The Past: Fear

When we are fearful we disconnect from ourselves, our resources, our friends, families, and our Higher Power (or the Light). This unconscious action reinforces our disconnection and our fear. Fear is the opposite of love. If we have had a lot of trauma in our lives or we have had a very difficult and/or abusive relationship with one or both of our parents our nervous system can’t develop in a safe and nurturing way. We easily get overwhelmed and may easily go into panic.

 

We may even become phobic about things like what others think, leaving our homes, animals, etc. By realizing what we are doing and by going back to our first traumas through image and feeling as well as words, and by staying with our body feelings, we can begin to stay more connected a little at a time.

 

Visualizations, meditations, new images, and awareness of what is happening within us are some things that help us remain in the present. Fear keeps us locked in the past. Fear can even be held in our bodies over generations when past traumas in our parent’s families were never seen, accepted, or resolved. With appropriate boundaries we can take steps toward a future of living in love.

 

Click for meditation to go from fear to healthy boundaries

 

 

The Present: From Fear to Boundaries

When we are able to remain present in our bodies, in spite of fear, we can then begin to see and know when our boundaries are being crossed or when we feel we are being invaded or abandoned. To move from fear to love we need to establish healthy boundaries. Then we feel protected. As we feel protected we can then begin to love ourselves more fully and reach out to others. The foundation has to be re-set in order to take a risk and love freely. The key is being able to be in the present.

 

Click here for exercise for boundaries to love

 

 

The Future: How Boundaries Create Love

Healthy boundaries enable us to love ourselves and to recognize and own our truths while honoring the truths of others. Boundaries enable us to see and feel our feelings while remaining connected to ourselves and to others. This is the foundation of being able to experience love for self, others, and the world.

 

 

The Past: Depressed

Many of us move through what is called situational depression, but true depression doesn’t alter when the situation alters. We feel depressed most of the time. Often depression is repression of our feelings; especially anger. The energy it takes to hold anger inside is immense.

 

Being able to become unstuck and move out of this depressed state takes many things. One important resource is being able to move from the sense that everything is about us. As children in order to survive, most things do revolve around us. We feel as if everything is about us; our parents anger, a fight with a sibling, etc. When something occurs which freezes us in that state of believing someone’s mad look is about us, for example, we stay stuck there. This usually takes a large traumatic event; the sudden death of a friend or parent, being thrown out of the house, a parent leaving, and so on.

 

A large step in moving us into the present, and away from a traumatic event, is to gain perspective; to step back from what someone says, to see our parents with a larger lens of what happened to them and so forth. The weight of believing things are our fault is huge. As we begin to realize that everything is not about us, we can give ourselves permission to feel our own feelings and to separate from others. This distancing allows us to see others’ reactions are not about us. We can begin to accept ourselves for exactly who we are. This later translates to accepting others for who they are.

 

Click here for meditation on becoming unstuck

 

 

The Present: From Depression to Perspective

When we feel depressed we are engaged in an active process of holding in our feelings and not allowing ourselves to feel our anger and resentment. We are stuck in the past of the trauma. This energy doesn’t allow us to see that we are reacting to our perceived ideas of what others are thinking and feeling. As we can step away from the trauma which still lives in us and see ourselves as separate from others, we can own our feelings; which also means learning our feelings will not kill us. This shift in perspective gives us the inner freedom to begin to accept ourselves, our feelings, and others exactly as we all are. This is what is called being in the present.

 

Click here for exercise on developing perspective

 

 

The Future: How Perspective Leads to Acceptance

Self-acceptance is the ability to truly love oneself just as one is. This True self-acceptance includes our shadow side as well as our light side to surface. We get to this place step by step and by fully being in the present.

 

 

The Past: Lost

Feeling lost is often an indicator that we have lost something important. We have lost a connection to ourselves, to others, or to the light which shows us our way. We get lost when we forget to listen to our own guided small voice inside. We get lost when we don’t know how to listen to our voice or we listen to much to someone else’s voice.

 

Maybe we have been told by others all our lives what we should do. We felt we had to follow and listen to our parents and others in our community. Maybe we also didn’t have a chance, in order to survive, to develop our own voice; yet it is waiting inside of us for us to give it voice.

 

This requires learning to be nurtured; especially if we didn’t experience it from our mother and father or caretakers. Nurturing enables us to grow inside and to listen more fully to our own voice which tells us who we really are and how to truly connect with others. Being lost can actually lead us to the present and to real inner growth.

 

Click to hear meditation on self nurturing

 

 

The Present: From Lost to Growth

When we can separate from others and are able to hear our own voice we can then begin the process of allowing ourselves to follow where the inner voice wants to lead. Often the path is slow; kind of like the game Chutes and Ladders where we have to climb up slowly, and then suddenly we have a chute which goes quickly. This also takes being able to risk doing something our own way, which can trigger our old survival mechanisms. Doing something our way, rather than our family’s way, can cause fear of losing them. When we allow that fear to keep us from listening to and following our own voice, we become lost to ourselves. Only by growing our confidence and steeping in self-nurturance can we be fully in the present which in turn then leads us to a future of connection.

 

Click for exercise on listening to and following our path/voice

 

 

The Future: How Growth Leads to Connection

One step at a time by being connected to ourselves, to others, and to our light we open internal and external vistas that expand and deepen our desires in life.

 

 

The Past: Defended

We begin to defend ourselves while still in the womb when we feel our mother’s fear, anger, loss, overwhelm or other difficult feelings. We also pick up chaos in the atmosphere; the loud voices of those around us penetrate the womb. It is at that time our nervous system is developing and we know everything that is going on around us without understanding or words to help us to categorize everything. We know what we are being born into without the words to describe them.

 

All of this goes into our hearts and into our bodies. If the early years of our life are marked by mom or dad’s overwhelm, depression, or anger we subconsciously find ways to defend ourselves. These defenses keep us alive. In order to survive, we put armor around us so we can’t be hurt. This armor protects and distances us from our pain and discomfort caused by our parents and those around us.

 

This kind of distancing does not allow or foster perspective or understanding. Too much distance – from our feelings or our parents – can be harmful to us. Yet we developed these defenses to protect ourselves which is the conundrum.

 

In order for us to move forward and live in the present we need to develop a different kind of distance; one with consciousness that protects us and allows us be our true selves while remaining close to those we need and love. This distance helps us to be separate from our caretakers and to create enough space between us and their emotional realities.

 

Click for meditation on creating distance from our caretaker’s feelings

 

 

The Present: From Defended to Distance

As we separate from other’s pain and suffering we develop the ability to truly live in our own bodies and experience our own feelings. This enables us to slowly strip away our unhealthy defenses a little at a time. We then have space to experience something new. We can hear our inner voices and feel our breath as we live in the present instead of the past. The new distance gives room for inspiration, new ideas, and thoughts for a different kind of future.

 

Click for exercise on creating necessary distance and unmerging from others

 

 

The Future: How Distance Leads to Inspiration

Inspiration is the ability to inspire; to take a deep breath. By breathing freely and hearing our inner voice we give ourselves space to bring in something new which comes from inspired ideas grounded and sourced from our own soul. Living with inspiration is also a legacy for the future.

 

 

The Past: Alone

When we feel alone, we have disconnected or separated from ourselves, from others, and from our higher power. We know when we have done this when we experience emotions such as abandonment, anger, resentment, overwhelm and depression. Those feelings, while very real when we are engaged in them, keep us disconnected from who we really are and from those around us.

 

When we were little, we often felt alone; maybe our mothers weren’t able to be present with us. Maybe they were angry and alone. Maybe dad was yelling or mom was yelling. This emotional atmosphere didn’t allow us to experience our value or to feel loved exactly for who we are and as we are.

 

Feeling alone then becomes our default place whenever we are triggered. It is important for us to learn to nurture ourselves and to connect to who we are; rather than to feelings of victimhood. That can be difficult to do when we are stuck in those traumatic feelings and times. Identifying with victimhood then also keeps us from making decisions which can move us to the present.

 

Doing dream work, visualizations, and creating new images are all very helpful in letting go of that sense of being alone while also allowing us to integrate our old memories and the past which is essential to being truly present in our lives.

 

Click here for meditation/visualization to help us to be present to our alone and victim parts

 

 

The Present: From Alone to Integration

As we recognize that this feeling of aloneness is really a choice; and one which might not have been a conscious choice, we can then choose something different. This also involves realizing that feeling alone is a type of identifying with being victimized in some way. We might have been when we were very little and therefore we became entrenched in that feeling.

 

When we accept every aspect of ourselves that we have abandoned we can then welcome each part of join our whole. This integration is what allows us to leave the aloneness behind. When we are whole, even when we are by ourselves, we are never alone.

 

Click here for exercise on welcoming all our parts

 

 

The Future: How Integration Leads to Hope

Hope is being in a place where we know that we are on a positive path of growth that leads to a knowledge in our bones that we are choosing life and wholeness; that all of our parts are integrated and moving forward. This is saying that all is good; not by ignoring or denying the difficulties, but by realizing by bringing up our dark memories and sides and embracing all, we become one. When we are one, there is growth and hope and new light.

 

 

The Past: Angry

When we are angry we are really in a secondary emotion; most of the time. Usually, when we are angry, we are in a reactive state. This is different from feeling anger as a temporary emotion when we are wronged or hurt in some way.

 

As a state of being, anger is destructive to our health and to our growth. Being angry is being in a place where we are defending ourselves from an underground feeling of loss, sadness, or disappointment. When we are angry we are often really sad or disappointed.

 

Growing up feeling disappointed is very difficult for us. Maybe we had a father who kept saying he would visit us and then never came; or if he did he was late and you never knew if or when he would come. Maybe mom was very angry and took it out on you and anger is all you experienced of mothering.

 

Moving away from anger means we have to feel and acknowledge our anger; without necessarily acting out. When we can feel our anger we can then ask what is behind and beneath the anger. We can begin to see what we have been hiding from and protecting ourselves from; the loss of our father or mother, the not knowing when someone would come and the disappointment, and so on.

 

Allowing our truth to be seen and recognized means we are also able to hold and contain our feelings. Containment without numbing through alcohol or other addictions involves being able to soothe and talk oneself through one’s emotions and hearing the words that need to be heard.

 

Click here for meditative words for self soothing

 

 

The Present: From Anger to Truth

In order to lift the veil of pain and disappointment, and see inside to a greater truth, we need a safe place. This safe place is an inside place where, through a greater state of consciousness, we can face what we have been running from. When we create an inner safe place we can connect with those we love and to those we want to love but feel it is too painful. We can have compassion for the pain that both we and our perpetrators experienced. This also allows us to develop compassion for our own internal perpetrators and victims; as we all have them. This compassion gives us a safety net so that we can see a greater truth and live more fully in the present.

 

Click here for exercise on compassion

 

 

The Future: How Truth Leads to Clarity

Clarity is the ability to see and know things clearly; the inner and outer window of perception is as clear as possible. Seeing a difficult truth opens us up (and our future generations) for living in clarity, love, acceptance, connection, inspiration and hope.