A close friend of my mother's was intelligent, brilliant actually. One of those people who everyone loved and admired. Yet he had a strange problem. Every time he actually got down to doing something wonderful with his life, after he had made a head start, something or the other would happen that would make it impossible for him to continue.
He'd either suffer a deep emotional tragedy, or simply get distracted by an old friend in town, spend a few days partying drinking and blowing up his savings - during which his opportunity would slip through his fingers. He'd then be back in rehab shattered and wondering how this happened to him again.
It was when his children - both wonderful intelligent kids - started having the same life-pattern as adults that I began to see that they had inherited their Dad's addiction to escapism. We worked it out and they are today happily involved in successful emotionally-stable living.
The need to escape or cover up reality seems to pass on to children from care-givers.
This escapism is the basis of most addictions, but more importantly its what sub-consciously keeps a person demotivated and under-achieving.
If you;
- consistently under-perform
- were around people who were addicted to escaping reality, in childhood
- are intelligent, capable but seem to lose focus after a good start
chances are, you are fighting a subtle addiction to escapism.
In my working with people over the years
I find this addiction to be accompanied by deep emotional wounds that one was not allowed to express.
This habit of suppressing the sense of justice and natural emotion seems to run through generations of a family. While every generation approaches it with different forms of addiction, the underlying need to escape reality stays the same.
The majority of people wonder why they don't like their reality when much of it is positive and supportive of their dreams. The present reality might indeed be that way, but
the energy field and psyche of the person has not found closure for injustice experienced in the past and so we are stalled - not able to move forward or backward.
At this point anything that helps us bypass reality becomes an indispensable need.
The way out is simple, if you really want to break out of the addiction to escapism.1) Face your own lies.The lies we feel compelled to tell, reveal our deepest fears. Face them.
Do you pretend you had a perfect childhood? Do you pretend you have the perfect marriage, or that you never loved someone who you did, or that you love someone you really don't?
The lies we tell ourselves choke our life force every day, keeping us in limbo, stopping out energy fields from functioning harmoniously.
Its hard to face the truth after a lifetime of supporting a lie as a the truth.... but it is possible and it is SO WORTH IT.
You might be afraid of the pain inside, but its ok... after a few days/weeks/months of crying it out you'll be fresh as a rose. You'll love living once you've faced your dark secrets.
2) Refuse to tolerate behavior that demeans your nature.By 'nature' I mean who you are as a person, how your body is, your sexuality, your likes and dislikes and so on, those things that come naturally to you - whether others think they're 'good' or 'bad'.
Simply refuse to tolerate jokes, behavior of any sort that demeans you. As we do this, our lives get cleared up as only those that appreciate us continue to hang out around us, and those that don't will begin to see things differently.
This goes a long way in making our reality actually acceptable so we don't have to trip off all the time anymore.
3) Give yourself permission to LIVE and thrive.Somewhere in the heart of every escapist is the idea that they were not meant to live. That something happened that took away their right to be happy, and now they should just be grateful for whatever they have and not expect too much out of life. This is an absolute un-truth. If you're alive, the forces of nature want you to live FULLY. That's just how it is.
It will take weeks and months but do the following exercise through the day or atleast when you wake up in the morning;
Put your left hand over your heart and your right hand over your stomach and bless yourself again and again;
I bless you my SoulI bless you my bodySpirit of Life, Arise.4) Learn to face reality boldly.Is someone harassing you? Do something about it. Is something troubling you? Do something about it.
Don't be passive, things and people won't go away... everything in the universe pushes itself until it finds its boundaries.
Draw your boundaries clearly, don't be scared, you will be supported.
5) Get out of the mindset that life is against you. Its not. Seriously, its not. If Life was against you you wouldn't be alive today.
We need to remind ourselves right through the day that the universe is for us being happy, for us living and thriving, and everything in our lives is working to support us, whether we understand it or not.
An ancient Sanskrit mantra goes;
"Om purnamadah purnamidam purnaat purnamudachyate,purnasya purnamadaya purnamevaavashishyate"It means that
the universe is perfect and our lives are evolving in perfection, towards exactly what we want, whether we are able to perceive that at this time or not.Its literal transalation goes;
That is perfect, this is perfect.From the perfect, the perfect manifests.If you take the perfect from the perfect,then only the perfect remains. Find stuff like this that reminds you of the rightness and goodness of life, and have it around it you where you see it. Do little things to remind your self of this fact.
I hope this has helped you. I am a survivor of addiction to escapism myself . It took me years and many near death experiences to give myself permission to live well, to face the truths I was taught to hide, and have a life that I love living. I wish for you NEW LIFE and all the joy you can possibly hold.