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Does Happy Hurt Your Hurt?

We all have the choice to be happy, to find the good in any situation, or at least something to take away from it, to learn, to not dwell in the negative but strive to find happiness, even in situations that didn’t favor us, or turn out the way we would have wanted. Happiness is always a choice. But, have we put so much time into our hurt that happiness hurts our hurt? Are we not willing to let our hurt go? Has it become our identity, who we are, something we wear like a badge of honor? There are those of us out there that it is.

For me I used to wear my hurt like a dark cloak, I used it to hide behind and I used to protect me from more hurt, or so I thought. What it did was keep me in the darkness, and it kept me isolated from people, and when I wasn’t connecting with the people in my life I was left with only listening to the lies my head was telling me and I sank deeper into my hurt. I put a lot of time into that hurt, many years of work had gone into it, so when I made the choice to get better and live in the light, it was hard to say goodbye to it. It was a place that felt safe to me, even though I knew it was killing me. I knew that place, I thought I deserved that place, and I knew no one else could come into that place and find me. When I was finally able to reach out for help, when I began to share my hurt with those around me, I realized that there were many people who shared similar hurts, who were living in similar places, and were fighting similar battles, I wasn’t alone, but, was I ready to shed my hurt?

My hurt had become my identity, and I used to it to my advantage when I thought I could. I used it to manipulate, to gain sympathy, to lower people’s expectations of me so that I could disengage in life, but also still get what I wanted. I was a walking contradiction most of the time, I thought I was a piece of crap who deserved only bad things, but I also thought I was better than you. So essentially, the most unique, most incredible piece of crap you were every going to meet. Think about that. And try imagine living in that space. Some of you know that space. It was pure torture. Torture I was administrating to myself.

When I stepped on this path, I’ve said this before, I outed myself to everyone in my life. I called them and told them everything I had been doing and I explained to them what I was planning to do to get better. It was scary, I didn’t know how people were going to react, but my life depended on me lifting back the curtain and sharing my truth. What did happen was an outpouring of love and support. Of understanding. Of friends sharing their stories with me, stories I had never heard because I had never bothered to ask. I realized that we all have hurt, but it’s what we decide to do with it that sets us apart.

Our hurt is not who we are. It’s not the best of us. We all deserve to be happy, or find our happy, and know that that looks different for everyone. And yes, our happy will hurt our hurt, and it should, because our hurt is hurting us. In some cases, killing us, it was killing me. Let the happy in, or find it, look for it, and let it kill your hurt, let it die, it’s not who you are, not at your best. Your hurt is from the past, it is not your present unless you let it be, you have the power to stop it. Find your light, shine bright, and let it take away all the shadows and darkness in your life, let your hurt go, because when you do, there’s a whole beautiful world waiting for you on the other side, I know, because I’m there right now. SLAY on!

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you let your hurt define you? Are you afraid to let it go? What frightens you? When you think of yourself, what do you think about? How would you describe yourself? How would you like to describe yourself? Why can’t you? What actions can you take so that you are able to describe yourself that way? What can you do this week to allow more light into your life and let go of your hurt? Do it SLAYER, let it go, and let your true self shine for all of us to see, nothing is worth dimming your light, especially those things from our past we cannot change. Live for today, live in this moment, and live for yourself. Choose to be happy. Choose to be you. Choose to be bright.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you

Shutter Shame

How often have we let shame get in the way of living the life we want to have? How often have we let it limit us, hinder us, and diminish us? We think our shame is a way to protect us from being hurt, from being rejected, from allowing others to see who we really are, because we believe we are not good enough. All of this thinking is false. Shame isn’t real. We can make it real by believing in it, by buying into it, but it’s no more real than The Boogeyman, or whatever else we hid from as a child. We give it life by feeding into it’s energy. We give it permission to be active in our lives. We let it in by and let it grow by not talking about it, not sharing with others, and believing it’s lies.

Shame can manifest from many places. Childhood trauma, addiction issues, or even just the failure in something you place importance and value in. Once we have let shame in we typically engage in a series of behaviors as a result of feeling shame, we try to cover up our perceived flaws by overcompensating, by blaming and shaming others, by perfectionism, by lying, or by isolating thinking we don’t deserve or are not good enough to engage with others. Shame has a ripple effect, it’s not just our own stinking thinking that disrupts our lives, but it ripples out to all relationships we have affecting us personally and professionally. Shame holds us back from connecting, from sharing, from allowing us to be our best selves and from celebrating that. Shame steals our light and causes us to choose self-destructive behaviors to reaffirm shame’s negative voice that you are less-than and not good enough.

But really, shame doesn’t exist. Not unless we let it. When you think about it, you can’t touch shame, smell shame, taste shame, it’s not really there, so why do we give it so much power? Why do we have so much fear around it, when, only we can give it the power to hurt us? Why would we turn our power over to something that, when we let it, becomes so strong it can manifest itself physically in our lives? Many of us, while in shame, will feel flush, dizzy, have tunnel vision, have an inability to focus, hear loud noises in our ears, feel a tightness in our chest, have shallow breath, or not be able to make eye contact. When we’re experiencing this level of shame, we have lost control. We have completely given into it. So, how do we overcome the shame we feel and allow ourselves to be who we are meant to be, flaws, and all, and not only be that person, but be proud of who we are?

First, shame is a feeling and feelings are not facts. As I say all the time, what are the facts? What do we know to be true? If the answers start with “I feel,” that’s shame talking, not what is fact. Second, shame can’t thrive when we talk about it, when we share how we’re feeling with others, it diminishes it’s power. When we talk about our truth it brings in the light, shame can only survive in the darkness. Also, when we share, we realize that shame is not a unique feeling to just you, we all can relate, and when we feel a sense of connection of our common experiences shame starts to die and our relationships get stronger, and we feel a bigger bond to those around us, we realize that we are all the same, and that really, there is nothing to be ashamed of, we all make mistakes, we all fall, we all have lessons in life we need to learn, we shouldn’t feel shame over not getting something right the first time, or at all, because our path and our journey is on it’s own timeline, not someone else’s.

We all feel shame from time to time, but when we live as our authentic selves, when we share our feelings and connect with others, shame goes and hides. We have the power to stop shame in it’s tracks by not apologizing for who we are and who and what we love. Things may not look the way we think they should, but they look the way they are supposed to look, it’s up to us to find the good within that place, and to change those things we can that we feel we can do better. Tell shame to hit the curb, it has no place in your life SLAYER, practice self-love and acceptance and allow yourself to make mistakes, there is no shame in that.

SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you feel a sense of shame about yourself? Are there certain events or incidents that you carry around as badges of your shame? What are they? Have you ever told anyone about them? Why not? What do you think will happen if you do? What do you think is happening because you don’t? When you think about your shame, is it based in reality? Or is it based on your own perception of how think it should have looked or should look? Is it based on what others think it should look like? All that matters is that you live in your truth, through the highs and lows, just be you, no one gets it right all the time, it’s part of our journey and part of this path, shed your shame and shine bright, celebrate everything that is you, and take your power back over shame.

S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you