“As newborn babies, we arrived in the world with natural, innate needs that had to be met for us to develop into mature human beings. However, even in the best circumstances, our parents inevitably could not meet all of our developmental needs perfectly. No matter how well-intentioned they were, at certain times they had difficulty coping with our needs, especially those that had not been adequately met themselves. As babies, it is our nature to express a wide range of emotions and states of being. If these qualities are blocked in our parents, they will feel anxious and uncomfortable whenever those qualities arise in us. This made our infant selves anxious and unhappy.
If, for example, a baby is expressing her joyfulness and delight in being alive, but her mother is depressed, it is unlikely that the mother will feel comfortable with the baby’s joy. As a result, the baby learns to suppress her joy to keep the mother from getting more upset. Another baby with a different temperament might cry or make stronger attempts to get a reaction from the mother, but no matter what response the baby uses, her own joy is not mirrored. It is important to realize that these reactions did not occur because our parents were “bad” but because they could only mirror the qualities that were not blocked in themselves.
This limited- and often dysfunctional–range of behaviors and attitudes becomes imprinted on the child’s receptive soul as the psychic backdrop that the child brings into life and all future relationships.
As a result of unmet infant needs and subsequent blockages, we begin to feel very early in life that certain key elements in us are missing. Naturally, this feeling creates deep anxiety. Our innate temperament likely determines how we may respond to that anxiety, but no matter what our later personality type, we eventually come to the conclusion that there is something fundamentally wrong with us. Even if we cannot express it in words, we feel the tug of a powerful, unconscious anxiety our Basic Fear.” – The Wisdom of the Enneagram by Don Riso and Russ Hudson
No matter our personality type we have blocks. Our mothers had blocks and their mothers had blocks and all the mothers before them had blocks. Release, forgive, and heal. 💕
Dealing to Healing 