Have you experienced something traumatic in your life? Are you filled with anxiety and don’t know why? Do you have a history of abuse or intrusive memories? Do you have self-destructive habits that you can’t seem to shake? Despite your best efforts to leave the past behind, do you find yourself spinning your wheels?
Answering Yes to any of these questions may indicate you have issues from your past that are very much affecting your present. Confronting the parts of yourself that you are afraid of or that you loathe can be a monumental task. However, shedding light on your past allows you to see the present and the future much more clearly.
Despite our natural urge to run, forget or sweep painful events under the rug, feeling the crappiness of the dark parts is the only way through it. Maybe you think that if you act confidently enough, your insecurities will simply go away. Faking it will not fix the problem. Fixing the surface does not fix the foundation.
Sitting in the awfulness of it is necessary. Sitting in guilt is essential. It is important to feel the pain. This doesn’t mean you need to set up shop here. You want to make sense of the past, put memories in their proper place and learn tools to make it more manageable.
THIS IS NOT AN EASY TASK. It will be painful. It will be upsetting and unsettling. You’ll want to run. You’ll want to stop the process. You’ll think it’s senseless and every fiber of your being will try to convince yourself that you’re right. You’ll question if the pain will ever stop.
Nevertheless, if you don’t acknowledge these feelings, change is unlikely to happen. Avoiding only impedes healing and starts the process all over again. Instead, use the pain to change the direction you’re going.
Facing your demons shows true courage. Therapy allows you to tackle your darkness with compassion and forgiveness. The key to moving forward is either accepting yourself (all of you) or accepting the situation by acknowledging your pain and the affect it’s had on you. To be really happy, you must be self-aware.
Let me help you find your capacity to bear what you thought was unbearable. www.carrienet.com/contact
Carrie
