Everyone has a story to tell. Life provides many valuable learning opportunities that we can, in turn, use to benefit other people.
People love stories. They want to hear them and they need to tell them. When we share our story, people connect with us on a more personal level. They can relate to us and we have an awesome opportunity to bless other people.
If we are open, we will continue to have new and valuable experiences we can in turn generously share with other people.
A few months ago, I was at a workshop on feminine leadership . I had a profound experience I’d like to share with you, trusting it has the potential to be a benefit to you.
First, the leader Tracey Trottenberg of Amazing Women International, provided an exceptionally safe context for the event . Then she talked about how we all were squashed as little girls and were taught to not speak up for ourselves. Now, as adult women, we still have that little girl inside us and she may be keeping us from taking action when we need to be speaking up.
At first, I kind of rolled my inner eyes at the thought of doing inner child work. In all my years of personal development I’d managed to avoid it.
Suddenly, though, I was struck by a vivid memory of an interaction with the man who sexually abused me:
We were in the field at the neighborhood school. When he approached me, I told him I didn’t want the physical stuff. I just liked having him spend time with me. He gave me a disapproving look and turned away from me. He gave me the cold shoulder and wouldn’t talk to me anymore.
Inside I was crushed. The silent treatment seemed like a punishment to me. He left my life very shortly after that incident. Things went bad quick at home and my life basically fell apart.
Fast forward almost 30 years later and I’m suddenly realizing that that experience was keeping me from telling my husband John that I had an important message that I need to share with the world. The injured girl in me was screaming, “Don’t tell John you have your own message! If you insist on sharing a message that’s not his message, he’ll leave and your world will fall apart!”
As painful as it was to have this realization, I am grateful for it. It allowed me to check her misguided assumptions. I didn’t marry the kind of man who leaves when things get rough. In fact, he’s been extremely supportive and he wants me to get clear on my story and to share it with the world.
I’m glad to say that it is congruent with what we teach at Simply Great Lives. In my next blog (on Wednesday), I’d like to share with you the message I am so passionate about. So, don’t miss it.
