According to Mary Goulding (1987), children decide either to accept these
parental messages or to fight against them. If they do accept them, they decide
precisely how they will accept them. The decisions children make about
these injunctions become a basic part of their permanent character structure.
When a child accepts the emotionally transmitted injunction, communicated
by the fervor of the Child of the significant grown-up, the child will bury it
deep within and not let his or her own internal Parent and Adult know what it
is (Ray Quiett, personal communication, May 24, 2009). This becomes a matter
of survival. Group members often have the misconception that if an injunction
is discovered and changed in any way, they will not survive. For example, Tom
exhibits nervous, fidgeting behavior during his first meeting with the group.
Outside of his conscious awareness, Tom is afraid the injunction segment of
his script will be discovered, and he will perish. The life script doesn’t match
reality, but it matches his perception of reality in the Child ego state. This becomes
a challenge for the group leader. The leader, from his Nurturing Parent,
must ally with the member’s scared internal Child and build a safe environment
in the group to facilitate change.