Michael Jackson: 5 Lessons To Heal or Change Your Life
By Caryl Westmore
The Break-Free Fast ™ Coach
SMASHWORDS EDITION
PUBLISHED BY:
Caryl Westmore on Smashwords
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Michael Jackson: 5 Lessons to Heal or Change Your Life
Copyright © 2009 by Caryl Westmore
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All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
DISCLAIMER AND/OR LEGAL NOTICES:
The information presented herein represents the view of the author as of the date of publication. Because of the rate with which conditions change, the author reserves the right to alter and update her opinion based on any new conditions.
The book is for informational purposes only. While every attempt has been made to verify the information therein provided, neither the author nor her affiliates/partners assume any responsibility for errors, inaccuracies or omissions.
Any slights of people or organizations are unintentional.
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This EFT oriented book is provided as a good faith effort to expand the use of EFT in the world. It represents the ideas of the author, and does not necessarily represent the complete, standardized EFT training offered at http://www.emofree.com”
Important note: While EFT has produced remarkable clinical results, it must still be considered to be in the experimental stage and thus practitioners and the public must take complete responsibility for their use of it. Further, Caryl Westmore is not a licensed health professional and offers EFT as a personal performance coach. Please consult qualified health practitioners regarding your use of EFT.
Michael Jackson: 5 Lessons To Heal or Change Your Life
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CONTENTS
PART 1 explains the concept of the “Inner Child” and why I believe Michael Jackson’s childhood may hold the key to how he lived and died. My goal is to help you the reader to benefit from these insights to heal or change patterns which may be damaging or sabotaging your health and happiness.
PART 2 gives you practical tools to heal and change – namely my Break-Free Fast ™ Formula which incorporates the tool called Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT)
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PART 1
Introduction
Why I Wrote This Book
Hi there! I’m Caryl Westmore, the Break-Free Fast ™ and Law of Attraction Writer and Coach.
Why did I write this book?
Because when you discover a secret that changes your life from despair to happiness, loneliness to love, you want to shout it from the roof-tops and help others to break free!
Michael Jackson died on 25 June 2009, aged 50, the same month I published my book “You Can Break-Free Fast™ - 3 Simple Steps to Get Unstuck and Attract the Life you Love”, now available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Like millions around the world I was fascinated to watch re-runs of Jackson’s TV interviews and video clips of his songs.
A rush of compassion and understanding arose in my heart when I heard Michael Jackson’s frequent references to his lost and damaged childhood. I intuitively knew there was a connection between my book and life work and this aspect of his life which was being overlooked in the dramatic focus on his last hours and bizarre behaviors over the years.
This book is all about healing and empowering your abandoned “inner child” with these aspects of Michael Jackson’s life as a metaphor.
Psychologists, sociologists and self-help experts popularized the term “inner child” in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. Most note-worthy were authors John Bradshaw who wrote many books on the subject, including “Healing the Shame that Binds”, and Charles L. Whitfield who wrote the classic: “Healing the Child Within”. Both psychiatrist Dr Eric Berne, who originated Transactional Analysis and later Dr Thomas A. Harris who simplified it in the book “I’m OK – You’re OK” defined the “inner child” as part of a trio of three “inner selves”: Parent, Child, and Adult.
Parent Self - sets out the rules and regulations with “shoulds” and “oughts”
Child Self - feels and reacts emotionally, irrationally
Adult Self - makes decisions and solves problems with wisdom and nurturing
All three parts co-exist and one or other can dominate our life depending on the circumstances. In order to lead a balanced, happy, healthy life we need to ensure there is peace – not war – between Parent Self and Child Self and ultimately we are happiest when we can trust our wise caring Adult Self to be in charge.
How I wish I’d had these insights to guide me in my own adult life. For a long time I would swing between beating myself up as the Critical Parent Self or acting out my pain and vulnerability as the emotional, vulnerable, Child Self. I became a journalist and woman’s editor, married and had two children and tried to control my life mainly through “positive thinking”.
It was only when a devastating mid-life crisis shook me to the core that I found help through energy healing tools like Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT). This method is fully described in Part 2 of this book. This helped me to rescue and heal my frightened Child Self.
So when I lost my dog and home in a fire and divorced my husband after 25 years of marriage – I came to recognize that my Child Self was the one feeling abandoned and fearful about coping. Once I was able to “rescue and empower” her and step into my role as a Caring Responsible Adult Self, my life transformed into a healthy joyous journey and dreams turned into reality.
I get cold shivers when I think of Michael Jackson dying at 50 – the same age I “died” to my former self. But unlike Jackson, I was given a second chance at life through applying and training in emotional-energy tools like The Journey and Emotional Freedom Techniques.
I identify with Michael Jackson in four main ways:
We were both Baby Boomers – of the generation born after World War 2.
We both had fathers that made our childhood a living nightmare.
We were both what is now recognized as Highly Sensitive People with intuition, creativity and compassion for the vulnerable.
We were drawn to addictions to mask our shame and pain and a feeling of being different as a result of our dysfunctional childhood.
ADDICTIONS
So How Do Addictions Fit In Here?
Any dependency is an addiction – and who of us does not have some addiction?
Advertising in our culture entices and persuades us to indulge in many addictive substances: food, sugar, chocolate, alcohol, coffee, cigarettes. At the same time many addicts get hooked on things like marijuana, cocaine, pornography, sex, abusive relationships, shopping, television, videos, computers, internet, extreme sports, accumulating money, and spending money. These all offer inexhaustible sensations and instant stimulation for our bodies and brains. But they can soon become toxic.
An addiction is an attempt to find happiness, peace, love, enchantment outside ourselves. This can’t ever happen – but we don’t know where else to look or we’re too lazy or addicted to look elsewhere. The trouble with addictions is that they cause progressive damage as we continue to indulge. We need more and more to satisfy our needs. In the end, one way or another they kill – kill our bodies and minds and smother our ability to access the happiness, peace, joy, love and enchantment which are only ever to be found inside us.
FAIRYTALES
The concept of “The Child in danger” has always fascinated us. It is common in our favorite fairytales and stories from childhood.
Harry Potter, Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood - all of these have one thing in common - child heroes threatened by ogres and demons. In books and movies they hold our rapt attention.
Why do they tug at our heart-strings and have such universal “pulling power”? Because, as psychologist Carl Jung and mythologist Joseph Campbell explain, all humans have one thing in common - we start out life as vulnerable, dependent infants.
Whether you look at Greek or Roman mythology, religion, or fairytales, the vulnerable child is embedded in our universal unconscious. Deep inside we resonate with such helpless, misunderstood, threatened or abused children. We want to rescue them and take vicarious pleasure in their journey of recovery and overcoming the odds.
THE FANTASY
Michael Jackson demonstrated a yearning to heal the world and make it a better place, especially for children. He expressed this longing in his fascination with Peter Pan, a character created by Scottish novelist and playwright J.M.Barrie who lived from 1860–1937.
Peter Pan is a mischievous boy who can fly magically. He spends his never-ending childhood adventuring on the small fantasy island of Neverland. Jackson created his own fantasy playground at Neverland Ranch to fulfill his heart-felt longing to regain and reclaim his lost childhood.
THE REALITY
Jackson’s planned come-back concert shortly before his death would no doubt have rocked the world, considering his innate brilliant talent and creative genius. Instead reports show he was almost broke despite once having been a multi-millionaire (some say a billionaire). He was striving to make a come-back to rectify his situation – but from a place of low energy, painfully thin and addicted to massive doses of prescription drugs. Having subjected himself to countless plastic surgery operations his face was ageing in a bizarre way with his nose crumbling, hampering the breath of life flowing into him and forcing him to wear a false nose in public.
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What are the five lessons we can learn from Michael Jackson?
HEALING LESSON #1
Heal YOU before you focus on healing OTHERS.
In his lifetime Michael Jackson often gave his heart and soul – and millions of dollars in donations – to helping charities focused on vulnerable children and to use his own words: “to heal the world.” This was indeed praiseworthy and yet it’s a known fact that people who become addicted to serving, saving and helping others – often at a cost to their own sanity and well being, are in fact co-dependent because they pay a high price by neglecting their own needs.
This is a common trait in children who were subjected to emotional or physical abuse or excessive control by their parents or care-givers while they were growing up. They go numb inside and stop feeling their true feelings.
In effect, they are suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome and unless they get the right kind of help to heal they can become addicted to one or other substance such as, in Michael’s case, prescription drugs for pain and anxiety.
This addictive attempt to numb out can also lead to activities like gambling, shopping or reckless over-spending. Over the years the addict needs more and more of the activity or substance to alleviate the original symptoms.
Alternative therapy based on ancient wisdom, including Chinese meridian energy-healing is one approach that works well to heal traumatic memories. Psychiatrist Dr Servan-Schreiber, author of “Healing Without Freud or Prozac”, describes the workings of our two brains – the “thinking brain” and inside that, the “emotional brain” which stores intense events and memories.
The technique called Tapping or Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) is one tool which I use in my three-step Break-Free Fast™ Formula to release negative intensity of memories stored in the emotional brain.
In my book “You Can Break-Free Fast™”, I give numerous case studies of clients who successfully sourced their addictive behavior to childhood pain or memories buried in their unconscious. Once healed, they stopped being victims of their past.
If you – or someone close to you – are showing addictive symptoms, don’t wait until it’s too late – take action today to break free. In the next tip: Healing Lesson #2 I’ll share how your inner child is alive inside you and must be set free.
HEALING LESSON #2
Find the "frozen child within" and set him or her free.
Why? Because if you DON'T you risk that irrational, emotional child-part of you running – or ruining - your Adult life. Unconscious programs and beliefs set up before you are five to six years can hijack your life NOW... keeping you frustrated or in pain. Michael Jackson was clearly in deep pain (emotional and physical) by the time he died.
Having helped hundreds of clients to break free with my Break-Free Fast™ Formula and heal from substances or activities they felt helpless to stop, I can say that a single traumatic memory buried in the unconscious can set you up for failure and escalating addiction that can cripple or hijack your adult life, no matter how much willpower you summon.
In addition to fast clearing of the traumatic memory with a “break-free-aha”, I highly recommend ongoing support in the 12-step programs – such as Alcoholics Anonymous, Overeaters Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous, as well as Co-Dependents Anonymous and Adult Children of Alcoholics (also for Adult Children from dysfunctional families). These 12-step fellowships are proven life-savers for millions of people and they offer free spiritual and emotional support that often works miracles.
HEALING LESSON #3
Lovingly re-parent Your Creative, Spontaneous Inner Child
Michael Jackson said: "What we need to learn from children isn't childish".
We can take that to mean his genius and brilliance came from a creative spontaneous place inside. This will remain a legacy to all of us, a staggering tribute to a soul born with breath-taking talent and gifts which he showered on the world. He loved pageantry, dramatic visuals and dance. His proposed come-back into the spotlight may have dazzled us yet again. But we will never know.
Painfully thin, his body ravaged by what some called an eating disorder, his addictions to prescription drugs out of control, Jackson faced mid-life physically depleted of life-force. He was also emotionally battered by financial wrangles and legal proceedings against him for child molestation, for which he was acquitted.
The wear and tear on the body and nervous system after times of high stress can take its toll unless you take extra pains to build it up again in a healthy way. Taking huge doses of prescription drugs as Jackson did is NOT the way to go.
Nurture your body by choosing energizing whole foods rather than sugar, caffeine and junk food because you want to build your life on a healthy mind-body foundation. Then you can enhance this physical well-being by encouraging your Creative Spontaneous Inner Child to expand with fun, laughter and play. Ignoring this vital source of inspiration, beauty and love can bring frustration, pain, and even early death.
In her book “The Joy Diet” Martha Beck recommends giving ourselves and our bodies daily treats or rewards. She defines this as “anything that makes you feel like smiling” and preferably that focuses on one of your sensory pleasures. List these under the headings: “I love the taste of…sight of…feel of…smell of…sound of…”
Put at least three sensory pleasures into your day, says Beck, and feel the difference it makes to your life. For instance her Creative Child Self loves sparkly gel pens and painting – so she indulges in them while on the phone, planes and whenever she can!
Like Beck I recommend you enlist a Treat Buddy who gives you permission and encourages you to indulge in fun, laughter and play treats whenever you need a push. Do not share your desires with Critical Parent naysayers in your life. Find a fellow smile-sparker Treat Buddy and bring on the joy!
HEALING LESSON #4
Embrace your “Dark” Side
A month after Jackson died, the term most searched on Google about him was: “How did Michael Jackson whiten his skin?”
Over the years in television interviews with Oprah, Barbara Walters and others, Jackson repeatedly denied he was having plastic surgery to change his skin color, face shape or nose. “It hurts to hear the lies,” he told Oprah. “I have a skin problem called vertiglio.”
Jackson also revealed in interviews how he was deeply scarred by taunts from his father and others that he had a big nose. He also suffered acute embarrassment as a teenager with acne.
Did his ongoing skin-whitening, face-changing, nose-sculpting obsession suggest attempts to escape his essential looks and “black” self? More likely it signifies low self-worth with attempts by his hurting Inner Child to obliterate the pain and humiliation of the past.
Our wounded self is our dark or shadow side, not because it is bad but because it lives in the darkness of fear and the heaviness of false beliefs instead of in the light of love and truth.
Jackson’s story reminds us to look within at our own dark side of denial and addictions. Addictions are merely a symptom of our repressed shadow.
In the Star Wars movie, The Return of the Jedi, the emperor, who was the epitome of darkness, was trying to get Luke to join the dark side. He knew if he could just get Luke angry enough or frightened enough, he would want to kill his father, Darth Vader, and then the emperor would own Luke as he had owned Luke's father. The emperor knew that anger and fear were the doorways to darkness.
Debbie Ford in her book “The Dark Side of the Light Chasers” explains how, consciously or unconsciously, we hide and deny our “dark” side, rejecting these aspects of our true natures rather than giving ourselves the freedom – and gift – to live authentic lives with all parts of us, dark and light, integrated into a more powerful persona.
When we recognize and reconcile with our rejected parts we find they have rich treasures and gifts to reveal to us. For instance perhaps the Lazy Lout part of you is just thirsting for the Workaholic Warrior which you present to the world to take a much needed break.
So embrace your dark side - the disowned parts of yourself – trusting that each aspect you hate or deny can either lead to ruin – or hold a gift of golden wisdom and insight to propel you forward to happiness, love and true wealth.
HEALING LESSON #5
The Gift of the “Highly Sensitive Person” (HSP)
Our society does not readily honor 20% of its population who are deemed “Highly Sensitive People” or HSPs.
Was Michael Jackson one?
Like many brilliantly creative and original people, Jackson displayed the characteristics of a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP). This trait, first pinpointed in the 1990s by Dr Elaine Aron in her best-selling books “The Highly Sensitive Person” and “The Highly Sensitive Child”, is not a disorder but a combination of recognized traits that are applicable to one in five people. People with these traits are often deemed gifted but the downside is that they might grow up feeling different and not fitting in, especially if they have non-sensitive parents or teachers who belittle, bully or badger them about being daydreamers, too shy or too sensitive.
Anyone can read between the lines when it comes to Jackson’s childhood and assume from his remarks that his domineering father fell into the latter bullying category.
Like many HSPs, Jackson showed a wonderful imagination, creativity and meticulous, conscientious dedication to his work. He once told Oprah he was intuitive – a sure clue that a person is Highly Sensitive. He was also caring and compassionate, artistic, aesthetic and appreciative of music and the arts, as are most HSPs.
Pearl S. Buck, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1938, once referred to creatives as “abnormally, inhumanly sensitive”, something that could easily apply to Jackson. She wrote:
"The truly creative mind in any field is no more than this: a human creature born abnormally, inhumanly sensitive…add to this cruelly delicate organism the overpowering necessity to create, create, create - so that without the creating of music or poetry or books or buildings or something of meaning, his very breath is cut off from him. He must create, must pour out creation. By some strange, unknown, inward urgency he is not really alive unless he is creating”.
My Life as a “Highly Sensitive Person”
It took me many years to discover there was a name “Highly Sensitive Person” for the acute sensitivity which colored my childhood, teens and adult years. Once you have a name for your experience and an understanding that you are not alone, you no longer fall into the trap of trying to please others and exhausting your resources in the process.
When lights are too bright, noise, music or people too loud or sights on TV or the movies too violent, you can stop and say NO! Protect your sensitive nervous system and you can be happy, peaceful and productive rather than frazzled and prey to addiction.
As a healer, I often help clients wracked by low self esteem, despair and rejection to break free and honor their birthright to be a Highly Sensitive Person instead of shameful outcasts. As children, they often suffered deeply from comments and gibes from care-givers, siblings and kids at school which shamed them into feeling inferior.