Comment on So you grew up with a dad who didn’t know how to express love? Here’s how it could be affecting you today by Sarah Best.
I hear your frustration, John, and it must indeed be frustrating that your daughter hasn’t been available to have the important chat you wish to have with her.
I hear that you are concerned about her attitude, behaviour and mental health, and about what the future might hold.
I would wholeheartedly recommend the work of Byron Katie – which is, literally, called The Work. If you’re new to it, start with her first book, “Loving What Is”. I have no words for how transformational this material can be.
It helps us to bring the focus back to our internal world and our inner peace rather than trying to control others and external events – something we all do, and something that causes most of us great suffering in life.
It shows a way of detaching from the stressful thoughts and beliefs that cause this suffering and involves challenging these thoughts and beliefs with a series of four questions.
The approach also teaches us to be aware of whose business we are in – “my business, someone else’s business or God’s business.” We have a tendency to spend a lot of time on the second and third, yet the path to inner peace – and indeed sanity – is in keeping our focus on the first: our own business.
The more we focus on what’s not right (in our view) with others and with external events over which we have no control, the less time and energy we have for taking care of the one thing we can control: ourselves.
Putting these teachings into practice will often transform the way others relate to us, and that’s because it will ALWAYS bring about a profound transformation in the way we feel inside, and show up in the world.
As someone who’s currently working through these teachings – and really needed to – I can’t recommend them highly enough.
As an overview of what this approach is about, you could check out Byron Katie’s interview with Oprah Winfrey. It’s worth watching all three parts. In the third she specifically addresses the issue of minding our own business, and also setting boundaries in a loving way, including with family members.
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpl–6GhdfM
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xECrkSKZvrE
Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLGJ8bMxwJ4
Byron Katie’s website: http://www.byronkatie.com
Sarah Best Also Commented
Thank you so much for sharing that.
Yes, it is devastating to miss the love of a father.
And it’s not made any easier by the fact that this is so little talked about and understood.
But for what it’s worth, in the four years since I began writing about this topic I’ve heard from SO many women who feel just as you do.
That’s why I started my free email series on the father-daughter relationship, which is designed to answer the very questions you posed, and which I see you’ve signed up for. I hope you’ll find it helpful.
Thanks again for the share.
Sarah x
Thank you so much for sharing all of that. I hear you and for what it’s worth, since I started writing about this topic four years ago I’ve heard from many women in similar situations who feel just as you do. That’s why I started a free newsletter, full of info and tips for women who are dealing with a challenging, painful and/or non-existent father-daughter relationship.
If you’d like to receive that you can sign up here.
Sarah xo
Are you signed up to receive my (free) Father Daughter Factor emails ‚Ä쬆those are ALL about healing the relationship and one of the topics I’m going to covering soon is the very one you asked about: “at what point is it okay to cut ties and say enough is enough?” You can sign up here.
Sarah xo
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