Our Guiding Principles and company Values serve as a foundation for the program. They outline what we stand for and how we will show up to serve and guide our students.

We developed the guidelines in hopes of providing the student with insight into how they can get the most benefit out of the course.

This program aims to guide the student through the process of doing the work to create change. The work itself is challenging, both mentally and emotionally.

Because the work itself is so demanding, it is important that we show up for ourselves by continually considering and revisiting these guiding principles.

We want to ensure everyone feels prepared and has everything they need for the 10 weeks ahead. We will use this time to review the program and set reminders for important dates and deadlines.

Short introductions will take place, each student will have the opportunity to share as much or as little as they feel comfortable with. We will explain the buddy system and announce triads.

Students will have the opportunity to ask any unanswered questions or name concerns.

Our highest priority is ensuring that each student feels safe and has the tools they require to self-regulate throughout the program.

Together, we will work on developing our individual self-care toolkits. This exercise will walk us through the process of creating a list of items or experiences that engage the senses and help us to de-escalate triggered emotions.

We are setting intentions so we can get clear on why you’re taking this program.

This program involves a lot of self-reflection. We have to ask ourselves questions and be honest with ourselves in order to make progress. 

We are setting intentions because we want to give ourselves time to reflect. When you take the time to think about our intentions, it helps us to better understand the reasons behind why we are here.

We start here because, if you’re not willing or able to figure out what your intentions are, then you’re probably not interested in the self-reflection involved and required by the program.

Denial refers to something you may not be aware of. It’s an unwillingness to accept that something unpleasant is true.

Denial is a critical piece to address right away. If you’re in denial about a problem, you’re not able to address it.

Our inability to be honest with ourselves is one of the biggest problems when it comes to recovery. If you can’t be honest with yourself then you can’t move forward because you don’t have a problem and therefore you don’t have anything to solve.

Self-delusion and chronic lying have to be confronted. It’s hard to see because it’s likely been a pattern for a long time, but this is the time and place to question things and confront yourself.

Acceptance is acknowledging that I have a problem. I am no longer in denial about it.

You can only change something you are aware of and acknowledge. When you’re honest with yourself, you have the opportunity to create change. You have the opportunity to address the bad habits you created that have become ingrained in your lifestyle.

 Once we move into acceptance, we’re able to take ownership of the problems we need to address.

When we look at our negative habits, we have to consider them from a two-prong approach.

1. You innocently picked up habits just to survive. In the beginning, they served a purpose. You took them on without having any idea of the consequences. 
2. Despite this, even though we are innocent, we still have to take full responsibility, even if we didn’t mean for this to happen.

If we don’t take responsibility, then we find ways to blame someone or something else. If we displace the blame like this, we become victims and who have no control. If we don’t own or have any control over the problem, we can’t heal or create change in our lives. 

Even if the issue was caused by someone else. Even if you were innocent and the problem was dumped on you… You have to take ownership so you can do something about it and move forward.

True, it may not have been your fault, but you do have to take ownership now if you intend to do something about it.

Cross-addiction and switching mean the same things and can be used interchangeably. They take place when you subconsciously develop new habits to correct old bad habits. 

The new habits you develop don’t solve the problem, they still serve the function of helping you to avoid discomfort in your day to day life. 

What’s driving all of these habits? Guilt, shame, past traumas, false impressions and uncomfortable feelings or interpretations about things from the past that we want to avoid feeling in the present. 

All of the habits we develop have a function and serve a purpose. If we want to change a bad habit, we must replace the habit with something that serves the same purpose and function. If we don’t replace the bad habit with a good habit, we’ll continue to switch from one bad habit to another.

This is the most important part of the process of getting unstuck. We are working through denial and the things that stop us from getting started.

We need to look back into the things that keep you from taking a step forward. You’re stuck. Most of the time, this has something to do with shame and guilt you’re carrying from the past.

We’re gonna go back and look at everything you feel guilty about or ashamed of.

Imagine moving into a new house that is already full. There’s no room to bring in anything new, because there’s no space for new life, new patterns, new ways of being.

We have to clean out everything that’s not helpful. Everything that gets in the way of your ability to enjoy life.

Through this program, we’re going to find ways to make amends for all the things you feel bad about. This way, we are addressing things from the past so that they don’t creep into the present anymore. We are doing the work to allow ourselves to move forward.

Doing the work comes down to taking action. In this case, the action we’re taking is digging through the past and making lists of memories we feel shame, regret or discomfort towards.

When we do the work and have the right attitude, an attitude of willingness to do whatever it takes to enhance our lives, then we prove to ourselves that we’re capable of doing hard things.

Willingness is an act of opening. If we’re not open to things being different, then they can’t be. Willingness to do the work is being ready to confront and do what it takes to make amends. It’s the attitude of willingness that matters.

Sometimes it can be painful and distressing, but we’re willing to do it. When we get through the other side, we look back and realize we’re capable of addressing things, even if they seem impossibly difficult.

If this was easy, if you could Get Unstuck yourself, you would have done it yourself by now. You haven’t been able to find a way to do it, up to this point. You’re here because some sort of willingness lead you here.

Now that you’re willing to do the work and make amends, you’re in a position to take action and create change.

Through this process, what you’ll be able to create for yourself is a person you care about. But you have to protect yourself! If you don’t protect yourself, it will be very easy to fall back into past patterns and go back to doing all the previous things you were accustomed to.

Developing boundaries allows us to get protection. Boundaries create a safe environment so we don’t get triggered and revert back to our old patterns.

When you don’t have boundaries, every time somebody says something to you, you imagine it has power. You take it in, let it affect you and you react to it. The truth is, what others say or do doesn’t actually have power unless you give it power. You are imagining it has power and because you believe, in your imagination, that it has power you make it come true.

Boundaries contain you so that you can maintain your energy and stop yourself from violating other people’s boundaries. Through mental imagery, we will practice creating boundaries for ourselves before we go out into the world. This will create a sense of protection for yourself so you can let things bounce off of you.

Only a competent adult would know about boundaries. Imagine the boundary system. Step into it. That’s how you know you’re becoming and practicing being a competent adult.

The work we’re doing here has to do with getting your history straight. In order to do this, we must start to recognize some of the things that have happened to us along the way. We will use this information as a starting point to work off of.

Trauma refers to these things we carry that remain unprocessed or unresolved. It’s not that you’re still trying to cope with them, it’s more that you are stuffing them away and avoiding them, which becomes a habit that we apply in our day-to-day life. This habit stops us from taking chances, or taking risks. We are not able to just let life happen, which is an important part of living a full, rich life.

Life experiences are traumatic if we interpret them as being our fault and feel shame towards them. That belief becomes associated with our sense of who we think we are. It builds a shame-core within.

This is why we are doing the work to address trauma. Through the homework, we are going to start looking at these traumatic experiences and consider how many of them have left us with a sense of shame about ourselves.

We have to address these feelings of shame that we carry and walk around with. When we start to address them, we’re able to investigate further and ask ourselves “Where does this come from? How did this get started?”

The traumatic experiences we’ve been through have caused us to create false impressions about ourselves, and these false impressions make up the shame-core. The shame-core is what we want to address and work through together.

Who we really are is the essence of creation. We are all born onto this planet and throughout our existence we are subject to experiences that create false impressions about who we think we are. The process of resolving these traumas involves observing them and asking ourselves how they make us feel about ourselves.

If we’re going to go back and clean everything up so we can uncover and release the false impressions we believe about ourselves, we need to come back to this idea that we are precious, valuable, and worthwhile just the way we are. Now is the time for us to return to our true selves.

This clean up process is providing us the opportunity to come back to the core of who we really are, beneath all of the false impressions we’ve accumulated over time.

In this module we will introduce you to one of the most valuable tools we can teach you: breathwork. This is something you will add to your toolkit and turn to whenever you need help to cope or to get quiet. Breathwork is one of the most powerful tools we can use to help ourselves self-regulate. Many of us have developed a habit of turning to outside sources to self-medicate whenever we need to regulate how we’re feeling.

The breath is the first action we take when we leave our mothers and enter the world. If we don’t take a breath in that very moment, right after we’re cut loose, then we won’t survive. As human beings, breathing is the most fundamental thing we have to do in order to survive.

Because this is such a natural process that is woven into the fabric of everyday existence, most of us never learned or even considered the power of the breath. We aren’t aware of how the breath can be used to enhance our lives, we just automatically breathe without ever thinking about it.

Those of us who are obsessive thinkers or who experience racing thoughts as a result of hyper-vigilance or other trauma responses, we tend to think that we are ‘broken’ and that our minds have been compromised due to the stress we endured during challenging life chapters. We think our busy minds are a result of something that happened to us that can never be undone, we think we’re doomed to live with brains that function differently from others… but that isn’t the case. 

Practicing breathwork is like flexing a muscle, the more we do it, the better we get at it. The stronger our practice becomes. Starting with breathwork can serve as the training wheels version of meditation. Once we get a bit of practice with breathwork, our beings and our minds will know how to fall into place so we can practice getting quiet and expanding into the silence of meditation without counting. 

In this module, we learn that we have everything it takes to become the competent adult we have always needed.

Growing up, we don’t always have access to competent adults who can provide reliable support and unconditional love. This creates an inner child within who is consistently needy and constantly let down for lack of someone reliable to turn to.

Remember, all our habits and patterns got created as a means of survival and then it created who we are. We have been acting out in ways we feel bad about, or we are in the habit of thinking of ourselves in negative ways because we internalized interpretations (false impressions) from the outside.

We saw ourselves as flawed and inept, which made us stay stuck. In order to feel more fulfilled in life, we need to move away from what’s easy, comfortable and familiar, and go towards doing the work. 

The thing is – we think of ourselves as being stuck. But we’re not. We just don’t have the resources we need to Get Unstuck. In order to move from being stuck, for various reasons, to getting unstuck, we will start to use our imagination to envision the types of adults we previously needed in our lives.

What would be the habits and qualities of a competent adult? We’re not here to determine this for you. You get to decide what you want and what you need.

The definition of inherent value refers to a characteristic that is fundamental to the nature of something. Inherent means intrinsic or innate therefore inherent value suggests that every human life has an intrinsic (or absolute) value.

We are learning, through more recent research and studies on cellular consciousness, that every cell in the human body has intelligence. When you are first conceived, at the beginning of your human development, you start off as one simple cell. Then you evolve into multiple cells. 

The impact of the mother will impact the child in these early stages of development. If a mother doesn’t want her baby, or if the pregnancy was the result of something negative, then the child gets the impression there is something bad about them… at a cellular level!

If you’ve ever been around babies or young children, you may have experienced the sense that they have value. They matter. They are innocent and precious, just as they are. They don’t do anything for anyone, they don’t earn their keep or their worth. Nonetheless, we know, when we look at a small, innocent child, that they have value. 

The qualities we embody as infants are our natural qualities as human beings. They’re our natural state and they represent our inherent nature that’s connected to the life force, or the source of all life.

You are a life force, you were created for whatever reason and you are here now. Because of the simple fact that you are alive, you are as important and precious as this little baby.

This week’s video lesson consists of a guided visual meditation involving the concept of rebirthing. We take our first breath and come to life at birth – this meditation will take us on a journey where we will have the opportunity to experience our own birth, and then, through the subsequent Inner Child Meditation, we’ll walk through each stage of life we’ve already lived through so far.

The purpose of these meditations is to bring forward our inherent value and reframe what we’ve been through so we can gain new perspectives. It also provides us with the opportunity to re-write our story, from birth to present. We can see things differently, if we so choose to.

The work we’re doing in this module is focused around what we perceive about what has happened to us, rather than what we did to somebody else. 

What’s important to consider is whether you’re holding on to resentment. As you go through the homework and look back on your life, ask yourself “What do I resent? Who do I resent? Do I resent myself for some of the things I’ve done and can’t let go of? Do I resent life? Do I resent God? Are there things I can’t forgive myself that are causing me to feel resentful? 

If you’re carrying resentment, that means an event happened and you are carrying that experience with you. You are still identifying with the resentment and hanging onto it. You’re carrying the energy of this experience with you. If we continue to hold onto these things, we continue to give them importance and influence in our lives. We feed energy into these things and, in doing so, we stay stuck.

Are you willing to look at things differently, for the sake of freeing up blocked energy? That is what we are practicing in this exercise. Having an open mind and considering that every action often has a reaction and every reaction is often provoked by an action.

The shame-core is built up over time, based on our interpretations of day-to-day interactions and experiences. These impressions often lead us to believe there’s something wrong with us, or that we’re not good enough, or that we’re stupid, or unlovable, or unworthy or any variation of this sort. These impressions we have about ourselves sit at our core and they accumulate over time.

The shame core becomes the essence of who you think you are, and then everything else you create in your life is built upon this sense of unworthiness. It’s an unfortunate way to have to grow up. This shame-core is something you build within, without ever knowing you’re doing it.

The truth is, who you are deep inside, the being that exists at your core, the energy at the source of your heart, is pure and unquestionably worthy. There is absolutely nothing wrong with you or your being. There never was anything wrong, from the very beginning. Instead, you took on interpretations from the people and the energy surrounding you and these became false impressions that you came to rely on and believe about yourself.

These early interpretations of what we believe to be true become the foundation of who we think we are. Then, we build an identity based around a foundation of unworthiness. And then, we go look for evidence to support our unworthiness. And we will find it. If you are determined to find what you believe is out there, you will find it. You can find people that really appreciate you, you can find people who don’t appreciate you. The point is, you’re going to look for evidence to support what you think your reality is. 

This is why it’s so important for us to uncover these beliefs so we can reconsider and reframe them. So you can go out into the world and find new evidence. By doing this work of digging through the past and reframing these impressions, we have the opportunity to realize where we went wrong so we can rebuild the foundation of who we are at our core.

Carried feelings refers to emotions we experience or stories we tell ourselves that do not originate from within ourselves. In other words, these emotions are not our own, they are passed down to us by others (parents, family members, society, etc).

One of the significant pieces of work that takes place during the healing journey consists of figuring out what we hold to be genuine and true to ourselves, and examining all the other things impact our behaviors, beliefs and day-to-day experiences.

Children who grow up in chaotic environments don’t understand where expressions of anger or pain come from, they only know that they love their parent and they don’t want them to feel this way. They want them to be happier. What ends up happening is that they inadvertently start to take on some of the anger and frustration, in an attempt to take it away from the parent. They absorb these feelings and attempt to carry them for their parent because they subconsciously believe this will bring the parent relief.

The child unknowingly becomes convinced that taking these feelings on will alleviate the parent’s pain, therefore making them feel better so they can love and take care of the child. We unknowingly carry feelings like this throughout our entire lives. They’re not ours, but as long as we’re carrying them they can felt, triggered and expressed as if they are a part of who we are. 

The work we’re doing here comes down to noticing how we are feeling instead of running or avoiding. Once we’re able to understand our feelings, we have the opportunity to determine what’s ours and what isn’t. From there, we can start to let go and create boundaries to maintain space for who we truly are at our core.

The shame-core dictates how we see and feel about ourselves. If we don’t believe we have value, then there’s not much we can do to feel otherwise because it’s an ingrained belief that sits at our core, as the foundation of who we are. If I don’t believe I have value, I won’t let that feeling in… because I simply do not believe in it.

But that doesn’t mean we won’t try to prove our value! We don’t want to feel like we have no value, we want to be like everyone else we see around us, so we set out to prove ourselves wrong by chasing value. Unfortunately, if the shame core is solid and strong within, we get into this conundrum where we want to be seen as valuable, but we struggle to accept when others attempt to acknowledge our value. We tell ourselves, “they think I’m a good person, but they don’t know the real me.” Or we deny it, “They’re lying.” Or we become suspicious, “He’s just saying that because he wants something from me.”

This negative self-talk usually happens at the subconscious level. We don’t believe we have inherent value because our value is all covered up with shame.

Then, what happens is that we create new impressions “Well, I would be valuable if… I had a PhD. I would be satisfied and feel better if I had the perfect husband or the perfect kids or lots of money or an extravagant lifestyle…” These impressions create conditions we have to live by. We obsessively dedicate our energy, our time, our entire existence towards performing to achieve these conditions. 

We have the impression that we have to perform in order to achieve value. And yet, no matter what we achieve, we still have this underlying feeling at our core, that we don’t matter. So we just keep chasing more and more in a never-ending attempt to prove our value. 

The irony is that value literally can’t be proven. It’s not a tangible thing that can be calculated or manipulated or illustrated. It is virtually impossible to prove value. And yet, so many of us get stuck in this cycle of trying to prove our value through perfectionism. No matter how hard you try to be perfect, you will always fail.

One of the challenges for people who go into recovery, whether they’re in-patients or attending 12 Step programs, is that they have a lot of resistance to the idea of a higher power. The term ‘higher power’ almost always gets associated with God, which then takes you straight to religion. 

Depending on the individual’s experience with religion, this association could cause aversion, apathy or distrust. Those of us who struggle with addiction, or habits that cause us to beat ourselves up, almost always have issues with trust. In many of these cases, life experience has been such that the power higher than them, usually parents or teachers, was the source of most of their misery. It’s no wonder, if you grow up around people who abuse the power they have over you then you are going to find it challenging to open yourself up to something that is bigger than yourself. 

Their thought process might sound something like “Well, wait a minute, I’ve had to learn to take care of myself, I’m self-reliant, I’ve done everything on my own so far… why would I need someone else’s help? Let alone help from a figurative being? I’ve survived so far, I don’t need anybody else.” The reason you want to let go of that is because you’re stuck! If self-reliance was enough, then we wouldn’t be having this conversation. 

Everyone here is stuck so, consequently, we’re looking at methods to get unstuck. We’re not trying to prove anything, all we care to do here is share concepts and tools that have proven to be useful for people who are trying to move beyond what’s keeping them stuck. Clinical experience with clients has shown that believing in something beyond ourselves, or, having a higher power to turn to, seems to be a significant component for creating change.

Consider that your best thinking got you here. You’re here because you can’t figure your way out of whatever you’re stuck in. If you could do it on your own, then you wouldn’t be asking for help. The concept of believing in a higher power or reaching out to something beyond yourself is an opportunity to be open to something new. Maybe there are different ways of looking at things, or maybe there are different ways to operate in life? 

What we’re asking here isn’t that you blindly follow what we tell you to, but, instead, we’re asking for your patience in understanding that this is an exploration process. You may have preconceived notions attached to some of the things we’re asking you to consider, which is normal and fine, but remember that the work we’re doing here requires us to consider that what we know to be true isn’t working. We are now in a position to question what we know and explore new things by remaining open to them. 

Maybe this idea of a higher power is different than what you originally understood it to be? Maybe it’s not possible to carry everything on your own all the time? Maybe the idea of reaching out to something beyond our self could be useful?

One of the ways that consciousness plays into all this relates to keeping an open mind. Being open allows the mind to expand and provides us with the opportunity to consciously shift away from thinking we know what’s best or expecting things to be a certain way.

A closed mind operates from a place of familiarity, tries to control things so everything aligns with its existing beliefs. A closed mind thinks it already has things figured out, doesn’t believe it requires any further information and avoids uncertainty by claiming to have all the answers. An open mind is the only way to tap into consciousness. 

Consciousness is where everything comes from. Consciousness is something that can be explored. It’s a way of being that allows us to be more present with what’s happening, or more present for new ideas. It also allows us to experience peace at the same time as being engaged with whatever we’re applying ourselves to.

If my mind is open, and I’m here, then I’m in wonder. To be in wonder means that we’re open and curious to see what’s to happen in this next minute, and then the next moment, and so on. It is possible to live from a place of wonder where we are perpetually curious and open to whatever comes next. There is no good or bad, just moments. 

With a closed mind, we’re going to go exactly where we think we should. “I’m going there, I’m avoiding this because it’s not for me, I’m doing only what I choose and I control where life takes me.” A closed mind doesn’t mean you’re not thinking, your mind will still vacillate between the past and the future, but the main problem is that a closed mind spends less time being present or isn’t able to accept the present as it is, which robs us of satisfaction.

Within consciousness we’re able to sense that we are a part of some sort of creative life force that is expansive and detailed, where everything is included and connected. The thing is, there needs to be something that makes all that happen, that brings it all to life. 

This life force is a manifestation of energy that comes out of consciousness and into everything that materializes. Therefore, if we’re wanting to Get Unstuck, we’re going to require some of this life force. We call this life force prana, some call it qi or chi, but for our purposes we’re going to call it prana, which is the life force that permeates everything that exists. If there isn’t a life force, nothing materializes.

How can we enhance our life force so that we can put ourselves out there to explore and understand more, rather than isolating and hiding to feel safe? Life force is one of the key factors here. We need to have enough life force in order to develop, grow, expand and share with others. How do we enhance our life force so that we have the capacity to manage our needs and put ourselves out there more?

There are a number of ways to enhance life force energy, our program will teach you about a few different sources you can tap into to gain more or to maintain.