Awards page for Steve Cosmic and Bushpilot Productions.  This page needs work. Working on my feature film script is my main priority now.

Here's a chapter from my first book, written in 1995, after I closed my hypnotherapy practice.

Chapter 20: Relationships, Relationships. Why Don't They Work?

Do you seem to keep attracting alcoholics or people who abuse you or neglect you into your life? Or do you attract others who are emotionally unavailable and then later abandon you? There are reasons why this happens.

When I was a boy I used to like playing at being an inventor. I liked playing with magnets, and remember one time I had a few nails and washers and I thinly covered some of them with sand, and some others I covered with sawdust. By passing the magnet over the sand and the sawdust, I was able to extract the nails and washers. I thought I could accomplish the same separation of materials if I had a magnet which attracted sand, or another which attracted sawdust. And then I thought that it would be neat to have a magnet for brass or copper or aluminum or gold. And I thought about a magnet for glass, which would be handy when cleaning up broken bottles. These would all be special magnets, which would attract only certain things.

What if there were special magnets which we could use to attract certain people into our lives? Wouldn't it be nice to attract Prince Charming or Miss Right and live happily ever after?

Well, in actual fact, we do have what is like a special magnet inside us which attracts, and is attracted to certain kinds of people. I like to think of this as being a magnet in our hearts.

This is how it goes: Think of your Inner Child as being in your heart, living there, and wanting and needing certain things to keep alive. The prime thing that this child needs is love. It also needs to be comforted about the traumas and pain it has experienced, and to be assured that it won't happen again. It needs to express it's feelings about what has happened with someone who will understand. It feels most comfortable being with other children who feel the same way. Your Inner Child is not comfortable with anything that it is not familiar with. This child wants to stay in it's comfort zone.

So there you are, out in your world, maybe at a party, or maybe at a supermarket, or anywhere in between. You see someone, and feel an attraction to that person. You meet and immediately hit it off well. You feel comfortable talking to this person. The chemistry is working, you feel electricity and the sparks are starting to fly. In a short while, you feel like you've known this person for a long time.

You may wind up in bed together in fairly short order. A prompt sexual connection may be an attempt at intimacy by you and your newly attracted partner.

And then, do you live happily ever after? Probably not. You start to realize this person is not perfect. There is still an attraction there, but something inside you is telling you this person is not right for you. You may start to argue over little things. The arguments may get intense, and become very frequent. There may be infidelity on the part of one or both partners. A separation may result.

Why does this happen? Didn't it seem like you were meant for each other? You seemed so compatible at first. Things may have started out almost magical. The attraction was very strong, and you felt it would last forever.

But what happened? First, let's learn why the attraction was so very strong. There are two prime reasons why you both may have felt so strongly attracted to each other, with the first reason being the more obvious. If either or both of you were alone for a fairly extended period of time before you met, then the relationship may have been born out of loneliness. As humans we have a physiological and emotional need to be close to someone, and when we are not, a void is created. It is our natural desire and instinct to fill this void, and we will go to great lengths to do so. We can attempt to fill this void with addictive substances or behaviors as mentioned previously, or it can be filled with another person. Sometimes this void of loneliness can feel so overpowering that we may become quick to latch onto the first person we find who is also lonely. If loneliness is the prime reason for you getting together with someone, then the relationship will probably be short lived.

But while loneliness may have been a factor, there is probably something else that attracted you to this other person as well. And it is simply this: Your kids liked each other. What I mean is that your Inner Children liked each other. As your Inner Child had certain kinds of pain, so did the other person's Inner Child have certain kinds of pain.

Your Inner Child has the uncanny ability to see past the words you may be hearing from the other person, and to zero in, and strongly identify with the underlying pain and discomfort of the other Inner Child.

This new person in your life may at first seem to be much different than the last partner you had. You may have told yourself that this time you would find someone different, because you knew what to look out for so that you could avoid making the same mistake again.

You may have made a conscious decision to be more careful this time, and your conscious mind may be pleased with what it sees. This person may seem so different that there is no comparison to your last partner. For instance, he or she may be older or younger, from a different social background, with more education, and be taller or shorter, fatter or slimmer, with a different occupation. This new person may even be of a different race, and have been raised in a different country with different ethnic customs. And this person may not drink or smoke or use drugs or engage in some of the other distracting or dysfunctional behaviors of your last partner.

But you were really attracted to this person because you were identifying with his or her pain. The pain that this person experienced and is holding inside may have been the result of abuse which may have been exactly the same as that which you received, or the pain may be from a different kind of abuse. It doesn't matter if the abuse was the same or different, the pain this person is carrying will be the same kind of pain that your last partner was carrying. And it will be the same kind of pain that you are carrying. There will likely be one or more addictions involved, in one or both of you. And this will be the main connection for your relationship.

And when you think about it, it is not really the basis for a strong and healthy relationship. It is a relationship of two children, both in pain, somehow hoping that the other will somehow complete them and take away the pain. In essence, it's like two children, dressing up in adults clothing, and playing house together. It is a fantasy relationship which can go on for a long time.

My parents did it for over forty years. But it was not a healthy or happy relationship.

In a healthy relationship there is caring and sharing at an adult level. This is beyond the capability of two confused and unhappy children. And deep down inside, this is what we have: Two children, playing house together, trying their best to be adults, but failing miserably.

It is possible for two people in such a relationship to recognize that there is something wrong, and to do something about it. The first thing that many people do is go for some kind of counseling, and perhaps take workshops on conflict resolution. Efforts might be made to cooperate more around the home, and to share more of the domestic responsibilities, such as spending more time with the children if there are any, and to share housekeeping duties etc. This might lower the overall decibel level in the home, and make coexistence more manageable, but in my opinion it is not the way to a truly happy relationship.

I was at a workshop on relationships a while ago. The presenter had outlined some rules for making a relationship run smoother. It was simple basic advice on how to communicate better and how to resolve conflict in a healthy way. And then a lady said, "But what about my husband?......he always leaves the toilet seat up and it drives me crazy!" The presenter and others in the group then got into a lengthy discussion on this topic and more rules were presented on how to resolve this seemingly enormous problem.

I see it like this: You can have all the rules you want, and promises to adhere to them completely. But the rules go out the window when the Inner Children are not happy. Until the Inner Children are healed and at ease, the rules will be broken. The rules are simply too much for these wounded and confused children to follow consistently. This is why counseling and family meetings and resolutions and promises only give short term temporary improvement in a relationship.

The way to permanently improve a relationship is to dig in and do the harder work of actually healing your Inner Child. When the children are healthy and happy, rules are not needed, because the resultant cooperation and concern automatically takes care of problems when they arise.

But it is human nature to resist this. It seems so much easier to just read a few books and learn a few rules.

If you only want a more peaceful coexistence, then books and rules may be enough to accomplish this for you. But the question to ask yourself is, do you merely want coexistence, or a healthy, caring and sharing, intimate, adult relationship? The level of growth and happiness that you desire to achieve within your relationship is within your means. You can start with 12 step groups, and then move into workshops and emotional release work.

If you don't do this vital work, you will likely attract another addict or abusive person, or someone who is emotionally unavailable to you. Or you may set yourself up to be abandoned.

If you are not now in a relationship, but want to be in a good one, the procedure is the same. What you must do is heal your Inner Child, so that your Inner Child begins to send out healthier signals which will be picked up by a healthier person who will be attracted to you, and who may become your partner.

Or you can think of it this way: You must change the magnet in your heart so that it begins to attract something better for you. Do you seem to keep attracting people who are not good for you? Think of the many different types of hypothetical magnets described at the beginning of this chapter. Have you been trying to attract gold with a magnet that attracts only broken glass? Is it time to change the magnet in your heart?

END of Chapter 20. The book is called STEVIE'S BIG ADVENTURE