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How To Heal Your Guilt And Shame

A woman in one of my groups shared her experience of overwhelming guilt and shame.  Four years ago, she rescued a puppy that had deep fears, probably because of abuse.  Several months later, it began lunging at people on the street and actually nipped a woman.  After extensive training, the dog has come a long way and has not exhibited this kind of behavior for quite some time.  While my friend was out of town recently, the dog was being cared for by a neighbor and during a walk, it nipped an eight year old boy in the neighborhood.  After…

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How to Honor Your Survival System

We all created a finely-crafted survival system to bury or numb our pain when we were young.  We had to, as it was absolutely necessary for survival.  Life was too scary, and we didn’t have the skills to meet ourselves in our hearts. Our survival system can include compulsions, such as drug and alcohol abuse, shopping, work, sex, the Internet, busyness, self-judgment, and chronic worry.  I think about all of those years that I shut down the pain with food, drugs and alcohol.  In one year alone, I gained 97 pounds.  I would have died of the pain if I…

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