Soulshine

Disney’s Pinocchio takes on the theme of developing an informed conscience. If we are to be honest with ourselves and with others—as recovery requires us to be-- we need to know how to judge right from wrong and how to be responsible for the negative consequences of our own behavior. In many ways Pinocchio represents the typical child. We witness his birth shortly after Geppetto, his creator, wishes on a star for Pinocchio to become a real boy. The Blue Fairy appears and grants his wish. Pinocchio becomes animated and alive and yet he is not yet a real boy. Why? Because he has yet to develop a conscience. So Jiminy Cricket is called upon to act as a conscience for Pinocchio. We all go through the human process of developing an informed conscience. At a young age we begin the process of learning the difference between right and wrong, kind and mean-spirited, sharing and hoarding. Some of these moral choices are taught to us, but many of them we must learn for ourselves through...

"His parents were shiftless and unsuccessful farm people--his imagination had never really accepted them as his parents at all. The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God... and he must be about His Father's business: beauty... and to this conception he was faithful to the end."                                                            F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby It makes no difference where we have come from, who are parents were or how our past has shaped us. We are not prisoners to any of it, or anything. As adults, we have stewardship-- ownership-- of our own lives. We are all sons and daughters of God an...

“It’s just my imagination running away with me.” The Temptations, Just My Imagination It’s the 4 th of July and that means fireworks. If you want some real fireworks in your relationships, however, just try being suspicious, controlling and distrustful of the people you believe you care most about in your life. Oh my God! Do I remember those days and all of the relationships I destroyed through by obsessive-compulsive thinking. In the past, I could never believe anyone was really interested in me, much less loved me, because I didn’t love myself and wasn’t interested in helping myself. So I’d enter a relationship and everything would be good at first. But the more I saw the person, the more insecure I’d become. I mean, how could this person possibly love icky old me? So I’d start obsessing about who they were looking longingly at if we were eating in a restaurant, or dancing in a club. When we were apart, they’d be on my mind constantly. What were they doing? I know. ...