self abuse | David M Masters

When you let someone hurt you, it’s easy to jump to the conclusion that someone has struck out at you, even assaulted you. When your feelings are hurt because of what someone else said or did, it might be more difficult to realize that the responsibility for how you feel is on you, not the other person.

You make the choice to allow someone else’s words of deeds offend, hurt your feelings, or affect you in a negative way because you could also choose to not let whatever anyone else says of does to affect you.

While enduring all kinds of torture and suffering, Viktor E. Frankl, said, “The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one’s freedoms is to choose one’s attitude in any given circumstance.”

While being beaten for practicing civil disobedience, Mahatma Gandhi said, “Nobody can hurt me without my permission.”

These are both excellent examples of men who chose to rise above their current situation to disallow anyone else to exercise dominion over their state of mind. You too, can have this unshakeable resolve, if you so choose.

We go through life with the default setting of allowing other people to hurt us deeply and even feel the pain in our bodies as if we’d been beaten, assaulted, or tortured, when we have not actually been touched, and this is our choice.

We choose to feel sick to our stomachs, suffer sleepless nights, low energy levels, depression, and little motivation even to eat or get out of bed because of what someone else treated us. This is a lot of power over us to be granted to another person.

As perverse as this might be, it’s an attitude which you have been programmed to hold tight to as a method to control you within the prison of your own mind. Many heroic individuals have discovered this and broken through the programming to find their own peace in any circumstance.

You can choose to have the power to not let anyone shake your state.

Once you discover that you have the choice to be unmoved by anyone or anything outside yourself, you also realize that when you let someone hurt you, have made the choice to allow someone to affect you deeply out of respect or love, if you so desire.

From this vantage point you have the knowingness and power of your control over your state of mind at any time regardless of what other people think, say, or do. You are the master of your emotional state.

This high level of emotional maturity is within the grasp of anyone with the courage to grasp the idea and wrap their heart around such a concept.

There’s no need to look back at all the wasted hours, days, and living of life by being overly concerned about the dominion you allowed others to have over you. What is important is that from here on out, you are the master of your emotional state.

Nothing can hurt you.

Disappointment, fear, offensive statements, abusive circumstances (even the most unimaginable) are no longer effective weapons against you.

Also, letting go of expectations can be an effective tool in allowing others to have control over you, for if you let go of the emotional attachment to the expectation of a particular response or outcome, your emotional state is not at risk and cannot be shaken.

You decide to live your life in a state of pain and suffering or love and joy.

When you let someone hurt you, it is not without your invitation or permission.

I work with people who come in covered head to toe in should. How can anyone have any quality of life when they’re covered in should?

I should do this, I should do that… There’s should over here, should over there. How can you get anything done when you’re so full of should?

don t should on yourself no should — Don’t Should On Yourself

Nothing good ever came from should.

Take a good look at your should, what do you see? A big, ol’ pile of should that is at the very least unsettling to examine if not totally disgusting.

Should is rooted in negative, guilt-ridden angst and needs to be eliminated from your life; otherwise it festers and piles up inside of you making you feel worse about yourself, doubt your ability to be productive, lose faith in yourself and can lead to self-loathing.

Should Elimination Cleanse

It’s time to take a big should elimination cleanse.

What’s on your Should List?

Get out a sheet of paper and write down all the things that you tell yourself that you should do on your should list. I should lose weight. I should write Aunt Emma. I should get a better insurance company. I should clean out the garage. I should get a better job. I should start working out. I should spend more time with my kids. Also include those things you feel you shouldn’t do, like I shouldn’t spend so much time with technology, I shouldn’t watch bad news, I shouldn’t drink alone, I shouldn’t show up late, I shouldn’t scream at the kids, I shouldn’t put others needs before my own, and the list goes on and on…

Look at the size of your should list. It’s overwhelming when you realize that you’re so full of should. We’re getting rid of your should list, although you get a chance to cull some of the things from the list and move them to another list.

To clean up your shoulds, get another sheet of paper, this is a list of goals. If you feel compelled to keep some of the shoulds, you may convert them to a goal only if you are willing to take action on it.

That’s the difference between a big pile of should that bogs you down and drains your enthusiasm and goals that inspire you to take action. Shoulds are the things that you don’t do and goals are the things that you do do. Shoulds feel bad because how long have they haunted you? They bombard you and overwhelm you with guilt and make you feel unworthy, that you’re not good enough or like a loser. If something’s been on your should list for more than a year: Really? That’s a lot of unnecessary self-abuse. But, if you’re willing to transfer it to your goal list, you’re only allowed to if you’re committed to taking an action on it within the next seven days. Otherwise, it’s gotta go.

You can revisit the eliminated should at a later date. If it is something you really would like to accomplish at some point, you can re-evaluate it when it’s more likely that you will take action on it and make a goal of it. In the meantime, there’s no more should about it.

Burn your should list. You’re done with that should. No should.

If you’ve transferred it to your goal list and not taken action on it in the seven days, take that should and burn it. Burn that should.

No more should.

You’re not taking any should any more. You’re shouldless.

And that’s just you shoulding on yourself. How often do you should on others?

You know what it’s like to be shoulded on. You don’t like to be should on, so stop shoulding on others.

And if people are shoulding on you, then put them on notice. They are not allowed to should on you again. You’re not taking any more should; not from you, not from anyone.