Almost the opposite extreme from the indulgent King/Queen Baby is the young child component in the person who never got to be a child - who had to be an adult from early age (I have had clients who were cleaning the house and cooking the family breakfast as early as 4 years old - mind boggling!) Very serious, over responsible, controlling, with a very black and white/right and wrong perspective of life - this child has no idea how to relax and enjoy life - fun, playful, and frivolous are foreign concepts and shameful notions.

This is a child who has to be taught how to play, and talked through letting go of the seriousness. The cowering, very wounded (inside emotionally - on the outside they usually look great, very good at keeping up appearances) child who got the message that he/she is only worthy and lovable by taking care of everyone else has a very hard time relaxing.

The type of message she/he needs to hear from the adult within would go something like this: "It's Ok honey. You don't have to be working or producing all of the time. It is important for you to play also. You are Unconditionally Loved no matter what you are doing. I Love you and am here to take care of the adult stuff. You are a kid - it is your job is to play and have fun. I am very proud of you for all you have done but now is the time to 'be' not 'do.' Just feel the sunshine on your face and breathe. Run and yell and swing on the swings. You are beautiful and perfect just as you are, and I Love you very much."

A good thing for this child to do is skip. I find it is very hard to be serious and skip at the same time. Being silly is very good for us. One of the closing prayers for my inner child healing/grief groups is to do the "Hokey Pokey" - which is a silly dance that many American children learned when little. (I don't know if they do the Hokey Pokey in other parts of the world - maybe some of you can let me know. The point is to do something silly and pointless that helps us to not take ourselves so seriously.)

Many of us swing from indulging in instant gratification to mercilessly beating ourselves up out of the right and wrong belief system. Most all of us have some aspect of the serious child wound because of being raised in societies that define success and worth by doing and achieving. It may not be evident in our lives because many of us reacted to this programming by going to the opposite extreme of seeming to be irresponsible and a "failure" in society's/our parent's eyes. The reason we reacted in that way was because we didn't think we were good enough to achieve/live up to the expectations. At some point in my late teens I decided that I could never be "perfect" in the way I was supposed to be - so I might as well go to the other extreme.

"We may never be a success according to our parents or societies dysfunctional definition of success - but that is because our heart and soul do not resonate with those definitions, so that kind of success would be a betrayal of ourselves. We need to consciously change our definitions so that we can stop judging ourselves against someone else's screwed up value system." - Article Learning to Love our self

The core issue to be worked on with this part of us (all of the parts of us for that matter) that was wounded by a society that is based on dysfunctional belief system that says we have to earn love, respect, and worth by producing/being human doings - is opening to receive. We all have a part of us that doesn't feel worthy to receive. Our worth is not dependent upon anything that we do or how we look or how much money we have, etc. - we have worth because we are Spiritual Beings having a human experience - we are part of the ONENESS that is the God-Force/Goddess Energy/Great Spirit - We are children of The Holy Mother Source Energy. This is where Positive affirmations about our inherent worth and value are very important.