I M Perfect lady

One of the books by my nightstand is "Trust" by Iyanla Vanzant

So far I have highlighted many sentences.

"Trust is a function of choice"

I love this.  I also believe, that when we literally allow ourselves the freedom of choice, we can then trust ourselves.  Without knowing we are free to say yes or to say no, we don't trust ourselves.  How can we?  Nor, do I trust in others who are unable to freely choose.

It is quite remarkable actually, to boil life down to this simple freedom of your individual self. 

Trusting yourself to make a choice. 

To see that life has choices.

What the church has taken away mostly is the right to choose and in doing so has put the people's trust IN the church and away from the self.

A person without trust in themselves, is one who has no idea who they are.

"We lie to ourselves about ourselves and then become highly offended when others impose their lies on us. We violate our most basic instincts and in doing so invite others to do the same. We put our faith in everything that can go wrong, and when it does, we feign shock. 

Another profoundly simple and extremely hard thing to do; stop telling yourself lies.

They don't even have to be big ones, just lies.

Saying "Yes" when you would feel so much better saying "No".  That is lie.

All the little ways, you don't speak your truth, chip away at who you are and erodes your feelings of trust towards yourself.

I mean truly, if you can't trust yourself to make a choice based upon how you truly feel, how can you literally trust yourself.  And, if you can't trust yourself; how can you ever put trust in someone else?

"Learning to trust is so simple, and yet it is the hardest thing we must learn to do in this life. For me, it begins with knowing that my thoughts and feelings are valuable."

Our value is truly raised or lowered by the choices we make.  In the way we discount our feelings and place more value in others.

Not only do we 'discount' them, we totally ignore or even recognize the validity of how we feel and even our right to feel a certain way.

It is very hard coming from dysfunctional families where abuse was present to find our own self-worth, when we were literally treated like we had zero value.  And, harder still is when our feelings about our family are not of high value. We don't even feel we have the right to feel we see them as being less than loving. Even when reality is clearly showing us.  We want to preserve the value of family and we do this by lowering our own value.

"When I trust what I think and feel, then I am empowered to take actions that are self-supportive, self-respectful, and self-naturing.  I can do this now because I have done my work, cleaning up my past, forgiving my own transgressions, and taking complete responsibility for what I think, do, and say – moment by moment. These, i believe are seeds of self-trust."

It is so completely hard to trust what you think and feel, when both of those have been taken away.

When the church has stepped in front of you; taking away your right to think on your own. When it has taken away the right to your body, you no longer feel you own your feelings.

The same goes for abuse.

Abuse is an act of 'no choice'.  And, due to the fact, you had no choice, you then place no trust in yourself.  An oxymoron for sure.

For in order to have trust, you have to have choice and in typical dysfunctional families, the very act of choice is removed. 

So, you literally start the journey of healing and following yourself out of the pattern of abuse as a person who doesn't even trust herself!

It is to place trust in someone who has not even proven to be someone of value and worth.

I am not sure I can wrap your heads around this fact clearly enough.

For the only one to save you is you.

And the you who is in charge of saving you, has never made a free choice, when it comes to being the strong one to support your feelings and your thoughts.

It is to change the way you see the world and respond to it. It is to take your sights off of the outside and zero in on the inside.  To become intimately connected to your emotions and your gut feelings as well as what will bring you love, peace and joy….and, then being strong enough to stand your ground.

I was only able to do this; by seeing the alternative.

By seeing how my mother's life turned out, was I able to do the opposite.

The complete opposite led me out.

I was fearful. I was terrified spitless to do this.

I didn't know who I was, nor did I trust that I was doing the right thing; but I was more terrified of ending up like my mother, so I forged on.

Each little choice I made that was in support of my inner feelings and emotions, and my trust grew.

I learned to trust Me.  

My body never lies.

I only lied about what it felt…or what I felt.

Now, I trust myself implicitly!

I had to look up the definition of Trust.

"firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something."

Yes, I completely believe in who I am.

"We need truth to grow in the same way that we need vitamins, affection and love." Gary Zukav