At The Stages we begin to realise as our child within awakes that disapproval has been used as a weapon against us in childhood and beyond.

At The Stages we begin to realise as our child within awakes that disapproval has been used as a weapon against us in childhood and beyond. If we've have developed a phobia of disapproval, then others will scare and therefore control us if we play their games. Seeing reality through a narrow and prejudiced lens of 'does this please or displease me?' makes others appear pretty tyrannical. Others who are quick to disapprove (even if they just imply disapproval) can make us on edge feel controlled or dominated.

We need to start to focus on what we think and want. If someone seems to disapprove, call them out on it. Ask them what their problem is. As weird as it sounds, you have every right to disapprove of their disapproval!

Ultimately, disapproval fails to deliver what it threatens. When the 'bomb drops', we learn there is no bomb. When we let people disapprove of us if they want and cease to worry, a whole new world of freedom and recovery opens before us.