All of us at some point in our life feel the pain of abandonment. We came into this world needy and helpless, unable to feed or clean ourselves, emoting to get these basic needs met through our parents or guardians.
For some abandonment is clearly felt through the lens of divorce, death or neglect. Others, even under the best circumstances of being nurtured, will at some point along the way become disillusioned by the fact that our parents will die as will we.
Viewing Our Parents as God
Regardless of how we are raised when we are little we view our parents as God, even if this is far from true. They are perfect beings that seem to perform magical acts continually. Our parents take on the roles of best friend, confidant, protector, hero or that of an indestructible force. “My Dad can lift two cars by himself!” “My Mommy can fly!”
Our exaggerations are living truth at this stage of development. The parental figure is powerful, strong, vital and literally much bigger than us. We look up to our parents as the measure of how to behave and function in the world.
So when we first become aware of any disappointment we are having with our caregivers it also transfers over to our view of God or Source. If we grow up with the understanding that we should be fearful of our parents, we fear the idea of God as well. The disappointment we feel becomes internalized and we set out to alleviate ourselves of that pain; that fear of abandonment. Whatever survival tactic we have used that seems to work (whether or not that has negative implications) we stick to.
Religion Instills This View of God Deeper
If our parents recognize that we will grapple with this feeling of abandonment they will help us to understand the deeper aspects of who we are. Our autonomy and individuality will be celebrated and nurtured. This, however, is not always the case. Many (not all) organized religious systems are based in shame and guilt where a judgmental God watches our every move and for whom we must consistently ask forgiveness for our “sins”.
In Michael Lerner’s book, The Left Hand of God, he repeatedly demonstrates the difference between the judgmental, wrathful and punishing God (The Right Hand) that is the foundation of the conservative movement against the kind, compassionate and empathetic God (The Left Hand) that gets lost in the shadows (especially in times of war).
If we are to understand our own unique relationship with God (or whatever word feels appropriate) we may feel that the Left Hand version is much more our cup of tea. The conservative, all-fear-the-wrath-of-God system has seeped into our culture and society as a whole.
To turn the tide and create a new conscious understanding of our individual relationship to our spirituality is necessary. It is at the core of transcending the negative connotations of God having to be one specific way, or of being left for dead if you question or disagree with a particular system of belief.
Returning to Childhood…
We enter this world with our essence in totality. Nothing is left behind. Our soul’s work is within us and our work is to discover what that work consists of while making many mistakes along the way. Regardless of our upbringing that essence does not leave us or cease to exist. We simply need ways to remember what it is.
Reclaiming The Soul
There may be pieces of our soul that get lost, trapped in moments of trauma or difficulty from the past but we can retrieve them. That is the purpose of a soul retrieval, an internal journey to call back to us the aspects that feel lost or abandoned.
When we are young, we are not capable of being able to work with the extremity of certain situations. We get overwhelmed and dissociate, a piece of who we are may leave to protect us from the damage. Our body and soul are incredibly intelligent and our always working on our behalf even if it means “checking out” in order to prevent us from experiencing the full brunt of the pain.
Being Ready to Re-Parent Ourselves
When we are ready (and I want to emphasize ready) we can then find the objective conditions to call these pieces of ourselves back, reclaiming them. We re-parent these childhood injuries, nurturing and befriending these hurts back to health. We can then start to understand our abandonment issues from a subjective and objective place while also unapologetically restructuring our relationship to the Divine.
What’s Next?
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