How we lost our Innocence: part 1

We are surprised when people do not “perform” and live up to our expectations. We experience a shift in our understanding of the world as we begin the painful adjustment to reality. We think just because we may be innocent, bad things won’t happen to us. We lose our innocence and begin grieving our wishes for a perfectly safe and dependable world. God created a safe world and then came sin. Sin entered into the world through Satan, Adam and Eve and sin is evident and demonstrated in these first two (of four) areas:

Sin by Us: We all have a sinful nature. In our own pride, we have the inclination to live without God and we come to despise our dependency and neediness. We are envious.  Envy makes us resent people who have something we do not have. When we are envious, the very people who are loving, safe and generous become the bad guys in our eyes. Envy wants to control love but ends up destroying love. Ask God to help you be grateful and thankful for what you do have and to rejoice in what others have. We think we are self-sufficient. We think that the individual who doesn’t have problems is the model for maturity but God created all of us incomplete and inadequate. Our needs are a gift from God and are the cure to the sin of pride and self-sufficiency. We think we are entitled to special treatment. “It’s all about me! You must do as I say and I demand the best!” Entitlement is self-absorbed and grandiose. It demands special treatment instead of being grateful for ordinary resources and situations. We break God’s Laws. It is a tendency and deliberate refusal to follow God’s standards and boundaries. It chooses indulging self over loving God. It is our destructive actions and attitudes. This is the aspect of our sinful nature that rebels against having any restrictions.  Envy, self-sufficiency, entitlement and transgressions are behavioral patterns of sin and drive us into isolation. The result is there is some type of breakdown. Our connection with God and others is essential for growth, change and maturity.

Sin against Us: Not only are we perpetrators of evil, but we are also victims of it. We are sinful, but we are also sinned against. As in the principal of “generational curses”, the innocent suffer for the wrongdoing and evil of others and is evident in these following areas:

Our bonding process was disrupted: Our first and deepest need as human beings is to bond, attach to another, and to belong. The bonding process is disrupted in the following ways: Detachment: someone being emotionally inaccessible to us. Abandonment: someone connecting, and then leaving. Inconsistency: someone being unstable in a loving relationship. Criticism: judgment, condemnation, and attacks upon our needy aspects. Abuse: violations that destroy trust. These negative experiences cause us to recoil, withdraw emotionally and do not let love in. This is called  “defensive devaluation”.  This is a protective device that buries the need for love, deep inside so we can no longer be hurt. This inability to bond causes many symptoms including addictions, depression, emptiness, guilt, outbursts of anger, panic, shallow and negative relationships, and thought problems like confusion, fear and distorted thinking.  

Our boundaries were not respected: Our second developmental need is to learn boundaries. Boundaries are our spiritual and emotional “property lines”. They tell us where we end, and where others begin. They help us to keep good things in us and bad things out. We can be hurt with our inability to set limits, establish consequences and when try to “rescue” others. When boundaries are clearly defined, we can carry our own loads and then know when it is appropriate to help others with their burdens. Here are some ways our boundaries can be disrupted and injured: Aggressive Control: Someone hurting us if we say no. Passive Control: Someone leaving us if we say no. Regressive Control: Guilt messages if we say no. Limitlessness: Someone never saying no to us. Just as the person with broken bonds cannot take love in, the person without boundaries cannot keep love in. First people without boundaries tend to feel abandoned when there is distance. Because they’ve often been punished by abandonment, they don’t have the ability to stand apart, to be alone and to hold firm in conflict. Second, people without boundaries tend to isolate themselves as their only limit. People who have trouble with boundaries may exhibit the following symptoms: inability to say no, inability to follow through, feelings of obligation, over responsibility, guilt, impulsiveness, blaming others, resentment, victim mentality, codependency, depression, disorganization, lack of direction, and obsessive-compulsivity.

We were not seen as whole people with good and bad traits: Our third developmental need is the ability to resolve the split between goodness and badness. Even as Christians we still struggle with sin and fail. Even though Jesus died for us giving us grace, many of us believe we are not loved when we do bad things. Good-bad relational patterns occur in the following ways: Perfectionism: Others expecting us to have no faults. Idealization: Others denying our imperfections. Shaming: Others condemning our negative qualities. People who have this good/bad split may exhibit the following symptoms: idealism, inability to tolerate weakness, perfectionism, poor self-image, broken relationships, guilt, anxiety, sexual addictions, rage and anger issues, eating disorders, and substance abuse.

We were not allowed to mature into adults: Our fourth and last developmental need is to mature and move on into adulthood. It is the moving from the child’s one-down position to the equal and mutual position of being grown-up. Here are some ways our need to be adults can be disrupted and injured: One-up relationships: others who treat us as if we were children. One-down relationships: Others who treat us as if we were the parents. Controlling: Others who need to be in charge of our lives. Criticism: Others who attack when we challenge their thinking. Because of our lack in emerging adultness, we are unable to relate to safe relationships because safe people encourage adultness and safe relationships create the possibility of a frightening power shift within us, followed by conflict and breakdowns in our ability to function. A breakdown of emerging adultness may exhibit the following symptoms: obsessive-compulsive, compliant, controlling, domineering, superiority, rebellious, & judgmental.