Processessing Exercise

Release, heal

Step 1: Purge

Now, write out or record your pains, shames, secrets, traumas and biggest insecurities. However they come out, let them all out. List them, even if you don’t go into detail just GET THEM OUT. Release, release, release. Writing or recording them unapologetically, one by one. You can get into the stories of them now or later, if it feels good to just keep jotting them out. Feel out the emotions that they bring up. Crying is one of the most intense releases you can offer yourself, and often ignites incredible breakthroughs following. Write the traumas and how they have effected you or continue to effect you in life. Be kind! Imagine yourself as the hands that carry an egg through a triathlon. For extra oomph vocally express and SAY THEM OUT LOUD. Talk to the wall or a stuffed teddy bear or whatever doesn’t make you procrastinate. Speaking them out loud and sharing them is the key to your freedom!! Get them out!

Step 2: Accept + Forgive

“Forgiveness isn’t approving what happened. It’s choosing to rise above it.” -Robin Sharma

This profound step grants you to live freedom from the situation. This step is about feeling every emotion of it and accept what has happened in the past as apart of the past. Apart of the contrast of what you do not want for yourself. Forgive who and where you must. Forgive others, for they are on their journey. Above all, you must forgive yourself. For every shit, shame or should in your life, let it go. Allow yourself this pivotal moment to forgive, accept and release.

“The act of forgiveness takes place in our own mind. It really has nothing to do with the other person.” -Louise Hay

Step 3: Hindsight

“Consider for a moment that what you call your ‘personality’ is actually just a composite of habits and behavorial patterns you developed to cope with trauma. Now ask yourself, who am I outside my pain? Who would I be if I stopped living life as a product of my story?” -Ebonee Davis

Can you trace back the lines to witness the resulting effects? Can you see where your mindset influenced your perspective and decisions at the time? How have your traumas shaped or warped your identity, or your sense of self? We devote a section to this later on, but for now… ponder the quote above to open up the channels. Many traumas mold your feelings of self-worth, which literally sets the course for your entire life. Through your relationship with your self-worth, you determine everything you attract, what you believe in and what you go for. Can you meet and nurture those parts of yourself where you feel unworthy?

-How have these experiences shaped you in both positive and negative ways?

-How have your traumas and their resulting effects influenced your decisions and desires?

-What feels inauthentic in your lifestyle or being that may have been influenced by your traumas?

Step 4: Boundaries

“Whatever you are willing to put up with, is exactly what you will have.” –Anonymous

Often when we are violated, our boundaries may weaken. Through your processing, can you see where your boundaries might have been hindered in the time after your traumas?

-How have these boundaries been broken in your early life, and then up through today? Detail major violations and the emotions they caused.

-Can you identify areas in your life where your boundaries are damaged or loose? For instance, if you grew up feeling unworthy of love because of a certain incident, in adult life do you find yourself falling for all the wrong partners? Can you see the correlation?

-Many traumas result in a boundary violation of unworthiness.

Step 5: Release 

“Pain is physical; suffering is mental. Beyond the mind there is no suffering. Pain is essential for the survival of the body, but none compels you to suffer. Suffering is due entirely to clinging or resisting; it is a sign of our unwillingness to move on, to flow with life.” -Nisargadatta

Trust you can let things go, and that you are free to free yourself. Allow the release what holds you down or sticks around as residue. You no longer have to hold onto the weights or darkness as part of your story. Release. Let. Go.

“Inside every mistake – I was shown the truth. Through every pain – I learned how to heal. Within every heartbreak – I found love.” -Phoebe Garnsworthy