Healing From Incest Takes Time

Healing from childhood sexual abuse takes time and much effort on your part and you are worth both. The most important step is learning to love yourself. Most incest victims hate and blame themselves for their abuse. Know that the blame and shame belong to your abusers, not to the child you were then or to the adult you are now. Love both your inner child and the adult that you have become. You are both survivors. Many children don't survive. If you survived, you can heal.

Learn to trust yourself and a few close friends with your story of incest. Telling is more than okay. Your healing depends upon telling someone else the many secrets that you were forced to keep by your abusers. Don't tell just anyone. Tell someone that you trust. You may not trust anyone because of your abuse. In your childhood, you couldn't trust those who were closest to you, if like with me, they were your abusers. Trust is a very big issue and one that you need to do very carefully. Sadly, the world is full of people that you shouldn't trust with your story and your vulnerability. As an adult, there are abusers who will instintively pick up that you are vulnerable and will take advantage if you give them the chance. Believe your heart and your gut when you get signals to run away from these people. This is one reason why learning to trust yourself and your intuition are so important. Really listen to your body. I know how hard that is if you disconnected from your body as a child in order to survive the pain of incest. I also know from my own experience that you can learn to reconnect. Be patient and kind with yourself as you learn to do this. You are blessed to live in a time when many resources are available for your use.

Trust a few close friends with your story or, if it is easier, trust a roomful of strangers, like I did, in 12-Step programs. Those people weren't strangers for long. They totally accepted me and my story of incest.  Today I thank God that my dad was an alcoholic. I was able to find out how I was affected by the family disease of alcoholism and had taken on the characteristics of both of my parents but I also found a safe place to talk about the incest. I talked and talked and talked until I started to feel and the hurt started to leave. Talk as much as you can until the abuse is talked out of your body and mind. Some people will think you are stuck in the memories and will possibly wish you would just shut up. Don't shut up and don't trust those people.  Most people don't realize that you were silenced for so long that you can't let the hurt and anger go with just a few words and wishes. You have to work at and talk your way through the healing process. Writing helps too if you are a writer like me. You are worth whatever it takes to heal. Find a counselor or therapist that will listen and help you work through your pain. Don't settle for just any therapist. Not all are trained to help incest survivors. A therapist that doesn't know what they are doing can do more harm rather than helping you. Sometimes you just don't click with that person. Find a therapist that you can trust and feel safe sharing your story with.

Find others who can love you until you can love yourself. Surround yourself with people who will support you through the long journey to healing. Some won't stay for very long. Those who do will be your true friends. If you trust the wrong person with your story and get hurt by them. Let go of them and move on. Don't stay in an abusive relationship. You do not deserve to be revictimized by anyone. You couldn't do anything about the abuse you suffered as a child. As an adult, you can choose to say no to abuse of any kind and leave if the other person doesn't. Don't trust everyone with yourself or with your story. You deserve to be believed. If others can't treat you with respect and kindness, leave them behind. Move forward into your healing.

As I said before, trust your intuition which will tell you who is trustworthy and who isn't. Start with trusting yourself. Be kind and compassionate with yourself first. Start to listen to your inner voice that has your best interest at heart. Don't listen to any critical inner voices that you got from your parents or abusers. Learn to tune them out. Critical inner voices don't have your best interest at heart. Being critical of yourself is just carrying on the shame that your abusers passed on to you. Don't shame and blame yourself. Being responsible for your own actions is not the same as blaming and shaming. Feeling guilty for making a mistake is not the same as feeling shame because you were taught that you are the mistake. You are not a mistake, now or ever. That is the abuser speaking. Don't listen to that crap any more. You are worthy and lovable. Love yourself and heal. You are worth it.
Patricia

Doing Good Deeds

Today I went to get my haircut and on my way into the building, I opened the door and stepped aside to let a lady go in before me. She was so surprised at my actions. She thanked me and told me that with the day that she was having, she really appreciated me opening the door for her. I smiled and told her that I was glad that I followed my impulse to open the door for her.

When is the last time that you extended such a small courtesy to another person without expecting anything in return. I didn't plan to open the door for the lady. She was far enough away that I opened the door and stood and waited for her to get to the door. A little voice inside nudged me to open the door for the lady. Boy was I glad that I did when she told me she was not having a good day.

I am not telling you this because I want your praise. I think we should all do things to help each other, not just at Christmas but all through the year. I didn't think about how my actions would affect the other lady. I simply followed the impulse that said open the door. Go out of your way to do something nice for someone else. It doesn't have to cost you anything except maybe a little of your time. It doesn't matter if the other person expresses their appreciation like my lady did. It is nice if they do but it isn't a requirement. Use the Christmas season as an excuse to do something nice for someone else. Choose to do some good today.
Have a glorious day.
Patricia

Name It, Claim It, Make It So---Intention To Hear Your Spirit Guides

Slade Roberson recently wrote an article called "You Can Hear Your Spirit Guides". You will find the link to this article at the bottom of the page along with some other links with information about Slade. In the article, Slade says, "If you wish to communicate more effectively with your spirit guides, the number one thing you need to tell yourself and your guides is that you are open to their presence and to receiving their guidance."

Here is the intention that I set for hearing my guides:

I am open to being psychic. I do hear my spirit guides in whatever form they choose. I play a significant part in the forming of my world.

Like most people, I was a little afraid of my psychic abilities. I was more puzzled than afraid. I really didn't know what to do with these abilities. Sometimes they are right on with the messages that I receive and sometimes, because I don't have the whole picture, they make no sense to me. The messages are easier to receive when the messages are for me rather than for someone else. If the message is for someone else, that means I have to risk voicing the message and being wrong in front of someone else. What if they look at me like I am crazy, like I have totally lost it? What will I do then? I have learned to present the information anyway. Whether I understand it or not, it is usually understood by the person that needs it. I am doing them a disservice by not presenting the information.

If you are interested in learning how to hear your spirit guides, Slade gives classes occasionally. I have taken two of the classes and greatly benefitted from them. Slade teaches you how to be more aware of the psychic hits that you get from your guides on a daily basis. We totally ignore so much of what our guides send us because it doesn't come in the form that we expect it to. That is why my affirmation says, "I do hear my spirit guides speaking in whatever form they choose."

If you are interested in learning more about your spirit guides and how to contact them, check out Slade's blog, Shift Your Spirits. Start with the article linked below. If you like what you read spend some time checking out the rest of Slade's articles.

What is your intention toward hearing your guides?
Patricia


Related Links:

You Can Hear Your Spirit Guides --- http://sladeroberson.com/spirit-guides/you-can-hear-your-spirit-guides.html

Epiphanies From Freaking Out --- http://lightbeckons.com/2008/09/09/epiphanies-from-freaking-out


Ghosts, Spirits, Seances - and a story --- http://www.personal-growth-with-corinne-edwards.com/ghosts-spirits-seances-and-a-story/


Stephen Hopson Interview with Slade Roberson of Shift Your Spirits, Part I of II --- http://www.adversityuniversityblog.com/2008/08/26/stephen-hopson-interview-with-slade-roberson-of-shift-your-spirits-part-i-of-ii/

Stephen Hopson Interview with Slade Roberson of Shift Your Spirits, Part II of II --- http://www.adversityuniversityblog.com/2008/09/02/stephen-hopson-interview-with-slade-roberson-of-shift-your-spirits-part-ii-of-ii/

True Independence Comes From In-dependence

True independence comes from in-dependence. This thought went through my mind today. We are not truly independent until we learn to turn inward and become dependent upon our inner self---that part of us that comes from Divine Source. For a few years now, my guidance has been telling me that instead of an outer teacher that I should pay attention to my inner teacher. We all have a connection to the Divine Source of all knowledge and wisdom. It is from that Divine Source that is inside of each of us that our answers come. I don't think I am going to say any more about this. I want you to think about what this means to you individually. Please share your thoughts with me.

Gifts Of Facing Your Fears

A few days ago I read an article called "Cash in on the Hidden Gold Beneath Your Fears" written by Tom Volkar at Delightful Work. You will find the article at this link: http://www.delightfulwork.com/2008/06/24/cash-in-on-the-hidden-gold-beneath-your-fear/ .

Click on the link above and go read Tom's article, then come back here and read mine. I'll be here when you get back. In the mean time, I will go fix myself a cup of coffee.

People keep telling me that I am courageous to write about incest. I am not any more brave than anyone else. I have just reached the grand age of 56 years old where I don't care as much what other people think about me as I once did. I do care. At 56, my opinion of me is the most important. Doing what is right for me has become more important than your opinion of me.

The praise does feel good so if you want to keep it coming, I won't object. I will even admit that I love it when you tell me how good, nice, courageous, outspoken I am. My ego is still in tact and even still in control at times. So thank you for your words of encouragement. They are appreciated.

I need to set the record straight. I am just as fearful as the rest of you, probably even more so than some of you. Yes, writing down my thoughts on this blog for the world to see is scarey business but the rewards have been well worth facing my fears to do this. Facing my fears has been so rewarding. I can so relate to Tom's article and see that when we face our fears, there is gold hidden beneath the fears.

In one of my recent articles, "Quit Playing Small And Insignificant" ( http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2008/06/quit-playing-small-and-insignificant.html ), I faced a major fear of mine---the fear that I might be "powerful beyond measure" (Marianne Williamson in "A Return to Love"). I was fearful of letting my light shine to its full strength because you might think I felt superior to you. My ego might even try to convince me that I am superior to you. As it says in my article, I was fearful of accepting that I am responsible for my life and what I do with that life.

What have been the immediate gold that I found hidden beneath those fears?
1. I have found a new level of self-confidence that I didn't have before. I acted as if I were confident but it was only an act. Now, it is real. I am powerful beyond all measure and so are you. Each of us is powerful as magnificient reflections of the God in each of us.

2. My creativity with my writing for this blog has gone through the roof. I have never written as many articles as I have in the past week. I am not posting them all at once so you will continue to see these articles come out over the next few weeks. I wrote 5 articles last week, three of which have already been posted. This article is the second one in two days that I have written this week.

3. Tools such as Tom's article and the information that I posted from Paula Kawal that you will find in my article "Shame, The Abuser's Friend" found at http://patriciasingleton.blogspot.com/2008/06/shame-abusers-friend.html have come my way to be shared on this blog. Helping others has to come second after helping myself to grow since I choose to help others through sharing my own journey. These tools will give me and you more ways to heal ourselves. This is a lesson I learned about 20 years ago. I can't help others heal until I have done the work of healing myself.

4. Michelle Vandepas and CK Reyes at Divine Purpose Unleashed ( http://divinepurposeunleashed.com/ ) have helped me to look more clearly at what my divine purpose is. This blog is the tool for me to accomplish my divine purpose of reaching out to others who wish to move beyond victim and survivor to become who they really are as Divine Beings.

5. Slade Roberson ( http://sladeroberson.com/ ) and Andrea Hess ( http://www.empoweredsoul.com/ ) have both opened the door for me to learn to communicate more with my Spirit Guides. Hey guys, that voice in your head or your ear doesn't necessarily mean you are going crazy. It could be your guides communicating with you.

6. Michelle Vandepas introduced me to the new Debbie Ford book called "The Secret of the Shadow, The Power of Owning Your Whole Story." You will be hearing more from me about this book. It is the missing piece I have been searching for.

7. As I release more fears, more joy and contentment come into my life.

Next time I find myself faced with my fears, I intend to use Tom's four statements to look at my fears and his four questions to find out exactly what I am afraid of and what actions I can take to release the fears. Thank you Tom for sharing this article with the rest of us. I love it when I find tools that do what they are supposed to. With tools, we are better equipped to deal with life. Life can be beautiful. Life is beautiful. Live it to the fullest. Be as powerful as you truly are.

Your life can be glorious when you choose for it to be.
Patricia

Quit Playing Small And Insignificant

I am blessed to be able to participate in the "Communicating with Our Spirit Guides---Workshop" that Slade Roberson is hosting for the month of June. Thank you Slade for putting yourself out there to do this workshop. As usual, when you and I communicate, I learn about myself.

For awhile, I have been butting my head up against a wall of my own resistance to growth and searching out new terrritory in my spiritual journey. I recently told Slade that I was being a rebel and rebelling against structure in all forms. The little kid in me (the two-year-old) is in full tantrum mode and has been for awhile. She is always afraid of moving forward, especially spiritually. She is the one who still feels shame and worthlessness. Sometimes, I ignore her tantrums and sometimes, I face them head on and move forward anyway. Sometimes, like the past few months, I just let her throw her tantrum and wait for it to be over. She has strong lungs, like most two-year-olds.

I have waited and waited and waited. Now it is time to move forward again after reassuring her that her fears are unfounded. They are just leftovers from my childhood that need to be let go of. No one is going to hurt her. No one is going to make her life nearly impossible. I will protect her.

In Slade's class, we are learning different ways to get in touch with our spirit guides and to use the information that we get from them. We all get this information in various ways. Most of us ignore the majority of the information and if we do admit to receiving it, we blow it off to imagination or wishful thinking. Slade is teaching us how to know the difference between wishful thinking and the real thing---intuition. Most of the time, our guides use our intuition to speak to us.

Last week's assignment from Slade was to tell us to ask a question of our guides, out loud, and then follow that with the statement, "And my guides say _________." My rebellious two-year-old doesn't like being told what or how to do things. She was afraid.

One of the ways that I have learned to face my fears is to voice it so I did that in an email to the workshop group. Here is part of email that I sent them:

"Slade, I haven't played with the assignment of talking out loud to my guides and asking questions and then saying, 'And then my guides say . . .' I think that I haven't because of the answers that I might get. Am I ready for those answers? Am I ready to accept that much responsibility for my own life and actions and moving forward. Are any of the others in the group feeling what I am or am I just being a coward? . . ."

I got back several wonderful responses from group members that just added to the information that started coming to me from my guides almost immediately after sending the email on its way. Thanks to those who responded, if you are reading this. It made a big difference. Almost as soon as the email hit the air waves, my fear was gone. I have discovered, as I said above, that sometimes just voicing my fears is enough to make them disappear. I have also learned that voicing our own emotions can sometimes be a spur for someone else who may be feeling the same way to voice their feelings as well. We do all like company when we are feeling fear, anger, sadness or happiness.

About two days after sending out the above email, I received a message that loudly said, "Quit playing small and insignificant. It isn't you." I received the message and very quietly to myself say, "Oh, ok, is that way I am doing, again."

Then the articles started coming in from other bloggers telling me the same thing, just in a different format. The first of several came from my daily "Today's Heartfelt Blessing" which you can find at http://www.bettertobless.com/ . I love the messages that I receive daily from Kate. They are always uplifting and full of wisdom given out with humility.

The next article that came to me was from Albert of "Personal Development - The Urban Monk." Albert's article is entitled "The Power of Being You" which you will find at http://www.urbanmonk.net/318/the-power-of-being-yourself/ which starts out with saying, "Each individual brings a uniques light into the world, however, often that light remains buried below the surface of the person others see in us. Discovering that light and letting it shine is one of the fundamental steps each individual must take to become a more whole person." This was an article written by a guest author---Alexander De Foe. Thank you Alexander and Albert for this article.

At this point in my week, I started to realize how determined my guides were that I get the meaning of their information. Then I got the following article from the blog "6 WEEKS" written by Brett and found at http://6weeks.ca/?p=215 . What Brett told me came to him from Battlestar Galactica and was that "God loves you because you are perfect, just the way that you are." Then Brett went on to quote my favorite Marianne Williamson saying:

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others." - Marianne Williamson

By the time that I finished reading Brett's article, I was laughing and told my guides, out loud so they would know I was serious, "Ok, I get the message." I do love what Marianne says and I guess I needed to be reminded of it. So, okay, people, quit playing small and insignificant. It isn't you and it doesn't suit you or anyone else for you to do it. Let your Light shine for all of the world to see. You never know who may be watching and learning from you about how to let their Light shine too. Isn't this world and time a glorious place to be? Can you tell that "glorious" is my favorite word. It has such a wonderful feel. One of these days, my two-year-old inner child might just reach out and grab onto that glory herself.

Patricia

Let's Talk About Spirit Guides Teleconference With Andrea Hess And Slade Roberson

Saturday afternoon, November 17, 2007 at 1:00 p.m. C. S. T., I was on the phone for the first teleconference that I have ever participated in. I was on the listening end of the conversation. The teleconference was done by two of my favorite spiritual bloggers---Andrea Hess and Slade Roberson. If you have never checked out their blogs, just click on the links below.

You will find Andrea at http://www.empoweredsoul.com/blog/ .

You can find Slade at http://sladeroberson.com .

Both of these spiritual bloggers have added to my spiritual growth by sharing their particular areas of expertise. I don't know if either of them considers themselves as experts on their subjects. Those are my words.

Today's teleconference was about Spirit Guides and how to connect with yours. I took nine pages of written notes from the phone conversation which lasted a little over an hour.

The first advise that Andrea gave to us was to tell us to each find our own unique way of contacting our spirit guides.

Slade told us to let go of any expectations that we may have about what our guides should look like, sound like or how they should connect with us.

Slade and Andrea both talked about how our guides are with us from birth so we are very familiar with their energy and what it feels like to have them near us so that most of us know they are there and have forgotten because of the familiarity. We are so used to having them around that it isn't a part of our consciousness for most of us.

Your guides can work through a voice or voices that you hear in your head. (No, you are not crazy, but your ego will ask if you are.) Hunches and intuition can come from your guides. Repetition can be used by your guides to get your attention. Ex.: Hearing the title of a book over and over again. Hearing the same song over and over again may be a message. A word that keeps coming to mind over and over again may be a signal for something. Symbols, numbers, anything that you keep hearing or seeing over and over again may be a message that your guides are attempting to get your attention.

Andrea said that your guides always work in the present moment. Information is for now, not next week. The future has different possibilities and different paths than today.

Andrea and Slade are both going to be doing future teleconferences so go to their sites and keep up to date by subscribing to their blogs. I look forward to future teleconferences from both of them. Thanks to you both for a very enjoyable hour.

A relatively new blog that I discovered this week, that you can also check out is called Spiritual Drifts from The River of Karma. He still hasn't told me how he decided on River of Karma as a name. I really like it. You will find this blog at http://driftings.blogspot.com.

Another favorite of mine that I hope is back for good after a little hiatus is Damian at http://soulterminal.com . Damian provided the inspiration for my The Most Influencial Person series that were some of my first articles that I wrote for my blog back in June and July 2007.

I am amazed that I have actually been blogging for such a short period of time. Writing and blogging are two of my most joyful activities that I have ever done. I have also done some tremendous growth because of some of the articles. Revisiting some of my childhood has been painful, which I didn't expect it to be. What the pain told me was that some areas still need more work. My goal with writing the incest articles is to offer others the knowledge that they can heal as I heal. This is my journey.

Thanks to those of you who are reading this and have joined me with your own healing journeys. We are all connected. We are all one. As one of us heals, it affects all of us.

Have a glorious Thanksgiving Day. My husband, son and I will be visiting family in Louisiana. I will be busy cooking all day Wednesday. I enjoy cooking for special family occasions. It is a chance to make old, much loved recipes like pumpkin pie and Southern cornbread dressing like my mother used to make. I also love to find some new, untried recipe to tempt appetites with.