If You Had Controlling Parents: How to Make Peace with Your Past and Take Your Place in the World Book

A pretty thought-provoking book.

"More than anything, children want love. When you are a helpless, tiny creature in a world of giants in which events happen that you don't understand and can't control--a 'blooming, buzzing confusion,' as William James called an infant's experience--a parent who loves you and whom you can trust and love is the top priority for survival. Children need not only love but also all that goes with it: nurturing touch; acceptance; safety; belonging; being seen for who they are; and the freedom to laugh, cry, rage, and be afraid. Because they need love and acceptance so desperately, children will take them in any form they can get them. When they don't get love, they'll construe whatever they do get--including unhealthy control--as love. Therein lie the seeds of problems later in life.
"The most unfortunate parallel between controlling families and destructive cults is that parental control becomes internalized in children, just as cult dogma becomes internalized in cult members. No parent can be present twenty-four hours a day. But controlling parents don't have to physically be there because the family system installs an omnipresent inner controller in the child. These twenty-four-hour internalized parents, with their nagging commentary, second-guessing, and criticism, can perpetuate deprivation, perfectionism, and speech-and-feeling control well into adult life. The inner control may surface in the form of poor interpersonal boundaries, feelings of unworthiness, lowered expectations, self-loathing, fear of closeness, or poor self-image."

Exercises:
1. Meet your future self. When faced with a challenge or decision, envision yourself in 5 or 10 years, then ask your future self for advice. Doing so underlines the faith you have in your own innate development.
2. Trust yourself. Go through an hour assuming that you are completely trustworthy, your feelings reliable, and your intuition accurate. As situations come up, ask yourself, 'If I knew I was absolutely trustworthy, what would I do now?' This can help you see that you have within yourself all you need to handle challenges.
3. Trust gravity. One helpful exercise is Napier's 'Gravity-is-your-friend'. Lie down and feel the support of the bed or floor. Feel all you weight ease down into it and gradually let the ease deepen for five minutes. The earth will support your weight, and gravity will keep you grounded. Trust it. You can take this experience of trusting into relationships and situations.
4. Express gratitude. Take a minute at the end of the day to recollect all the experiences and gifts for which you are grateful.
5. Notice what you do. For one week, each night before bed spend 5 minutes listing what you accomplished, experienced, or became aware of that day. At the end of the week, look over your lists. You'll see plenty to acknowledge. This builds the inner nurturer instead of fueling the inner tyrants.
6. Explore various paths to spirituality. Pray. Meditate. Read. Visit a cemetery. Read about or visit Jerusalem or other 'holy' sites. Explore existential philosophy. Attend various church services such as an inner-city gospel, a fundamentalist tent revival, a Catholic mass, or a New Age or Zen center. Go on a vision quest.