How to unpack life's difficulties without getting stuck

2018/2019 — before AWAKEN the joy within™️

Trigger Warning: Domestic Abuse Discussion

Before intuiting my AWAKEN the joy within™️ framework and letting go of past traumas

I was 18 months free from abusive marriage #2 — yes I was a survivor armored up & Tanky-da-tanking my way through my life with a fortress wall around my heart.

I was FEARFULLY determined, I was looking back in regret for the shit I had chosen to pull into my life.

I regretted not appreciating my life BETWEEN abusive marriages & instead throwing away what I had been building for myself to go round 2 with another abuser.

It was worse than the first time, because I actually didn’t properly appreciate the little cottage I owned, the woman I was becoming, & was trapped in the belief that life was the accumulation of stuff & events outside of myself.

Even my spiritual practice was intellectual — in my head & based on fear … looking to fix what I believed was broken and fill what I believed I lacked.

My focus was on IMPROVING myself — if only I was better … but better at what?

I had no vision, so I had no idea what to make better anyway. Little did I realize back then that I did not have to improve my True Self anyway. I was asking the wrong questions.

For as long as I can recall I had walked the earth believing I was not enough at the most fundamental level- let alone that I was an adult without the Capitalist Consumer standards of success & validity under my belt.

BECAUSE I DID NOT HEARTFULLY REALISE I WAS ENOUGH — that my mere existence is testament to my miraculous being; then I kept looking outside for validation, for belonging & turning myself & my life inside out in the process.

FEAR of lack (lack in me & lack ‘out there’) was my engine.

I took the story in my head & my emotions totally seriously & was sure that the outside world didn’t like or care about me & that I would have to fight & beg for even basic sustenance, basic decency.

From this place of FEAR I did take action:

I looked for full-time employment telling myself I had to be grateful considering how unworthy I was

(If only people knew)

I could list the achievements on my CV like a list of ingredients

But

I did not have the ‘TRUE SELF’ view to tap into my Universal abundance & create from these ingredients.

I had spent the years before, actively & deliberately creating a false image around my marriage & my life; I photoshopped the abuse & concealed my screaming sense of shameful failure.

So I stepped into 2018 with this load on my back, having returned to Australia on Dec 1 2016 with a suitcase, penniless, homeless, unemployed & heavy with shame & guilt for putting myself & my family through abuse 2.0.

Why the heck did I not learn from 8 years of single life between marriages, to not make this mistake?

I had degrees in Psychology & 20 years of spiritual & Faith practice — clearly, I failed to learn anything otherwise I wouldn’t have insisted on pursuing toxic marriage #2.

Seriously, I sold up my hard-won livelihood gained after abusive marriage #1 & moved continents to insert myself into the life of a man who in truth did very little to invite me in.

So, in 2018/2019 I had a full-time job, a cute apartment I was renting & totally refurbished my life, down to the veggie peeler.

And I stepped into the online support & advocacy space for Muslim converted women overcoming abuse & struggling to keep their Faith. It turned out I was far from alone in this experience.

Though an outward measure of security & validity it was all still pre-earth-shattering SHIFT!

I was still in Fight or Flight mode as a SURVIVOR.

I had been given the RESILIENCE badge of honor & wore it with pride.

As if, identifying as a SURVIVOR was the top spot in this obstacle course called life.

It took until 2019/2020 — the year of being taken back to the mat one last time for the SHIFT to happen.

A shift that meant I no longer lived from fear EVEN IF the outside measures of ‘security & success’ were eluding me.

Can you believe that near homelessness in 2020 was the switch that flipped & showed me where my TRUE security actually came from?

Part 2 — Life beyond trauma continued…