep down into myself and look for something good. I will be sustained not only by courage but by a sort of goodness, a trust in life, a willingness to think that if I stay with it long enough and well enough, things will work out. I could give up on living fully, but I feel that if I did, I would regret it.
Trouble and suffering are a part of the human condition. Once I accept that I am in a position to look for my rewards where they are most likely to be found-not in the world but in my relationship to it - I can move closer to spiritual living.

I have a loving relationship with living.

Teach me, like you, to drink creation whole And, casting out, my self, become a soul.

Richard Wilbur

Releasing Shame

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:18:21 +0000

Today I will release the shame that has a hold on my heart. When I allow a sort of historical shame of who I am to engulf me, nothing in life seems sweet or good anymore. Embarrassment is over something I do; shame
is over who I am. In dysfunctional homes we feel isolated in our pain as if no one understands us. We feel that somehow we don’t know how to be happy like other people do. Because our insides were ignored, we learned
to shut them down and to pretend they didn’t matter. We developed a persona and presented that to the world in lieu of ourselves. Relationships became increasingly hollow because less and less of who we really were came through the mask. Recovery is about removing the mask and allowing more of who we really are to come through.

I let go of debilitating shame.

You must pay for your sins. If you have already paid, please ignore this notice.

Sam Levenson

Friendship

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:17:21 +0000

I will value the comfort of friendship and hold a true friend dear. Soul is expressed through human relationship; care of relationships is care of the soul. Relationships are what trigger my anxieties. Intimacy acts like a black light under which my emotional cracks show up. In a close friendship I have an opportunity to see and feel those cracks, to allow them to be looked at so that I can work with them and heal. A friend is someone with whom I can explore my limits and become more of me.

I value friendship in my life.

Friendship is the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person, having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring all right out just as they are, chaff and grain together, certain that a faithful, friendly hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping and with a breath of comfort, blow the rest away.

George Eliot

Minding My Own Business

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:16:18 +0000

Today I will mind my own business. Interfering in other people’s lives doesn’t help them or me. Sometimes I get fascinated by another person’s problems as a way of getting away from my own insides. Sometimes I am actually seduced or excited by trouble and crisis. This is an old pattern and can only get me into trouble as a recovered person. I will be honest with myself today about my motivation for getting involved with someone else’s turmoil. Is it coming from a place of caring and genuine concern or is my radar just out for a sticky situation in which to lose myself or take a vacation from my own insides? I will look within to see if I am repeating a “go-for-the-crisis” behavior pattern or simply being helpful.

I will take a personal inventory.

“And whatsoever else shall hap tonight, Give it an understanding, but not tongue.”

William Shakespeare

Accepting My Limitations

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:15:17 +0000

True connection with others also requires connection with self. When I look toward connection with others to fill my lonely emptiness, I never get what I want. I become a perfectionist and demanding because I see what the other is giving as crucial to my personal sense of wellness. Within me is a fullness from which I can have a true encounter with the fullness of another person. Two empty containers don’t make one full one. Today I will go within for nourishment and support another person in doing the same. When each of us is able to do this, we will have something beautiful to share.

I connect with the fullness of others through the fullness of my own soul.

Soul or saint making is not an overnight process; it may take most of our lives, or it may take only a few revelations of the truth-it all depends on who we are and what we are dealing with. That is why it is so
important to have respect for one another. Finding the gifts at the core of our soul is an interesting process. It frees us to be truly ourselves in the most beautiful light available, God’s love.

Terry Lynn Taylor

Having Fun

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:14:06 +0000

Today I will have fun. What’s the point of all the work I do in recovery if my life doesn’t become lighter and happier? Even though I am working through deep issues, there is no reason why I can’t have some enjoyment
in the process. Fun is when I relax and let things happen - when I can laugh at myself and other people- when I don’t take everything in life so seriously. It is when I can enjoy a seemingly meaningless conversation just for its own sake. Fun is when it doesn’t have to be all my way - when the heavy load is removed, when my meter is turned off and I just goof around in the moment. Fun is something I don’t have enough of for a number of silly reasons. Today I see that there is no reason not to enjoy myself.

I can let go and have fun.

On with the dance, let joy be unconfined is my motto, whether there’s any dance to dance or any joy to unconfine.

Mark Twain

A Dream and Faith

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:12:53 +0000

I will take stock of my life today. I will do some small thing to make my day a little bit more beautiful and positive. I only need to do a little better. I don’t need to reach for the moon or to become perfect. If I don’t hold a good dream for myself and this world, who will? It is up to me as much as anyone else. If I don’t have faith in humanity, who will? It is my responsibility to help God. My spirituality and my inner relationship with soul guide me. They show me daily where to look to see light. They let me know that my efforts are worthwhile. I will dream a little dream today. I will think up something - some good work, whether it be planting a tree or helping to build a program. I will make a contribution. Rather than complain about what isn’t here that I want, I
will take steps to create it.

I will plant a garden.

All we need to begin with is a dream that we can do better than before. All we need to have is faith, and that dream will come true. All we need to do is act, and the time for action is now.

Carl Sandburg

Intimate Relationships

Tian Dayton, Ph.D. — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:11:38 +0000

Today I understand that life is relationship and relationship is nature’s stimulus for growth. Intimacy with another person demands more of me than any other experience. It calls me to stretch and grow where it hurts the most. The people with whom I choose to be intimate are selected by me through a complicated unconscious process that lifts them out of hundreds of possibilities. At some deep level, I look for a person who can, by being a sort of mirror, help me to resolve my deepest childhood wounds. I choose them not only to be close to but also to be my teacher, and they do the same with me. It is the bond between us and the unconscious knowledge that I am meant to learn from this person that help me through this very painful process of personal growth.

I grow in my intimate relationships.

And throughout all eternity I forgive you, you forgive me.

William Blake