Ask Neycha: Ashamed Of My Past
2008-09-02
Dear Neycha:
I’m having trouble with someone from the past. Well he’s not really doing anything today, but six years ago I was involved with him and he was very abusive to me. Not so much physically, but he talked down to me. His words were very hurtful. Eventually, I ended the relationship after my family and friends kept telling me to. And I also realized I needed to instead of trying to understand why. Today I have a very different kind of boyfriend who says he wants to love me, but he complains that I’m “shell-shocked” and wont let him in. I try, I really do, but I just feel so ashamed of myself and the relationship I used to be in. I just don’t know what I was thinking. I want to open up to love, but I don’t really trust anymore, especially myself. I still feel so angry with myself for being in that relationship in the first place. What can I do now?
-Ashamed Of My Past
Dear Ashamed:
You have to make an important choice: to stay bound to the energy that connects you to your past mistakes or to forgive yourself.
Recycling your shame about the past over and over again is a grave misuse of energy. It cannot alter history, AOMP. However you CAN revise YOUR RELATIONSHIP to the past. Start with confronting what was real for you at the time you entered the abusive relationship. Perhaps you will discover that you were feeling vulnerable, rejected, unloved or unlovable. It is obvious that your love for self was challenged if not absent at the time for whatever reasons. Rather than continue the useless attempt to make that reality (however painful) untrue, accept that is where you were at the time and practice, practice, practice self-compassion! The purpose of self-compassion, AOMP is to release us from the past (and fools). It helps us to forgive ourselves.
If you find that you’re unable to do this with focused meditation or prayer, then I highly recommend you consider sitting down with a therapist or counselor in your area. This can be helpful with providing you a safe container to begin deconstructing your past and how it informed your ending up in an abusive relationship -AND- it can ALSO be purposeful in helping you to focus on what experiences you want to create for yourself IN THE PRESENT. Because, AOMP, it is these moments, the “now time,” over which we have authority.
Please don’t allow yourself to miss out on the beauty of your life TODAY by punishing yourself for the past and having not always acted in ways that demonstrated your common sense. Lovey, we all have lapses in judgment every now and again – and there’s nothing uncommon about it! However, what I find remarkably uncommon is the brutal honestly with which some of us look directly at our misgivings - courageous enough to acknowledge, accept and move beyond them with grace. You can do the same. Is there really any other meaningful choice? AOMP, be among the courageous! It’s crucial to your wellbeing, AND the relationship ready to nurture you now.
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Any information or advice given not intended to provide an alternative to or replacement for professional advice or the services of your physician, psychotherapist, or psychiatrist.
