Lesson 1 Introduction  “Acknowledgement that there is a hole” 

I would like for you to think of this time together much like taking a walk with a friend and just chatting about life.

Thank you for coming along with me today on our afternoon walk. Today we will begin to light a new path for you. On our walk today we will explore how a “hole” may begin, how to begin to fill it in, how to let go of the hurt that has replaced whatever it is that once was there that we held dear.

In this week’s lesson we will examine the premise that each and every one of us has a “hole” inside of us. You will be provided with some penetrating questions that are meant to make you squirm in your chair. You will also be asked to think and make some decisions through the weekly schedule of activities contained in this lesson.

~Please try to have a quiet place in order to let this material really “speak” to you. This is very important “Life Changing” material and it deserves your full attention. The difference it will make in your life is huge!~

“Acknowledgement that there is a hole” 
 
I would like to begin with a story of a friend; I’ll call her Barb.  Barb and I are friends and we met quite by accident on day at a club meeting in the new neighborhood that our family had just moved into.  Barb was beautiful; she had creamy smooth skin, dark brown hair with a shine reminiscent of shampoo commercials.  She had an inviting bright smile and a bubbling personality.  She and I became fast friends.  We had nothing in common other than we were very creative souls who were constantly pushing the sides of “the box” that everyone else in our neighborhood had put themselves into.  Everything seemed to be in “perfect order” in Barb’s life.  Then, there were a series of events which seemed quite odd to me. Barb stopped communicating with me.  Oh, she had a perfectly logical explanation, but on the third lack of contact, I started becoming concerned that the “perfect life of Barb” was not so perfect.

 
I would like to begin with a story of a friend; I’ll call her Barb.  Barb and I are friends and we met quite by accident on day at a club meeting in the new neighborhood that our family had just moved into.  Barb was beautiful; she had creamy smooth skin, dark brown hair with a shine reminiscent of shampoo commercials.  She had an inviting bright smile and a bubbling personality.  She and I became fast friends.  We had nothing in common other than we were very creative souls who were constantly pushing the sides of “the box” that everyone else in our neighborhood had put themselves into.  Everything seemed to be in “perfect order” in Barb’s life.  Then, there were a series of events which seemed quite odd to me. Barb stopped communicating with me.  Oh, she had a perfectly logical explanation, but on the third lack of contact, I started becoming concerned that the “perfect life of Barb” was not so perfect.

 You see Barb was wearing a “mask”.  Everything looked great on the outside, but on the inside there was a very real “BLACK HOLE”.  Each of us has a hole inside of us whether we want to admit it or not.  It is there.  Barb’s hole was keeping up appearances to those around her. Her husband lost his job without warning. It really hurt me, that the appearance that everything was fine was more important than sharing this burden with her closest friend. Sharing the burden helps to lessen the hole and adds vital support. This would send even to strongest of marriages into a tail spin.    Add a year or two of living on retirement savings, taking a position well beneath the previous prestigious job, and cutting back everything including all contact with the women who love and care for you and you have a hole.    Years go by and I see Barb reenter the social network again, but now a little less bold and a little quieter.  Barb looks a little more tired.  No admission of trouble, no reaching out for my hand.  As we all know our lives move on; our parents age, and they need you.  This time Barb is OK with reaching out to me.  We have long talks and suddenly like a gush of release, Barb cannot hold on her mask any longer and she confesses her husband’s job loss.  I am almost in tears that she doesn’t feel she can tell one of her best friends in order to share the burden.   Almost at the same time we both tell each other that we will be moving far away from our current neighborhoods and no where close to each other.  Yes, letters and cards pass (we are neither one fans of the impersonal email boom going on).  Then stunned silence again; I am left to only imagine what has transpired.  It has been 5 years and not a word.  For some time I kept up my cheery banter and newsy holiday letters and finally, I closed the chapter of my life with Barb.  You see you cannot force this kind of release with a person, even if you have told them that you are there as the support net.  Sometimes we are the ones who must let go. 

 You see I too, had a hole.  The hole was from not being able to help my friend Barb bare her burden.  If she wrote me tomorrow, I’d be right there beside her once again and we would have a wonderful reunion.  This is just one small story of how a “hole” is born.  This story could just have easily been about a business man in a sales job.  There are thousands
of ways for a hole to develop in our core.  This is what we will explore in lesson one.

Lesson 1   “Acknowledgement that there is a hole” 

 

 

 

 

 

1.      In the introductory story of my friend “Barb”, you were given one possible way in which a “HOLE” can develop in a person. There are many other ways of a chipping away at one’s very core.
List all the “HOLES” you think you may have inside you.

 

2. Now think about each area of your life.  We have a professional life and a personal side of our lives. For our purposes here let’s just divide our “Life Areas” up into these:  Profession/Career, Personal Environment or home, Giving Back (where you Volunteer), Family/Parenting, Finances, Safety, Growth Opportunities (these are in the areas of:  “spiritual, personal, & professional”), Self, Fun, Relationships (which are personal, intimate, social, professional and friendships), Health Wellness/Aging, and Spiritual Life.  You may have more areas and some of you may have less.  Use what you feel comfortable with.  Take the list above and put them under the category that you think they belong in.

 Professional Life “HOLES”                           Personal Life “HOLES”
 

3. Let’s take this one step further.  Take each hole and think about when the first little chip was carved out to begin the hole.  This may require you to go to your thinking chair and ponder a bit.  If you are one of those individuals who have a great long memory, you may even remember the date and that is another important clue to filling the hole.  So again you may want to write or label each one in each category and do this exercise.  The purpose here is not to drag up old hurtful wounds and memories, it is to gain clarity around what put you in this place and what can pull you up and out. 

Professional Life “Holes” :  Circumstance and Date 

 
Personal Life “Holes”:    Circumstance and Date 

 

4. Great work!  If that seemed mentally tiring, please get up and go for a walk around the place and get a nice clean glass and fill it with water and breathe deeply and drink your water.

5. Look back over your answers in question #3.  If at first reading you are still feeling negative about what you wrote place a minus sign there (-).  If at first reading you have no feeling about what you wrote place a (+) next to the item.  If at first reading you have learned something and those insights have caused you to shift and move forward or to change direction, place a smiley face next to the entry.  This is an indication that there is very little or no hole there at present and you have moved on and let go.

6.OK.  How many smiley faces do you see?  Not many.  Then you definitely have a hole or many holes in your life.  How many (+) do you see?  Not many.  Then you have some holes and some work to do.  What this indicates is that there are still unresolved issues in those line items.  How about (-)?  If you see lots of minuses, then you are carrying around lots of heavy weight.  These are places to concentrate to fill in the hole with critical thinking and decisions which will need to be made to bring about a change to release this negative energy in your life.

7.Not to worry here.  This is normal.  Realize that not one single one of us is
perfect.  The person who tells you they are wonderful all the time is probably not.  We all have things in our past that we wish we could change.  Wisdom comes from learning from the past and not repeating the same mistake in the future.

 
Commitment With Self  This is a very special part of the lesson.  This is the place where you make one of those “Voluntary Decisions” to take one small step to begin to fill your hole.  What commitment will you make?   What are the top 2 items in your Professional life you want to make a commitment to begin to change this week? What is one small step that you can take to step toward this change? What are the top 2 items in your Personal life you want to make a commitment to begin to change this week? What is one small step that you can take to step toward this change?

 

 
                   The “Thinking Chair”
This is a quiet place where you can sit and close your eyes and really think.  You probably already have a spot that you go to, to make decisions.  When I was a child I always went to a swing and somehow the gentle back and forth motion cleared my head and clarity came.  Find your place. Go to your place and think about your answers in lesson one.  Let that still small voice inside you be your guide.  If you find  yourself in a negative loop, this is not the voice to listen to.  That is your “fleshly-I-wantit-my-way-self” talking.  Recenter and refocus your thoughts.  Pray, meditate, read something uplifting, breathe deeply and be still and let go of the negative self-talk and become quiet again.  

 
Congratulations!  
You have just taken the first step in filling in the holes in your two areas of life.  I know this seems like hard work, but that’s how we move forward with hard self examination.  This is an examination of self in a positive way!  As you work through these lessons take a moment and tell yourself “good job”, “I love myself for doing this work”, “I am worth every moment!”  And you know what?    You Are Worth It! 

Next week Lesson #2!