Bad childhood I want to stop thinking about. Any ideas?

[RedMenace]

Now that I think about it... almost everyone's been through something traumatic, I guess. Everyone's probably a little jilted one way or the other, maybe I should stop thinking about myself so much.

[Hottentot]

Depends on what you consider traumatic. Some people get endless supply of drama from spilling the milk to the floor or hitting their thumb with a hammer. What you described is something completely different and you said yourself how much it bothers you. Sure, you can stop thinking about it. The same way as you can clean a house by putting all the dust under a carpet. I know how cliche it is to say something like that, but trust me: in this one instance I know what I'm talking about.

[RedMenace]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

Depends on what you consider traumatic. Some people get endless supply of drama from spilling the milk to the floor or hitting their thumb with a hammer. What you described is something completely different and you said yourself how much it bothers you. Sure, you can stop thinking about it. The same way as you can clean a house by putting all the dust under a carpet. I know how cliche it is to say something like that, but trust me: in this one instance I know what I'm talking about.

Oh I definitely agree with you. If it was as simple as just forgetting about the past, I probably would have done it long ago.

But... there's a lot of pain in this world, you know? Lots and lots and lots.

[Castout]

Originally Posted by RedMenace

Oh I definitely agree with you. If it was as simple as just forgetting about the past, I probably would have done it long ago.

But... there's a lot of pain in this world, you know? Lots and lots and lots.

The pain is because you're still holding on to grudge or resentment. In other words witholding forgiveness. Victims usually feel this way especially if the conditions of their victimization still persist or still being experienced on regular basis.

It helps when you know we will all successfully die and that the very people who hurt you are definitely hurt people themselves even when they appear otherwise. They are troubled people themselves and I must say lacking love and even hoping for outpouring of love from the people surrounding them. Even when it is anger or aggression that they are showing. Aggression is love misplaced and rejected after all. If you dig deep these people often explode crying. They need love and forgiveness and forgiving people who hurt them. Unfortunately only God is aware of their condition. And often only God can love them unconditionally. The God whom they never seek and who often hide Himself from them for whatever reason.

[Skybird]

The past is no more, and the future is uncertain and still not here. The only thing we have for sure, is this one present moment. Nothing exists outside of it.

The emotional pain you feel is because you stuck to things that are not any longer, and the loss you experienced when your parents disappointed you and let you down. Analysing and endlessly discussing things with your friends or your own inner voice, doe snot make it any better. It just forms these memories a nice and warm nest to settle down in.

However, it is not the things themselves that bother us and make us mourning or fearing them but it is our evaluation, our commenting, our note-giving to which we attach all the time. Like in a reflex, a memory comes up - and immediately an inner dialogue starts to flow down the channels of our inner mind. And the more often this is repeated, the deeper the channel digs its bed into our mind.

Do not try to "manage" your sadness, no human can do that, trying it only delays the healing, may hide it from the surface, but only at the price of it becoming stronger and stronger. One day you'll meet it again unexpectedly but then it easily could have turned into something that overwhelms you.

Instead of doing something, let it go. Just this: let it.

Now, for us modern hyperactive, omnipotent brainmonsters used to manage even the worst of the worst disasters and never show a sign of weakness or pessimism, this is easier said than done. And if we nevertheless let things be, and some time later tell ourselves or our friends we successfully let things go, we nevertheless are still occupied by them plus the illusion of having let them go. Our luggage has grown.

But there is something you can do, and that is to always lead your mind back to the present moment you live in, your breathing, the most imminent and immediate thing you currently do. Neither become angry with yourself nor try to fight against your mind when you realize you have drifted back into past memories again and you feel sad again. Just recall that even the next minute is most uncertain and that your current stroke of breath is the only thing that you really have. Patiently lead your drifting mind back to the present moment. Dont evaluate the inner images of the past. Refuse to comment on them once you became aware you are drifting again. When you realize you drift, gently lead yourself back to the present moment. Do it time and again. You will do it very, very often. After some time, you will have turned it into a habit. That is good. When the habit has become so omnipresent that there are no more interruptions between different times when you practice it, then you are truly free.

Pain like yours cannot be "managed". It cannot be made to turn away. It needs to heal naturally, all by itself, in the time that it takes. It will not take too much or too few time. It will just take that time that it takes, not more and not less. Seen that way, it is perfect, and always right on time. That must be a tough nut for an impatient 19 year old, eh?

The past is no more. The future is not yet to be. All life is within this present single moment. Understanding this is key to everything. In this understanding lies true and unlimited freedom. In the end, everything we believe to experience, is temporal only and cannot last, and if we try to form our felicity by making temporal things everlasting, we necessarily must get disappointed, for they will go sooner or later. This is even true with regard to love, and parents. But we do not suffer because these things are hurting us or are not in order. Things just are the way they are, and we are free to let them go and move on, or to cling to them and allow them to occupy us. In other words: we suffer because we are not in order.

Life often is said to be a voyage. So travel on and leave behind your current stay. Bon voyage!

[Castout]

I just want to add there is a mistake that most victims do

To deem their victimization too personally,


It is NOT YOU. You just happen to be there at the time. It helps if victim could at least try to detach themselves out of their victimization in a less personal way. It wasn't because of you. It was probably even not because of the perpetrator but because of conditioning prevailing in the perpetrator at the time. It was never personal even when the perpetrator think otherwise. It wasn't because of you. So don't be too hard on yourself and have a relief KNOWING it WASN'T you. it could have been anybody else. If you can, take it one step higher. Be glad it happened to you than anybody else.

[danasan]

Originally Posted by Castout

I just want to add there is a mistake that most victims do

To deem their victimization too personally,


It is NOT YOU. You just happen to be there at the time... .

Thank you! I was just going to say that. It is a main progress to find exactly that fact out.

danasan

[RedMenace]

Originally Posted by Skybird

-

Thanks. I needed that to calm myself down. I do let my inner dialogue talk myself into insanity. That damned mind, always trailing off.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by RedMenace

Thanks. I needed that to calm myself down. I do let my inner dialogue talk myself into insanity. That damned mind, always trailing off.

That damned mind is you! And it just functions in the way it is designed, seen that way it functions flawlessly and proves that it is in order. What is driving you crazy is no your mind, and is not your eyes you see with and not your ears you hear with, but is your ever-rambling always self-focussed ego that always takes itself very!!! important and claims an own existence although it is just illusory by nature. It abuses this tool your mind is.

If you want to change that, change the attitude in which you meet the world, in the present moment. Staying focussed on what you do in the present, your mind then becomes clear and settled - and then finds the calmness and clearity and power to take out your ego, like sunbeams penetrate clouds and dissolve them if the sun's warmth is just powerful enough. The ego, like clouds, exists as a phenomenon, but it has no real substance of its own.

This does not mean your history will all of a sudden change, and your memories would be different or no longer be there. They will stay the same. But the pain will not have power over you again, you pick it up if you choose to have a look at it, like you take an appel in the store, and you then put it back if you have decided that it was enough and that you do not like it.

That is freedom from pain: not wishing to fight and supress pain (which is impossible since pain is inevitable part of life in a temporal world), but not getting ruled by it, but to handle it in the way you like to do, by your own terms and conditions.

[Pisces]

Originally Posted by Skybird

(clipped)... Post #13...

What he said!