It seems that we as human beings are part of each others construction.  We hold anxiety because we are fright -flight animals thus, are involved in the co-creation of existential angst.  The idea of existentialism is that we all hold fears about life and this is normal.  In addiction, individuals find self soothers that have profound effects on their psyche and behaviours.  Therefore, what once soothed this existential angst then becomes counderproductive to this and results in heightening the fears.

With this in relation to Step 8 , it is inevitable that we are all co-creators of how we relate and what we get out of life.  The step 8 offers hope that what we once co-created that became uber negative and destructive with others in our life can now have the opportunity for change.  First we have to look at the narrative of the co-created story of self.  This involves writing the list of significant others who were part of that story.

This is part of our life script which is co-created with others having influences on the decisions we made in our lives even before cognitive awareness.  Our relational self is significant even before birth by the mother keeping us safe in the womb and us being effected by her well being.  Then later on as babies and  children we have others in our lives that influence how we feel by how they relate to us, their behaviours and  own scripts.

Here I see it as “script influences script”  there are the intergenerational effects of this from family members to each other.  There are the influences of each individuals scripts impacting each other.  I often feel in group therapy that if I have 8 people in the room I have all their families and anyone who has had relational influences in their lives.  In other words and simple terms “our scripts all influence each other”  and this is often out of awareness..

I see people as living in a kind of “big soup” together offering different ingredients and chemistry.  With each ingredient giving different flavours and textures.  Life has this rich flavour and we all contribute to this soup and invite others to be part of this process also.

Existential writers such as Ernesto Spinelli write about human anxiety, uncertainty and relatedness.  That we are part of others, a system, a culture and to understand the self with ones fears we need to see our co-creation.  There is “inter-relational grounding to all subjective experience that holds meanings and behaviours”.  In our hearts lie distinctly our ways of examining the world which has influence on how we understand ourselves.

Spinelli (2001) “No choice can be mine or yours alone, no experienced impact of choice can be separated in terms of “my responsibility” versus “your responsibility”, no sense of personal freedom can truly avoid its interpersonal dimensions”.

This is reflective that although we have made choices and the individuals in our lives may have kept boundaries, gone away or held back.  This does not mean that it does not have interpersonal dimensions thus consequences for the self and others.  We are not isolated but a sum of many parts in the co-creation of our own story. This has impact, influences, exposes, moves  and touches us .  With this we can see why listing  those in our lives is important.  This experience also applies to them as part of the co-created system of how we function in the relational world.  Bandura called this the concept of “reciprocal determinism”.