A friend and I recently laughed as we thought about our relationships and the challenges we all face on the journey of emotional and spiritual intelligence. Most especially how it relates to CHANGE. Change not only calls us to choose new behaviors that may be uncomfortable and awkward but we must face and confront the unknown. What will the relationship be like when we change? How might our life change if we stop doing the same things over and over? What if the unknown is not what we want?

There is also difficulty that others have in believing that we really have changed especially those who have been in our lives for a long time: our children, spouses, siblings and old friends. So not only do we sometimes choose to live in a time warp, but others relate to us in our "old selves" and we relate to them this way as well. It's hard to leave that time warp behind and enter the unfamiliarity of present day. There is an expectation that we will react in an old pattern or as we "always have in the past" and others may be resistant to seeing our new behavior changes as well.

We are also learning about brain chemistry and the challenges that there are in developing these new patterns in the brain, letting go of old beliefs and automatic patterns. In our wounding, we learn to adapt to dysfunctional environments and navigate trauma by shutting down and/or reacting automatically to avoid further pain. Our brain patterns get set as well and when there is any similar situation to the one in which we were originally wounded, we react as we did then. It takes great intention to recognize this and adjust to more flexible and effective options. The time warp is comfortable, predictable and easy to fall back into. Here are some tips for dealing with others' or our own tendency toward living in a time warp:

1. Recognize the ease of living in a time warp and the challenge there is in changing reactive behavior. Have patience but be determined to change and allow others to change as well.

2. Stay Calm when someone seems to be resistant to seeing the changes in you. Without defensiveness or anger, explain that you are choosing to do it differently, or just let them be with their own reactions while staying calm and peaceful. They may need time to leave their time warp of old and reactive behaviors and join you in the present time relationship with new and more functional behaviors.

3. Work the 12 steps with someone who is more experienced. As you work the steps and clean out the old family of origin issues, beliefs, feelings and see clearly those adaptive behaviors, you will be free to choose more functional and healthful behaviors. You will learn to recognize the old way of reacting and choose new responses and behaviors in any given situation.

Doing our own family of origin work allows us to move out of old, reactive patterns of behavior. We can leave our time warp where it belongs, in our histories and choose new patterns of behavior in our relationships today based on awareness, current values and spiritual principles. This takes time, but persistence and commitment to the spiritual discipline of the 12 steps will overcome the pull of familiarity and old reactive behaviors.

Blessings on your journey,

Sally