Euthanasia: Do You Really Need It? This Will Help You Decide!

Our Experience of Life and Death is tightly connected with our childhood experiences and our Unmet Needs. Awareness helps us to take back our responsibility.

How do you feel about Euthanasia?

Death and dying always intrigued me and Euthanasia has long been an ethical issue for me as a physician. Who was I to assist you to end your life? Euthanasia is a huge territory, and by delving deep into this matter we might discover a great deal about our relationship with the cosmic principle of life and death.

Do you remember a moment where you wanted to die, and after profound deliberation you chose to live?

In this article we wonder if we really need Euthanasia?

In order to assist you to deicide, we first define euthanasia and then connect it with our unmet needs.

What is Euthanasia?

Euthanasia is the right to die painlessly, when you suffer from an incurable, often painful, disease or condition.

Some countries, like Belgium, have detailed and far-reaching policies around Euthanasia.

It is remarkable how Belgium creates the possibility to have meaningful conversations around difficult issues such as euthanasia.

Underlying these policies lies the desire to give the responsibility back to the individual person who has the possibility to consider Euthanasia. And the pitfall of regulating Euthanasia is that through the complexity of the procedure people often feel lost, overwhelmed and powerless.

What makes Euthanasia such a complicated issue? Euthanasia is about death and dying. Death and dying are intrinsically connected with our soul’s purpose.

Whatever happens and has ever happened to you and around you will affect how you live and how you die.

Let us return to the developmental steps we all take in our lives and how they can create unmet needs (you can read more about these developmental steps in: How our Childhood Stories can Bridge our Soul’s Purpose). Those unmet needs will clarify how we handle death and dying and help us decide whether we need Euthanasia!

A lack of safety and a desire to return to the spiritual realm, versus creating safety within your body-mind
Unbearable pain of emptiness as a reason to die, versus achieving inner recognition
Trying to control the ‘inevitable’ versus a balanced inner authority with regard to death and dying
Unmet needs around giving and receiving love, choosing death in order not to be a burden versus compassion for self and others
Taking responsibility for your death and dying from a place of failure and burnout versus taking responsibility in deep connection with all that is.

Unmet physiological needs

During your stay in the womb until the age of six months, you are very vulnerable and depending on your primary caregivers to have your basic physiological needs met ¾ food, warmth, comfort and rest.

If those physiological needs are not met sufficiently, it creates a lack of safety and a feeling of insecurity. You develop a high sensitivity. This sensitivity freezes you, and you perceive life as harsh and unsafe.

The spiritual being that you are has difficulties to incarnate in this human reality. A part of you always wants to return ‘home’ to your spiritual family. You have a natural tendency towards suicide and Euthanasia.

Euthanasia is normal for you. You flirt with dying.

For your soul there is only safety in the spiritual world. Your body-mind will experience fear to die and your decisions will depend on which feeling is stronger.

You can become alienated from your body-mind. This body-mind can move for instance through a process of dementia and your soul wants to leave. Nobody has to decide in your place.

When your soul achieves safety within your body-mind, your gift is your natural ability to connect with the other world and guide other people through their dying processes.

Unmet needs of approval and recognition

You start to develop your sense of self from the age of six months until two years. You explore what you like and dislike, and you have a huge need for approval and recognition.

We are all damaged in our sense of self. Sometimes we are extremely dependant on external approval and recognition. We easily search for distraction through addictive behaviour.

Your sense of self can be so low that you go into a huge depression and experience unbearable psychological pain where you can only see the possibility of dying as a definite way out of your misery.

Who can decide in your place? Not many of us realize that anybody who has the totality of your circumstances will react in the same way.

Euthanasia is the escape of this huge emptiness inside of you, this place of deep despair.

When you learn to accept the despair and find your own inner recognition, your gift is that you have been there and if you choose to live, you are an amazing gift for others in comparable circumstances.

Unmet needs for control and power

At the age of two until six, we all experience the need to control our life and have power over our environment. We begin to explore and develop our inner authority.

When you feel powerless, this will inevitably affect how you handle your death and dying. Do you rely on an outer authority to give you permission to die, or do you decide for yourself when you came to completion for this incarnation?

Euthanasia can be a way of trying to control what inevitably will take place in its own unique Divine Timing.

When you have allowed yourself to have the conscious choice to make an end to your life or to continue your life, you have grown inner authority and gained an awareness that is a huge gift to the world. You redefine euthanasia; you do not decide governed by your unmet needs, you decide about your dying from a balanced inner authority, a power from within. Your life comes to completion when the time is right. You can really live when you are no longer afraid to die.

Unmet needs around giving and receiving love

In this developmental stage from the age of six until twelve, you move into the astonishing realm of relationships. How well are we able to give and receive love?

Distrust and betrayal easily can give rise to unbearable psychological pain.

Is Euthanasia a secret way of creating huge separation? Escaping a world where you feel there is no space for you? Painful beliefs arise that there is nobody to hold you, nobody to be with you. Living in itself becomes unbearable.

You perceive yourself as being a burden for your children or caregivers.

When you manage healing cycles through the suffering of painful unfulfilled relationships, your gift is love and compassion arising from within. Dying in your unique timing surrounded by people who really love you and listen to you can be a bath of love.

Unmet needs around expressing ourselves

From the age of twelve onwards, we begin to express ourselves in the world. We offer our unique contribution and our gifts, and we take responsibility for who we are.

Burnout occurs when you feel the world does not appreciate ‘you’ and your unique contribution to the world. Burnout can drive you towards a request for euthanasia. You have the feeling you don’t matter.

Speaking your truth, whether it is received by others or not, is inevitably connected with taking responsibility for your life and death.

Is Euthanasia a way an individual can take responsibility or is it only part of the Story of Separation? Is taking real responsibility for your life and dying something completely different?

Our gift is to take responsibility in a new way, according to the new structures, not in separation, though in deep connection to what is much bigger than we are.

Euthanasia and our unmet needs
Developmental stageOur needs	Pitfall	Gift
Conception through the age of six months.Need for safety.	Not fully incarnated, safety is assumed in the spiritual world.	A natural ability to connect with the spiritual world, being a guide for others through death and dying
6 months through 2 yearsNeed for approval and recognition	Escape from your reality of huge depression and emptiness, from your incomplete sense of self.	A human guide for others in comparable circumstances.
2 through 6 yearsNeed of control and power	Giving away your power or exert control over the ‘inevitable’ fact of dying.	A balanced inner authority handling the precise timing of your death and dying.
6 through 12 yearsNeed for giving and receiving love	Unbearable pain of unfulfilled relationships.	Compassion for self and others.
From 12 years onwardNeed to express ourselves	Taking painful responsibility from a place of failure and burnout.	Taking one hundred per cent responsibility in deep connection with all that is.

Conclusion:

We are not arguing if Euthanasia is necessary or not. We invite you as the reader to come to your own conclusions and make your decisions with a great deal of insight.

Every unmet need can in its own right give rise to a request for euthanasia or a desire to make an end to your life. When we make a conscious choice to live, whatever our circumstances are, we might create for ourselves a huge opportunity for soul growth. When you have considered the possibility to die, you really live.

Euthanasia can be very graceful and serene.

And Euthanasia can be an escape, a failing, separation.

Only our body-mind dies, our soul is eternal and returns with what it has established.

Dying is a transformation into another form. Nothing is ever lost in the Universe. It is a gateway into another reality.

You can learn more about handling your developmental edges and unmet needs in Becoming What is Changing: Exposition.

I would love to hear your stories around death and dying.

Veerle

June, 2014

VEERLE DE BOCK is a physician, healer, facilitator, trainer, coach and author of the trilogy, Becoming What is Changing. She spent nearly three decades of her life as a physician specializing in geriatric care, including a 21-year career as department head in an Antwerp regional hospital. In 2003, she began her study as an energetic healer, teacher, process facilitator and supervisor at the Barbara Brennan School of Healing, and since 2007 has been leading many other trainees to master these same skills. In 2010 she was trained in the practice of Dynamic Facilitation by Jim Rough, which she now incorporates into her workshops and training sessions. In 2012 she decided to devote her work exclusively to writing, facilitation and coaching. That same year, she devised a new integrative practice of facilitation she calls ‘Guest House Facilitation’, that helps teams learn how to listen and utilise both the inner and outer processes within their organisation, to see it as a dynamic and living organism, and to reconnect to its intrinsic purpose and intention. Her book, Becoming What is Changing: Exposition, is the first part of a trilogy aimed at managers, team leaders and responsible employees who wish to bring this kind of transformation into the workplace, so they can create an environment where people are happy, satisfied and continuously growing.

Contact Veerle about the book, or to discuss coaching/facilitation for your organisation at:
http://www.chancestochange.com

http://twitter.com/VeerleDeBock

http://facebook.com/BecomingWhatIsChanging

Aspects of life

How our Childhood Stories can Bridge our Soul’s purpose

December 10, 2013December 11, 2013 Veerle de Bock

Awareness is closely related to how well we understand our inner make-up. Author Veerle De Bock shares five developmental steps that can help this understanding.

Throughout childhood, a great deal happens to us and around us. We pack these memories away inside of ourselves as stories that help define who we are. These stories become our beliefs. We act and feel according to our beliefs.

Our inner make-up reveals the connection between all these different beliefs and our soul’s purpose. It’s fascinating to look at the contents of our stories in order to reveal our beliefs and gain a greater understanding of who ‘we’ are.

The combination of our personal process and our life’s task compose our soul’s purpose. The stories of things that happen to us or around us match the personal process we want to achieve. These stories make our issues clearer for us. We are able to free the gifts specific to our developmental stage. These gifts strengthen the unique life task that we have to fulfil for the world.

In this article, we will explore our inner make-up through our childhood development. I will show you five developmental stages that we all go through and connect each of these stages with its unique beliefs. The stories that underlie each belief are unique for each of us.

Developmental Stage 1: the need for safety and security

This stage lasts from our stay in the womb until the age of 6 months. As a baby we need the safety and security that we get through bonding with our primary caregiver and from having our basic physiological needs met – food, warmth, comfort, rest.

The experience of unmet physiological needs creates a lack of safety and a feeling of insecurity. These are the beliefs we harvest:

“I’m not wanted.”
“Life is unsafe and harsh.”
“I have no right to exist.”

As adults we still have a part of us that defines itself through these beliefs and their underlying stories.

In order for this part of us to grow, we need to be able to create that safety and security inside of ourselves. When we have achieved this, our stories can then change.

We enter this physical realm as spiritual beings, and it is hard for us to adjust to our physical bodies. When our spiritual Self feels safe, it is able to incarnate. Then, our gift can surface as an ‘embodied spirituality’. This is a connection with the spiritual world that is lived through our body. We are able to live the sacredness in our daily lives.

Developmental Stage 2: the need for approval and recognition

From the age of six months until the age of two, we start to develop a sense of self. As a young child, we discern our sense of self by exploring what we like and dislike.

When we experience a lack of approval and recognition at this age, it creates insecurity about our likes and dislikes and therefore about our sense of self. At this stage, we collect beliefs and associated stories about humiliation and shame:

“I will be humiliated.”
“I am evil.”
“I am not important.”
“I will be ashamed.”

As an adult there is still a part of us that is defined by these stories as long as we, consciously or unconsciously, seek approval. When we allow this part to find recognition from within ourselves, we are ready to allow our stories to shift automatically. We begin to enjoy our own company. Our gift becomes pleasure, sensuality and life force. We radiate aliveness. Our pleasure is inspiring.

Developmental Stage 3: the need for control and power

Between the ages of two and six we develop our ego and, as our ego begins to relate to our sense of self, we learn to make sense of ‘who’ we are.

During this stage we explore our inner authority and strength.

There is a natural need at this stage to control the environment and exert power over others – and if we don’t, we feel powerless. Because of this dynamic, we gather beliefs and stories that define a part of us that either experiences feelings of self-importance or worthlessness:

“I need to be perfect in order to be in control.”
“I am powerless.”
“I am superior.”

In adulthood this power dynamic continues to pop up. This young part of us can grow when the older ‘us’ holds space for it to experience its inner strength. Our gift becomes a balanced inner authority. We no longer rely on an authority outside of us. We are able to fight with grace for what is really important to us.

Developmental Stage 4: the need to give and receive love

Between six and twelve years old we move into relationships with other human beings. As adolescents we engage in an amazingly rich palette of relationships.

These relationships are exquisite tools through which we can explore our stories. Other human beings reflect back to us our beauty and our challenges. We learn through those relationships and we can get hurt and feel rejected.

Our beliefs and the underlying stories we collect at this stage are related to betrayal and distrust:

“I am unlovable.”
“If I love, I will be hurt and rejected.”
“It is safer to stay on my own.”

As adults, we still carry this adolescent part within us when we are afraid of being hurt and consequently hesitate to reach out and connect with others.

When the older ‘us’ is able to deeply love and accept this insecure part of us, it is able to grow, thus enabling its gift for the world – love and compassion, real contact and undefended moving out towards the other.

Developmental Stage 5: the need to speak our truth

From the age of twelve onwards we start to express our truth which is the result of an inner process of assimilation and integration. This unique truth is how we express our unique quality in the world.

We ask ourselves how our truth will be received by our family and peers. Sometimes what we hear back from our family and peers does not resonate with what we know to be true.

We collect beliefs and stories of how we block our creative expression and hide our truth:

“My truth is not okay.”
“If I share I will be humiliated.”
“My inner truth does not fit with what is happening around me.”

As an adult, this part of us has difficulties creatively expressing and making sense of what is happening around us. We must hold space for this part to learn to trust.

Our gift, at this stage, is our ability to assimilate and integrate what we perceive and to take responsibility for our stories.

Closing thoughts

‘We’ are a wonderful resource. We are amazingly sophisticated human beings and each of us is a kaleidoscope of unfinished business, partly integrated steps and amazing gifts.

As we move through our childhood a part of us moves on to the next step while, at the same time, another part is very often defined through the beliefs and stories that belong to the previous stage.

Each of these five developmental steps focuses on a specific need. Our experiences of unmet needs are the stories that we gather at each stage and, as adults we learn to gently and lovingly care for these younger parts of ourselves. When we are able to hold space for the needs of those younger parts, they are able to show us the gifts they bring to the world.

Our unmet needs connect us with our soul’s purpose; they are the basis for our personal process and become gifts that are able to strengthen our specific life task in this world. These gifts are related with our developmental stages.

My book Becoming What is Changing: Exposition looks at our inner make-up in more detail. In it, I offer you maps to unravel your personal process and your personality.

I hope this article has helped you gain insight into the magic of ‘you’ and your amazing soul’s purpose. Please leave any thoughts, insights or reflections in the comments box.

Veerle de Bock
10th December 2013

VEERLE DE BOCK is a physician, healer, facilitator, trainer, coach and author of the trilogy, Becoming What is Changing. She spent nearly three decades of her life as a physician specializing in geriatric care, including a 21-year career as department head in an Antwerp regional hospital. In 2003, she began her study as an energetic healer, teacher, process facilitator and supervisor at the Barbara Brennan School of Healing and, since 2007 has helped many trainees to master these same skills. In 2010 she was trained in the practice of Dynamic Facilitation by Jim Rough, which she now incorporates into her workshops and training sessions. In 2012 she decided to devote her work exclusively to writing, facilitation and coaching. That same year, she devised a new integrative practice of facilitation she calls ‘Guest House Facilitation’ that helps teams learn how to listen and utilise both the inner and outer processes within their organisation, to see it as a dynamic and living organism, and to reconnect to its intrinsic purpose and intention. Her book, Becoming What is Changing: Exposition, is the first part of a trilogy aimed at managers, team leaders and responsible employees who wish to bring this kind of transformation into the workplace, so they can create an environment where people are happy, satisfied and continuously growing.

Contact Veerle about the book, or to discuss coaching/facilitation for your organisation at:

http://www.chancestochange.com

http://twitter.com/VeerleDeBock

http://facebook.com/BecomingWhatIsChanging