self schema

for a couple of the groups we offer at mile high meth project, we use a curriculum called "spiritual self schema" which was developed at yale university for injection drug users who may or may not have hiv. i love this particular protocol because it really offers some very practical insight into why we behave the way we do and how to make it possible to create change in our lives. it talks about the schema we develop as life goes on or the masks that we wear. how much of our behavior and our thoughts are only habits that we have developed over time in response to life. we can see ourselves as "faggots, or queers, or addicts, or brothers, or drunks, or perverts, or writers, or criminals, or people with problems" because that has become our experience.

but truthfully any of these labels are simply masks we wear to present ourselves to the world. beneath all of these labels resides the spiritual self, the "true" self. everyone has a spiritual nature, but we have abandoned that part of ourselves and put our energy into one or more of the other masks we wear. and we always have the option of going to the core self- this spiritual self- and nourishing that part in order to grow. the more we feed the spiritual self, the true our purpose becomes, the clearer our intentions become, and the more visible our spiritual path becomes. we can relearn to honor this spiritual self by teaching our mind new habit patterns. one is to learn about meditation- especially meditation on the in and out breath. when we can teach ourselves to look inward regularly, we can also learn how to respond to life with different reactions completely apart from the ones we have developed and cling to presently.

i love this concept. i am putting effort into following this plan in my own life. it is not so simple, but i am worth the effort. it relieves me often from trapping myself into reacting to situations with old behaviors that used to be automatic reactions to most situations. i can pause more easily and try to take action or make a move that will be much less painful and much less damaging to my journey.

i can remember i am a spiritual being and i have a spiritual path. i need to remember this in order to go forward in a direction that follows this path. when i am able to pause and ask myself, is what i am thinking, doing, or saying in line with my spiritual path, i can more easily keep my self in check and on that path.

Today is gonna be the day
That they're gonna throw it back to you
By now you should've somehow
Realized what you gotta do
I don't believe that anybody
Feels the way I do about you now