Separateness

November 8th
HIDING FROM LOVE

Chapter 14 – Hiding from separateness

Developing boundaries and an accurate sense of responsibility is essential to healthy development. People should respect our boundaries, but it doesn’t always work that way. Share an experience when you were punished by someone for saying no to them.
Have you ever rescued another out of guilt or misplaced responsibility? How did these situations make you feel?
Most often, people with a separateness deficit, are afraid of being separate which causes abandonment or isolation. Have you experienced any of these fears?

Attachments

November 1st
HIDING FROM LOVE

Chapter 13 – Hiding from attachment
We are complex and creative human beings, consequently we all use a variety of hiding styles for a variety of reasons. If we display a self-sufficient persona, what do you think we may be trying to hide?
If we seem to “have it all together” what might we be trying to hide from others?
Harmful hiding patterns fall into two groups, internal and relational. The result is we are either unable to give love or we are unable to receive love. Find out how to identify your own hiding style using the charts provided in class.

6 critical stages

October 25th
HIDING FROM LOVE

Chapter 10 – Harmful hiding six critical stages
Our parents may have done a good job of helping us through important emotional processes, yet things go wrong in everyone’s childhood. It’s here that we develop our early defenses. Discuss the six stages in the process: 1) Our needs go unmet, 2) We experience injury to the soul, 3) We make legitimate needs bad, 4) We deny our own needs, 5) We develop false solutions, and 6) We produce bad fruit.

Chapter 11 & 12 – Harmful hiding: The results & the cost.
When we are ashamed of our needs, we are unable to feel safe about sharing them with God and others and so we hide them. Can you recognize any needs you may have felt shame about?
How does ”living in the past” keep your heart in emotional limbo? Why does telling someone to “forget the past” never work?
Have you been able to identify a hiding style in someone you know since doing this study? Why do you think it is easier to recognize these things in others than in yourself?
Harmful hiding ultimately ends up costing us something. What has it cost you?

Helpful Hiding

October 18th
HIDING FROM LOVE

Chapter 8 – Helpful hiding – Dealing with suffering
Give an example of “good pain”, and “bad pain” from your own experience. Can you recount a time or incident when you may have rescued someone by denying them the experience of learning from consequences? Share some of the ways helpful hiding can help you manage the suffering process.

Chapter 9 – Helpful hiding – Preparing for relationship When can withdrawal be a healthy choice for ourselves and our relationships? Can you remember an example from the life of Jesus?
Describe how withdrawal may be the most responsible action to take in a relationship.
Discuss the difference between withdrawal and isolation.
Forgiveness, humor and patience can benefit the emotional helpful hiding process. Discuss how each of these can help deal with pain.

Growing up

October 11th
HIDING FROM LOVE

Chapter 6 – Our need for resolving good and bad

When the tension between the real and the ideal been most obvious and/or distressing to you? Describe the situation, what brought this tension into focus, and how you responded emotionally.

Review the skills (listed here) that can help you resolve your good/bad split. Confess your shortcomings to God and people. Receive forgiveness. Let go of the demand for the ideal. Accept “good enough” in yourself and others. Make sadness your ally instead of your enemy. Which skill is the most challenging to you?

Chapter 7 – Our need for authority and adulthood

Review the list of the skills (listed here) that can help you step into a position of authority and adulthood according to god’s design. Question authority and learn to accept the good and the bad. Take an inventory of your values and convictions. Address adults as adults, not parents. Develop your talents. Make sexuality a good thing. See guilt as a sign of growth, a sign of taking risks and, often, of showing us that we are attempting to become adults. Which skill is the most challenging to you?