2 - Conference on Human Development – March 2010 (pg 2h)
A MODEL OF THE “DEVELOPMENTAL SELF”©
Case study #3
• 29 year old male – waiter – living with Mom and step-father he characterizes as ‘crazy’, continually get into trouble with authority figures at work and moves from restaurant to restaurant, disowned by father
According to the model of a Developmental Self M. is only aware of being angry and hopeless. He has no ability to create vision outside of his past experience and therefore there is nothing positive that informs his communications. He feels rejected and has concluded he is not worthy of loving himself.
Story - Feels life has passed him by - never finished college – feels stuck, not knowing what direction to take, lost. Father is a minister in the Jehovah’s Witnesses faith – once M. rejected the faith, his father disowned him. Since childhood, when he didn’t meet father’s expectation, would be verbally abused by father. Overreacts to authority that he deems irrational and controlling – keeps getting fired from waitering jobs. Feels unsupported by mother and family. Older brother also a Jehovah’s minister. M. tends to procrastinate, behavior which creates many problems for him. His present vision, operating context is – I will never become anything, I am not worthy of love and support, people can be morons, can’t take orders from idiots, can’t work for anyone idiotic, a psychiatrist gave me medication that helped me control my rage…but did not help me understand myself better or with creating a positive future, I don’t really believe in your Self Development…awareness… especially scribbling down vision…. communication …loving unconditionally… ideas.
M. is aware of having been rejected, criticized, unsupported, and the pain it caused him -
awareness is damaged
M. has an unconscious vision/goal that he will never
make anything of himself - visioning is damaged
M. can’t communicate without getting angry
only has negative vision to motivate him - communication is
damaged
M. cannot meet his own needs, lost self-respect, hates life and himself - does not love
himself unconditionally
M. knows everything about psychology and psychiatry. After struggling with trying to prove to me that my ideas don’t work, he finally decided that he had nothing to lose…so we wrote a new vision. It included – I deserve to love myself, I am capable, I get things done today, my dysfunctional parents did the best they could, my mother loves me, I will have a wonderful future including a career and family. We started by thinking about finishing college at Washington U. The vision also stated that the universe would support his goals because he is deserving, as we all are. Since he dropped out 6 years ago, he was certain they didn’t remember or even want him. With great trepidation he finally called the Dean…who to his surprise was very helpful. Part of the deal of coming back was to take a few courses back here…to see if he was capable of doing academic work. He enrolled in a local college…and not without a bit of emotional tribulation, his issues with procrastination came up, finished both course with an A. Feeling better about himself he took the Menza test and passed. Members of Menza usually have over 160 IQ. This definitely seems to be M.’s mental capability.
Heartened he proceeded with other requirements to complete incomplete courses, and found the school receptive, supportive. This time he told his mother of his new vision to finish college and asked her for emotional support. His mother not only gave him her blessing but all his rent money for the past 2 years and bought him a computer. The school offered him a $17,000 scholarship and unemployment awarded him 6 months of benefits for being fired from a company that unfairly blamed him. M. was not exactly sure what the heck was going on but was open and accepting of the support. He went back at Washington U. and sent me his brilliant writings – an English major.
Update 2 years later– M. has finished his BA in English, with an A average, and has become a confident, social, agreeable young man, looking forward to a career and having a family. While his brother was recovering from cancer he had an interaction with his father during which he said some king, loving words to his father. His father responded by saying those were the nicest words he heard for years. M. now understands that human beings all need and deserve loving energy – although all behavior is not necessarily to be approved of.
Becoming aware of his pain and his operating vision, creating a new positive vision, communicating and persisting based on his new vision, and embracing himself unconditionally has brought M. the results he wanted.
By working with M. to educate and train the 4 facilities of his “what is Self was real”, we also rewired his brain by working with 4 tracks simultaneously.
