Giving and Receiving Are the Same
In my recent blog posts and newsletters I’ve been introducing the principles of Attitudinal Healing (AH). Jerry Jampolsky, one of the early readers of A Course in Miracles, simplified its complex lessons into the 12 Principles of Attitudinal Healing. As a child and adult psychiatrist, he first began applying them with children facing terminal illness. Soon the AH groups grew into a worldwide service that can be applied to almost any difficulty. Today, we consider Principle 3.
In Jampolsky’s book, Teach Only Love, he gives this explanation: “When our attention is on giving and joining with others, fear is removed and we accept healing for ourselves.”
So, How Do We Do It?
There are many people in this world who are labeled givers. Givers usually have a hard time learning how to receive.
There are also receivers, who are great at receiving but don’t really know how to give.
Givers are usually rescuers who manipulate the other person. If the person doesn’t respond to their expectations they are disappointed.
The receiver, on the other hand, makes many demands on another and never seems to get his or her needs met.
Both look to the external world to fulfill their needs, and both tend to have emptiness inside.
The Attitudinal Healing definition of giving and receiving comes from another place. It is egoless. There are no conditions, no expectations, and no boundaries put on the extension of people sharing love.
When we have no goal or desire to change another person, or no need to get anything from them, a different dynamic takes place. We are actually only there for that person in an egoless way, and we can start to feel a sense of inner peace.
As we begin to feel a sense of joining with another
person, we seem to forget about ourselves. We become less concerned about our own feelings as we extend and expand. It is at this point that one feels the gift of giving and receiving becoming one. The supply is endless, and we become more and more full.
Where Does It Happen?
This kind of interaction takes place in the AH groups–a safe place for people to extend themselves towards others. They are able to forget their self-consciousness and through this become empowered with love to be able to reach out toward another without expecting something in return. At this point the person who is being helped almost automatically can let go of fears or anxieties and become one with those in the room.
When people are truly operating in this mode, fears are released and healing begins to take place.
(Source: Definition of the Principles of Attitudinal Healing)
Gigi Langer has been sober 37 years, and holds a PhD in Psychological Studies in Education from Stanford University. Formerly crowned the “Queen of Worry,” Gigi resigned her post many years ago and now lives happily in Florida with her husband, Peter and her cat, Easter.
