As it says in the bible there is a time to give up childish things, this contrasts with what Jesus said about only being able to enter the Kingdom of Heaven when we become as a little child.. I think there is a way to be childlike still deep down in our soul, to acknowledge and honor that part of us that was and can still live in awe and in touch with magic, happiness, joy, aliveness and creativity. The deeply emotional part of us that cries when hurt, feels love, desire and longing and even deep frustration, hatred and pain when hurt and yet not allow those feelings to carry us away into self defeating or hurtful behavior.
As John Bradshaw makes clear in some of his best books Homecoming and Creating Love this involves us working through where developmentally we got derailed and to understand what we needed and what went wrong along the way with finding was to achieve that at a minimum of cost to others who also are separate to us and have different needs..
If we remain as a child we just expect others to ‘get it’. We think connection will magically happen without us needing to communicate and have healthy conflict and there is a lot of good information about this in the book The Intimacy Struggle written by therapist Janet Woititz.
If we were raised by emotionally immature or overly self involved parents we most probably did not learn a lot about developing true intimacy and healthy communication as well as negotiating areas of difference and conflict as we grew. Janet’s book focuses on the legacy of being an adult child of an alcoholic parents but that moniker could also relate to the two earlier terms mentioned since drinking and drugging in parents often relates to their own problems handling and making sense of emotions due to an emotionally deficit or unhealthy background or upbringing of neglect.
Intimacy cannot occur in the absence of vulnerability and that requires us both to feel safe enough and as in touch as we can be with ourselves.. Since we will often attract a partner out of unresolved issues or needs in adulthood if we lack the necessary emotional development and insight then we often find ourselves getting pulled up by our childish or demanding attitudes.. This is not to say that the needs wrapped up inside of them were bad or wrong in any way.. Emotions are not, they simply act as information as to where energy in motion (e – motion) wants to go.. And just because we feel the ‘spark’ with someone does not ensure that spark will be built into a reliable fire that gives us heat, life and warmth.. if we continue to pour water on it or overly fan the flames with out of range idealism or unending arguments that go no where the fire may either die out or go wild and end up burning us half to death.
So yes I am with the bible there comes a time to put away childish things but before we can do this we have to trust that the inner child does hold the keys to heaven if we can find the right way of holding its hand and being a good strong emotionally available and loving self containing parent to it as we can as we work through our unresolved intimacy and vulnerability issues as well as all of the complex feelings our parents did not want us to feel or address and actively blocked us from accepting and relating to. Without this awareness we can never have a healthy relationship, most especially with ourselves..
Emerging From The Dark Night 