* Continue your list in your notebooks.
2. Read the following carefully at least once and up to three times. This explains how these promises affect your daily life.

COMO PROMISES AFFECT YOU

First of all, I want to remind you that there is nothing wrong with wanting to be good or wanting to help your parents. The problem is that promises block the energy that allows a person to act freely for spiritual, emotional and material growth. Promises block unconditional love, causing fear which stops the individual from acting freely.
I’m going to be good… I’m going to behave… I’m going to please you in every way … I will never cause problems…
These promises or false reasons for living are related to all situations of life.
To be good means that you must please your parents and others. They force you to feel that everybody with whom you interact should be satisfied with what you say, do and think. When they do not agree with you, you feel bad, rejected or guilty. Unfortunately this promise is not focused only on complying with the person you made this commitment to, but rather extends to all others with whom you interact, even strangers.

Example:
Emily: Promised to be good and always behave so that she would not give her father a reason to be angry with her. From the time she was very small she helped her mother with her sisters and brothers and with the house. She was always a good student and did everything she could so that everything was in order and her parents would not fight or punish her and her brothers and sisters. But Emily could never keep her promise in the hostile environment in which she lived. For as hard as she tried, her parents made her feel that she was not good. They constantly punished or scolded her, not because she was disobedient or didn’t do as she was told but rather because her parents/aggressors could not change their behavior and stop fighting, showing their anger and frustration that took the for of aggression towards their children.

Emily’s false reason for leaving was to be good. When she was criticized, punished and rejected, she failed in all her attempts to keep her promise. As a result her fantasy of death was activated, because she had no reason to live.

I’m going to show you… I’ll be the best… Nobody is going to beat me… I will do everything I want…

These are the only promises that we could say have a positive aspect-they push the individual to success. The negative aspect is greater since the motives causing these promises are tied to the need to make somebody know that you are worthy of attention, of being listened to, accepted, etc. On many occasions we don’t care if we don’t care if we step over another person, to show that we are the best and to feel important.
This promise can be fulfilled by very energetic beings who under the scorn of one or both parents, and sometimes their sisters or brothers, concentrate all their energy on proving to the family what he or she is capable of doing.
The individual’s false reason for living changes into showing them his intelligence, his abilities, his strength, his courage, etc. There is a constant need to draw attention to him or herself, and if this is not achieved, then it is no longer a reason for living, and there is no reason to live.
To be the best and Number 1 means that nobody can ever beat you; it means that you will always want to be right, even though you aren’t. It means that all your actions, thoughts and words include some kind of competition--for you to be Number 1, then automatically somebody has to be number 2.
These promises interfere in a loving relationship. Since the person who made this promise will always want to force his beliefs on others, there will be frequent arguments and disagreements between the two partners.

Example:
Lauren: My husband always wants to be right. I feel like he is constantly competing with me. No doubt he is very good in his business. At home his advice and opinions are very good, but sometimes he doesn’t let me express my opinions and generally does not take what I say into account. I have to be very subtle if I want to explain what I want and get him to accept my opinion, without him saying something to show that he is better than me.

I’m going to take care of you… I’m going to protect you…
These are promises that bind for life. They are truly destructive, destroying every attempt to have an independent and free life. In order to keep any of these promises you have to be there, present, living with the person you made the commitment to. It is impossible to fulfill or attempt to fulfill living apart.
To care for a person requires being with them 24 hours a day, caring for them, attending to their needs, making sure they lack for nothing or that nothing happens to them. This also happens when you offer to protection. Protection means that 24 hours a day you are watching out for the individual so that he or she is safe and nothing happens, keeping them free from the risk of accidents, illness and death.

Example:
Gilbert is a very successful doctors. He is 50 years old and has never married. He is independent. He lives next door to his parents, respecting their privacy but always there to care for them. When he was a child his parents had an automobile accident and he promised them that he would take care of them and protect them so that nothing would happen to them. This promise has continued throughout his life, first because he chose to be a doctor so that he could care for them and protect them from illness, and secondly because even though they live “apart”, their house are next door to each other.

I will never leave you… I will always be with you… If anything happens to you, I will die… I will be with you until death do us part…
These promises imply that subconsciously there is no possibility of separation after death. Unfortunately if you promised or made any of these decisions and the person receiving the promise dies, then unconsciously you will look for the way to be with them. Your false reason for living is to be with them.
Generally people who make this kind of promise never come out of mourning. They always miss the loved one. They cry frequently and feel a great emptiness.

Example:
Allison: I never knew my father. I was always very close to my mother. I adored her and she me. I promised to always be with her. Since she died, two years ago, my life has had no meaning. I feel like I am dying. I have always been healthy, but from the time my mother died I have had heart problems. Even though the doctor says it’s not serious I know that I am dying.

Allison’s false reason for living (promise) was to always be with her mother. When she died, Allison felt she had to follow her, she could not stay away. Her Enemy Within began to send physical symptoms, looking for a justification to rejoin her mother. Although the doctor says that there is nothing wrong, Allison really believes that she is dying, until finally her heart begins to fail.
The evolution of the individual does not include children living with their parents or being their nannies forever. The evolution of the individual requires freedom to live, to experience the situations that we all face in our life. This does not mean that when our parents truly require our help, we should not give it to them. Of course we will, but with freedom, using our freedom to choose how, when and where we can best do this in relation to that moment of life and without the weight of the promise-guilt-that forces us to be there, next to them, just because we have to…, even though on many occasions we may not want to or cannot.

“I’m going to make you happy…” Impossible! There is no way that anybody can keep this promise. A person’s happiness depends only and exclusively on that person. It is like eating or sleeping--nobody can sleep for another person!
A child’s promise to its mother to make her happy because its father is a violent man is impossible to fulfill. The child cannot force its mother to leave the man that she chose as her husband and that she herself has decided not to stop in any way. This is a lie that many mothers tell their children:

“I’m living with your father for you. I am unhappy because I want you to have a father…”
The mother lives with her husband because this is what her own promises, fears and guilt demand, or because she doesn’t have the courage to go out and look for work, or confront society, or many other reasons.
The child never forced his or her parents to marry, much less to make love in order to conceive the child.
Happiness is private, individual and unique.

Example:
Jose says: My wife says I’m not a man, because when my mother calls me I go see her immediately. But she is very alone and unhappy because I am far away. Well, we live 30 minutes from her house. But I feel guilty because she tells me:

It hurts me that you are not here, you are far away from me…
The possessive mother, without consciously knowing that her son has made promises, uses this formula to manipulate, and since the son feels guilty because he has not fulfilled his promise, his guilt makes him allow the manipulation.

I will never forget you… I will always love you… You will always live in me… Frequently the Enemy Within uses these promises in a cruel way. Since this prevents a fully loving relationship because subconsciously the love you want to give your lover or spouse cannot be 100% because this place was occupied first by the person to whom you made a promise.

Example:
Roselle: I was going to marry my first boyfriend, Alberto, and I always thought that if anything ever happened I would never forget, that in spite of the distance I would always love him. When we decided to marry Alberto changed. He became very jealous and possessive. We began to fight, until finally I decided not to marry him. His jealousy terrified me. I remember him with a lot of love, I have not been able to forget him. I feel very guilty with my husband because I cannot love him as I would like.

Promises made to oneself to never forget and to always love continue; through these promises the ex-boyfriend is occupying a mental and energy area that blocks the love she could have for her husband, and her Enemy Within makes her feel guilty.
In this absurd way we commit ourselves for all our life, holding on to a devotion to people we will never see again.

I’m going to make you get on together… I will be the bond between you … I will make you love each other again. These promises are made by children for their parents who are divorced or whose marriage has gone bad. The child’s false reason for living becomes a struggle to help his parents come back together or get along even against their will. When he cannot unite them he feels like a failure, guilty that he could not achieve his false reason for living. In no way is it the obligation of the child to change his parents’ decision; it is the parents who are free to choose with whom they live and how to manage their relationship with their partner.

Example:
Silvina, 14 years old, says: When I was four years old my parents divorced. Before they separated they fought constantly. I promised myself that I would make them get along so they would never separate. The arguments continued until finally they separated. When my father left I decided to be the tie between them and make him come back. I was a very happy child before that, but from the time he left I changed. My mother says that I became very quiet and didn’t want to be with anybody. My mother remarried, but I never accepted her new husband even though he is very good and treats me like his daughter. The week I turned 13 years old my father called me and said that he had remarried. I felt terrible and was very depressed. Since then I don’t want to do anything, I don’t care about anything.

When Silvina’s parents separated she lost her false reason for living, which was her promise to make them get on and prevent them from ever divorcing. When she heard her father had remarried, she lost any hope of reuniting them.

I’m going to be like you … In an attempt to please our father, mother, brother, sister, we wish to become like that person. As we grow we take on different characteristics, both physical as well as character traits, becoming a bad copy of the person we wish to imitate. Generally this similarity is emphasized in adulthood, where the similarity can be appreciated in the way we express ourselves and the way we act; physically the similarity can become extraordinary.

Example:
As the years pass I look more and more like my mother or father.

There are many cases in families where the father or mother is a lawyer, that the children become lawyers.
If the mother married at 16 years of age, the daughter will marry at the same age.
This promise may seem harmless, but it isn’t. The program does not discriminate, it includes both positive and negative things. The individual acts without thinking about what he likes, wants or desires; he accepts the tastes of the person he wishes to imitate as his own. If he can no longer fulfill his promise, his life becomes a constant attempt to be the same as the father, mother, brother or sister.

I don’t want to grow up … I don’t want to be big … The problem with this promise is that the child subconsciously blocks the process of physical and emotional development. These promises can be caused by overprotection by the parents; or when the parents’ beliefs are by the child observes who out of fear decides not to grow; or when the parents’ expressions and petitions to the children such as, “I wish you could always be a child…”, “I wish you could always be my little boy…”, “children don’t suffer, they just enjoy childhood…”, etc.

Example:
Italia’s mother was worried because her daughter was not growing. At 11 years of age she was far below average height.

Italia: I don’t want to grow. If I grow I won’t be a girl anymore. I am afraid of being big. Adults suffer, like my mother who has to work all day. Adults have a lot of worries. Children only have to play. My grandfather told me that he wished I could be a girl forever, because the only obligation children have is to play. And I want to play forever.

When Italia understood that the growth process is inevitable in humans and that there was nothing wrong with being an adult, her physical body grew various inches in a couple of weeks. Emotionally he began to act like a girl her age, leaving the behavior of a little girl behind.

I will work so you never want for anything… I will always give you all you need… You will never lack for anything… The usual behavior of the person who makes this kind of promise is very clear. He is constantly aware of the needs of those he made this promise to, giving them money and gifts even when they can work and need no special attention.

Example:
Blanca: My husband invests almost all his money in his parents. We have been married for four years and live in a small house because everything he earns he gives to them. Six months ago he bought a new living room set for his parents. Our house has an old, broken living room set, it was used when we bought it. Nevertheless he looked after his parents first, before taking of our own home. We have argued about this a lot. Sometimes my children have no clothes, but he buys clothes for his parents before for his children. Once he told me, “My parents were first.”
I am the oldest, it is my responsibility to take care of my brothers and sisters… This is a great lie; it is the parents who are responsible for taking care of the children. For generations they have asked the older children to take care of their little brothers and sisters, because the parents are busy or one of the dies. It is against the laws of nature for one child to care for another. The “older” child or teenager has the same needs to be taken care of as the younger children.
The confusion begins when the child accepts the momentary responsibility of caring for his or her brothers and sisters. The child or the teenager’s Enemy Within takes advantage of this and creates a lifetime commitment, preventing the person from developing his or her own life because of the much more important obligations to their siblings.

I’m going to be perfect… I want everything to be perfect… The people who make these promises tend to be constantly dissatisfied, angry, critical. They are intolerant and authoritarian. They demand perfection from themselves and cannot accept their errors because they cannot see them--they are, after all, perfect. This means that if they make a mistake ad are obliged to accept it and feel foolish, embarrassed and angry with themselves. And if things do not turn out the way they planned then they become angry with everybody else, criticizing the people and the system in which they live, wanting to force their opinion I order that things come out “perfect”. Their expectations are always greater than the reality of their lives.
Perfection is impossible on this planet Earth. The human being is constantly learning. Learning implies making mistakes, resulting in imperfection.

I have to love you because you are my father or mother… This promise is self-imposed due to the guilt created by abandonment, rejection and social beliefs. Love is a seed sown in the child and cultivated like a plant. When a person is mistreated, rejected or abandoned, that love becomes clouded, erased due to the interconnection of reciprocal energy from this obstructed love.
For a child to love his or her parents, the parents must earn the respect, love and trust of the child. It is impossible to demand love from a person to whom you offer only blows, scolding, insults, and physical, verbal and emotional abuse. The only feeling this child can have for his or her parents is an enormous fear and an enormous guilt created by the false belief that he or she is bad. But society and religion tell us that you should love your parents simply because they gave you life. It doesn’t matter that you have been mistreated or that you will never again see that parent that abandoned you. At the moment the parent returns, you should open your arms and say I love you. How romantic! But it doesn’t work that way. Mistreatment and abandonment create resentment, fear and guilt. In no way should you feel guilty because you cannot fulfill the promises you made to love somebody who never gave you love.

This does not mean that you should feed your hate-that, never. First we must try to stop feeling guilty for not loving those who gave us life but who could not give us love. Second, we should feel compassion and forgiveness for those who in their ignorance hurt us.
3. After reading these examples, lay down on your back, relax, let the music wash over you like you are washed in light.
4. With your eyes closed, concentrate on the area of your navel. Allow yourself to remember how you acquired these promises (if you can’t do this don’t worry). Let the energy that connects you to those promises dissolve and leave you, renounce those bindings and recuperate your freedom, use your free will to freely decide without guilt, fear and resentment.
5. Focus your attention on your navel (where all dependence energy is stored). Order the Enemy Within to leave you. The energy of dependence is related to the promises that through the Enemy Within force us to depend on others.

Now focus on the center of your chest (where all fear accumulates) and expel it as if it were a source of dark energy springing from your chest and navel. Let it leave as you renounce any slavery to the promises that caused you fear and guilt, that make you fee that if you do not comply you are evil or doing things that are bad.

*Alternate Step 5: You may use the following Step 5(a) instead of Step 5 above.
5(a). Use the Cromotherapy audiovisual aid. As you watch it maintain the intention to eliminate the Enemy Within related to promises. Eliminate that energy from you, expelling it through the center of your throat, your chest, the mouth of your stomach and navel. Free yourself.
6. Let the music continue playing until it ends, finishing the exercise. If you have fallen asleep that’s all right. The music acts for itself and your bodies will work in the order of liberation that you have t the beginning of the exercise.
7. If negative thoughts such as “I’m wasting my time,” or “I’m not achieving anything”, etc. come to mind, or different thoughts that distract you from your objective, let them go. Don’t stop when these occur, continue working, focusing on what you are doing.
8. Work every day with one of the promises you marked, as well as those that you added to the list. Repeat the exercise until you feel they have n longer have an influence on your life.