It happens that I am overcome by an old, familiar feeling. It could rise up at a family holiday gathering.  That old family friend who says the most annoying things.  Or Aunt Bessie, who means well, but boy is she in my business.  Let’s not talk politics or religion or work or anything.  Sometimes the feeling is shame or guilt or sadness.  And there on the table is an abundance of food and all the sugary treats that are poison to me.

In the past, I brace my body, tell myself I won’t let it get to me. When that old, familiar feeling takes over, my brain goes to work seeking to identify if there is danger, if it is familiar and if the story make sense.  Sometimes the thought driving the feeling will not be conscious.  It is tiny and elusive.  Like a hair in your eye, can’t see it, yet it takes all your attention.  So I used to eat.  When the family left -- just one more piece of that special treat.  Just one more. You get the picture.

How do I break that cycle?

This is what I learned.  When you want to change, to either take something out of your life or add something to your life it is best to have a clear intention.  It is also good to have a compelling reason to make the change and to identify an important value that connects to it.

So I created a protocol for my life.

I had a brain error today.  I almost did it again.  I was obsessed with CNN and anticipating one more woman showing up to accuse Trump.  This one was going to have invincible evidence!

My brain was slipping into old thoughts without my even realizing it.  “I am a victim. I am powerless.  No one will stand up for me.  No one will believe me.”  And besides, I did my own damage in my later years by choosing to seek love and attention from men when all they knew was sex.  I was too young to “get it” and there were enough older men willing to use my ignorance for their pleasure.

Seeing survivors bravely rising – forced to face a wave of misogyny and a predator using shame to keep them in hiding.  I am so proud of their courage.  And to Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, Gloria Steinem, broadcasters and pundits of the Republican, Democratic, and Libertarian persuasion come to our side and stand with us.  To educate.  

Because we forget there is no way we can be re-traumatized by the words of such a man and others who in ignorance, just don’t understand the issue. 

Healing Shame

This past month we have been in Brené Brown’s words, rumbling with shame.  Via podcast, blog, one on one coaching and webinar.  In the hallway, the bedroom, the office and the kitchen.  In the depths of my own brain and soul. If you have come along for the ride, we are stronger after each rumble.  Neurons fire together to support us to a newly learned response.  You can be stronger too.

Which brings me to the other side of shame most of the time.

Shame is a feeling we may have to entertain throughout life.  I identify and name the physical manifestations in my body that I call “shame”.  A pounding in the head, heart racing, a throat that tightens and a shortness of breath.  There is the warm flush and a sense of doom.  That’s what happens to me when I notice shame. What happens to you? 

Did you know, naming shame takes away its power? Did you know the rumble is for practicing? The rumble is for learning

Back in November of 2012 I joined an online class taught by Martha Beck.  The course, Find Your Calling, was uplifting and fascinating, but it was my first online training and I could not connect to the online community.  I was just too lazy to sit there and type so I invited whoever was interested to meet in person.

Out of my frustration with technology, Flying in Formation© was formed. 

Wait, that’s not how it really happened! 

Flying in Formation evolved from our first meeting on January 20, 2013.  A small group of women came together because we loved the work of Martha Beck who taught us how to interpret our dreams and how to look at any household object and use it to find something new about the fight we had with our partner the night before.  We were hungry for being with other women also searching for connection.

As I prepare for my last year on this earth, first I have to say that I am so grateful to have a whole year and this heads up. (OK, this is just an imaginary story – I am not dying that I know of.  I don’t know how long I’ll be around, but I am creating this fantasy to look at what is really important to me.)

What would I want for my last year?

To do what I wanted and didn’t get to.  To slow down time so that I can be with the birds in my garden.  To plant one last garden and to watch it grow over another spring, summer and fall.  To live on a beach for one season. To watch my friends and family live and grow. To see my daughter's face. I would have a week long party on the beach with all of you!

To write about my experiences.  To have the opportunity to coach more people and teach Martha Beck’s and Brooke Castillo’s tools, that have so transformed my life.  I would want to learn about how racism operates in me and discover how I can be part of a solution – one little part of a solution.  One little understanding to add to all the drops of people who want love in the world; to partake in making heaven right here on earth.

The past is gone.  The pain of the past is gone.  Our experience of the past is gone.  What is here now is the story we tell about the past.  The vague feelings I am having right now are from my current thoughts about the past.  The story I tell myself about my life can reflect either dulce o amargo – the bitter or the sweet. 

How can I change my past?  How do I reframe the story so that my past is a reflection of the strengths I have today?  My strengths were built upon that very same past. How can I write my own legend?  How can I change my thinking?

After writing about how transformed the mirror became when looking at my spectacular face, I came upon thoughts that were hiding in the corners of my mind.  Feelings of aversion to my aging, sagging skin.  I have a friend who lost 100 lbs. to my 40 pound weight loss; she decided that she was going to wear no sleeves this summer even though her upper arms were imprinted with her weight loss and her age.  She was going to think of it as her badge of honor instead of a badge of shame.  I had to admit that I was definitely not going to wear sleeveless clothes.

I have been taught through so much osmosis to dislike any part of my body that doesn’t compare to the perfection of models, stars and people who are famous for being famous!  Now, don’t get me wrong, I love beauty.  Men and women who I perceive as beautiful are captivating.  But when did I start believing that I myself – a perfectly normal human specimen – had to be perfect to be acceptable, even to myself?

Standing in line at my local café around 8:00 am on a sunny, summer morning I overheard a young woman say that she was obsessed with the mirror and her weight.

The transformation in my brain is completely miraculous when I look into the mirror today vs. years ago.

Then: I was a typical teenage girl, growing up on the streets of Brooklyn.   One in five girls are victims of abuse by the time they are 18 years old; that fact makes me typical!  Sadly this fact is true.  Perhaps, typical of young girls, I gave the mirror the power to be my torturer, my judge.  It was a critique- seeking missile.  My mirror always reflected where I came up short.  My job was to make my face, my hair, my boobs, and my stomach acceptable. 

I’ve been traveling.  Touring the beautiful island of Sicily – land of ruins, vistas, castles, ancient churches, freshly made cheese, wine, olive oil, agriturismo, the panelle and granita.  A people incredibly aware of their history of dominations by other cultures.  Starting with the Greeks, followed by the Romans, Visigoths, Vandals, Ostrogoths, Byzantines, Arabs, Normans, French, Spanish, British, Bourbons and their own Mafia.

I met a proud, vivacious, hospitable people ready to share, to teach and to give.  The melodic and physical language, each region with its own dialect.  Familiar sound and names.

What draws me and repels me from my past?

Why Sicily?  The fabric of my Brooklyn childhood was made up of the sounds of Italian being spoken all round.  Ancient women dressed in black, men standing outside of clubs, the mysterious and smelly bacalla shop, butchers, shopkeepers and grandparents of friends all speaking in a language I didn’t understand. Food that was so much tastier and abundant than at my house.

Is it time to forgive?  That depends on who is asking.  If you are asking me, "Is it time to forgive myself?" I would say YES, YES, YES!  NOW is the time to forgive. What are you waiting for?  It is good for you, it heals your soul.  It is the kind and gentle thing.  Isn’t life a series of mistakes?  Isn’t a mistake just a negative label we put on a learning process?

Then there are all the sayings about being knocked down and getting back up.  And we have all the sage advice about facing fear.

Looking back, if you had asked me, “Is it time to forgive yourself?” I would have been hard pressed to honestly say, “Yes.” 

In the years of seeking transformation, in workshops, meditation retreats, New Year’s resolution parties, or in working the 12 steps, I was asked to write a letter to forgive the person that hurt me the most. 

We trauma survivors are superior at living with discomfort.

When we turn that ability towards our own growth we are called “Super Survivors”.  

For us “normal” was a nightmare that would scare the socks off most.  Make you want to gag.  Direct experience of physical and sexual trauma sends your body and soul into protection mode. 

It takes super strength to open your vulnerability with care and compassion.  Yet why do it?  What might be the benefits? 

Lord knows, I am a wimp when it comes to doing hard labor or heavy exercise; you won’t find me training for a marathon.  Why? I’m not willing to suffer.

But, I spent years suffering and withstanding emotional pain.  At the same time acting as if all was well.  I developed a capacity for physical and mental pain that I spent on bad relationships and avoidance behaviors. 

The daily job of my brain was to integrate confusion and betrayal and to accept it so I could go to school and appear normal, go to the market and look the butcher in the eye as I asked for my order, play ringolevio up and down the street with the neighborhood kids.  All the while not letting them see what I was really hiding from them. 

Healing started when I finally stopped hiding.  Actually, I didn’t know I was I was in deep hiding, so first I had to notice that.  I was working overtime in disguise.  I certainly couldn’t risk you seeing me in all my tender neediness. (Like you didn’t see me anyway!)  In the language of Brené Brown, as I rumbled with my own inner demons, I moved through some kind of hierarchy of consciousness or mind cleaning.  I used writing, reading, meditating and looking at my thoughts.  I had conversation after conversation with you, with myself, my inner child, the survivor, the delinquent teenager and the know-it-all rebellious feminist hippy with incredibly low self-esteem!   We still meet often in my head.

I am grateful that today I know my purpose and for today it feels true.  I am here to love and to serve.  I help survivors of trauma, child sexual abuse and incest heal and become empowered to live their lives to the fullest.  Some days the only survivor I help is me.  Some days even doing that is like swimming through a thick forest of seaweed, trying not to panic that my ankles will become entangled.

If you lived in NY in the late 70’s and saw the film Marathon Man, those 3 little words – “Is it safe?”  became ominous.  If you were, like me, terrified of the dentist, hearing it sent shudders up your spine. 

We register pain, fear and loss. We are living creatures with intelligent bodies.  Bodies operate without our direction.  Blood pulses, heart beats, stomach digests, and hormones send signals. 

We assign associations to pain, fear and loss. As children, our minds also operate without our direction.  Language, input, analysis, logic and intuition all influence our development. 

The fear of abandonment is often seeded in childhood trauma.  Children are bribed, manipulated and deceived into doing things and thinking about things in a way that does not serve them.  If they allow this touch, they will be loved.  If they don’t tell someone, they won’t be hurt.  If they keep their mouths shut, no one in their family will get hurt.  If they hit back, they will be crushed.  When there is no language used, the trickery is devious because the child is left to her own devices as to how to make sense of what is happening. I am not lovable.  No one really cares or wants me.  How do I survive the unspeakable?  

You want something to change.  You want peace.  You want joy.  You want excitement.  You want to stop bad habits.  

I invite you to write. 

I write in the morning, not a lot of words. 

Writing helps me with my madness. 

Yes, my mind can be mad, how about yours? 

I have learned habitual thinking that undermines my desire to live a happy, peaceful (sometimes exciting) life.  My mind without an anchor reels back to those unhelpful thoughts. 

Writing and the daily habit of it is my anchor

In my many years, I have put in hundreds of thousands of hours of worrying, becoming expert as a result.  Some might say I have a Ph. D. in Worrying.

When I had a daughter – I double majored in Worry; for my own incompetence as a parent and for my daughter’s development.  Poor Girl, she never had a chance.

I worried about her health, her body image, her feelings, her choices.

I worried when she was bullied the first day of school and an older girl stole her $1.00 she was so innocently waving about on the bus.  Still breaks my heart.  

One night in her sophomore year of high school, she didn’t come home– I searched everywhere, finding her passed out drunk at a new friends’ house.

There is a current thinking highlighted in the book Outliers, where author Malcolm Gladwell reports that if you want to become expert at something spend 10,000 hours doing it. (There are 8,760 hours in one normal year and 8,784 hours in leap year.) 

Based on time put in, I have earned a doctorate in the art of worrying.  Though I know many folks who are much better at it than I am, I have put in the time. 

If I take an honest look back, worry was my middle name. 

I worried about not being pretty, being hairy, having small breasts, not having a boyfriend, appearing poor, being recognized as a pitiful, dumb, ugly girl. 

I worried about being found out for my physicality – revealing the episodes with my uncle when he would touch me under the covers. 

There was so much to worry about. 

For the past 3 months, I have been reciting a gatha I learned from Thich Nhat Hanh.  A gatha is a Sanskrit term meaning a verse or hymn.  Thicht Nhat Hanh teaches that we can use various gathas throughout the day to remember.  I have trouble with remembering.  While memory really tells of a process or series of processes that are used to acquire, store, retain, and later retrieve information, I visualize it as a place inside my skull.   As I get older, and as the information highway multiplies, that place inside my skull seems to have exploded into a million pieces!  So I set up an alarm on my phone that rings twice a day.  I have to tell you that each time it goes off disturbing my work day, I think “What the????”  Then I read:  Breathe and notice your feelings.  Be Present.  ”Oh! OK.”