I am often dismayed at how much negativity there is in healing communities towards other healing paths. I recently listened to a conversation putting down the Landmark Forum. I did Landmark, and while I did not find it remarkable, and did not like the pressure, there are certainly good things to be learned there, and I have many friends who point to the Forum as the significant changing point of their life.
Likewise, 12 steps programs, as tame as they seem to me today, were my turning point, and I will forever remain grateful to them. It was the first time in my life that I was ever really heard, and it transformed me, perhaps more than anything else I have done.
There is a tendency to develop a loyalty towards whatever system has provided us with healing, and we forget that there are many paths out there, any of which can lead to healing and transformation.
Another story from my fundamentalist past - when I was growing up, there was a controversy in my church about Bible translations, and there were some more liberal translations being circulated which our church railed against because some favorite verses had been changed. We actually went out and told people not to read "The Good News Bible", one of those translations we didn't like. We even spent money printing "tracts" that told people why they shouldn't read it. Get that? A fundamentalist church discouraging people from reading the Bible? You would think we would be glad that people read *any* version of the Bible, but no, we were too stuck in our little world to be able to see that. It had to be our way, and none other.
I've known so many wonderful healing systems, including RC, New Warrior, Shalom Mountain, Seven Oaks, New Culture, 12 Steps, on and on, each of which think they are the only ones with the truth, or the best truth, and the only ones saving the planet psychologically, each of which has wonderful things to teach, but each of which sticks to themselves because no one else has the truth like they have it. Healers wind up isolated from each other, ignorant of the other methodologies out there, unaware of the huge mass of people on this planet all working for healing, thinking their little group is the world's only hope.
How much better if we could just see and acknowledge the huge force for healing and growth that is inherent in us as humans, and that comes out in this wonderful variety of ways? How much more connected would we feel if we understood our little group was not the only one doing good on this earth? How much more hope would we have if we could see so many "competing" systems as really all wanting the same thing - the healing of humankind? Yes, we have all been wounded by systems that haven't worked for us - but they have worked for others. Let's heal from our prejudice first before we tear others down.
