~ MORNING LIGHT ~ (Meditations to Begin Your Day)
Happy or unhappy, families are all mysterious.
~ Gloria Steinem
Children often adopt roles to help them cope within a dysfunctional family. You may identify with these roles.
• Hero. Your role was making everyone in the family look good. Your struggles today are with your need for perfection and learning how to face conflict.
• Mascot. Your role was to make light of the bad situation in your home. Your struggles today are dealing with anger and resentment, and understanding the difference between humor and sarcasm.
• Lost Child. Your role was maintaining silence and staying out of everyone’s way. This timidity is something you need to learn how to overcome today so you can find your voice, express your feelings, and take risks.
• Scapegoat. Your role was to act out in ways that created distraction from the addict and family problems. More often than not your actions resulted in punishment and abuse. You need to come to terms with childhood abuse and the consequences of rebellious actions.
• Caretaker. Your role was to try to make everyone happy. Your struggles today are learning how to balance taking care of others with developing the ability to focus on yourself.
I will shed my childhood role so I can become who I need and want to be.
So glad that it is OK to be me and I don't have to go there in today. Are you still role playing?
