Norman L. Coad, D.Min
Based on Chapter 7 of The Divided Soul
Self Esteem and Dissociation
There are two factors that must be present in order to loose access to your God given self-esteem. If you are a person with multiple personalities: 1) You must possess the innate ability to dissociate (which is your hereditary heritage), and 2) You must also be traumatized. (Your hereditary abilities are from God; the traumas are from Satan.)
Types of Trauma
The traumas of life may be intentional or just happen. Without going into too much depth I will give here a suggestive few.
Fear trauma seems to be the major traumatizer. There is womb trauma (trauma that splits the child in the womb), parental rejection, the mother’s personal traumatic experiences, alcohol and drug addiction, abuse, etc. There is birth trauma that occurs in the birthing process, doctor generated or mother’s difficulties in bringing forth her child.
There is trauma in the family of origin arising out of a vast number of parental dysfunctions, self-centeredness and cruelties. These include such things as the chaos of the alcoholic or drug addicted home. There is the lack of structure, provision and safety, perfectionism, negative critical faultfinding family interactions. There is abuse, physical, sexual, verbal, religious, ritual and emotional. There is emotional deprivation, lack of love, belonging and unconditional acceptance, lack of caring, nurturing appropriate touch, word and interactive time spent together and many more. There are accidents causing brain trauma, disfigurement, anxiety and periodic and particular phobias. There is cruelty that causes the above based on intention to hurt and destroying which violate normal and healthy boundaries and many more.
The Trauma Process
Whatever the trauma, Satan and his hosts use it against us at the crucial moment to inflict deep and enduring traumas on us.
The Personality is split—The birth personality, the part of us that makes executive decisions, is split out of the whole of the personality. At this time the inner self helper is formed. This is the one who lives life day by day in a wholesome and healthy manner. Many other alters are formed as well.
The Demonic Invasion—Demons, fallen angels and spirits of the dead, the unredeemed of all the ages and other alters not native to the person’s personality invade the traumatized one.
Self-esteem Is Hidden—Most of the time the self-esteem, which is an entity that carries our value of our worth, is stolen. It is then hidden somewhere within our personality.
If the person is male the self-esteem will be male, if they are female, female. At the point of trauma and splitting the alters stop growing psychologically and will remain that age. They will remain that age until found and healed. With lesser trauma the self-esteem will be covered over all the time. With even less trauma the self-esteem will be misted over at critical moments and hidden from view. When any of these three occur, the person will revert to performance based love and acceptance.
Salvation Necessary—Every separated part of the personality, self-esteem, or any other, must be saved. These parts, or alters, or personalities, are all making decisions separate from the birth personality. Each has spirit, mind, emotion and will. They are asked to make a voluntary decision to accept the Lord Jesus as Savior and Lord.
The Core of Being—The core of being is that place where God has put all He created us to be when He knit us together in our mother’s womb.
After the Theft—After the theft (or covering) of the true self has occurred, we are put into a crisis state. We no longer know who we are. The normal state of the dissociated person is I don’t know who I am. This causes problems; we cannot be nobody and live. We have to be someone. In this vacuum we create a self. What we create is not the true self that God created, but a false self.
The False Self—This false self only works after a fashion, and not well. Whereas the true self is created by God; we make the false self. The true self is a state of being—being who we really are. The false self is an ongoing attempt to be somebody. It’s an effort, a doing, a performance.
The false self performs so as to be validated. Without validation from significant people one does not feel he is good, valuable and precious. Lack of validation amounts to an attack on self. This is the essence of performance based love and acceptance. They are forever performing, trying to prove to others and reassure themselves they are someone of value. It’s like walking on a treadmill—it uses up a lot of energy, but in the end you are in the same spot as when you started. After a brief moment of feeling good about ourselves, it fades away. We then have to start all over again. [See illustration.]
Reversal of the Trauma Process
An interaction of the therapist and the individual led by the Holy Spirit can take place to find or discover self-esteem. The therapist is aided by the Holy Spirit by words of wisdom and words of knowledge.
When found, there is usually given a nurturing angel for the true self. This angel will stay with self-esteem until he/she reaches maturity. Adulthood is recognized to be eighteen years of age. During this time the self-esteem is completely restored. When eighteen years of age he/she is integrated back into the core of being. If the child self-esteem is integrated before adulthood, the child would be traumatized by adult demands on them.
During the maturation time, two of God’s angels are assigned and taught to be the self-esteem by the Lord. There are two angels because they each work 12-hour shifts. They enter into the core of being and they become who we are. Who we are is then visible to the spirit person within. The true self then knows who he/she is. We are who the Word of God says we are. We are loved and therefore lovable and many other attributes of personality are added and understood. The true self, the self-esteem that God creates is a state of being, not something we must attempt to be.
Next Article: Diverse Family Structures
For more information and help check out Dr. Coad’s book, The Divided Soul in the Book Store.
