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| Photo courtesy of Microsoft |
Have
you ever got stuck in a blame-game with someone, refusing to accept some
responsibility for your role in the situation or to accept the other person’s
apology for hurting you? Do you ever hold onto the anger and emotional pain
about something that occurred so long ago that you don’t even feel those
emotions anymore but keep holding onto them because…you don’t even know why?
Would you be willing to let go of all that negative energy if you knew this
release would help you feel better, to be at peace and free you from the
emotional baggage you have been dragging around?
I recently saw
this quote from Inspirationboost.com, and it really resonated with me:
“Forgive. Not because they deserve forgiveness, but because you deserve peace.”
At some point
during our lifetime, someone hurts us. This injury may be physical or
metaphoric, intentional or accidental, but long after the physical wounds have
healed some emotional scars continue to feel raw. To assuage this pain and gain
a sense of control over what happened, we may claim that the injury was
justified or believe that we somehow brought it on ourselves. Indeed, it can be
very difficult to see past this pain when someone you once cared about is
hurling verbal and legal barbs your way during an acrimonious divorce or
dissolution of a business or social relationship. You may even resent and even
guilt/shame for having ever trusted him or her with your heart (and your
finances).
The problem with
holding onto these negative emotions is you are the one who continues to suffer
emotional pain long after the relationship is ended and you and the other
person have parted ways for good. Whenever you dwell on the negative events
that happened during the relationship and the sadness or anger that you felt at
the time, you reinforce the strength and the habit of feeling (and feeding) those negative emotions. This
continued bombardment of thoughts, memories and negative associations with the
past relationship overloads the conscious mind, triggering the fight/flight
mechanism and putting you in an even more hyper-suggestible state (hypnosis). Since
we are most suggestible to ourselves, every time we repeat a thought or
behavior you reinforce its strength and power in your subconscious mind. In
other words, you are hypnotizing yourself to perpetuate this unwanted behavior.
Ultimately, the most effective way to heal from that hurt is to forgive the
person who inflicted it so you can pursue the life that you want and deserve to
be living.
Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in
Southern California. She graduated with honors from the
Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. For more information about
Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.
© 2014
