What's the worst that's happened to you so far? How did it hurt you? Do you wish that the pain would just go away? Do you wish, maybe, that it never happened at all?
What if wishing your pain away was the wrong answer? What if instead, you co...
The life you have today is the sum total of your past. Everything since the day you were born until right now has made you who you are. If your life is not what you want it to be or you are not who you want to be, the reasons are buried somewhere in your past. Somewhere along the way you made a mistake, didn't do the right thing, missed an important lesson, held onto negativity, something bad happened to you and so on. If you never focus on resolving these issues, it's like never throwing out the garbage or never cleaning your room. Stuff builds up. This build-up of junk hampers your efforts to have the life you want. I call these your 'Past Problems'.
A lot of your Past Problems are a result of your childhood, even the ones that didn't happen when you were a child. Let me explain.
When you're a kid and something bad happens, you must find a way to deal with the emotions and thoughts about it, at that time, with the skills you have then (which are usually limited). Consciously or unconsciously, you come up with a solution that makes you feel better as soon as possible. This doesn't always lead to the best long-term outcome (you're a kid, remember). You're just trying to move away from whatever is causing you pain.
Most people never effectively resolve their Past Problems from childhood. When those kids turn into adults, and a similar event triggers the same thoughts/emotions, those adults often employ the strategies they used as a child. Ever see a 'grown-up' throwing a temper tantrum about something silly? Exactly.
This isn't deliberate. People are just trying to resolve the pain. Once the pain is gone, the brain thinks 'crisis averted' and people think the problem is solved. It's only later, when something else triggers the same emotions, that you realize the problem is still there.
If you're reading this, you've been alive long enough to have lots of experiences. Literally every single day you are dealing with various situations and emotions. Over time, life has taught you and you've developed systems and strategies to deal with those situations and emotions. But how much of this has been deliberate and thoughtful? How many times have you sat down with a pen and paper to really work on and practice how you should respond to a given situation? Probably not many.
There is one group that does significantly more work in this area – women. Women have an enormous advantage over men here for most of their life. Why? Because they talk to other women about how they are feeling and the situations that produced those feelings. This is a form of practice and analysis which men (typically) do not do until much later in life (and some never do). That doesn't mean that, because women do more, they come up with better solutions (quantity doesn't always equal quality). But the odds are, as a group, the average woman will have 'studied' this topic more than the average man and she will have more insight. If you do push-ups every day, even if they aren't great ones, you'll end up stronger relative to someone who does nothing. Volume of practice still counts.
Back to the point. People just want to make the pain stop. But the 'solutions' that make you feel better today might not actually fix the underlying problem or, worse, they will make it worse. If you don't effectively deal with your Past Problems, they can stay with you, festering.
Even if someone knows they can benefit from resolving their Past Problems, it's still not easy to work up the courage to do it. Why? Because Past Problems hurt. It hurts to look systematically into an experience like having an abusive parent. It hurts to re-live a really embarrassing moment in school. It hurts to face feelings of shame about something you did (or failed to do). It really hurts.
Like cleaning out garbage from your house, facing the Past Problems in your life is the biggest opportunity you have for a better life.
That's because in addition to removing the negatives, each Past Problem carries with it something special. Something that's just for you. Inside each Past Problem is a Treasure. Treasures are good things that reside in all Past Problems. How can that be you might ask? Keep reading -- more on Treasures in a little bit.
This book gives you the tools to discard the bad stuff and keep the good stuff. To eliminate your Past Problems, and discover the Treasures unique to you.
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Digging up your Past Problems is like removing a tree stump. You have to remove all the unwanted material and plant something fresh.
Your issues today are the result of unresolved problems in your past. Using the tools in this book you can turn Past Problems into your most valuable life experiences.
