Philip wrote:Annette, God does not want us to be trapped by our pasts. It is amazing how events and treatment during childhood can permanently impact us.
I went through a lot of bad stuff with my dad as a child. He suffered from depression and he'd had a very mean-spirited father. So there was constant yelling and "spankings" (I got clobbered a lot but not beaten). I was constantly put on restriction to the house, was given relentless chores. Dad had some terrible issues. I was the oldest. I bore the brunt of it. Dad had electric shock treatments when I was about 9. I always had high anxiety around him - I was afraid of him, to a significant degree. This crap continued, to a degree, until I was about 18. It killed my confidence. It gave me a bad temper. All that said, my dad fiercely loved me and he was a Christian. He made sure I knew all about Jesus. And to make it all worse, ALL of high school was very dangerous. I suddenly became a minority is a recently integrated Southern school. I was constantly threatened. I was a little skinny kid. Every day, I had to navigate a huge school yard, knowing racist bullies were all around. It was scary, filled me with anxiety. I was a miserable student. I had a significant hearing problem and so I didn't clearly hear a lot of instruction. And although I had happy pockets of time, a fantastic and loving mom, fun brothers and sisters to play with, my childhood was a mess.
The above made me want to please people. It made me insecure. It made me lack confidence. I felt powerless. God healed me of most of it, although some memories trickle back, now and again - which I vanquish with prayer. God showed me that I did not have to be defined or trapped by my past. My dad mellowed tremendously as he got much older. I forgave him. It's not that he wanted to be a bad dad; he just had some really bad issues, which impacted my entire family. So, I'm very easy-going and know how to relate to almost every kind of person. But I also trust people very little and so well know and can read their evil or self-serving motivations. I don't tolerate much nonsense. And so when someone really crosses the line, I can really unload on them. But God also showed me to practice grace with people - just as he has me (I'm working on it!). So, I took all of those all those bad memory tapes and I put them on a shelf somewhere. I know precisely what is on those mental tapes, but I never play them. They are in the PAST. And to the best of my ability, with God's help, I just refuse to be controlled by my childhood. God showed me how to be confident in who I am IN CHRIST. It does help to understand WHY and WHAT has produced negative feelings and traits - as these are the first steps to understanding what needs to be overcome. And Scripture tells us we are not to be controlled by our feelings - past or present.
Lastly, the devil wants to use all of that crap from our past experiences to keep us unhappy, focused on negative consequences, and to have them control our present. So, instead of brooding, thinking things cannot change, this or that is beyond our control, we need instead to PRAY and bring those burdens, negative feelings and attacks to the Lord. He knows how to handle what we can't. Seek the light which God gives us in our lives. Focus on the good. Surround yourself with spiritual and loving people. Avoid those who drag you down - don't give them opportunity. The thing is, the devil wants us to keep ruefully gazing at our own navels, to believe we can't overcome this or that, to think we are always going to be controlled by things beyond our ability to do anything about them. He loves to control us mentally by reminding us of our pasts because he knows we cannot change them. He is constantly whispering lies to us: "You know yourself - you'll never be able to ____________ (whatever), you'll only have continuing misery, failures, and insecurity."
And so it is when we give, in our minds and hearts, credibility and belief to what the devil wants us to falsely believe (and to be controlled by), that his tactics work brilliantly. And it is not enough to try to resist him IN OUR OWN POWER - we must turn to the Lord to overcome. So, the lies combined with our own feelings they give us, infect our minds and hearts, instilling feelings of insecurity, hurt and hopelessness. The Lord is the solution! The key is to quit looking AROUND at all the devil's lies, our feelings, and our sense of powerlessness, and instead look UP and call upon the Lord. That is the devil's most successful tactic - distract people with prolific lies so as to constantly burden them - so much so that they fail to look to the Lord to vanquish his power and their false perceptions. The Lord is more than just hope - because He has the power and ability we need to allow us to actually overcome _____________ (you fill in the blank!).
Thanks for sharing Phil, or should we call you Dr. Phil
, I struggle with things past also.
What makes it especially difficult is I'm often disconnected within myself and it's hard for me to identify my moods which I believe are brought on from past issues surrounding an emotionally volatile mum and head-in-the-sand dad who was present but never really there as a Father. Gosh, such a big and last impact they made on your life. Then as a child, my frustrations and associated anger, issues with OCD that were my own... today I'm left with trying to deal with triggers where I'll withdraw or become short, and prevent like this second personality setting within me which comes and goes for days at a time. Things may be good, very positive, and then in one moment something triggers and it's like these issues that lay latently within me surface and I'm a different more withdrawn and angry at the world person. I may not think about them consciously and I've healed much from my past, but I know it's my past affecting me when I have dreams involving my mum, dad, past and the like.
You talk of putting the past on the shelf, and praying to God to take your memories of such away... but is that really what is best? Like it or not, the past is part of you, has shaped and made you. Shouldn't such be embraced? Perhaps, rather than tuck them away on the shelf or try bury them, then we hand them to Christ to carry for us where we can't carry them. So that we can be held together as who we truly are, a composite of good and bad in life, only with Christ.
I'm more reflecting upon how such (burying the past) probably wouldn't work for myself here. If such works for you, then keep doing what you do. I've gotten over my past in so many ways, on a conscious level I think I'm healed... however there nonetheless seems to be past issues that lay beneath that will surface. I'm not sure how to deal with them, but trying to ignore and bury such or place them away on a shelf, I'd think would make them even more latent. And then, if there's a trigger, whether such is seeing a quality pop out of myself that I feel was like my mum, or something in my own wife even, they quickly resurface and I seem unable to stop myself from entering a state of depression where I become withdrawn, bitter, resentful, hating myself and the like, I can instantly become this different person which I struggle to break free from. Such impacts upon my wife, kids and life.
