Some of our beliefs were developed by us in efforts to make sense of our experiences and others were handed down. They served a purpose during our childhood, but as adults, some beliefs become outdated and destructive. Believing others are responsible for determining your worth is destructive to following your heart’s desires, adds stress to relationships and puts your sense of self-worth out of your control. In blaming someone for not meeting your needs you are blaming them for not being the way you need them to be so you can be comfortable. Most of us know we can’t change others, but that doesn’t stop us from trying in situations where our comfort is concerned. As a child if you had to stop crying, laughing, or being angry for an authority figure to be comfortable, you learned that you are responsible for the comfort of others and others are responsible for your comfort. 

When we believe others are responsible for meeting our needs and keeping us comfortable, we will have a tendency to be critical and controlling toward them rather than ‘honoring’. No wonder conversations commonly involve what’s wrong with our relationships and how great our lives would be if others could love us better. Everyone has their issues, but as we can understand that our energy will attract people and situations to us, we can understand that they are our messengers, showing us something about ourselves. In not ‘honoring’ yourself on the inside you will attract an experience to demonstrate this for you on the outside. The Universe will always provide a match.

Rather than being able to enjoy a partnership, relationships become high maintenance when you believe others are responsible for meeting your needs. You will repeatedly be disappointed and look outside yourself for someone to meet your needs until you realize that it is time to re-evaluate your beliefs around honoring, respecting, cherishing and responsibility. 

A pattern that many of us repeat is one where we focus on not getting hurt again. In not learning from our experiences, we move forward from relationship to relationship with our hurt. Any hurt experienced in the next relationship will be magnified because of the hurt we still carry. If you don’t understand that as a rule, only 10-20% of the emotion experienced is from the current situation and the remainder is old unresolved emotion from your past, you will hold the new person accountable for all of it and be looking for them to heal your past by being perfect. 

In processing your experiences and taking responsibility for your part in the creation, you become aware of your beliefs around ‘honoring’. In bringing to awareness that you were not ‘honoring’ yourself in a relationship you will see that you have attracted a partner to mirror this. When you put yourself last, so will others. As you learn to ‘honor’ all the parts of yourself from the beautiful to the ugly, the strong to the weak and the loving to the fearful, ‘honor’ is what you will attract. As you set the intention to heal a belief, the Universe will provide assistance, perhaps by attracting those who don’t ‘honor’ you to help bring awareness to parts of yourself with unfinished business around honoring, respecting and cherishing. 

Once you stop blaming others for how you are feeling, you can start taking steps toward getting in touch with aspects of yourself that are holding these triggered feelings and in need of your attention. In healing enough unfinished business around ‘honoring’, the Universe will provide a match, and you will begin to attract those who honor you because you do. Those who didn’t will either grow with you or fall out of your life because there is no longer a match. In getting the message you can release the messenger; he/she/it is no longer needed to bring to the surface a wound you have healed. If you feel unappreciated for what you give to a relationship, it may be because you are attempting to fill a void from outside yourself. In “giving to get love,” you are manipulating others to fill your void; looking outside yourself for others to prove you have value and are worth loving. When we “give to get love,” we are afraid it won’t come back otherwise. If love is not present, love won’t come back. In looking outside ourselves for love, it will never be enough and never the way we need it because it needs to be coming from us. Looking for love outside of ourselves in efforts to feel complete, places a heavy burden on our relationships to provide for us. We will consistently need others to prove that we are valuable and that can be exhausting for both parties. Needing someone else to complete us creates a co-dependency. We give our power away to those we need to fill our voids. In needing someone we feel controlled by them not to mention the fact that it is impossible to fill a void. We may spend excessive time trying to please or help others in efforts to feel loved, appreciated and valued and it will never be enough. 

People commonly complain about the neediness of others, not realizing that they themselves need needy people to feel valuable. In their own way they are just as needy as their needy friends. In needing the needy to feel valuable we have an investment in their neediness. 

It takes a lot less energy to get in touch with the wounded parts of ourselves that are needy. As we can love, appreciate and value the needy aspects of ourselves, the Universe will provide a loving, appreciative and valued match. Our healed Self can help others out of their needy space whereas our unhealed Self needs them to stay there. When we love, ‘honor’, respect and cherish ourselves, there is no void to be filled and no need for co-dependency. In loving, and ‘honoring’ ourselves, we can truly express these feelings toward others and will be a magnet for these qualities. We can’t accept someone for who they are if we are taking their weaknesses personally. When we love and ‘honor’ ourselves, our intentions come from a loving place rather than from a place of fear. In looking to fill our needs from the outside we can become self-absorbed and place demands on others to take responsibility for completing us. As you understand and take responsibility for choices you make, forgive yourself for your mistakes and learn from them, you will learn to love all the aspects of yourself. 

Our Spiritual Adult is the aspect of us who acknowledges and loves all our parts and can listen and comfort them without giving them authority to make decisions. Our Spiritual Adult, has learned to love him/herself and can express forgiveness and compassion toward him/herself rather than judgment and rejection. As you are more understanding, compassionate, forgiving and accepting of your wounded parts rather than judging and rejecting, you are filling your voids and becoming more whole. When acting from our Spiritual Adult we hold intent for whatever is for the highest good for everyone involved in decision-making. 

Parents are often frustrated when their children aren’t ‘honoring’ them and may refer to them as ungrateful or disrespectful. I will always tell a parent with this frustration initially to look to how they may not be ‘honoring’ themselves. Many adults will demand or manipulate to fill this void. Demanding ‘honor’ from children is not teaching them to ‘honor’ themselves. In teaching children that ‘honor’ is out of their control, we are teaching them to control others before they control you if you want to get your needs met. 

Looking at the parent/child relationship from the perspective of both parent and child can be very enlightening. A child responsible for ‘honoring’ a parent who is not ‘honoring’ him/herself, is damned if they do and damned if they don’t. When a parent demands respect from a child the child will demand respect from someone else, perhaps a peer, sibling, or even from a pet, creating a domino effect, skewed responsibilities and controlling personalities.

For generations adults have been working on survival issues. Fathers often worked at jobs that didn’t nourish them mentally, emotionally or spiritually, to provide food, shelter and clothing while mothers sacrificed their dreams to get married and have children. People forgot how their energy worked and how to co-create with the Universe and instead, did their best to control others and their environment to feel safe. In efforts to keep families safe using methods of control and motivated by fear, the survival of families was often at the expense of parents ‘honoring’ themselves. Children were expected to fill these voids by ‘honoring’ their parents for their sacrifices. No one really thought about it, they just did it and in the process, sacrifice became nobilized. 

Even a parent ‘honored’ because of their status in the community was setting an example for getting ‘honor’ from others. If you learned that you are ‘honored’ for what you do, this could play a role in career decisions or in your beliefs involving the weight you place on what others think of you. 

If you were taught by your role models’ example to get ‘honor’ from outside yourself, as an adult, you will unconsciously continue the same. You may be just like your parents, demanding that your children or others ‘honor’ you or place too much weight on what others think of you. If being responsible for ‘honoring’ parents created resentment or hurt, you may have made a decision to be nothing like your parents. As an adult you may put your children or significant others first, going overboard in an attempt to make up for the loss of value you experienced over never feeling good enough. You may think you are doing the opposite with those you love, but are really doing your own version of the same thing your parents did. In putting your children first you may shower them with toys and activities, letting their activities rule your schedule and then are frustrated when they don’t ‘honor’ you for all that you give, sacrifice and do for them. Both extremes are attempts to get ‘honor’ from those you love, one actively and the other passively. And just for the record, you can’t heal your childhood through your kids or through anyone else, but you. The above example can be applied to any relationship. 

Many parents place burdens on their relationships with their children and some children take on responsibilities that should belong to their parents in efforts to be seen and valued in their families. These children will continue these patterns of behavior as adults in efforts to get their needs met from the outside. It will become more and more apparent that this pattern is no longer effective as we go through relationships, blaming others for not meeting our needs the way we want them to. After awhile hopefully we figure out that it is time to look inward at ourselves, to stop blaming others, and to start taking responsibility for ‘honoring’ ourselves.

Many adults still hold the “not good enough” belief established in an attempt to make sense of their failed efforts at ‘honoring’ their parents. On a Soul level, if you came to the Earth Plane to work on the “not good enough” belief, you will choose parents to help you re-create the pain and belief in order to resolve or continue to work on it. In understanding this, you will see that your parents did their jobs perfectly. This does not mean your parents were perfect or that you chose abuse, etc. We have free will so you can’t predict the details of how your experiences will play out, but your parents probably hold/held the “not good enough” belief too and because they didn’t know what to do with it, they handed it down for you to address. In attempting to get others to ‘honor’ you, you are handing this belief down as well. As we realize this, it can help us to forgive our parents for why they did whatever it was, to let go of the past, to forgive ourselves, and to move forward with the gifts. 

Most couples don’t give a lot of thought as to why they want to have children. Children, born and unborn, can be given the responsibility of filling a void in a parent when the parent is not 
conscious of his/her intentions. Some parents are looking for someone to love them, look up to them, make them happy, give them a sense of purpose, a sense of value or an identity and they think having a child will fill these voids. In believing you need a child or anyone else to fill these voids, you will feel controlled by them. Placing too much weight on a child or relationship to complete us will cause us to struggle with him/her. “When I have this child or when I find a man/woman then I can be happy, feel loved, etc.”, is placing the child or relationship as responsible for healing a part of you that is starved for love, again, too much weight. Children and relationships were never meant to carry this kind of weight, this kind of responsibility. Yes, children and relationships contribute to your being happy and feeling loved, but if they are the source of these feelings they are filling a void. 

Your voids may temporarily be filled by a child, but as they grow and develop their own friends and interests, a parent’s voids will be exposed once again. This is why you often hear parents talk of wishing their children were still small. It’s not for the benefit of the children, it’s because they are missing having their voids filled. You won’t be able to be happy for your child’s happiness and growth or anyone else’s if you aren’t taking responsibility for filling your own voids. Consciously or unconsciously you will place guilt on anyone pursuing their happiness at the expense of filling your void. 

A void may be temporarily filled by having a child or significant other, but in taking a deeper look, expecting someone’s life purpose to be to fill another’s voids is a pretty selfish way of thinking. Unfortunately this thought process is very common in most types of relationships. Sometimes ‘honoring’ someone involves loving them enough to let them go. You would never want someone to be with you if that wasn’t where they wanted to be and vice versa. It can also involve ‘honoring’ yourself and someone else enough to let them go express their undesirable behavior elsewhere, but not with you.

When a parent’s efforts are to get a child to stop pushing their buttons so the parent can be comfortable, there is no growth and learning for the parent, and the child is being taught skewed responsibility. Sometimes behaviors are not acceptable and this must be addressed, but a parent can spend a lot of unnecessary time and energy trying to control a child so they can be comfortable. As adults, we will continue to hold others accountable for our buttons until we realize that they are our responsibility to heal. As we begin to wake up and realize these buttons are ours, we also will begin to be grateful for those who have brought them to the surface and presented us with an opportunity to heal them.

No one is winning when responsibilities are skewed, and everyone experiences feelings of “not good enough” because of it. In the process, some are enabled, some are used and struggle and stress are the results of too much weight on relationships. A child can give up on who they came here to be and become an overachiever in efforts to be “enough” in the eyes of a parent/role model, or withdraw, feeling defeated, giving up because it is too painful to keep trying. In either case the child won’t feel loved just for being and will unconsciously take these behaviors into their adult lives. In understanding that many Souls have come back to heal this belief at this time, we can see the value of skewed responsibilities in re-creating “not good enough” so we can experience it again in efforts to understand and heal from it. 

Perhaps you were that child that believed they were “not good enough” and as the adult continue to attract people and situations to help you demonstrate your outdated belief. “Not good enough” can be like a computer program, running in the background without your conscious knowledge, getting in the way of what you desire as an adult. If you have inherited a belief, as an adult you have the choice to learn from it and change it or allow it to control you and pass it on.

When we love, honor, respect and cherish ourselves, these qualities are what we will express and reflect and be a living example of. Rather than seeing the world as an out of control place we will see how much control we really have over our future and the beauty we can create with the power of our love in partnership with the Universe. When we are motivated out of love we can acknowledge our mistakes, learn from them, forgive ourselves and make better choices in the future. Motivation out of fear of being punished teaches that mistakes are intolerable rather than inevitable. Being motivated out of love prepares a child for adulthood far better than motivation out of fear of being punished ever could. 

It is not the job of an intimate partner, family, friends or employer to give you a sense of value, comfort, happiness, identity, safety, security, ‘honor’, respect, etc. In giving others responsibility for us and taking responsibility for others we give our power away. We can’t accept others for who they are if we take their weaknesses personally. People needing others to be whole create co-dependent relationships. People that are whole within themselves create partnerships. In taking responsibility for your comfort it will be necessary to heal your wounds. As painful emotions are released and replaced with love and understanding, more optimal futures become accessible. As we understand how powerful processing is in creating what we do want, we begin to realize that we really don’t have time not to process. As we take responsibility for filling our voids we can focus on honoring, respecting and cherishing in relationships rather than being focused on ways the other person could be loving us better. 

As you ask for help and open to receive it, the understanding of co-creation and how the Universe provides will unfold. Being responsible for your feelings and ‘honoring’ your heart are integral to creating your heart’s desires. Sometimes the Universe will bring someone into our lives for us to give advice to because that advice is something we need to be reminded of for ourselves. Sometimes it provides by bringing obstacles to the surface that are necessary to work through before our heart’s desire can find its way to us. When we ask the Universe for assistance and relinquish control over how that help can come, She can be incredibly creative in her response.

In our life review at the time of our death, we view what we did to others and what was done to us for the purpose of learning. In this lifetime we can have many mini life reviews if we choose. Meditation is a great way to review our experiences and to gain the desired clarity we are seeking. In taking advantage of this opportunity we can die to old beliefs and identities that no longer serve us and be re-born to what is more real in us without having to physically die. Rather than repeating the same mistakes over and over again, in being more conscious we have the opportunity to review our experiences. With meditative techniques we can process our emotions, understand our role in attracting our dramas and move forward with the gifts and more love, ‘honor’, understanding, forgiveness and compassion for ourselves and others. In learning from our experiences we are on our way to creating a future that we do want with harm to none in the process. 

Our true power is in our ability to love and be loved, not in how well we can control others or our environment. No matter how far you run from yourself you will always show up. Your energy is a magnet for your experiences, therefore, it is important to nurture it if you want your future to be optimal. Where we are headed is out of “control,” not by giving our responsibilities away, but by taking them back and becoming more whole. As we become more whole we will move out of the energies of “control” and into the energies of co-creation. The world through the eyes of control is hell. The world through the eyes of co-creation is heaven, right here, right now.