The Five Core Issues:
1) How was I valued in the family?
2) How was I protected from parents, family, and friends?
(Physically and emotionally)
3) How was I expected to behave in the family?
4) How were my needs and wants taken care of?
5) How was I disciplined, contained or not contained?
The Five Core Practices:
1) Loving the Self – Self Esteem
2) Protecting the Self – Using Healthy Boundaries
3) Creating and Knowing the Self - Owning Your Reality
4) Taking Care of the Self – Self Care & Interdependence with
others
5) Containing the Self – Moderation/Balance in the Self
© Pia Mellody 1
CORE ISSUES ARE:
About immaturity
Caused by trauma in childhood
All five reflect the nature of a person’s relationship with the
self
There are two polar extremes in each issue
They all interact with each other
HEALING FROM THESE CORE ISSUES ENABLES A PERSON TO BE
MATURE RELATIONALLY:
This is the process of “becoming a Functional Adult”
Living in the extremes of each core issue are two child ego
states
In the child state we cannot function well in relationship
with others
© Pia Mellody 2
CORE ISSUE # 1:
Self Esteem - One’s worth, value, love
These words are interchangeable
A person’s esteem is on a continuum from respect to warm regard
Our weaknesses and strengths speak out to our humanity rather than define us as worthless
or better than
Esteem:
Is a total reality experience
Starts with a thought - “I have inherent worth.” It cannot be raised by my strengths or
lowered by my defects of character
Is experienced as a physical sensation - Warmth and swelling in the heart
Is identified as an emotion - Love
Is reflected in behavior - Respectful or loving care of self
Regarding Behavior:
Culture fails to teach us to apply the concept of inherent worth to ourselves
We are taught to compare ourselves to others to determine our value, i.e.:
Other Esteem – what my children, spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, parents do,
etc…
Attribute Esteem – what car I drive, how big my house is, where I vacation, or
what my spouse looks like, etc…
Performance Esteem – winning at sports, business, extreme risk taking, etc…
If you do not apply the concept of self-esteem to yourself, you will probably try to
obtain a sense of value through the affirmations of others or by comparing yourself to
others
This leaves you quite vulnerable to the opinions AND strengths of other people
This causes our sense of worth or value to fluctuate between Less Than and Better
Than
Until we learn to embrace the concept of inherent worth for our own self, we won’t
be able to stay respectful when another person is being difficult. Staying respectful is
the minimum of love.
When we suffer from only being able to love conditionally, this is immature love
Fluctuating between being Less Than and Better Than interferes with your ability to
be truly intimate
© Pia Mellody 3
CORE ISSUE # 2:
BOUNDARY ISSUE – Protecting and containing ourselves too much or too little during
intimacy
Vulnerable vs. Invulnerable
Containment – an issue of being respectful of others
Protection – an issue of self respect or self love
INTIMACY
A process of sharing the self with another person and/or receiving another person
physically, sexually, spiritually, intellectually, and/or emotionally
This process creates a relationship
A personal boundary problem occurs when one either has NO protection or NO
containment during intimacy (Boundaryless)
A personal boundary problem occurs when one either has TOO much protection
or TOO much containment (Walls)
RELATIONALLY:
This is a Disaster and Wounding
Causes Chaos or Boredom
Causes a sense of deadness during intimacy
© Pia Mellody 4
BOUNDARIES
DEFINITION:
System of limit setting that protects a person from being a victim
Contains a person so that he/she is not offensive to others
PURPOSE:
Contain and protect a person’s reality during intimacy
Establish identity
REALITY: BODY - What we look like
THINKING - How we give meaning to incoming data
FEELINGS - Our emotions
BEHAVIOR - What we do or do not do
COMPONENTS:
EXTERNAL SYSTEM
Contains and protects the body
Controls distance and touch
External Physical Boundary
Protection:
I have the right to control how close you get to me and whether you get to touch me
and/or my personal property
Containment:
The same is true for you
External Sexual Boundary
Protection:
When someone is approaching me sexually, I have the right to control when, where,
how, and with whom I am going to be sexual
Containment:
Others have the same right to do so with me
INTERNAL SYSTEM Protection
Contains and protects thinking, feelings and behavior
Acts like a block or filter
Internal Listening Boundary
Protection: Containment
Use of the Listening Boundary
Internal Talking Boundary
Containment:
Use of the Talking Boundary
© Pia Mellody 5
BOUNDARY VIOLATIONS
INTERNAL BOUNDARY VIOLATIONS:
Yelling and screaming
Name calling
Ridiculing or making fun of another person
Lying
Breaking a commitment
Patronizing a person. (Better than)
Attempting to control or manipulate another person by telling them what to do, say, act or what
they are feeling
Being sarcastic especially when being intimate
Shaming or blaming a person
Interrupting
EXTERNAL PHYSICAL BOUNDARY VIOLATIONS:
Standing too close to a person without his/her permission
Touching a person without his/her permission
Getting into a person’s personal belongings and living space such as one’s purse, wallet, mail, and
closet
Listening to a person’s personal conversations or telephone conversations without his/her
permission
Not allowing a person to have privacy or violating a person’s right to privacy
Exposing others to physical illness due to your having a contagious disease
SEXUAL BOUNDARY VIOLATIONS:
Touching a person sexually without his/her permission
Not negotiating when, where, and how to engage in sexual activity
Insisting on having your way sexually in the face of another’s “NO”
Demanding unsafe sexual practices
Leaving pornography where others who do not wish to or should not see it may see it
Exposing oneself to others without their consent
Staring or looking at another person lustily (voyeurism) without his/her permission
Exposing visually and/or auditory to others on your sexual activities without their consent
© Pia Mellody 6
CORE ISSUE # 3:
How we give meaning to what we see, hear, smell and taste.
What we make up about that experience with a thought.
What we emotionally feel from that thinking.
How we then behave is:
THE CREATION OF SELF
REALITY
BODY
(SENSORY ORGANS)
MIND
(WHAT I MADE UP ABOUT THAT)
FEELING
(PHYSICAL SENSATION)
EMOTION
BEHAVIOR
© Pia Mellody 7
CORE ISSUE # 4
Dependency – Having trouble with self-care and being interdependent with others
Too Dependent vs. Anti-Dependent or Needless/Wantless
Shows up as poor self-care
An inability to be interdependent
This comes from neglect, abandonment and enmeshment
This creates the caretaking of adults in the child’s early life
One Extreme:
The individual believes they cannot take care of their basic needs and wants
Presents relationally as very dependent
Asks for too much from a relationship
The Other Extreme:
The person is not able to ask for help with their own needs and wants
Either because they believe it is wrong or unsafe to ask for help
Also they are too detached from their own sense of needs and wants
Relationally:
The too dependent person is perceived as a burden
The anti-dependent person is perceived as needing nothing
Self Care Issues:
We all have 11 basic needs
1. Food
2. Clothing
3. Shelter
4. Physical Nurturing
5. Emotional Nurturing
6. Spiritual Practice
7. Education
8. Money
9. Medical
10. Dental
11. Sexual (as adults) as children sexual education
Needs are different from wants:
Our needs are basic to our survival
They keep our body and soul intact
Wants are not necessary for basic survival, but they are an important part to our
sense of abundance
© Pia Mellody 8
Our wants bring us a sense of joy and are very individual
Joy brings hope, and hope gives us a sense of abundance, i.e. (I have enough)
Interdependence is part of self-care
There are two aspects to consider:
1. One is about offering help
2. The other is about asking for help in regards to needs and wants
There are three rules to follow in regards to interdependence:
1. Avoid asking for help when you can take care of the need or want yourself - this
keeps you from being too dependent
2. Decline helping if you think you are going to wind up feeling resentful (victim
anger) - this avoids overextending yourself
3. Decline helping if you will enable the person asking for help to be dependent
© Pia Mellody 9
CORE ISSUE # 5:
Moderation/Containment Issues:
Out of Control vs. Controlling of Others
Focus is on moderation or problems with spontaneity
In spontaneity we are being our most “real” self
We experience a profound sense of life and excitement
In our spontaneity, others are drawn to us
In their spontaneity we are drawn to them
The Problem:
In our spontaneity, when we have no personal boundary, we are out of control and
offensive
If we have a wall containing our spontaneity, we are too contained and we are in an
attitude of too much control
Relationally:
Too much uncontained spontaneity causes chaos
Too little spontaneity causes a lack of attachment
RECOVERY:
Is about learning to use your personal boundaries to contain yourself
You are then containing your spontaneity
But not too much
This ability leaves you relational without being abusive
© Pia Mellody 10
