Laundry List Trait 2: We became approval seekers and lost our identity in the process.
Reading assignment for Trait Two:
Laundry Lists Workbook: Pages 12 and 13.
This week’s study questions are found on pages 14 and 15 of the Laundry Lists Workbook under the heading “Trait 2 Reflections: The Laundry List”:
- As a child, what prompted me to seek approval?
- In what ways do I behave more as an approval-seeker; how do I lose my identity in the process?
- How did losing my identity help me in my childhood? When and why do I continue to not claim my true identity in my adulthood?
- What identity or identities did I focus on as a child? How did that focus help me survive?
- If I weren’t raised in a dysfunctional/alcoholic home, what type of identity might I have had?
- Describe how your true identity (being valued for who you truly are) has been hidden/suppressed (for example, by being as your caretakers and/or loved ones wanted you to be.) How did this happen in your childhood? How has it been hidden in your adult life?
- When you answer questions like this, do you anticipate “what they want to hear” and hope to get it “right”? Have you taken tests or completed forms and filled in the blanks as you “knew” they wanted to hear? Have you answered the questions to “get what you wanted” after the form would be read, perhaps for some service?
“Copyrighted by Adult Children of Alcoholics World Service Organization.”
ACA Workbook Study 