You’ve likely heard the saying somewhere that we are met with teachers and messengers when we need them most. All too often, people associate this with people who have some sort of teaching title, or are a spiritual guru in some way. When we’re told to seek a teacher, we often don’t realize we learn more from those already in our own lives. There’s a common misconception that teachers and messengers are benevolent people with hearts of gold and kind words. This isn’t always true. I have found that the greatest teachers are those who’ve forced us to make the most significant changes within ourselves that helped us grow and learn about our true selves. The good thing about this is that just as portrayed, teachers and messengers aren’t permanent people in our lives. This allows us to let go of those who didn’t treat us fairly or with respect. It frees us from negative attachment, and allows us to be grateful to them for the lessons they helped us learn. Harboring hatred, thoughts of revenge, or negative feelings toward these people that treated us poorly only darkens our own hearts—a weight we shouldn’t carry.
These teachers and messengers come in a variety of forms: selfish friends, neglectful or irresponsible parents and relatives, failed romantic partners, or the worst of people (like, rapists or other perpetrators of crimes and immoral behavior). People in all these initially have us believing they should have never been a part of our lives due to the heartbreak and physical pain they cause, having us questioning why we ever let them so close or why we had to suffer. But truthfully, to overcome these negative feelings, we are forced to change ourselves, to release these negative thoughts within ourselves, and to change our behavior. In trying to prevent these same circumstances from reoccurring, we GROW. We learn to protect ourselves with healthy boundaries and asserting them, we learn to respect ourselves and know we are worthy of more respect, love, and happiness. We become more firm our own truths, and therefore, more self-empowered.
Does this mean it’s easy to do this? No. It just means that freedom from these types of people, from these cycles, from these traumas is indeed possible.
You probably wonder if you’ve also suffered horrific traumas how do you free yourself from the fear or hatred of even those who’ve abused you (perpetrators, rapists, abusers, etc.)? You focus instead on what you’ve learned from the experience, the things you’ve changed to prevent such things from happening again. What behaviors were you doing that may have created an opening for these people to exploit, or what do you feel you could have done differently to have prevented it? When I analyzed my rapes and child abuse traumas, I learned that I didn’t want to keep people who did not respect my boundaries in my life; that it was my disserving motto from then ‘that I never wanted to cut someone off completely or leave them feeling alone’, that kept me keeping those in my company who I shouldn’t have, creating openings for me to be abused. I learned that putting up a ton of defenses, keeping people away, and allowing people to think I was cold to the idea of a relationship—behaviors I adopted in effect of the traumas—were not serving me positively. When you block out everyone and put up defenses, you also block out people that could be positive influences in your life, as well as, positive opportunities. Even though these defenses had me feeling safer, I came to learn they weren’t worth the things I was sacrificing and losing as a result. I learned there were healthier ways to both protect myself from negative people, while also allowing in and remaining open to new opportunities and positive influences.
But were these lessons learned only from teachers of a malevolent nature? No, not in my case. Yes, I learned the importance of taking better care of myself and protecting my boundaries from the negative experiences. However, I was only able to see my old ways of protecting myself were not serving me in positive ways because when I came to realize I loved someone, I was saddened to see all the mountains and density that laid between us, and felt guilt and remorse because I knew that all the defenses I put up, the walls around my heartspace to keep it safe from heartbreak as a result of horrific traumas, blocked my heart chakra and this love from both going out and from coming in. I knew that the walls I put up were keeping this person out too. So, learning this lesson, I began to change how I protected myself and have worked hard to tear down these walls I put up. Only because of this love revealing the weight of the walls I had up, was I willing to go back and analyze the traumas I endured and learn how I could change myself.
Although there are teachers and messengers that are benevolent beings in your life, there are also those who teach through negative behavior and treatment. We need to learn compassion, and to accept and be grateful for both types. For ultimately, it is growth and our movement back into love that is what we all aim for, even if we don’t yet consciously realize it. When we love ourselves and work to free ourselves from the weight we’ve created, can we truly share our love with others.
Not Your Cup of Tea 