The Kid isn’t really a Kid anymore. He’s over 30. How many of us know where this is headed? Have this in our own lives, or have clients or friends living with this weight on their shoulders?

The preceding is the opening paragraph from Part 1 of this three-part series. If you missed it, you should go back and catch up first. This Part 2 picks up right where Part 1 left off. It won’t make much sense without Part 1.

Point #2 – Everything out there is out there. We can’t control anything external to us. That includes everything from the Kid to getting a flat tire. External events and circumstances simply are what they are. That doesn’t mean we have to like them. That doesn’t mean there’s nothing we can do about them.
Point #3 – We control what is in here. Our own internal being is our dominion. We have the ability to change our beliefs and our way of thinking. Thereby changing the emotional outcomes. Moreover, changing the external circumstances we so desperately want to be different. We can’t control what’s outside of ourselves. But, we can definitely influence that realm.
Point #4 – Acceptance is the key. What if Mom and Dad could accept the Kid and everything that has developed in his life? (Again, they don’t have to like it.) Imagine if they were magically able to get completely clear inside. No judgment against themselves, each other, the Kid, or anything else. No judging the past. No comparing to others. No fear, hurt, despair.
Point #5 – What is left? Love. If all of the negativity - the capacity for that negativity - was simply gone. All that is left is pure love for the Kid. There is way more than enough love there already. The parents are just handicapped by their pain and internal baggage.

Point #6 – That can’t just magically happen. I get that it is easy to say “What if Mom and Dad were all clear and only full of love inside.” Getting there is a process. It takes some time. It is achievable. In the short-term, they can do their best.
Point #7 – This is much bigger. This set of new skills, this way of being, applies to our entire lives. Imagine losing the capacity for upset! And, living life from that place, in that way. Do we suppose that might open capacity for infinitely more peace and joy?
Point #8 – We don’t have to like it. I like to use a head and heart analogy to explain. When I say acceptance, think of that as the heart. Think of the hurt we do to ourselves by setting up right and wrong rules deep within. Rules that say “If my children don’t prosper, I must’ve been a bad parent”. Or, “If the Kid doesn’t have a job, he is never going to amount to anything.” The list of the lies we buy into is endless. There is nothing like a struggling child to bring it all to the surface. In all its rawness and pain.
Point #9 - I still evaluate and take action. Evaluate from a place free of the baggage. Think of those internal right/ wrong judgments as only harmful. Once removed, from that place of clear love, we evaluate intellectually and clearly.

Point #10 – Making the best decisions. Will we make better decisions and determine better courses of action from a place filled with judgments, guilt, shame, anger, etc.? Or from a place that is completely clear? The issue of supporting the Kid financially comes up. Consider evaluating that course of action intellectually, from a place of only love. With no interfering guilt, fear, lack of confidence, and a couple dozen other negative beliefs. From that place, the parents will come to decisions that will have the optimum positive impact on the Kid.

Point #11 - The parents have a choice. They can be with the Kid from that place of angst, seeing the disaster, and the plethora of negative human emotions. Or, from a place of clear love. A place without any of those detracting forces. As they are making decisions, offering advice (or not), or just being with him, how will they come across? If the parents believe the Kid is broken, the situation is desperate, they don’t know what to do. That “vibe” will be present. They cannot put on a happy face and change what is under their own hoods. Alternatively, the vibe can be entirely different and infinitely more powerful.

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