I Saw Her Become

I'd been weeping most of the morning when I finally followed my own advise, and asked, "why am I so emotional?"  I knew that attending the play, "Celebrated Silence" last night had moved me.  But, come on, I know the impact of groping and what it does to lives. Why was it echoing inside me still?
I remember the day Anisha, sitting in our Advance! course, asked me, "Is groping really sex abuse?" "Absolutely!" I replied. "Sex abuse is about what it does to someones heart and soul." Anisha looked at me with shock. The worksheets were revelation to her as she began to uncover the deep impact of realizing how having been groped had shifted her thinking and behavior patterns.  Anisha completed the course.

When I went on my own restoration journey years ago, I stepped into my destiny and Connections was birthed.  My passion lies in giving victims of sex abuse tools to conquer the impact of trauma and move into living out of authentic identity where destiny lies.

Last night, I watched Anisha walk into destiny!  And I was shaken at my core.  My tears were not about the reality she shared, as challenging as the content was.  But my tears were at seeing someone do the hard work of restoration, reclaim their authentic identity and walk into purpose.

You see, she wrote and starred in the play.  "Celebrated Silence" is about the personal damage of groping and offers a challenge to each of us, who in our denial of outrage, celebrates keeping victims silent. Through restoration she unlocked her passion.  She left her profession as a doctor and established All Shades Theater, a theater group designed to start conversations about difficult issues. She moved out into destiny!

Someone who will see that play also carries inside a locked destiny. Perhaps it is the destiny designed to help us really take down sex abuse as a way of life in our culture.  That play has purpose woven into it.

One more thing Anisha did last night.  Two weeks ago she contacted me to tell me about the play. She acknowledged that it was the Advance! course that started her journey.  She invited me to participate in the evening so that she could give recognition to Connections.  Today as I explored my emotions, I was reminded of the story of Jesus healing the 10 lepers, and how 1 came back to thank Him.  Anisha was doing that - she was thanking God for helping her conquer trauma and unlock the destiny she carries.

I was one of the first to see her backstage and we held each other and cried.  She gave me the gift of seeing my walk in destiny be multiplied and bring forth fruit, because she stepped into hers.

15 year ago I made significant changes in my life to open the doors of Connections. Anisha walked through those doors, did the hard work, and now will do even more than I did. Anisha leaves in January for India where she will present the play.  Upon returning, she will share "Celebrated Silence" around the United States and unleash a movement.

I am so humbled, proud and grateful.  My cup runneth over.  Thank you Anisha!

Compassion Redefined

You've seen them - the commercials about abandoned and hurt dogs.  I have to turn them off.  Those sights and sounds tap into my compassion and compel me to go to the local SPCA.  I can't take in another dog!  The commercial is very effective.  We respond from the heart and want to fix the problem.  We are spurred into action, either we write a check, volunteer or go to the pound.

Now refocus on a news report about the latest arrest for the sexual violation of a child. You may have to turn that off as well.  And look away.  Not out of compassion, however, but out of fear and denial. We take no action at all.

This post is a call to exercise compassion in a new way!

Next time you see a report of sex abuse, or think of someone you know who has experienced the trauma, don't look away.  Look through eyes of compassion!  Silence your fears and take a hard look at what is happening around you. We are not powerless over this issue! Consider this:

1. Recognize and have compassion for the victim! Somewhere the victim is reeling.  Trying to make sense of what happened.  Wondering what to do next and how to overcome the reality of trauma.

2. Turn compassion into action!

• Write a letter to a judge or prosecutor who is involved in the news report you saw. Ask them to do everything they can to hold that perpetrator responsible.
• Attend any event you can to gain skills to be proactive and learn how to address the reality of sex abuse in our community.
• Begin to recognize how the use of language in ads or television contribute to a climate of objectifying women and children. Point it out and do something to challenge it.
• Support those of us who are on the front lines.  Provide a scholarship for counseling.  Ask what you can do to help their efforts.

Let your heart be touched by the reality of sex abuse.  

Connect to your compassion and then ACT!

Sensitivity Hijacked

Restoration - becoming all you were created capable of being!

We have this amazing sheet art piece, the "Handprint Banner", on which victims of sex abuse have written about how sex abuse impacted them.  Central to many of the statements is the question, "Who am I?"  Thus, core to our restoration model is the process of reconnecting to parts of identity by removing any disregard or damage done to them.

We typically start by exploring character qualities - we all have them and can be discovered pretty quickly.  Character qualities are those guiding principles behind the scene.  They can be impacted by sex abuse and require some adjustment.

This week we have explored sensitivity.  Sensitivity is an awareness and understanding of how other people are feeling. The victim of sex abuse absolutely has sensitivity - an often heightened and distorted sense of sensitivity.  For example she is sensitive to:

• The nuances of the perpetrator:  They are sensitive to such things as movements and breathing; always vigilant to sense the mood shifts in anticipation of the actions of the person who hurts them.
• The nuances of even "safe people".  On guard to protect themselves from rejection or possible hurt, they are sensitive to body language, i.e. facial expressions, breathing, tone; anticipating what they might need to do to protect themselves.
• The escape route in the room:  Sensitive to where the door is, perhaps choosing to face it in order to have a sense of power.
• Sensitive to read people in a room; who appears to be a danger; who might be safe.

The character quality of sensitivity was designed to create intimacy and connection.  The appropriate use of sensitivity allows me to recognize your emotional state and need so that I can meet you there; so that we can feel connected.  Sensitivity was not designed to be a means of discerning danger.

When the victim of sex abuse does the work of recognizing how a character trait has been hijacked, they then have power to shift it - clean it off - and gain the freedom to connect to their authentic identity in the purpose and design in which it was formed.

Freedom to have access to all aspects of identity and live out of their authentic purpose is AMAZING!

I don't need these anymore!

"I have something to give you," she said as she withdrew these rocks from her purse.  "Remember when we did that activity with writing the negative things we believed about our self?  These are from that activity; I saved them. I've held on to them and felt the heaviness of them. But I don't need them anymore - I've shifted these beliefs, they don't belong to me!"

AWESOME!  We celebrated and congratulated her!

It absolutely is possible to conquer the impact of childhood sex abuse!  Utilizing the tools of Restoration, you can be restored to your authentic identity and become all you were created capable of being.  The core tools are:

Recognize:  Work on hearing what you say and what you do that stems from trauma, and see the impact of sex abuse playing out in your life.  Recognize the negative messages and the positive messages.

Power of Agreement: Whatever you agree with, your energy and focus empowers.  You have the power to shift from aligning with negative beliefs to aligning with positive beliefs.

Internalize:  That means you intentionally make a part of your thinking the positives and the truths necessary to defeat the thinking that negates and hurts you.

Exchange:  When you've recognized the negative, and been exposed to the alternate positives, you consciously exchange the old for the new.

Responsibility:  Ultimately you have to take responsibility to do this hard work.  Only you can do it!

Our Advance! Workbook gives you a taste of how to utilize these tools. I'm excited to tell you that now, if you don't live in the Cincinnati area to participate in our group - you can now GET THE COURSE ON LINE!

Check out the free video and worksheet and order it here:  CLICK HERE

Really? We're Still Having this Discussion?

The very first conversation I had at this interfaith conference about human trafficking and domestic violence was astonishing.

The concerned father was telling me how he told his daughter that her dress was bait; that she was tantalizing men.  When I explained that those types of comments contribute to victim blaming, he pushed back by saying, 'my daughter isn't a victim.'  When I asked that if she did become one, would his first response be, 'I told you not to wear that skirt', he paused and said, 'I never thought about it that way.'  And when he stated, 'women have to demand respect,' I countered with, 'why aren't we demanding that we raise boys to respect women.'

He walked away.  I hope he doesn't forget our conversation.

I was left with a deep angst and concern of my own.

• Why is it we are still holding women responsible to control men's sexual behaviors?
• Why is it that childhood sex abuse, a contributing factor to human trafficking, and more prevalent than human trafficking, has to fight to be included in the discussion?  (It took me two years of lobbying to get invited to the discussion.)
• Why is it that conferences are still focused on information, when what we need are personal challenges to the mindsets that keep it all in place?

I'll keep going to the conferences.  I may even hold my own conference.  The focus being: ask the attendees to take personal responsibility and do some self-confrontation.  To take a look at their language and mindsets so that we can obliterate sex abuse, not just manage it.

I wonder if anyone would come.

.

Overcome a poverty mindset

Learning to" live without" is actually an overlooked impact of being victimized by sex abuse.

• The victim learns to live in silence and live without voice.
•  Losing the ability to trust means you live without connection and intimacy.  
• Realizing you are not safe in your home  means you live without a sense of well being. 
• Having your body violated, you learn to live without boundaries.

For the victim of sex abuse, this "living without" translates into developing a poverty mindset.  This mindset keeps the victim trapped in thinking "I can't have", or "I don't deserve." Couple this with the emotion of shame, and the poverty mindset becomes really strong.

Safe people around him show him love and acceptance and he can't receive it.  She is encouraged to ask for what she needs, but she doesn't.  She makes sure her children have the latest style clothes, but she won't get them for herself.  A poverty mindset at work.

Why is it important to recognize this concept?  Because a poverty mindset keeps the victim of sex abuse trapped in patterns of behaviors that reinforce the belief that she doesn't deserve.  In addition, it has the potential to set up a pattern of behavior in which the victim needs to have constant validation of worth in order to silence the whisper of her wounds.  Because the poverty mindset blocks her from internalizing the safe intimacy, and safe love offered, she must hear it again and again.  That can get tiring for the people around her.  And that can trap the victim in thinking she needs to hold onto the wound so she can hear the affirmations she needs.

Use your power of agreement and take down the poverty mindset.  Align your thinking, will and emotions with the truth that ALL human beings deserve and need love, care, nurturing and acceptance.

The Trigger is Gone!

It happens almost every time.  The push back when I share the possibility of restoration. People are skeptical - I get it! Our culture is so blanketed in the status quo, that we dismiss our power to change.

Last night one of the attendees at the training could not believe that it was possible to conquer the impact of sex abuse.  Her question to me was:  "Do you mean to tell me that if the perpetrator came near her (the restored survivor) she would not be triggered?"  My response: " She would not be triggered.  She most likely will have an emotional reaction in the now moment, but she has the tools to process that now emotion without experiencing the trauma again."

Then this morning I had a conversation with a Connections alumni who spoke of seeing a former husband and feeling disgusted and shameful.  She was worried that she would fall into old thinking and behavior patterns.  As we talked further, she stated that in the moment she had a new awareness of what she had lived through, and felt emotions that reflected her experience. That is healthy!  She did not, however, get flooded with memories or experience the internal reinforcement of being shameful.  Her trigger is gone!

Here's what I have understood as a result of these two back to back conversations:

A trigger is something, i.e. a smell, a sound, a piece of clothing, an emotion,  or anything that has the power to take you back to re-experiencing unresolved trauma.

Your emotions by themselves are not a trigger! The unresolved trauma connected to the emotion, (or smell, etc.) is. When you do the hard work of facing the trauma, processing emotions, shifting beliefs born of that trauma and reconnect to authentic identity - the trigger dismantles.  You are free to experience life in the now and not from the past.

Yes, you can learn to relax when it is dusk. 
Yes, you can learn to receive a hug and not quake.
Yes, you can smell that aftershave and not get nauseous!

Yes you can dismantle triggers!