The Basic Elements Of Voice Dialogue, Relationship, And The Psychology Of Selves: Their Origins And Development

By Hal Stone, Ph.D., and Sidra Stone, Ph.D.. Reproduced with permission.

Hal and Sidra Stone: their work and the complete article library · Further Reading

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1 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueThe Basic Elements of Voice Dialogue,Relationship, and the Psychology of Selvestheir origins and developmentby Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.

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Table of Contents3 introductionThe Earliest Influences8 the first elementV oice Dialogue as a Methodology:The Beginning of the Joint Adventure10 the second elementThe Psychology of Selves:The Beginnings of Theory12 the third elementThe Consciousness Model:A New Definition of Consciousness13 the fourth elementThe Theory of Bonding Patterns:The Selves and Relationship16 the fifth elementThe Psychology of the Aware Ego:An Energetically Based Psycho-Spiritual Approach to Consciousness21 the sixth elementThe Energetics of Relationship:Learning to Play Your Own Instrument25 the seventh elementPartnering:Using Relationship as Teacher, Healer, and Guide28 the eighth elementDreams, Daydreams and the Intelligence of the Unconscious:Accessing the Inner Teacher

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.3 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueThe Basic Elements of Voice Dialogue,Relationship, and the Psychology of Selvestheir origins and developmentby Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The story changes depending upon who tellsit. And, as the journey goes on, we view ourlives from different vantage points and throughdifferent eyes as we integrate more and moreselves. What seemed important at one timeseems less important later. What seemed lessimportant can assume greater importance astime goes on.At this point in our lives—our 70th and80th years—we have decided that it is time tolook back and to tell the story of the originsand development of Voice Dialogue and thePsychology of Selves the way we see it. We wishto honor those we know have directly contrib-uted to our work, to clarify some misconcep-tions that are common, and to tell—to the bestof our ability—the stories of those momentswhen some new element was added or ourthinking has changed.Let us begin with our view of the creativeprocess. We find that outer and inner influ-ences blend indistinguishably. We have livedrich, complex—and jointly examined—lives.From the outer world, there have been teachersand information from many disparate sources.We have had many powerful experiences withothers, both professional and personal. Fromthe world within, we have had our individualdreams, transpersonal experiences, and mo-ments of sudden clarity that seem to be giftsfrom sources outside of our personal experience.All these are digested by each of us, providingus with the raw material from which we create.When an idea or a concept emerges, we arenever quite sure of where it comes from.In the past, people’s first reactions to VoiceDialogue were usually: “That’s a Gestalt tech-nique” or “It’s psychosynthesis.” Interestinglyenough, Hal’s actual work in Gestalt startedonly after Voice Dialogue was definitivelyestablished in our lives and although Sidra hadsome contact with very early Gestalt work,her experience of it was extremely limited. Asfor psycho-synthesis, we were both fascinatedwith its use of imagery, but neither of us haddelved deeply enough into it to know about itsconcepts of the different selves. Nor were weparticularly influenced by psychodrama or TA,having only a passing acquaintance with both ofthese through the popular press.We have always honored these various ap-proaches as having some relationship to VoiceDialogue since they were clearly a part of thegeneral psychological culture in the early 70’s.At the same time, we recognized that our owncreative process was based upon a very differ-ent, and unique, set of experiences. The rootsof our work go far deeper than our exposure to

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.4 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguethese newer schools of thought. We came fromtwo contrasting, one might even say conflicting,backgrounds.Hal & Sidra in the Early Years:Treasure Hunting in the Bahamas 1978The Earliest Influences—Hal’s ExperiencesI was trained as a Jungian analyst, eventu-ally becoming the president of the Societyfor Analytical Psychology in Los Angeles in1968. I studied at the Jung Institute for severalmonths in 1957 and actually had the opportu-nity to meet with Jung himself for an individualsession. These experiences went deep into mybeing and have, to some extent, informed mywork throughout my life.My experiences with the Jungian communityand my early training gave me the gifts of a deepunderstanding of dreams, myths, fairytales, anddepth psychology. On the other hand I knewthat something was missing. I didn’t feel likea grownup. I go into these matters in greaterdetail in the 5 CD series I made last year. Theoutcome of all this was that I left the Jungiancommunity—and the traditional practice ofanalytical psychology – in 1970. This was twoyears before Sidra and I met. My experienceof all of this was the end of my personal andprofessional life as I had known it and thebeginning of a new life that was as yet totallyundefined and unknown to me.Though I found it necessary to separate fromthe professional organization in 1970, I realizenow that I would have had to separate from any-thing that I was a part of. I needed to float freeand not be tied to any kind of outer professionalform. Only in this way could I begin to moveinto an entirely new kind of creative process thathas led me to where I am today. I shall be eter -nally grateful for the remarkable opportunityI had to discover Jungian Psychology, to thecolleagues I had, to the clients I worked withand to the innovative spirit of Jung himself.From my very first analytic session my un-conscious opened and with it the life of spiritand a most remarkable dream process thathas always helped to maintain some kind ofobjective clarity. From that first session I hadcome home to the symbolic life of spirit and Iwas able to separate from the arid desert of myrational mind.My first encounter with Voice Dialogue, orthe idea of talking to selves, came some timein the late sixties. The story I am about to tellyou is not about Voice Dialogue directly. Itis concerned about a clinical experience thatled me to a different place professionally andthat is intertwined in my mind with the earlyorigins of the work.

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.5 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueIn the late sixties a couple came to see me inregard to their son who we will call Jimmie. Thecouple lived in Southern California and theirson had spent the past year at a special residen-tial treatment center on the east coast for actingout or disturbed children. In particular Jimmiewas acting out in school and it was felt that hecouldn’t function in a regular academic setting.Jimmie was eleven years of age when his par-ents first came to me and they were very upset.They had just received a letter from the schoolinforming them that they had done a completepsychological evaluation on the boy because ofhis disturbed behavior, that he was being di-agnosed as schizophrenic and that they werestrongly recommending he be placed in a specialsetting run by a psychoanalytic group in the area.Since they felt that he was schizophrenic theyfelt that he needed a special facility for this levelof mental impairment.The parents had moved out West the yearbefore and they were looking forward to hisjoining them in their new home. They werevery upset by this letter and their ques-tion was whether I could help them in thissituation. I told them I would be willingto see Jimmie if they brought him to L.A.and I would do an independent evaluation.I would need all of the medical records thatwere available before I saw him. I couldn’tpromise them more than that.Two to three weeks later Jimmie walked intomy office. He was a very curious child, interestedin everything he saw. On my desk I had a pile ofpsychological and psychiatric reports four or fiveinches high containing notes, test materials andpsychiatric evaluations. All of them concurred inthe diagnosis of schizophrenia. They describedhow what had begun as acting out behavior had,over the past year, developed into an increasinglydisturbed state. As I sat with Jimmie I was expe-riencing a huge conflict because my experienceof him was very different. It was very positive.I liked him very much and I thought he had awonderful spirit. On the other hand, I had thesereports from a very fine school and very quali-fied health care practitioners all making the samediagnosis of schizophrenia.Jimmie was easy to talk to and he toldme about his school and about its philoso-phy. Basically, their management style was tonever let children be alone but to always keepthem busy doing things. It was felt that beingalone allowed them to collapse into their ownimagination and fantasy and that this wouldbe damaging to them. It was becoming clear tome that Jimmie was a very imaginative young-ster and that the school routine might nothave been the best kind of experience for him.In the course of our discussion I asked Jim-mie if he ever remembered any dreams. He toldme that he had one just last evening. This wasthe dream:“I am sitting in a wheelchair in the lobby of myschool. My parents are visiting me before they goback to California. I am crying and begging themnot to go. They feel they have no choice however andthey get up to leave and I wake up sobbing that theyare leaving me here.”The dream was totally stunning to me. Hewas in a wheel chair. Why was he there? Didthis mean that he was indeed crippled in the waythe reports on him indicated was the case? Whyelse would he be in the wheel chair? Yet every in-stinct in me felt a core of health in him that wasincompatible with the diagnosis.I asked him to close his eyes and go back intothe dream and be in the wheel chair. He did thiseasily, just as I expected, and after a half-minuteor so I asked him why he was in the wheel chair.What was wrong with him? Could he tell meanything about how he felt sitting there?

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.6 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueJimmie then said a remarkable thing to me.“What I feel is that there is a magnet in theback of the wheel chair and that this magnet isholding me in the chair.” I said before that I wasstunned when I heard his dream. Hearing hisresponse to my questioning was being stunnedto tenth power. Suddenly it was all so simple.Everything made sense and the excitement I hadbeen feeling began to lessen and I really felt veryhappy with things.I realized then that Jimmie was a highlycreative, highly gifted, highly imaginative childwho had been misplaced in this school. I’m surethe theory worked for many of their children,but for a youngster like this one it was totallycounter-productive. He was a magical child andthe world of imagination was essential to him.It had literally driven him into schizophrenicbehavior because he had nowhere else to go. Itwas an artificially induced state and this I feltcould be changed.I then said to him that if he was being heldin the chair by this magnet it seemed to me thathe could do something to break the power of themagnet. We did this together. First he broke thepower in his imagination and then he actuallygot up from his chair in my office (as thoughit were the wheelchair) and walked around theroom. All of this was done using simple methodsof active imagination. After five or ten minuteswe then went into my art studio where he beganto work with sand play and painting. I saw himfor about 12 sessions. He was now ready to stopour work together and he began public schoolnear his home in Southern California. I saw himfor two sessions when he was in High Schooland he just wanted to talk over some of the is-sues he was dealing with in high school. Throughother sources I can tell you that Jimmie ulti-mately went into the film business where he hasled a successful professional life.It was a month later that I received a callfrom Dr. Hedda Bolgar from Mt. Sinai hospital.Hedda was a lovely woman, a gifted therapistand analyst; she was the director of psychologyat Mt. Sinai hospital in Los Angeles. Hedda wasalso affiliated with the psychoanalytic group thatwas in charge of the school that Jimmie attend-ed. Apparently they were very upset because Jim-mie was now in public school and they couldn’timagine how this could happen. They contactedHedda and asked her to talk with me and findout what had happened. I told her that it was along story and maybe it was best for us to meetin person over lunch and I would share with herwhat had happened.Hedda has always been a remarkable woman.She has always been open to new ideas andnew possibilities. When we met and I gave herthe whole background on what had happenedwith Jimmie, she really understood what hadhappened at a very deep level. Shortly after ourmeeting, she called and invited me to become aconsultant to the department of psychology atMt. Sinai and then to become a consultant tothe department of psychiatry, also at Mt. Sinai.This was the beginning of a wonderful few yearsworking with Hedda and other staff membersand students in training in this dual capacity.It was about a year after I started my consult-ing work that Hedda told me about a clinicaldemonstration that she had witnessed that wasfacilitated by a professor at U.C. Santa Barbara.She had watched him working with a client us-ing a number of chairs for the different selves ofthe subject. I was fascinated by her description ofwhat had taken place in this session. I contactedthe professor and asked him about the demon-stration and he told me at that time that he hadno real interest in this work and he didn’t mindat all if anyone wished to explore it more deeply.Whatever he was doing had no name though it

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.7 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguecertainly seemed like the way a Gestalt therapistwould work even though the professor had noconnection to Gestalt workI then began to play with the idea at homeusing my daughter Judith and my son Joshua(now deceased) and my then wife, Thea, assubjects. We facilitated each other and it wasfun, and sometimes seemed important, but itnever went any further and within a year or so itseemed to have died a natural death. The resur-rection did not happen for another two years orso when Sidra and I first met.The Earliest Influences—Sidra’s ExperiencesMy earliest psychological influences date backto the early 1950’s at Barnard College. At thattime I was a committed behaviorist and basicallya “Skinner groupie.” My friends and I were fasci-nated by the early operant conditioning work asan explanation of human behavior and we wouldgo to hear Skinner whenever he came to NewYork to speak. Our favorite psychology instructorarranged for a special seminar for four of us whoshowed particular interest in this work. There weinvestigated the possible interface of the (Freud-ian) psychoanalytical thinking of the time andoperant conditioning.I was intrigued by the idea that a psycholo-gist could break down complex behavior into itscomponent parts and see how everything workedin an ultimately sensible and predictable fashion.This was only one area of fascination with howthings worked. Along these same lines, I hadseriously considered becoming a physicist.I still see this early Skinnerian influence inthe way I look at the development of primaryselves—at how they emerged, at least in part, asa result of operant conditioning. I was alwayslooking for ways in which they were adaptiveand how, as selves, they did their best to protectus and to earn us love. So, as an old-time Skin-nerian, I deeply honor a primary self.The other major influences that I broughtwith me from earlier times were the writersHermann Hesse and Nikos Kazantzakis. As awoman of the 1950’s, I was uncomfortable withthe psychological and psychiatric establishmentsas they related to women. At the time, I didn’tknow what it was that didn’t feel right, but I feltit was important—and somehow safer—to keepmy teachers more impersonal and at a distance.Hesse and Kazantzakis were men whose liveswere deeply committed to the evolution of con-sciousness and whose writings contained—forme—a glimpse of universal truths. All of theirbooks explored the struggle between opposingforces within each one of us, what Hal and Inow call “the tension of opposites”. Each had hisown passionate polarities. Hesse worked pri-marily between the mind (the intellectual) andthe feelings (the romantic) while Kazantzakis’interest was the tension between the earthy andthe spiritual.Both men were influenced by Henri Berg-son and based their worldviews on the exis-tence of an “élan vital”, a creative or evolution-ary impulse within each of us, a powerful forcethat moves us towards continual evolution andgreater consciousness. That concept felt like adeep truth and became a part of my life view.I recognize echoes of this in what we now call“the inner intelligence” or “the intelligence ofthe universe”.Hesse’s Steppenwolf was the most impact-ful book I ever read. It was my introduction tothe many selves and to the “Magic Theater” inwhich I began to view my own tumultuous innercast of characters. Once I peeked into my ownMagic Theater through the doors opened by thisbook, my view of life and of people was unalter-ably changed. I could no longer look at any of us

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.8 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialogueas single entities. From that moment on, I wasfascinated by the many selves that I could see inmyself and in those around me. I loved it! Thisfollowing quote sums it all up:“Harry consists of a hundred or a thousandselves, not of two. His life oscillates, as every-one’s does, not merely between two poles, suchas the body and the spirit, the saint and thesinner, but between thousands and thousands.Every ego, so far from being a unity is in thehighest degree a manifold world, a constel-lated heaven, a chaos of forms, of states andstages, of inheritances and potentialities. As abody everyone is single, as a soul, never.”—From Steppenwolf by Hermann HesseInterestingly, Hesse was deeply influencedby Jung and this, I feel, provided much of thecrossover between Hal’s Jungian background andmy own thinking. Kazantzakis, on the other hand,was a Cretan by birth and Greek to the core. Histhoughts, much like those of the Jungians, werenever far from the ancient gods and goddesses.He knew the importance of honoring all the godsand goddesses—and I always felt that as an un-derpinning in his writings. His greatest book, TheOdyssey, A Modern Sequel, was like a Bible to mein my own intellectual and spiritual wanderings.My own journey was an outer journey inthese early years. I traveled extensively and wasparticularly interested in ancient cultures. Ivisited the sacred sites in Greece and honoredthe gods and goddesses by visiting their shrines.Hal visited Jung, I paid my respects at the graveof my teacher, Nikos Kazantzakis, in Crete.And so it was that from these disparate back-grounds—these opposites as carried by each ofus—that something new came to be born. Nowlet us look at the basic elements of our work andsee how each evolved.the first elementVoice Dialogue as a MethodologyThe Beginning of the Joint AdventureIt was early in 1972 that Sidra read an article byAssagioli on Guided Imagery. She was fasci-nated and decided to try it out in her practice ofpsychotherapy. It was amazingly successful andtotally different from anything she’d ever donebefore. A new kind of depth and universality—the kind she had previously experienced onlyin her contacts with great works of art or ofliterature—was now available to both herself andher client. People had such wonderful experi-ences that she wanted to learn more about thisand—most important—wanted to go on oneof those “trips” herself. She asked a friend, Dr.Jean Holroyd, the head of the psychology internprogram at UCLA, where she might learn moreabout this technique.Hal had been teaching this work which wascentral to his training in Jungian Psychology.He had recently given a very powerful demon-stration of this work at UCLA that Jean hadattended. She recommended that Sidra contactHal and see him for a few training sessions.So it was that in February, 1972, Sidra came tosee Hal making it very clear that she was notinterested in personal therapy, not interested inanything that might change her life, but that shejust wanted a few training sessions so she couldbecome more effective in facilitating this process.In the first few sessions Sidra went verydeeply into the realm of the creative imagination.Her initial experience was of initiation into theancient goddess mysteries. It was in these depths,one might say, that the two of us met. It becameclear almost immediately that the explorationthat was happening was a joint exploration—nota mentor/student relationship—and that Halcould only continue on this basis. In the depths

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.9 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialogueof this kind of work there could be only equalitybetween us. We began to share our dream pro-cess in addition to the visualizations and in thecourse of one of these sessions we started talkingabout how vulnerable they were both feeling andhow unfamiliar this was for both of us.It was during this discussion that Hal sug-gested that Sidra move over and become thevulnerability instead of just talking about it.It was the moment of the resurrection of thistechnique of talking to the selves. The termVoice Dialogue did not yet exist. That camelater. In this moment, the game that Hal hadplayed with before became something quitedifferent and the birthing process of the VoiceDialogue method began.This is how Sidra remembers that very firstexperience:Hal asked me to move over and to become thevulnerability. I knew it was the right thing to do.I trusted him. I trusted him so deeply that I movedfrom the couch where I’d been sitting, sat down onthe floor and put my head down on the coffee table.In total silence, I allowed myself to move into myvulnerability, I literally became someone else. Ibecame a very small child who experienced the worldin a new way. There was total stillness. I had thesense that the “I” that was sitting there had beenhiding in a deep cave for my entire life and thatthis was the first time she felt safe enough to comeout. The world around me changed, my perceptionsbecame more acute, colors and sounds were different,and I could feel Hal’s energy holding a space for me(although it would be years before we were to knowmore about the energetics of relationship). This wastotally foreign to me; I was accustomed to experienc-ing the world in a rational, sensible, and controlledway. I felt that I had finally entered Herman Hesse’sMagic Theater!Hal was himself stunned by this experience.He could feel that he was in the presence of achild and he knew that it was best to say noth-ing. He was with a pre-verbal child—the childwas real, and the selves were real. When Sidraleft her place on the floor and returned to herseat on the sofa—returning to what we latercalled the Aware Ego—we both sat in silence.We both realized that something momentoushad happened.Hal had to wait a week before Sidra facili-tated his child. His own experience was mostprofound. It was the beginning of Little Harry,a totally unknown quantity in his life up untilthen, and so it was that instead of Sidra and Halexploring together, there were now four of us atwork. There were Sidra and Lisa and there wereHal and Little Harry. Everyone’s stories andideas were different.So the work began with what we named the In-ner Child—as far as we know, we were the first touse that term. It began out of a relationship in whicha deep love was evolving. It had no context so faras therapy was concerned. These children of ourswere real and the continuing work we did withthem gave us a way of widening and deepeningour co-exploration. We were not just stunned bywhat was happening. We were extremely excited.If these inner children were real, who else wasthere? After all, there were many doors to openin the long hallway of the Magic Theater. Wewere off and running, meeting the myriad selvesthat began to emerge into consciousness.In the next few years we did a great deal ofthis kind of exploration. At this early stage therewas basically no theory, no Aware Ego. We weresimply two explorers who were very much in loveand who had no idea where our lives were head-ing. We only knew that what was happening wasrich, creative, and original and that it deepenedour connection to each other at each step alongthe way. We still used the visualization processand shared dreams but in this early stage the ex-

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.10Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguecitement of the dialogue process quite possessedus. The theory was to come later.Our work with relationship began with a verypowerful experience very early in these explora-tions. One of Sidra’s early visualizations was thatof an ancient Minoan ship sailing on mythicseas. We were both on that ship. Emblazonedupon its sail, watching over us and protectingour journey, was a golden eye—the eye of God.As part of that visualization, we were told thatwe were on a journey that would not end. Thismeant that there was to be no real security orpredictability for us. We were not permitted toset up a permanent home; we were not even per-mitted to spend more than one night at a timeon land. It was truly the beginning of our journeyof relationship—a journey in which in which therelationship became our teacher.Collaboration in the Early Years 1983This is not the place to discuss our work indetail, but only the story of how it evolved andwhat—to our minds—are the most importantelements involved. To learn more about the workitself, we suggest the classic book, EmbracingOur Selves; or, if you prefer to listen to CDs, AnIntroduction to V oice Dialogue, Relationship,and the Psychology of Selves; and finally, if youprefer to see us as well as hear us, the documentary,The V oice Dialogue Series.the se cond elementThe Psychology of SelvesThe Beginning of TheoryIt is difficult to remember how and when ourtheoretical considerations began to intermix withour deeply personal work. We were both psy-chologists (practicing psychotherapists). Thingswere happening and changes were taking placewith remarkable speed and, quite naturally, webegan to organize our thinking about the eventsthat were occurring.The first realization to come to us was that theseselves inside of us behaved like real people and thatthey had to be treated with the greatest respect. Ifthey sensed that they were being judged in anyway or manipulated in any way, they withdrew.It also became clear very early that for a self toremain with the facilitator, the facilitator had toremain totally present—the self required a strongenergetic connection to hold it. This was longbefore our more sophisticated development ofthe energetics of Voice Dialogue. It was, however,a beginning.Primary and Disowned SelvesVery early in our explorations we began tosee that we are made up of primary selves—agroup of selves that define our personality. (Wehad some question as to whether we shouldcall them primary or dominant selves and wesettled on primary.) It seemed to us like a verysimple idea. Why hadn’t we ever been able to

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.11 Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguesee this before? Who we think we are is reallya group of selves that we have identified withand these selves become the persona or howwe present ourselves to the world.The next step seemed quite natural andobvious as we continued our work with eachother. Whenever we identify with a primaryself then on the other side, equal and opposite,is its opposite. We called this the disownedself. Nathaniel Branden had first coined theterm: the disowned self. When he talked ofthe disowned self, he was referring, however,to the disowned self as the emotions that aredisowned by people who identify with themind and have a basically rational approach tolife. We spoke with Nathaniel about all of thisand he was comfortable with our using thisterm. We are grateful to him for his largessein this matter because the terms disowned andprimary selves fit together so perfectly.Within the first few years, these ideas weregetting pretty well set. In the earliest years,we used the idea of a Protector-Controller asthe main primary self, the self that set up thebasic rules and was the guardian of the gatesof entry to our inner world. We saw the Pro-tector/Controller as a self that gathered andorganized information about the world aroundus so that we could understand it, a self thatprotected us, and controlled both our behaviorand our environment.It took time before we realized that thiswas a generic term and that every primary selfwas a protector and a controller in its own way,that each had its own way of figuring out theworld around us, and that each primary selflived by its own set of rules. The Protector-Controller is still used by many teachers and isstill a very good self to use at the beginning ofVoice Dialogue. It provides us with a pictureof what clinicians often refer to as the basicdefense structure of the personality.We, however, don’t think in terms of de-fenses; instead we think of the primary selvesin terms of their adaptability and creativity—we honor their attempts to contribute to aperson’s wellbeing. We saw them as selves thatwere central to survival, accomplishment, andthe ability (however limited) to relate to othersand, therefore, always to be regarded with thegreatest degree of respect.Working with OppositesAfter the first excitement of exploring indi-vidual selves, and after the ideas of primary anddisowned selves began to emerge, we began towork more and more with opposites in our worktogether. This happened gradually because in theearliest phase of our work we enjoyed concen-trating on a single self. We spent a great deal oftime working with the Inner Child, the InnerCritic, the Responsible Parent, the ObservingMind, and the Protector/Controller. And we hada great time talking with the disowned selves.Those selves were a lot more adventurous andrambunctious—often quite intense—and usuallyirreverent.We began to see, however, that the real gift ofthe work was not simply talking to selves. Instead,we began to get the sense that the real point ofthe work was working directly with opposites.It seemed important to learn how to separatefrom the primary selves, to talk with the dis-owned selves, and then learn to stand betweenthe opposites (of the primary and disownedselves) clearly feeling both at the same time. Itwas the opposites that were important.It took time for this shift in emphasis tooccur because talking to many voices, andespecially to the disowned selves, was so muchfun. As time passed, we increasingly put ouremphasis on working between the opposites.

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.12Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueBut something was missing —we needed to ad-dress the issue of a model of consciousness thatcould encompass all of this.the third elementThe Consciousness ModelA New Definition of ConsciousnessThe old forms didn’t quite work for us. Weknew that we needed something new, butweren’t quite sure what it was. We rememberdriving across a great flat valley wonder-ing aloud about just what it could be thatwould be beyond the selves and take chargeof life; and what we could do to bring in thespiritual dimension. We tried and tried, butnothing gave us what we were seeking. Thathad to wait.Finally, we looked at the term “Ego”. The Egohas always been seen as the directing agent ofthe personality and it is an excellent term—onewith a long history. It is often described as theexecutive function of the psyche. It is the “I” thatwe refer to when we talk about ourselves.What we began to realize was that thisall-powerful Ego is, in fact, a group of primaryselves that together run our lives and rule thepersonality without anyone knowing it. It canbe the Rational Mind, the Pusher, the Pleaser,the Responsible Parent, the Independent One,the Rebel—it is whatever it is that we think weare—it is whichever selves are running our lives.We decided to call this group of selves—the tradi-tional Ego—the “Operating Ego”.Then we had to develop a new name to describedwhat happened in Voice Dialogue when we sepa-rated from a primary self and returned to center.That center space was no longer occupied by theOperating—or traditional—Ego. The new termwe used was the Aware Ego. We found that thisAware Ego Process evolves and gets stronger andstronger with continuing work. What became in-creasingly clear to us was that the Operating Egois here forever but it gradually surrenders powerto the Aware Ego Process as we separate frommore and more primaries and integrate more andmore disowned selves.Now a new way at looking at consciousnessbegan to emerge.We saw three levels to the process of con-sciousness. First there was the level of Awareness.This has been around for a very long time. It isoften referred to as the witness state in medita-tion. It gives us the ability to step back and seethe big picture. It does not act. It is not attachedto outcome.The second level of consciousness we began to seeas the actual experience of the selves, the experienceof life itself. Awareness does not experience. Itwitnesses. Awareness without experience isolatesus from life. Experience without awareness keepsus locked into the animal kingdom. Both are es-sential to an ongoing consciousness process.Then there was the new kid on the block. Some-one has to live our lives; someone has to drive our(psychological) car. Someone has to use the gift ofawareness and the treasure of experience and, for us,that someone or something was the Aware Ego or,more accurately, the Aware Ego Process. We real-ized that this was an ongoing dynamic processthat was always changing, that there was no suchthing as an Aware Ego.As a matter of fact, over the years we havecome to see that consciousness itself is aprocess—with each of the three levels of con-sciousness representing a distinct, individuallyevolving process.Honoring the Primary SelvesWe were learning a great deal about primaryselves in those early years and the learninghas never stopped. There is one thing that we

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.13Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialogueunderstood from the beginning that has stoodus in good stead all through the years. One mustalways honor the primary self. In the practice ofVoice Dialogue this is probably one of strongestrecommendations we can make. The primaryself is the ally of the facilitator. Both have theinterests and wellbeing of the client at heart andthere must be a mutual respect and deep un-derstanding between the primary selves and thefacilitator.What we learned early in the practice ofVoice Dialogue has yet deeper and more farreaching implications for living life. We arealways dealing with people and essentially we arealways dealing with their primary selves. Know-ing this can save us much unhappiness.Many years ago, very early in our work to-gether, we were at a social gathering and a rathertraditional psychologist asked us about our work.Not yet truly appreciating how important it wasto honor the primary selves in the “real world”,we opened up to him and shared our ideas andwork. He became very judgmental as he aggres-sively questioned us about the empirical basis forour work and wanted to know exactly what kindsof experiments we had designed and carried out.He accused us of making up these selves andmade some vague threats about malpractice. Allin all, it was a very unpleasant experience.We are fast learners and we learned fromthis experience to feel into people more carefullyand to explore the nature of their primary selvesbefore we shared our ideas and feelings. We havetried our best not to share our work with peoplewho are not ready to listen. As we’ve often said,“We go only where the door is already open.”After this experience, we were much more cau-tious. We began to screen invitations to speakand, before we spoke with a new group, we didour best to determine the nature of the primaryself system that dominated that particular group,clinic or center. This kind of sensitivity wasparticularly important when we were working inother cultures. It’s important to know the rules,and to use language and concepts that do notpolarize the primary selves. This attention to theprimary selves in our surroundings has savedus untold discomfort—both professionally andpersonally.the fourth elementThe Theory of Bonding PatternsThe Selves and RelationshipWe are giving a very short version of our theo-retical structure. This material is available indetailed form in our books, CDs and our DVDdocumentary. In this article we are attemptingto give you a more sweeping view of where wehave come from. Someone who worked withus in the late 1970s or 1980’s cannot help buthave a very limited idea of what we are doingtoday. We do not enjoy stagnation and neitherdoes our unconscious. When some new ideaemerged or methodology changed then we let itchange. Sometimes we weren’t even aware of achange, it evolved so naturally. It is confusing tomany people to watch this happen. For us, it isvery exciting to see the work evolve and to bringeveryone along as a part of this process.We met in 1972 and we were married in 1977.This article is not about our personal life. We raisedfive children between us and the personal workwe were doing with each other helped us enor-mously in understanding our parental role. Thesewere also the years when Sidra was the ExecutiveDirector of Hamburger Home, a residential treat-ment center for adolescent girls and Hal was theDirector of the Center for the Healing Arts. Ourprofessional lives were completely separate, but ourwork together and the evolution of our thinkingwere central aspects of our lives.

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.14Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueThose five years of work clarified our rela-tionship and made marriage possible. We wereusing Voice Dialogue in our respective practicesand Hal had started to do some teaching of theprocess at the Center. It was becoming increas-ingly clear to us that in relationships selves wereconstantly interacting with the selves of theother person. With our marriage, however, someof the interactions between us were turningquite sour. Old patterns suddenly emerged butwith the new partner—a partner who was totallydifferent from the previous one. We called oneanother by the names of our former spouses. Wefound ourselves judging each other—often forthe same qualities that had attracted us to oneanother in the first place. We literally becameother people: judgmental, closed, and humorless.Underneath it all there was a vague feeling ofbetrayal, helplessness and desperation.What was happening? Was marriage neces-sarily the end of love? There had to be a way ofunderstanding these painfully divisive interac-tions, of bringing them under some kind ofcontrol. We wanted our relationship back. Weknew that the selves we had worked with overthe previous years had something to do with this.It was obvious to us that a set of selves had takencharge of our relationship. There was no more“us”, there was no more connection, and the vul-nerable children that were a part of our relation-ship from the very beginning were nowhere tobe found.This was the start of a remarkable threemonths of a new kind of exploration. We lookedat the selves that had taken over our relation-ship and tried to figure out what was reallygoing on. We wrote down and diagrammed outevery negative interaction that we had. We didthis over and over and over again until a patternbegan to emerge. We began to see how thesenegative interactions followed a basically simplepattern that repeated itself.Hal would get angry with Sidra and suddenlyhe was no longer Hal, he was a cold judgmen-tal father talking to her. She became a victim/defensive daughter and argued back. Then, inthe blink of an eye, she became a judgmentalmother—withdrawn, critical and cold—andalthough Hal became a hurt and vulnerable sonto this cruel mother, still his judgmental fatherattacked. There were always four selves (or sets ofselves) involved. We replayed this scenario overand over again but now we were beginning to seethe pattern. We looked for all the selves involvedin these interactions. Some were more apparentthan others. But they were always all there.We named this pattern a “bonding pattern” inrecognition that it was basically a set of parent/child interactions. We also felt that this was a wayto honor it as a normal way of relating as contrastedto a pathological one. In those years, we looked atthese patterns as basically an interaction betweenpower selves and disempowered selves. As timewent on, our views of this have clarified; the par-ent/child nature of the interaction has becomeever more apparent and we have come to see thisbonding pattern as the basic default pattern in allrelationships.We discovered other constants in theseinteractions. All bonding patterns grew out of thenegation or disowning of vulnerability. This tookmany forms, but it was always present. When ourinteractions became negative we could alwaystrace back to a time when we lost contact withour core vulnerability (or what we called ourInner Child). Something had happened to hurtit, to frighten it off and we had ignored this;instead we had reacted in a more seemingly adultfashion. We had basically disowned our vulner-able child. If we could hold on to the child, (or toour vulnerability) and took care of this directly,these negative patterns lost their power; they

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.15Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguedidn’t need to play themselves out.The other constant we discovered was a tru-ism that we had recognized from our early deal-ings with selves. Whatever you judge is a disownedself of your own. In these negative interactions, orbonding patterns, our judgments would flare upand assume center stage. We looked carefully atthis. Gradually it became clear to us that as wereacted to each other negatively we were, in fact,being given pictures of our own disowned selves.If we recognized this, we could use it as a teach-ing in our own relationship—and we could helpothers see this in theirs.This was almost painful to realize. We hadhoped we were beyond this. Besides, our judg-ments were so much fun. It was such a wonderfulfeeling to pin the other up against the wall withbrilliant and self-righteous criticisms. It was sowonderful to be unquestionably right.If, however, our judgments are reflectionsof our disowned selves, then where’s the fun?How can you feel righteous in the middle ofa “righteous dance” in full knowledge of thefact that you are basically attacking your owndisowned self or selves?We had some wild and (in retrospect) funnyinterchanges as we closed in on the bondingpattern theory. One evening we were still arguingover a particular bonding pattern at 11:00 PMand Sidra finally said that she was exhaustedand going to bed. Hal continued to work on thepattern, simmering in the heat of his judgmentsand furious at Sidra’s comment that he wasn’tin his Aware Ego. After about 10 minutes Halstormed into the bedroom and with great graceand dignity yelled at her: “I am too in an AwareEgo.” We both laughed and that was the end ofthat one. Such is the snake-like path of the co-exploration of consciousness.Our excitement at this time was enormous.What was emerging was something quite new.It was something that worked for us in everydayTeaching in Holland 1987

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.16Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguelife. It was a simple, precise, and elegant wayof looking at relationships that had a sense of amathematical certainty and balance. Later we cameto think of it as a kind of technology of relationship.Our excitement about all of this was magnifiedas we realized that the theory of bonding patternsgave us a very creative (and non-pathologizing)way to look at the transference. The same principleswere operating. The only difference is that we referto it as transference if we get paid and bondingpatterns if we don’t. We’ve come to call this “ThePsychology of the Transference”.There was immediate gratification from our dis-covery of bonding patterns. We felt better. Feelingsof love and intimacy returned. Of course, we had toaccustom ourselves to the loss of self-righteousness(that deliciously seductive feeling) but we were a lothappier with each other.There’s something wonderfully freeing aboutescaping from a negative bonding pattern. Andit totally changed the nature of working withcouples, making it a joy rather than a nightmare.Teaching people about the bonding patterns andthen working with the selves created a wonder-ful path to change and we used it ourselves withincreasing effectiveness.It was much later that we began to attend tothe positive bonding patterns and to realize howoften these set the stage for the appearance ofnegative ones.the fifth elementThe Psychology of the Aware EgoAn Energetically Based Psycho-SpiritualApproach to ConsciousnessWith the theory of bonding patterns in placeand the re-defining of consciousness providingus with a model that seemed effective over time,we began to think about actually changing thetitle of our work to the Psychology of the AwareEgo. We realized more and more that the corework was not about talking to selves. This wasimportant but not as much as the developmentof an Aware Ego Process. This was really the keyto the kind of changes we were looking for.We saw that people could work forever withselves but until there was a true separation anddis-identification from the primary self, changeswere easily lost. We saw that, without an AwareEgo Process, the primary self would automaticallyregain control. This Aware Ego Process evolvesbetween any pair of opposites. Some common op-posite sets of selves are power and vulnerability,pusher and beach bum, thinking and feeling,control and release.There are many sets of opposites and theAware Ego Process emerges from one set at atime. Clarity in one area does not mean clarityin all areas. For instance, we find the someonedevelops an Aware Ego process that is capableof holding the tension of opposites between themental and the feeling selves but—at the sametime—has no Aware Ego Process when it comesto spirituality. This same individual who doessuch a good job of embracing both feelings andthinking, still might be totally identified withspirituality and reject selves that are ordinary orinstinctual.For a spiritually identified person to developan Aware Ego Process in relationship to spiri-tuality, he or she would have to do work thatseparates him/her from the spiritual self so thatthere is an Aware Ego Process that can see it andexperience it but not be identified with it. Thisseparation can be very difficult but we have dis-covered a truly fascinating self we call the “spiri-tual pusher” that runs the life of many a spiritualseeker. After the separation from this spiritualself (or the spiritual seeker) there would be thechallenge to discover and integrate the spiritualsloth, the “ordinary” self, and the instinctual.

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.17Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueConversely, someone who rejects spiritualityfrom a primary self that is rational and mental mustlearn to unhook from the rational mind so that theAware Ego can begin to see the rational mind asa separate self/energy system. This makes a spacefor the spiritual selves to emerge and be properlyembraced. At this point, we have an Aware Egostanding between the more earthbound rules andexperiences of the mind and the numinous realmsand experiences of the world of the spirit.At times it has felt to us as though we wererunning a divorce court. In this framework wehelp people to learn how to get a divorce fromtheir primary selves. Once a person is divorcedfrom a primary self, the Aware Ego can learnhow to use that energy in a conscious way. Noth-ing is lost. The primary self simply begins to op-erate under the aegis of an Aware Ego that hasall the information and input from that primaryself but, in addition to this, has the complemen-tary information and input from the oppositeself or selves.We have tried to give you a feeling of theongoing process we have been in as our work hasdeveloped. The focus on the Aware Ego dramati-cally changes the nature of the Voice Dialogueprocess. Whatever work we may be doing withselves, the primary focus is how to support theAware Ego in its evolutionary process. It is thistransformation of the work that moves the sys-tem onto the larger world stage. It now becomesmore of a philosophy of life. Yet at the same timeit remains a system that anyone can integrateinto their work and it is not opposed to, or fight-ing against, any psycho-spiritual system.The Importance ofthe Aware Ego ProcessOur hope is that all the facilitators and teachers willhave a basic understanding of the Aware Ego Pro-cess. If this understanding is there, then the applica-tions of the Psychology of Selves and the actual use ofVoice Dialogue will be much more effective. Delib-erately activating a self or energy system is avery exciting use of the Psychology of Selves.But we do not see this as Voice Dialogue. Forus, Voice Dialogue—in addition to the directwork with selves—includes an experience ofopposites and an Aware Ego Process.We finally decided not to officially changethe name of the work to the Psychology of theAware Ego a number of years ago. Voice Dia-logue, Relationship and the Psychology of Selveshas achieved such a strong name recognitionthat we decided to let it rest there. Our sense isthat there is a gradual increased use of the terms“Aware Ego Process or Psychology of the AwareEgo” amongst practitioners and teachers andeventually this shift in name may well take place.The Aware Ego and SpiritualityWe are often asked: “What is the relationshipof the Aware Ego to spirituality?” or “How doesthe Voice Dialogue process address the issue ofspirituality?” We would like to take this opportu-nity to address these questions.For us, it is important to understand thatspirituality has two different components thathave to be considered separately. One compo-nent of spirituality has to do with the rules.The second component has to do with tran-scendent experiences—the experience of God,of the Higher Intelligence, of the Transperson-al or whatever name best expresses an experi-ence that goes beyond ordinary consciousnessand the words that can describe it.Generally in the development of religiousinstitutions there is first the transcendentexperience and then a body of rules develops tosupport this experience and bring it to others.These rules usually become more numerous andpowerful as time passes and eventually they may

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.18Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguewell cover over the original experience.For us, the transcendent experience is a veryreal and glorious gift. Who in us receives thisgift and what is done with this gift can vary.When a self receives this gift—let us assumethat it is a spiritual self—then that self usu-ally develops a series of rules and expectationsabout this experience. And that self judgesother selves that are different and polarizesagainst anything or anyone that does not fit inwith its expectations and follow its rules.We see this as the way in which many spiri-tual or religious institutions evolve. The originalexperience is taken up by a primary self (or theprimary self of the group) that guards it andkeeps out anything that might destroy it. Onlythe energy of that particular self is consideredgood and it is to that self and its rules that onemust surrender. We know that much can begained by this kind of surrender; this is the basicpremise of the Guru/disciple relationship. Thedisciple surrenders to the Guru and—in do-ing so—can receive the gift of the transcendentexperience.In contrast, the Aware Ego surrenders to allenergies or selves. This is quite different fromsurrendering only to the spiritual energies.This means very simply that the Aware Ego iscommitted to hearing, seeing and feeling allthe different selves. It excludes none. Whenone self starts to dominate, it is the job of theAware Ego to find the opposites on the otherside and to consider their input as well. In thissense the Aware Ego is like an orchestra con-ductor who welcomes all the instruments andthen uses their individual contributions to singthe song of the soul.Learning to surrender to all of the selvesrequires constant work with our negative judg-ments towards people (and things) to help theAware Ego in its constant evolution towardsclarity. Whenever we feel judgments towardssomeone or something, we know that we are ina primary self because the judgments come fromthe selves, not the Aware Ego.You may well ask “But how do you knowwhen you are in an Aware Ego? How do youknow that it is an Aware Ego that is doingthe surrendering at any moment? Might younot be fooled by the Mind that loves to act asthough it were God or any other primary selffor that matter?”The answer is that we don’t. We don’t knowwhen we are in an Aware Ego except for briefmoments of time. If your responsible self hasjust been facilitated and you can feel yourseparation from it, the most you can say is thatat this moment of time you have an AwareEgo Process operating in relationship to re-sponsibility; at this moment you have a certainlevel of understanding of this responsible selfand a certain separation from it.A second answer is that when we are con-vinced we are operating from an Aware Ego, weare not. We are most probably identified with aspiritual self, a rational mind, or a control self.All of these have a sense of certainty to them,and they like to masquerade as the Aware Ego.So as the Aware Ego bows down to the dif-ferent gods and goddesses of the light and thedark, of heaven and earth, of good and bad, ofbody and spirit, of knowing and not knowing, itis embracing both of the opposites. It is the “and”rather than the “either/or”. It truly represents theMiddle Way.We see the Aware Ego as surrendered to theIntelligence of the Universe. This intelligencecan manifest in many different ways. It is notpersonal in any sense, though for some of us itmay manifest through our personal relationships.Others can see it with utmost clarity in the

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.19Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguedream process. For still others it may manifestin meditation or spiritual practice. For manyscientists it manifests in the organizing principleat work in the material world and—on a grandscale—in the galaxies. Whatever the case, theAware Ego must be surrendered to the realityof this higher intelligence and how it can beperceived operating in his or her personaluniverse.For us, the Aware Ego must also be surren-dered to the way that this higher intelligenceoperates in human relationship. It must be sur-rendered to the idea that everyone in our lifeis potentially a teacher for us. We understandthat peoples’ reactions to us must be takenseriously. And we learn to use our own nega-tive judgments of people as a teaching deviceto discover our own disowned selves.The Aware Ego is an expression of apsycho-spiritual consciousness process. TheAware Ego has the job of embracing the worldof Spirit in all of its glory and, on the otherside, the world of physical matter, of emotion,of passion, and of psychological and mentalrealities.For us, it is important to not confuse spiritualitywith consciousness. A consciousness process encom-passes spirituality. Spirituality does not necessarilyencompass a consciousness process. Spirituality doesnot encompass matter or instinctual energies. Thatis why so many people in the spiritual traditionlose the connection to their bodies and theirinstincts. An Aware Ego process requires us to do thework of spirit and the work of relationship and thephysical world. For ourselves, we must say what adelight it has been, and what a delight in continuesto be, to spend our lives in these kinds of explorations.Teaching in France 1989

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.20Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueMoving into Many WorldsPeople use Voice Dialogue and the Aware EgoProcess in many different settings and with manydifferent kinds of clients. Management consul-tants have found a way to use the Voice Dialoguetechnique and the concepts of the Psychology ofSelves and bonding patterns in a business set-ting with individuals who are not at all interestedin consciousness issues. They have translated thelanguage we use here to make it work within adifferent frame of reference and for a different setof primary selves.Coaches or a management consultants might,for example, speak of “traditional habits” or“familiar strategies” versus “unexplored creativepotential” rather than talk of primary versusdisowned selves. They are not likely to use a termlike “Aware Ego” because this kind of languagemight not be acceptable in a business setting.So they improvise—some quite brilliantly—andmany have experienced great success.One of our major teachers keeps a focus onwhat we call “being” energy because she feelsthat is extremely important. Others use this “be-ing” energy as a vehicle for igniting the spiritualenergies.Other teachers are specializing in workingwith the selves involved in addiction. In thefield of Western medicine, there are research-ers who are beginning to investigate the neu-robiological aspects of consciousness, medita-tion, and the selves.In a totally different arena, this work hasproven extremely valuable for training actors.There, too, different words are used that matchthe requirements of the situation. There is evenan internationally acclaimed Tango coach whouses the energetics of this work in his training ofcompetitive dancers.There are a myriad of ways to work with theselves and we are delighted to see the creativityand the diversity of these new developments.Body Dialogue:The Work of Judith Tamar StoneThis is a perfect place to introduce the innova-tions of Judith Tamar Stone, Hal’s daughter,who has added an entirely new dimension to thiswork. In her early twenties Judith was working atBlue Cross and very much committed to a careerin business. Her plans were interrupted whenshe developed a debilitating medical condi-tion that was diagnosed as rheumatoid arthritis.Her symptoms were so severe that she had toabandon those particular professional plans anddevote herself to her own healing process.Judith made a choice at that time to not fol-low the orthodox medical model that is generallyprescribed for these kinds of arthritic conditions.She found an MD who was open to the idea ofher trying different treatment modalities and thisbegan a remarkable journey of exploration andhealing that lasted five years in its more activephase but in reality has continued to this day.Judith opened herself to ongoing psychother-apy, to many different forms of complementarymedicine, and to certain aspects of traditionalWestern medicine. She took all of us along withher on her journey. Hal, in particular, has beendelighted to work with many of the people Ju-dith discovered in her own explorations. Withoutthe constant health-oriented input and recom-mendations Judith has given to Hal through theyears, it is quite possible that he would not behere today.Very gradually, out of the profound experi-ence that she was going through with her ownhealing process, Judith began to develop a veryspecial and different kind of connection to herbody. It became much more real to her than it is

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.21Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialogueto most of us who don’t spend much time sens-ing into the body. She began to shift her overallprofessional identification to psychology andshe used the Voice Dialogue work as one of thecentral healing modalities of her own healingjourney. Over the years she has become one ofthe senior teachers of our work.What also began to evolve was an entirelynew and different aspect of the Voice Dialoguework that Judith called Body Dialogue. Whatshe realized, from her own experience, was thatthe body had a voice that could speak for it. Shealso discovered that many of the individual partsof the body were able to speak and to give spe-cifically targeted information and guidance.Even more significantly, Judith began totune in to the fact that the physical body carriedan intelligence and that one could activate this“intelligence of the body” and receive remarkableinformation and guidance. The process of work-ing with the body in this way began slowly andthrough the years has developed into what weconsider a major contribution to Voice Dialogueand the Psychology of Selves.the sixth elementThe Energetics of RelationshipLearning to Play Your Own InstrumentThere have been a great many periods of excite-ment in our adventures together as we’ve developedthis body of work. Certainly one of the most pro-found and most gratifying has been the Energeticsof Voice Dialogue and the Psychology of Selves.Hal was first introduced to the world of energy bythe work of William Brugh Joy in 1974 when hemade his first public appearance at the Center forthe Healing Arts’ summer conference. It was a trulyseminal moment in the world of consciousnessbecause large numbers of students flocked to Brughand were introduced to the body’s energy fields andshown how to work with them.In Central Australia 2002

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.22Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueAt that time the energy had to do with heal-ing. Hal was not interested in becoming a healerper se, but the world of energy was opened tohim by Brugh and, over the next few years, hedeveloped his own style of energy work thathe called field clearing. It has always been asignificant part of our lives and our work andhas helped us move through difficult physicalchallenges both at home and, perhaps even moreimportant, on our travels.It was only after we met that we began toconsider the world of healing as it applies to per-sonal relationship. Early on in our explorationstogether, we began to notice that different selvesactually felt different from other selves. Beingwith a vulnerable child or a loving parent feltlike being in the room with an energy machinethat gave off a warm glow that could be sensedand that made a palpable connection. We calledthat “personal energy”. Facilitating the mind wastotally different. The mind generally gave off noenergy and we did not feel a connection. Wecalled that “impersonal energy”. One was warmand connected, the other cool with clear, crispboundaries. These are two very different ways ofmeeting the world.We paid more and more attention to what webegan to call “the energetics” of Voice Dialogue.Different selves had different energies connectedto them. If we were facilitating sensual energy(which we called Aphrodite energy) we couldsense a tingling in the skin of our whole body.If we were facilitating the higher self we couldfeel a powerful sensation in the top of our head,the crown energy. Though Hal had learned aboutenergetic reality through the work at the Center,Sidra seemed to have a totally natural connectionto it. We began to see that some of the difficul-ties of our interactions were based on energeticrealities we hadn’t previously known. Sidra’sprimary self was personal in those early years andHal’s primary self was impersonal.We began to recognize that some of ourmost impassioned judgments towards eachother were based on this difference. Whenwe first starting teaching together this was areal problem. Sidra said of Hal that if some-one in the front row of the audience faintedand fell to the floor, Hal wouldn’t noticeit. Hal said of Sidra that if someone in thelast row of the audience got up to go to thebathroom, Sidra would be upset because shefelt abandoned or judged.One time we were teaching and at the endof the first hour at the break Sidra asked Hal ifhe had seen the couple in the front row rightin front of him. Hal didn’t know what she wastalking about. She then pointed them out tohim and it was a couple that was apparentlyinvolved in S&M practices. The girl was wear-ing a very large metal collar around her neckand metal bands around her ankles embeddedwith metal rings for bondage. Hal was quitesure that he was the only one in the room thathad missed seeing that.Another time Sidra and Hal were walkingon the beach near Santa Barbara and Hal—in full impersonal energy—was immersed inthe ideas they were discussing. Sidra stoppedwalking and, with a smile, asked Hal: “Hal,would you mind looking around and seeingwhere you are?” To his great astonishment hediscovered that they were in the middle ofa nude beach and that all around him therewere naked sun worshippers. It was not onlyimpersonal energy that created this dimin-ished perception, but impersonal energywas certainly a good part of it. Hal’s basicprimary selves were impersonal and he justdidn’t make an energetic connection withthe world around him.In more recent years, we have begun to use

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.23Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguethe word “linkage” or “energetic linkage” whentalking about this energetic connection. Whenwe got into negative bonding patterns, whenjudgments took over, we lost our linkage. Thingsfelt hopeless between us. Then we did our workwith each other. Maybe Hal discovered he hadbeen holding back his reactions. Maybe Sidradiscovered she was pushing too hard.Whatever the case, by doing our work witheach other we got back our linkage. We wouldfeel energetically connected again. We felt likenewlyweds. This happened over and over again.We were beginning to see with absolute claritythat it wasn’t marriage that destroyed love andintimacy. It was the development of negativebonding patterns and the ensuing loss of linkage.This happened repeatedly. Hal’s feelingswould get hurt. Maybe he was jealous of Sidraat a party when she was energetically connectingwith other men. If he didn’t share his jealousy,his vulnerability—whatever forms that sharingtook—his inner child disappeared from view. Heused to joke about it disappearing into the uni-verse about a hundred light years away when thishappened. What we realized was that linkageended at that moment. Linkage is real. When itis lacking it is very lonely and the relationshipfeels terrible. And—unless you know about whatyou have just lost—it is not so easy to get it back.We began to examine the nature of peoples’linkage. You can be linked to your dog or cat.You can be linked to a child. You can be linkedto your work, or your computer, or your book,or your television set, or your secretary, or tomoney. Or to worry, or to your “to do” list. Orto alcohol, or to drugs, or to food, or to exer-cise. You can even be linked to your spiritualpractices or to your consciousness process.In relationship work we began to see thatif the primary linkage wasn’t between the twopeople in the relationship, then there wereproblems. The primary linkage might go to oneof the children, creating a kind of psychologicalmarriage between the parent and that child. Thishappens with great frequency and then, if themarriage breaks up and the parent meets someoneshe/he loves, there is as wrenching disconnectfrom the son or daughter who had carried theprimary linkage before the arrival of the newpartner. This awareness of linkage introduced anew dimension to our considerations of familyrelationships and led us to a deeper understand-ing of the intense pain involved in step parent-ing and the introduction of a new partner into afamily system.Our work with energetics was in two basicareas. First, there was the fact that every selfcould be experienced energetically and that theawareness of this was of utmost importance. Wesaw clearly that the effectiveness of the facilitatorwas dependent upon the recognition of the energyand the ability to hold this. We realized that thebest facilitators worked at an energetic—ratherthan verbal—level. They paid more attentionto maintaining the energetic integrity of a selfthan to asking it the “proper” questions.There is another aspect to the facilitator’ssensitivity to energetics. If the facilitator wasable to use energetics, then he or she couldoften help a self to emerge by a process ofenergetic induction. This works like a tun-ing fork—you strike the tuning fork and setit down on a sounding board. The soundingboard then vibrates at the same frequency—giving off the same note. The facilitator oper-ates like a tuning fork, calling up a specific en-ergy within himself or herself and the subjectresponds with the same. In this way, and whenappropriate, the facilitator can help to induct asought-after energy. This is particularly helpfulwhen helping people to learn how to utilizepersonal and impersonal energies.

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.24Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueThis was a whole new world to explore. Wealso began to teach the Aware Ego how to bringinto itself, or channel, the different energies and,here again, it was the awakening of a whole newworld. We literally taught people how to “playtheir own instruments”, how to affect theirown energy fields. This work was particularlyimportant because it was a way of strengthen-ing the Aware Ego Process and empoweringthe individual.The second area of work with energetics was ourexploration and experimentation with linkage. W elooked at linkage as it related to bonding patterns andsaw how it led to an increased understanding of thedynamics of family systems.Hal has one strong memory here of anexperience with Sidra that catapulted him to anew understanding and appreciation of linkage.A good many of the negative bonding patternshe got into with Sidra had to do with feeling leftout when she was with her children. Since herbasic energies were personal, the linkage withher daughters was very strong. One day theywere alone in their home in Southern Califor-nia; it was the first day that all of the childrenwere away. They were sitting on the two ends ofthe couch and there was a very strong energeticlinkage—they could feel a buzz between theirhearts. Hal was a very happy man. This processwent on for five minutes or so and suddenlystopped completely.Hal asked Sidra what had happened. Sidrathen said something that was truly remarkablefor Hal. She said that she was doing an experi-ment. She wanted to see what would happen ifshe visualized her daughter in the next room.When she did that, the linkage between themended totally and her energies automatically (orunconsciously) went to her daughter.Hal had been working on his judgmentsabout Sidra’s mothering for a long time. Sud-denly he understood at a very deep level how thisprocess works. If a mother has children, and ifone or more of those children is near her, thenher primary linkage is going to shift to the child.We don’t mean every time but we do mean mostof the time. What Hal saw is that the mother ishard wired to link with her child. This is not aconscious choice so if we want to be very clear,we call it “unconscious linkage”.If Hal wanted quality time with Sidra awayfrom the children, he had to learn how to go toher with his own intimacy needs and make themclear to her without sounding either like a whinyvictim child or a killer judgmental father (he hadan advanced black belt in both, but they werenot very useful). She then was able to becomeaware of where her energies were and was able tohandle them in a more conscious way. She couldreinstate her linkage with Hal—and she couldeven maintain her connection to a child at thesame time. We call that “conscious linkage”.This was a turning point in Hal’s life andinterestingly enough, as we might well expectin this kind of process relationship, Sidrawas able to more effectively look at her ownlinkage issues with her children. Because shenow knew what was happening, she finallyhad some choice and she was able to begin tocontrol where her energies went.Everything changed in the work and in thetheory with these kinds of experiences. For thenewer person, Voice Dialogue may well look like asimple technique; just ask the right questions andyou’ll get to the self. For anyone who senses intothe underlying energetics of the work, it becomessomething quite different. Experienced facilitatorsare able to work at deeper and deeper levels as theybecome more at home with the energetic realities thatare in us and that determine so much of what hap-pens in our lives and in our relationships.And so it was that we began the practice of

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.25Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialoguehelping people to develop mastery in the worldof energy. Sidra describes this process as teachingpeople how to play their own instrumentsso as to be able to meet the world within andthe world outside with ever increasing levels ofsubtlety and imagination. And, as we age, we findthis ability to dance with the energies is truly oneof the loveliest gifts imaginable.Recently Sidra had a dream in which threewomen in their mid 90s came to our hometo teach us about aging. What they basicallytaught is that as we get older our relationship toenergetics becomes more and more important.We had to learn at ever deepening levels howto run our own energies, how to call up thenecessary energies to do whatever it is that weneeded to do.Thus it is that learning to play our energeticinstrument becomes an integral part of VoiceDialogue and the Psychology of Selves. Wehave not written a separate book on theenergetics of relationship, but it is includedin our book Partnering and in the CD sets“The Aware Ego” and “Partnering: The Artof Conscious Relationship”. For the energeticsof Voice Dialogue, see Robert Stamboliev’s TheEnergetics of V oice Dialogue.the seventh elementPartneringUsing Relationship asTeacher, Healer, and GuideIn the last ten years, we’ve begun to think of ourkind of relationship as a partnering relationship.A partnering model of relationship is a non-hi-erarchical way of being with someone. This wayCollaboration in Recent Years—On Our Back Porch at Sunset

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.26Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialogueof thinking about relationship can be applied toall relationships but its primary focus has par-ticular application to ongoing primary relation-ships. In addition to being non-hierarchical it isalso seen by us as being a serious Joint Venture inboth a personal and business sense.As part of this Joint Venture, both peoplemust be surrendered to some level of a psycho-spiritual process in their own personal livesand also surrendered to such a process in theirrelational lives together. It is important here tounderstand that the surrender is not to the otherperson but to the relationship itself.The ability and willingness to surrender tothe process of relationship has a number ofmajor consequences. For one thing, your part-ner/friend becomes your teacher just as youbecome their teacher. Another way of thinkingabout the Partnering Model is simply to thinkof it in the sense of Relationship as Teacher.There is another consequence to this process.We gradually learn to embrace the disownedselves that we carry for each other. This happensover a very long period of time. Ultimately wecome to the discovery that in each of us lives anintroject of our partner. Sidra is learning aboutthe energy configurations in her that correspondto Hal. Hal is learning about the energy configu-rations that correspond to Sidra. This is a veryexciting process and one that allows a continuingconscious separation of the two people and a yetdeeper clarity regarding the whole issue of bond-ing patterns.There is an extensive ongoing learning processwhere both people must learn the basics of thepsychology of selves, the Aware Ego Process,the consciousness model, the work with bondingpatterns, the understanding of energetic realities,and the relationship to the physical body. Thereevolves an ever deepening relationship to thespiritual dimension and, hopefully, there is someconnection to the dream process that is sharedin the relationship. We have seen that, over time,the dreams can become an increasingly power-ful inner teacher both in our lives and in ourrelationships.The concept of a Joint Venture also hasmajor consequences. Every aspect of relation-ship involves a joint decision making process.There is nothing wrong with one person beingresponsible for taking care of finances. It issimply that the other person cannot abdicateresponsibility for finances. The other personmust not become an unconscious daughter orson just because someone else is taking themajor responsibility for a particular area. In apartnership, both partners are liable—even ifone has a special expertise or interest in oneaspect of the business of living.In this light, an ongoing partnering relation-ship can be seen in part as a serious businessventure between two people, one that requires agood deal of time and energy. We strongly rec-ommend business meetings where the businessissues of life can be dealt with. That may soundunromantic, but if there aren’t regular businessmeetings, then the business of life—the require-ments of everyday living—have a tendency toinvade all available space and to be handledunconsciously.We live our lives most of the time out ofour primary selves. This changes as we do ourpsycho-spiritual work. We begin to have a choiceabout who is going to live our life—or, as we liketo say, who is going to drive our psychologicalcar. As partners we must decide over and overagain who is going to do what and when. Who isgoing to call the friends about the party? Who isgoing to take the clothes to the cleaner?Default unconsciously decides whatever part-ners do not decide consciously together. This isanalogous to the default position on a computer.

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.27Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice DialogueThe computers we use came with default settingsfor each application; there are hundreds of de-fault positions. They work, but they’re generic. Ifyou want to use the computer in a more personal,creative and artistic way, then you must learnhow to change these settings so that you havereal choice as to how it will operate.If you wish to have a more creative, imagina-tive and sensual connection to each other, youneed to be constantly handling the business andpersonal decisions—determining what belongsto each of you at a certain time and then work-ing out who does what. In this way, you do notlive your relationship via default positions, whichsimply means through your primary selves.Instead, you are a team—constantly workingtogether to support the Aware Ego Process ineach of you. The gradual integration of what-ever it is that the partner carries for us greatlyenhances our ability to make conscious decisionsand choices.The psychological work is essential to discoverwho is running our lives and who is living ourrelationships. The spiritual work is essential becausewithout a sense of spiritual reality / God / HigherIntelligence our lives cannot expand beyond purelypersonal considerations. The work with energeticreality is essential because for a truly satisfyingrelationship, the primary energetic connection mustbe between the two people involved.All of this is an ongoing process that canlast forever. One of the greatest surprises anddelights of our aging process is the amount ofchange, creativity, and intimacy that remains forMorning Mists at Our Home in Albion

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.28Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialogueus in a true partnering relationship. The continu-ing support of our dreams is truly awesome, andthe profound power of the Intelligence of thePsyche becomes more and more of an everydayaffair accompanying our ongoing and ever-pres-ent dance with the world of bonding patterns.the eighth elementDreams, Daydreams and theIntelligence of the UnconsciousAccessing the Inner TeacherAs we mentioned earlier in this article, dreamsand visualization have always played an impor-tant part of our explorations. At the very begin-ning Sidra, in particular, was deeply impacted bya series of visualizations that initiated her intosome of the very deepest waters of the uncon-scious. With time the work with visualizationbecame less important to us as Voice Dialogueand the dream process became more primary.And in recent years we have found ourselvesplacing an ever-increasing emphasis on the dreamprocess for ourselves and with our clients. Wehave also enjoyed working with daydreams as wediscovered how daytime fantasies provided a goldmine of information about what is happening inpeople’s lives (including ours).What we first became aware of was the factthat when people began to develop an Aware EgoProcess and were able to stand between opposites,the nature of their dreams began to change. Theybecame clearer. They become more organized.We have always known this at some level, butsomehow our understanding and appreciation ofthis process changed. We watched clients beginto decode their own dreams in relatively shortperiods of time, depending, in large measure, onthe strength of the Aware Ego Process.As this process continued, we saw that theintelligence of the unconscious began to manifestin an ever more powerful way, and we found thatthe dream process itself was becoming the teacherfor people. We had experienced this earlier in ourown lives as we watched how the unconscious or-ganized itself and seemed to have its own agendafor our development.What is this intelligence? Where does it comefrom? What does it want from us? And how doesit manifest in our lives?We became aware of the fact that the dreamego, or how the dreamer appears in his or her owndream, gives us a picture of how the primary self isbehaving. This seemed to be true of most dreams,though not all of them. Occasionally the dream egowould represent not the current primary self system(or operating ego) but instead, the disowned self.Then we began to ask for the daydreams ordaytime fantasies of people. These are differentfrom the visualizations of guided imagery. Theseare not deliberately sought after like visualiza-tions; instead, they are going on much of the timeeven though many people have no awareness atall that they are, in fact, daydreaming. These day-dreams play like background music—and nobodyknows who put it on.For example, imagine that you are driving inyour car and someone passes you and then cutsin front of you. You are angry and, in your mind,you begin to talk to that driver, expressing youroutrage at what happened. This can go on for along period of time and can totally destabilizeyou. Some people will continue this daydreamand imagine that they drive after the other personand deliberately crash into him and hurt him.Others will have just a momentary flash of furyor a fleeting image of destruction.The “you” of the daydream generally gives us apicture of your disowned self. Your primary self maybe calm, controlled and rational. The disowned selfthat emerges in your daydream is an energy thatcarries the rage, anger, and resentment that is gener-

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This article was found at: www.voicedialogue.org. Please visit us for more articles and other resources.29Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.The Basic Elements of Voice Dialogueally kept under control. We found that by listeningto people’s daydreams and by making them awarethat they are having daydreams, they begin to get apicture of a disowned self.Once the picture is clear, then there is thechance to explore the self. In this example, thereis a chance to learn how to stand between thecontrol and rationality of the primary self thatcontinues to drive carefully and the more uncivi-lized part of us, the angry, destructive self that canbe so frightening to the rational, controlled side.Rather than trying to change ourselves—which is always a problematical thing to do—what seems to be required of us is a surrender tothe unconscious itself as we learn to trust thatthe intelligence it makes available to us has aplan and direction for us. The surrender we referto is not that of a passive child who gives up allresponsibility. It is, rather, a surrender to a kind ofknowing that is not ordinarily available to us. Thedeeper problems of life can seldom be solved bythe rational mind alone. We need the mind, it’strue, but it is only one of our resources.The ignition of this intelligence is not thesame as having a particular religious, or enlight-enment, experience. Instead, it is an ongoing pro-cess that seems to clarify and deepen the AwareEgo. It wants to help us see who it is in us that isliving our lives so we can learn to take over fromthat part (or self ) and live our life with ever morechoice. This is not short-term work. As we’ve said,it is a process that continues forever!We are well aware of the fact that not every-one remembers dreams and we can only be grate-ful that there are so many different approaches toconsciousness that can be utilized in the journeyof personal growth. Yet, we cannot help but beamazed at how often the act of standing betweenopposites will initiate a dream process or todeepen an already existing one.Where all of this leads is to a natural andorganic movement within us whereby the uncon-scious itself becomes our teacher and graduallythe bonding to the outside teacher diminishes instrength. The role of the outer teacher changes tothat of a consultant to process. Finally, even thisis no longer necessary and the inner teacher takesover completely. We have had the deep satisfac-tion of watching this happen to more and morepeople. And so it is that Hal has revisited hisJungian roots, and this work with dreams anddaydreams has become one of the basic elementsof Voice Dialogue and the Psychology of Selves.One of the greatest surprises for us as Hal ap-proaches his 80th birthday and Sidra approachesher 70th birthday is the ongoing nature of thisintelligence as it continues to unfold and bringto both of us new understandings of mattersboth personal and transpersonal. It has helped usprepare for aging and it continues to help us withall the gifts and the challenges that come at thistime of life.God, the Greater Intelligence, the élanvital, the Organizing Principle of the Universe,whatever you prefer to call it, manifests in manyways. We feel privileged to have been a partof this manifestation in the work that we haveshared over the past 35 years. And, as we observethe various manifestations of this intelligence allaround us, and as we feel the organizing princi-ples behind them, we cannot help but feel assuredthat God is indeed a mathematician.Others have discovered this organizing mys-tery in their work—whether it was with math-ematics, the cosmos, the subatomic world, “thefield”, the physical body, the structure of cells—orin a variety of spiritual practices, both ancient andmodern. For us, this intelligence has found us, aswe have found it, in the depths, the complexityand the infinite richness of human relationship.© Albion, 2007

Original source and copyright: Hal Stone, Ph.D., and Sidra Stone, Ph.D.. Read the original at Voice Dialogue International.