A Path to Personal Freedom and Love by Bob Hoffman
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Written by Bob
Hoffman, this entire booklet offers substantial insights into
the principles on which The Hoffman Quadrinity Process is based. It
is available in its entirety via web links below, as a PDF
download and as a free printed booklet upon
request. |
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Re-Experiencing Your Childhood
Now let's examine the interaction of the entire family. The way Mommy
and Daddy related to each other, to us and to our siblings became
our way of relating to ourselves and others. Their way of living and
loving became our way. Our Mother and Father’s conflicts have
become our conflicts. Their faults became our faults. Their blindness
became our blindness. Our family system is the mode of operation for
the behaviors, beliefs, and patterns of Negative Love.
The following questions can assist us to explore childhood patterns
and identify automatic reactions and compulsive behaviors. Hopefully
they will trigger and evoke early memories for you. Current behavior
patterns need to be identified and then traced back to their origins
in your family system.
I invite you to honestly look at the reality of your childhood
experiences. Focus your thoughts and allow yourself to recall the
scenes, situations, and experiences the questions trigger. It may
evoke pain, but it's a necessary stage before healing. Give yourself
permission to re-experience the past along with any unhappiness
or pain.
If you have a problem with recall or trying to visualize what happened,
simply do the best you can and accept whatever comes. In doing the
Process work, you are asked to be both participant and spectator
as you chronicle your memories and feelings. You may want to write
down any scenes or incidents that these questions trigger.
Take a few deep breaths, let your body relax, and clear your mind.
Allow your mind to drift back to memories of childhood. Visualize
yourself as early as you possibly can. Re-experience what it was
like to be you as a child.
Did you feel loved and accepted by Mother and Father? Were you
really wanted? Were you abandoned emotionally? Were Mommy and Daddy
there, but not there for you? Did they die? Did they divorce?
How would you describe yourself as a child? How did others describe
you? Obedient? Achiever? Submissive? Sad? Sick? Angry? A rebel?
A helper? Were you delinquent? A troublemaker? Bad boy? Problem
girl? Dummy? The clown?
What were the nonverbal injunctions and behaviors? For example,
"Put a smile on your face. Put up a good front. Hide your true
feelings." Did you get disapproving looks? How open was your
family? Did they really communicate with and listen to each other?
Were they uptight?
How did your family act when they were angry? How was it when you
felt anger toward Mom and Dad? Did your family shout and scream,
or did they stifle anger with a smile? Were Mom and Dad angry in
the same way, or were they poles apart?
Allow yourself to recall a specific scene where anger was being
exhibited by one or both of your parents. Recall a scene when you
were angry with Mother, or Father. Did you express it? What happened?
Re-experience what you felt.
Were your parents moody or depressed? Did they talk about it? Did
they express and deal with their feelings directly? Or was everything
hidden, secretive, and ignored?
Who was the boss in the family? What happened if you challenged
your parents? Did you dare to express yourself?
What was communication like in your family? What did they talk
about? What were conversations like, if there were any? Who dominated
the conversation? Who never spoke up? Were your Mom or your Dad
quiet, withdrawn, polite?
Were your parents stingy or extravagant? Did you receive any presents?
Did they talk about money? Did they fight about it? Never talk about
it? Did they get into trouble financially?
What demonstrations of affection were normal in your family? How
did family members behave when they touched each other, if they
did? Did Mommy and Daddy express physical affection to each other,
by holding or hugging? Did your parents love each other and show
it?
What did your parents do when you or your siblings misbehaved?
How were you punished? Were you disciplined by lectures, or were
you punished cruelly, hit, beaten, or abused? Who punished you?
How did you escape punishment?
Did you come home to an empty house? Was Mommy afraid of Daddy
or was Daddy afraid of Mommy? Were you afraid of one of them or
both of them? Were you afraid of your sister or brother? Did you
terrorize your parents, your sisters, your brothers?
Did you like your family? Was it fun, loving, and joyful? Or was
it depressing, lonely? What was it like growing up in your family?
The interaction of your entire family and how you were taught to
be in the world was your family system of behaviors, beliefs and
programmed Negative Love patterns. The family scenarios of your
childhood created for you layers of lies, pretenses, and Negative
Love patterns. By allowing your memories to begin to surface and
honestly answering these questions, you have already gathered a
wealth of material.
And finally, go back to the beginning of the list of Negative Traits,
Attitudes and Admonitions (Page 8). Please, look at your own life.
Ask yourself very honestly, how many of these traits really describe
my life, my attitudes, my behaviors, my patterns? Check the box
in the column marked “Self, S.” Now you know exactly from
whom you learned these patterns. This is an experiential connection
to the Negative Love Syndrome.
Fully recognizing and acknowledging how much we are like our parents
is very difficult. It is a level of self-understanding that most
people never attempt to achieve. Even when they do, some degree
of denial remains, allowing them only to acknowledge the positive
qualities of their parents, or else blaming their parents and themselves
for the guilt and shame that arises when they act against their
own best interests. From time to time, through intensive work on
one's self, people actually do recognize how much they are like
their parents, but then many feel helpless for not seeing another
possibility for their lives.
Through my work with many people over more than 30 years, I have
found that true freedom is possible. Your Negative Love patterns,
though learned and adopted, can be un-adopted. Your essence, your
true reality, is like a brilliant diamond. It has never been lost
— only covered and hidden by the grime of negative parental
conditioning. Isn't it time to uncover your true self and allow
its brilliance to shine?
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Notes
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