Shalom Place

The Four Rs of Breaking Free

- by Philip St. Romain; all rights reserved

A. Relaxing
 1. Be-here/now-in/love all day long. Make this the chief concern of your attention.
 2. Take more time each day for silence, rest, and relaxation. De-stress.
 3. Quiet Prayer of Presence, seeking nothing more than to be in God's loving presence.

B. Recognizing
 1. What concerns keep coming up in the silence/relaxing?
    --especially those which come with anxiety, resentment, guilt, and shame.
 2. Make a list of these concerns, and rank them according to their degree of emotional intensity. Use your journal, or a separate sheet of paper.
 3. Take one concern at a time and inquire:
     * What question has this concern presented to your mind?
     * Why is this question so important to you? What do you think will happen if the "wrong" answer is pursued?
     * What have you been doing to respond to this question?
     * What consequences to you and others have come from your efforts to respond to this question?
     * What parts of this situation are you simply unable to change?
     * What parts of this situation can you change?

C. Releasing
 1. Make a commitment to do what you can do to respond lovingly and honestly to each of your concerns.
 2. Surrender to God in prayer all the parts of this concern that you cannot control. Use Prayer of Surrender format, or the Serenity Prayer.
 3. Identify all judgmentalism you had previously connected with this issue:
     -- ex. success/failure, approval/disapproval, smart/dumb.
 4. Release all judgmentalism through affirmation prayer:
     -- ex. "Lord, help me to continue to (work on this project) but to let go of all concern over approval/disapproval from others about the outcome. Help me, instead, to be content with my best efforts, and to find my joy in loving union with You in this moment."
 5. Symbolize your releasing of the unhealthy parts of your issue by visualizing each unhealthy aspect and "blowing it away" (or burning your paper).
 6. Continue to release unhealthy preoccupation when it comes up by Recognizing,
 7. Releasing with Serenity Prayer, then Relaxing.

D. Responding
 1. After a few moments of quiet prayer, visualize yourself involved in the situation/concern you've been working with, but now in a loving way--without any of the unhealthy aspects.
 2. Move back into a Relaxing mode, willing to respond in a loving manner to whatever comes up.
 3. Do not indulge the old, unhealthy aspects. Quit it!
 4. Do what is yours to do today, and leave the rest for tomorrow.