Journey Back to Soul - Week 4

This week all those burdens and regrets and past wounds that have been slowing you down, weighing you down, and making it hard to move forward, are going to be transformed into something that actually helps you. When something bad happens to us, people often say, you just have to let it go. But even if the body heals the wound, the mind is still scared and tries to protect you from getting hurt again, until...

 

Until you decide how to handle it going forward. I have found it more effective to say, if you can't let it go, learn how to hold it so it doesn't hurt you anymore. When something bad happens to us, and we survive it, we often live in fear of it happening again. The only way to overcome that fear is to find the lesson that can empower you from the experience. Today we are going to unlock your inner wisdom for knowing how to use any bad experience as a tool to make you better and stronger in the future and when you can do that, you become a source of wisdom not just for yourself but for the people you love and you set all of you up for more happiness and success.

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Step 1-

The first thing I want you to do is a make a list of all your regrets - anything that is hurting you from the past, that haunts you because you don't feel like what you did or how you handled something, any past memory that makes you feel bad about yourself, write it down. 

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Step 2 -

I want you to look at your list of past regrets as training experiences. Picture the most wise and loving and compassionate version of yourself showing up for this broken version of you in these moments. What does it say? Write down a message you think this version of you would say for each past regret. 

 

Good. I think one of the most important realizations you can have about past regrets is, if you would have known better you would have done better. If you knew what you know now, you would have handled it completely different. It's just part of being human, most things we have to screw up and learn to get better at. Not everything just comes naturally to us, unfortunately. But knowing that, can help you have a healthier sense of compassion for yourself and for others and make you much wiser and more understanding in the future. 

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Step 3 -

 

Before we do the next part, this is going to seem random but I promise it will make sense in a minute. I want you to picture a burning building. Everyone is terrified and rushes to get away from it except... the fire fighters. The fire fighters are prepared and willing to run into the building to help anyone that's in there. Why aren't they scared? 

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1. They have protective gear on

2. They have run through possible scenarios of what they might run into and they know how they want to handle every single one.

3. Because of their training, they know they can access a situation quickly and act effectively even if its dangerous. They have prepared themselves mentally, physically, and emotionally. They have game planned and practiced staying calm in challenging situations so they can keep a clear head and do what is best. 

 

Step 4 -

To gain a little more clarity around some of these experiences, here are a few more questions you can ask (just answer the ones that apply): 

 

How could I have handled that better? 

How could I have been more loving to myself in that situation? 

How could I have been more loving to others?

How would I like to handle this type of thing going forward? (Visualize yourself handling the situation in a way that you would be proud of.)

What advice would I give my friends and loved ones if they were in a similar situation? 

 

 

Facing our regrets and healing them, is like becoming a fire fighter. Bad things might happen in life, we make mistakes, other people might hurt you, but when you take the time to figure out a good way to move forward that honors your strengths and values and helps you become the kind of person you want to be and you decide how you want to handle that type of thing in the future, your mind heals and you're not scared of getting hurt anymore because you are empowered. You are protected. You know how to quickly access a situation better than before. And you know what to do differently now, you know how to handle it better now, so you get to let yourself off the hook for not knowing the better thing to do back then. You know now!

 

My favorite part is you don't just became a wiser and more powerful resource for yourself. You become a wiser more powerful resource for the people you love. Your experience which was terrible and I'm so sorry that you had to go through that, but what you just learned from it is a blessing of wisdom no one can take away and you can pass on to protect your kids and loved ones and help them be better prepared to handle similar hard things or even help them avoid it entirely. Because of your willingness to heal the experience, they won't have to carry around the same burdens of regret and neither do you anymore. When we take time to heal ourselves and figure out how to move forward in a way we can be proud of, it doesn't just bless our lives. It blesses everyone who loves us and cares about us. It makes all your relationships better and healthier. 

 

 

Great job today! I hope you go forward this week feeling lighter and stronger having completed this journey.