Loss Worksheet

One of the fundamental delusions of being human is that we are separate from other people and the world. This mind-set is particularly dominant in western culture and there are many studies showing that a lack of sense of connection can seriously undermine our lives, our health and even cause early death in infants. If we don't feel emotionally nourished, spiritually nourished, and entitled to live a fulfilling life, this may indicate a lack of sense of connection with others. This inner experience may be at odds with the current outer form of a person’s life, as the opportunity for connection may well be present but we don’t necessarily let it in. Our understanding is that this links back to one's own or epigenetically inherited experiences of lack of connection, and there are many roots to this issue, especially looking back through western history, for instance:

• lack of touch, carrying, interaction, eye contact and skin contact as a baby; bottle feeding and use of cots;
• cultural aversion to physical affection, hugs, emotional expression and tears;
• patriarchal 'power over' control in parenting, schooling and other institutions, work environments.

These behaviours, and many more, are products of the dominant culture in some countries. There are, however, cultural shifts occurring, and this resonance is designed to support the releasing of the threads that affect us from the past, in order for us to have more conscious choice about how we relate and connect with others. For example, Somalie refugees in Holland apparently find it strange that if they walk into other people's gardens as a group it is experienced as threatening, whereas they see it as being friendly and welcoming. This highlights how we westerners are living separately in imagined secure castles made of fear.

Exercises:

• Observe and be alert to how you connect with others and perhaps at times limit connection. How do you experience connection and disconnection? Are you able to freely choose how connected you feel, or do you feel limited by habitual behaviour? You may choose to experiment with doing a bit more of what really works for you, or trying something different in place of a pattern that you don’t find fulfilling.
• Mapping connections:
  • On a large piece of paper, place yourself in the middle.
  • Reflecting back over your life - adulthood, adolescence, childhood, infancy - think of the people you feel a strong connection with and place them close around you on the page.
  • Now consider other significant people in your life and reflect on how connected or disconnected you feel with them. Place them at an appropriate distance from you on the page. It may be that the degree of connection has changed significantly over time, in which case place them in two positions, linked with an arrow to indicate the shift.
  • Reflect on whether there are some people noticeable by their absence in your map and consider whether there is a place for them - even if it's the back of the page!
  • Observe what arises in you as you reflect on this map of your connections.

  You can do this exercise by writing names, drawing pictures or using photographs. It can be helpful to use colour and allow yourself plenty of time.

• Family tree:

  You may also wish to draw a family tree and reflect on what you know about the relationships in past generations of you family. Can you spot any repeating patterns through the generations? Is this echoed in some way in your own life? And what is your cultural inheritance around connection and disconnection? What are the dominant messages of the culture you were born into? You could use colour to highlight different themes in your family tree.