The purpose behind getting conscious, is quite simply, to take the power back over your life. Becoming conscious, while often painful en route, enables liberation because it frees your from distorted belief systems which have kept you fearful and living in shame.

As we have learned through the research that has been done, most of our personality is formed between the ages of 5 and 7.  Early in childhood, as subjected to the beliefs of our parents and their strategies for child-rearing, we developed our world view. We drew conclusions about our value based on how people interacted with us, how much attention was paid to us, and whether or not our individual interests were noticed and honored or squelched in exchange for the values of our parents.

Children, pre-programmed to seek the validation of their parents, and with an innate drive to survive, behave in ways that will ensure that both occur. They will forgo whatever their real needs and wants are if it means maintaining the acceptance of their parents.

This is what we call ‘unconscious programming’; values and beliefs that originate during our formative years in response to our surroundings. Too often, however, the conclusions we drew in childhood are inaccurate (as concluded by the child who sees everything but who’s interpretations are often faulty) and the values imposed upon us by our parent’s values and belief systems (projections of their own unresolved wounds and unconscious).

To become conscious is to clear away this unconscious programming by way of awareness; to do the work of learning about what really occurred during your early years, what your inner child concluded based on the messages he or she received and the environment he or she grew up in.  In doing this exploration, you are suddenly able to see the distorted beliefs you have been carrying; beliefs which, when having been allowed to run your life, have left you feeling shameful, fearful, and dis-empowered.

Sadly, a very small percentage of what guides our actions is conscious. Without concerted effort to really evaluate what was, to learn about how our beliefs  formed, and about why we were vulnerable to having these beliefs in the first place, we have no reason not to accept them as fact. Even beliefs as distorted as, “I’m not lovable, I’m not worthy, I’m not valuable, & I’m not free.”

Even more disturbing, unconscious patterns repeat generation to generation and so unless your parents did the work to undo their own distortions and become conscious, they will have been hard pressed not to pass these things onto you.

It is our unconscious programming, the beliefs we hold about ourselves and world around us, that ultimately guide our life. It is our unconscious wounds that cause us to attract painful situation upon painful situation in futile hope that the next situation will lead us to the cure. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. Instead, we attract what we fear, and what we resist, persists.

And in the words of Harville Hendrix, “Until you have done the work of healing your childhood wounds, you will unconsciously attract people and situations in an effort to resolve them.”

Looking back at repeated patterns in your life will show you that this is true. Suffice it to say, when the goal is to change patterns and find another way, looking backwards and doing this work is essential.

Indeed, let’s not leave the future of our lives to this ambiguous notion of fate. Not now, as research has taught us otherwise. We have more control over what happens to us than that…

We create the lives we lead through our beliefs, behaviors, and attitudes. But we have little control over these things until we get in touch with the beliefs of our unconscious, become conscious, and start making decisions from a conscious place.

It is also our unconscious that carries so much of our shame…shame we willingly took on as children that never even belonged to us.  And shame is responsible for so much of what holds us back. Getting conscious will enable you to, at long last, give it back.

I hope you’ll join me in the pursuit of becoming conscious. It has been the most empowering and enlightening journey I have embarked upon yet…