The whole Jeffrey Epstein saga reveals why it’s so hard for the world to eliminate sexual abuse. Let’s consider the facts. There are around 1000+ women who have complained about being abused by Jeffrey Epstein through his vast sex trafficking network. Even though investigations have taken place for years and continue to take place, the only person to ever be convicted is a lone woman. Let that sink in. One woman, Ghislaine Maxwell, has paid the price for the abuses of thousands of men. It’s almost as if the world has never moved on from the witch-hunting days. We are still hunting witches and burning them at the stake. In the case of Jeffrey Epstein, a woman was burned at the stake for the crimes of men, and the world wants us to move on and accept that this is justice. There is a complete refusal to release the names of people implicated in these abuses. Their privacy must be protected. The most high-profile person to be exposed, Prince Andrew, was never arrested or prosecuted. Epstein himself committed suicide before he could be tried for his crimes, thereby escaping accountability. Therefore, in this vast network of sex trafficking and abuse, only one woman has been held accountable for her crimes. One. Woman. All the men, many of them powerful, who did the actual abusing, have not been held accountable up to today. At every level of accountability, they are protected. The media does not reveal their identity. The police do not arrest them. The justice system does not try them and convict them. They still retain powerful positions in society. There is zero accountability.
What is the real problem here? Does society believe that it is okay for a woman to be sexually abused? Do we see sexual abuse as a problem, or are we comfortable living in a world where sexual abuse is common? Is sexual abuse just an unfortunate incident that is best forgotten? Are we okay with the suffering of women? It’s very telling that the only person to be punished in relation to Jeffrey Epstein was a woman. Does it mean that women have a higher threshold of pain? Do women even feel pain? They seem to go through childbirth easily enough, whereas we all know that if it were men who had to give birth, we would have perished as a species. So, it must mean that women don’t mind pain. It must mean that women’s pain is not serious. We all know that there are people out there who believe that black people don’t feel pain. I guess the same goes for women. They don’t feel pain. That’s why we have 1000+ victims and not one man convicted. I guess men wouldn’t survive in prison. Men should not be expected to pay for their crimes. They are too fragile, and also, they are just boys being boys. Who would want to punish boys for being boys? Especially white boys? Their reputations! Their careers! Their prospects! Their future! Their families! Their children! Quelle horreur, to subject a man to such pain.
Why does society have no problem sending one woman to prison for 20 years for the abuse of thousands of women, and not a single man? Are powerful people too big to convict? Will society fall apart if powerful people start paying for their crimes? I tend to think society will become better if we started exposing these powerful people and forcing them to pay for their crimes. They should be locked away and the keys thrown away. After all, the most powerful people commit the worst crimes. Crimes that affect entire populations. Crimes that impoverish entire populations. Crimes that kill entire populations. Crimes that cause entire populations to live without basic needs. And these are the people we choose to protect?
We need to have a reckoning. The kind of reckoning that is taking place in France, a country steeped in rape culture. We need to have a Gisèle Pelicot-style reckoning, where tens, hundreds, thousands of men are held accountable for their crimes against women. Men should be held accountable (arrested, tried, imprisoned – just in case it’s not clear what I mean by ‘held accountable’) for raping women in colleges, in slums, in homes, in the workplace. For raping children. For incest. For sexual harassment. For domestic violence. Instead, we have a culture of protecting the perpetrators and punishing the victims or those who try to protect the victims. Only a small minority of cases reported to the police are taken seriously. Jeffrey Epstein abused girls for years, and even though they kept reporting to the police, nothing was done for years. Only a small number of cases make it to trial, and only a small number of those are convicted. At every turn, there is a concerted effort to protect the perpetrator, to excuse his actions, to minimise them, to hide them. Victims are revictimized by a system that is optimised for allowing the perpetrator to get away with his crimes. Victims are shamed, as if it were somehow their fault. What we have done is we have allowed society to be shaped by the worst among us, rather than the best. The standards of how we live and what we accept are set by the worst people. We must change this. We must let the most gentle among us, the most loving, the most tender, the kindest among us, set the standard for how we should live as human beings on this planet.
Trauma bonding is a bond that is formed between an abuser and their victim due to a recurring pattern of punishment and reward that keeps the victim tied to the abuser and unable to break free. It is a kind of conditioning or programming that causes the victim to respond in unhealthy ways to a toxic person. The beginning stages of trauma bonds are formed when the abuser love-bombs the victim, causing a massive release of feel-good hormones such as dopamine and oxytocin. The love bombing is quickly followed by narcissistic abuse which appears suddenly and unexpectedly, plunging the victim into a downward spiral of shock and betrayal that can be compared to a drug addict going into withdrawal. The victim is left longing for the high, just like a drug addict longs for the high they receive from drugs. Thus begins the cycle of punishment and reward that traps the victim in a neurochemical bondage, no different from drug addiction. With time, the abuse gets worse while the rewards become rare, meaning the victim has no reason at all to remain in the relationship yet they find themselves unable to leave. When trying to understand why the victim doesn’t simply leave the abuser, we need to understand that the victim is struggling with an addiction, the same way a drug addict struggles with drug addiction.
The beginning stages of trauma bonds are formed when the abuser love-bombs the victim, causing a massive release of feel-good hormones such as dopamine and oxytocin. The love bombing is quickly followed by narcissistic abuse which appears suddenly and unexpectedly, plunging the victim into a downward spiral of shock and betrayal that can be compared to a drug addict going into withdrawal.
Most of us have grown up with an idea of “falling in love” that comes from the media, which equates falling in love with being under someone’s spell – thinking about them constantly, longing to be with them all the time, being unable to think rationally and giving up your autonomy for the sake of the person you fall in love with. This unfortunately sets us up to form trauma bonds with narcissists. If we expect love to look like the version we see in movies, we become prime targets for narcissists because we mistake the neurochemical addiction that occurs with love. We need to understand that love should not feel like an addiction and should not be painful or an emotional roller-coaster. Love should be joyful, harmonious and fulfilling.
Signs of trauma bonding:
The victim defends the relationship even though everyone around them has a negative reaction towards it. When friends, family members or others tell you that they don’t like the person you’re in a relationship with, it is wise to listen to what they have to say. If you find that you constantly have to defend your relationship, then there may be something you are not seeing. Many times, people outside the relationship can be more objective than you can. The reality is that many people, especially those who have been brought up by a narcissistic parent will not be able to detect when they are being emotionally abused. They may be so used to living with narcissistic abuse that they lose their ability to see it when it is happening to them. However painful it may be, listening to what others have to say about your relationship, especially those who love you and have nothing to gain from breaking up your relationship is the smart thing to do.
The victim is obsessed with the abuser even after they leave. A victim of trauma bonding will be unable to forget the abuser even when they abandon them. The victim continues longing for the abuser, missing him and hoping he will come back. The victim becomes trapped in an unending cycle of abuse, abandonment and betrayal followed by love. The victim is unable to move on as they are left longing for a return to the loving times. This means that the victim remains suspended, waiting for the abuser to give them the love they so desperately crave. Even though the abuser caused them immense pain, they feel like they cannot live without them.
Others are horrified at something that has happened but the victim isn’t. The abuser may physically hurt the victim or engage in unacceptable behaviour, but the victim is unable to see the seriousness of the matter. The victim may insist that the abuser has changed or has apologised and they do not seem to be aware of just how serious the abuse is. This is a clear sign of trauma bonding.
The victim feels loyal to the abuser and hides secrets that would be damaging to the abuser. The victim shows loyalty to the abuser even though it is completely undeserved. The victim identifies with the abuser and protects them, keeping the truth about the abuse to themselves. In this way, the abuser goes on with their lives and even abuses others without the threat of being exposed.
The victim continues to seek contact with the abuser even though it will cause them pain. This creates a cycle of breaking up and coming back together or the on-again-off-again type of relationship. Even though the abuser constantly betrays and hurts the victim, the victim is unable to stay away. This is why they say that it takes seven attempts before a victim finally breaks free from an abusive relationship. Even though the relationship is bad for them, they keep going back. The victim essentially becomes alienated from themselves and is unable to protect themselves. That instinct of self-preservation that motivates us to protect ourselves from harm is broken and the sense of self is shattered. The victim becomes conditioned to act in ways that are contrary to their own self-interest.
The victim becomes drawn to dangerous individuals. As a result of being in an abusive relationship, the victim develops a pattern in which they seek out or are attracted to dangerous individuals. It is almost as if they want to keep replaying their initial abuse or find such relationships thrilling. This is why it is so important to take time to heal after an abusive relationship before getting into another relationship. If you were in an abusive relationship and managed to get out, it is advisable to take time to understand why you ended up in such a relationship in the first place and to heal whatever wounds caused you to end up with such a person. Failure to do so risks repeating the same pattern over and over again.
The victim tries to change or save the abuser instead of just walking away. Many victims of abuse find themselves obsessively trying to change the abuser or feeling like they are the only ones who can save them. They develop a martyr complex which causes them to feel compelled to sacrifice themselves for the sake of the abuser. They are convinced that the abuser is a good person deep inside and that if they only make enough of an effort, the abuser will eventually change. But the reality is that abusers rarely change. The idea that you will change them is delusional. The best thing is to walk away and realise that it is not your responsibility or burden to change a toxic person.
The victim will go overboard in helping the abuser. Many abusers not only treat their victims badly but also commandeer their resources such as money or property. You will find victims who go out of their way to give money to the abuser or get them out of all sorts of situations. Even though the abuser has consistently proven themselves untrustworthy and unreliable, the victim will continue going out of their way to help them. In the end, the abuser may even take over the victim’s resources leaving them completely at their mercy.
The victim cannot leave the abuser even though they do not like, trust or care for the abuser. Trauma bonding is like drug addiction. Even though the victim does not like, trust or care for the abuser, they find themselves unable to leave. They will find ways to justify their continued attachment to the abuser, but the reality is that they are trapped in a cycle of reward and punishment that keeps them longing for the ever-decreasing crumbs of love that the abuser tosses their way. Even after they see the abuser for what he is, they still find it difficult to break the bond. It takes an almost herculean effort to break the emotional ties that bind the victims to the abuser.
The victim continues to play along even when things become dangerous or destructive. The victim is unable to leave the abuser even when their physical safety is compromised. Despite physical or sexual abuse, or even when loved ones beg them to leave, they continue staying with the abuser. They lose the desire or ability to resist the abuser, which is why in extreme cases, victims end up being killed by the abuser.
The victim continues trying to get the abuser to like them even though they clearly don’t care. The victim will try to do nice things for the abuser to get their attention. They will be kind to the abuser and become almost a doormat in an effort to please the abuser. They will walk on eggshells around the abuser, afraid to do anything that would anger them. Even when the abuser clearly shows that they do not care about them, the victim does everything in their power to get the abuser to show them the love they once showed them.
The victim trusts the abuser again and again even though they have proven unreliable. The victim uses emotional thinking when it comes to the abuser, i.e., they are unable to think logically or make logical decisions. Whenever the abuser abuses them, they manage to find ways to excuse the abusive behaviour – the abuser didn’t mean it, he was tired, the victim did something to annoy him, he will change, the victim just needs to try harder, no one understands the abuser, etc. The victim gives the abuser opportunity after opportunity to hurt them and never seems to learn from past actions. Just like drug addicts, they lose their ability to think rationally. It takes a tremendous amount of effort to overcome this way of thinking and stop making excuses for the abuser.
The victim chooses to stay in conflict with the abuser even though it would cost them nothing to walk away. The victim becomes so attached to the abuser that they engage in explosive fights with them rather than simply walk away from the relationship. Even when the relationship becomes so toxic that it makes no sense to continue in it, the victim stays put. They become afraid of losing the relationship even though they do not benefit in any way from being in a relationship with the abuser.
The abuser’s talent, charisma or contributions cause the victim to overlook destructive, exploitative or degrading behaviour. When the abuser is wealthy, a celebrity or in other ways an important person in society, the victim convinces themselves that they need to remain in the relationship. They view the abuser as superior to them and are unable to appreciate their own self-worth. They feel flattered by the abuser’s attention which causes them to ignore the abuse. This is why we hear of celebrities abusing people with impunity. Their wealth and position in society shield them from being answerable for their crimes.
The victim stays in a relationship longer than they should. Long after the relationship has become toxic and unbearable, the victim remains with the abuser using all sorts of justifications. They may have children together, joint property or businesses, or they may be unwilling to leave due to their history together. The victim is unable to see themselves as an individual deserving of happiness and a fulfilled life. They see themselves only as part of a couple. They are unable to envision life without the abuser. They may become so accustomed to the abuse that they normalise it and minimise it. Their self-worth is completely shattered by years of emotional abuse.
The victim sees how the abuser abuses others but thinks of themselves as the exception. In some cases, the victim is so convinced that the abuser loves them that even though they see how badly he treats other people, they still believe that they are the exception. The victim is unable to see that they too are a victim of the abuser. They think the abuser would never treat them badly because they are special or loved. Getting them to open their eyes and see the abuser for what he is may take quite some effort.
The victim internally sees the abuser as their controller. This causes the victim to constantly have internal conversations in which they justify themselves to the abuser. Whatever they do, they see the abuser as the one whose approval they need. They see themselves through the judgmental eyes of the abuser, feeling shame when they feel like they are letting them down or feeling as if they need to live up to the abuser’s expectations. The abuser becomes like God to the victim, the person they see looking over their shoulder in everything they do. The abuser is given too much power in the victim’s life, causing them to always conform to the abuser’s wishes. It takes intense introspection for the victim to become aware of the amount of control the abuser has over them.
How to overcome trauma bonding:
Recognize the trauma bond – One of the greatest barriers to overcoming trauma bonding is recognizing that you have one. Even though we may be aware that we are in a toxic relationship with someone, in most cases people just don’t realize that they have formed a trauma bond with the person. They do not understand that the reason they cannot simply leave even though they recognize the abuse is that they have formed a trauma bond with them. People who have been brought up by narcissistic parents are particularly prone to this. People in close relationships with psychopaths are also blind to their abusive nature due to their charming facades. If you’re in a toxic relationship which you are unable to leave even though you would like to, you should consider that you may have a trauma bond with the person.
Therapy – Breaking a trauma bond sometimes requires therapy. This is especially true for people who are trapped in abusive relationships with people who won’t easily let them go. Many abusers will not just casually let their victims go – the reason they abuse their victims is precisely because they want to keep them bound to themselves. In extreme cases, some people could be trapped in cults or other organised groups that ritually abuse them in order to control them. These abusers will not just let them go without a fight. Such trauma bonds cannot be broken through sheer willpower – they require therapy from knowledgeable psychologists.
No contact – Once you realize that you have a trauma bond with someone, the best way to break it is to break off all contact with the person. Trauma bonds are the hardest relationships to break because of the emotional, addictive element. The way we respond to the abuser is a conditioned response. The brain is conditioned to bypass normal, rational thinking and therefore breaking free is as difficult as breaking a drug addiction. It will require great determination to break off contact with the person. You will need to block them on all social media, email, phone, etc. It might mean changing your phone number so that the person can’t reach you. It may be difficult at first but with time it gets easier as the brain adjusts to functioning without the constant highs and lows.
Limit contact – In cases where it is completely impossible to break off contact, for example if you are co-parenting with the person, try as much as possible to limit contact with the person. Don’t talk to them unless it is absolutely necessary. Avoid face-to-face meetings or phone calls that could devolve into shouting matches. Determine the most impersonal way of communicating such as email or short, factual text messages and stick to that. Create as much distance between the two of you to weaken and eventually break the trauma bond.
Stop emotional thinking – The reason many people keep going back to abusive relationships is that they develop emotional thinking which keeps sabotaging their efforts to break free. Rather than use logic, they default to a way of thinking that allows them to justify going back to the abuser. Even if the person has proven again and again that they are unreliable, the victim still convinces themselves that this time will be different. Even if the person has clearly shown through their bad treatment that they do not love the victim, they continue telling themselves that the abuser loves them. Even if they have shown themselves to be an abusive, cruel person, the victim still tells themselves that deep down they are a good person. In other words, the victim is not using logic because their brain is bypassing the logical, analytical mind. If you recognise this type of thinking in yourself, you’ll need to counter the lies with cold logic based on an observation of the abuser’s behaviour.
Honour your feelings – Another reason it is so hard to break trauma bonding is that the victim learns to bury their feelings and does not trust that what they feel is valid. They learn that their feelings are unimportant and therefore they learn to suppress them. If they were brought up by a narcissistic parent, this process would have started from early childhood and will be their default way of being. To break this pattern, you need to recognize that your feelings are just as important as anyone else’s. Listen to what your body tells you and know that it is valid and should not be ignored.
Enforce boundaries – Victims of abuse usually find it hard to enforce boundaries. They have learnt that their needs are not important and that they should put other people’s needs before their own. Therefore, they allow people to treat them badly over and over again. One of the hardest things for such people is to say no to bad treatment. They are reluctant to appear rude or hurt someone else’s feelings. What they don’t understand is that the person they are so eager to protect has no similar feelings towards them. The abuser will have no qualms about hurting them or treating them badly. It is therefore their responsibility to enforce boundaries and make the decision not to accept abusive behaviour.
The topic of childhood emotional trauma is a difficult one to talk about. Anyone who has experienced childhood trauma knows how devastating it is. As a child, you don’t have the tools to deal with the trauma so you just push it to the back of your mind and pretend it never happened. You may even completely forget about it for a time, only to be forced to think about it later in life when something happens to trigger the memory. You may try to tell yourself that it doesn’t matter, that it happened in the past and it’s not important anymore but the truth is the trauma did happen and it did impact you and it does play a role in the person you are today.
There is nothing as painful as the thought of a child being abused especially by the people who should be loving and protecting the child. Just ponder for a moment that right now as you read this article, there is a child somewhere being sexually molested, physically battered or emotionally abused. It’s heart-breaking. The fact that we allow this to continue as society says a lot about our level of consciousness. It is something that should never happen and should not be tolerated and the perpetrators severely punished until this evil is eliminated from society.
The thing about childhood abuse is that most people never talk about it and many live their entire lives without ever revealing what happened to them. There’s a lot of shame that is experienced by the victims, which is crazy because why should the victim be ashamed? The perpetrator is the one that should be ashamed of their actions, not the victim. This says a lot about the world we live in, that the victim is the one who feels shame and the need to hide what happened. This shame and the hiding of abuse is what allows it to continue and thrive in society. Many people never even think to seek counseling to try and make sense of what happened to them. We just live with the weight of the trauma constantly pulling us down and affecting our ability to live whole, fulfilled lives.
Fortunately, there is a movement today towards greater emphasis on mental health which is allowing people to start thinking about what may have happened to them during their childhood. The starting point to healing is to acknowledge that something happened to you. This might be very painful to acknowledge and accept and it feels almost better to just push it to the back of your mind and forget about it. But the thing is, it takes a tremendous amount of energy to maintain the wall between your subconscious mind and your conscious mind which keeps the memory hidden. In the end, it is much easier to just deal with it once and for all and be free. There are techniques such as EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) that can prove helpful in facing the memory and this should ideally be done with the help of a therapist, but I don’t see anything wrong with trying the technique at home especially if the memory is too painful to contemplate.
We may be tempted to think that childhood trauma does not impact us in any way as adults and that it is better to let bygones be bygones. But the truth is the trauma does manage to seep into various aspects of our adult life and this just goes to show how essential it is to face the trauma head-on and overcome it. We cannot live whole lives with the trauma hanging over us because we become the net result of the trauma we are carrying. It is better to do the hard work of facing and healing from trauma than to lie to ourselves that it has no impact on our lives and that we can live as if nothing happened to us.
We may be tempted to think that childhood trauma does not impact us in any way as adults and that it is better to let bygones be bygones. But the truth is the trauma does manage to seep into various aspects of our adult life and this just goes to show how essential it is to face the trauma head-on and overcome it.
Below are some ways in which childhood emotional trauma impacts us as adults:
Nightmares
Everyone experiences nightmares every once in a while, mainly caused by external factors such as being too tired or going through a stressful situation. For some people though, nightmares are a chronic problem they have to deal with on a nightly basis or several times a week. This is especially true of people who experienced childhood trauma. Nightmares are caused by a glitch in the system which causes the mind to become accustomed to an unhealthy way of processing memories. Memories are normally processed while we sleep through dreams which are the language of the subconscious mind. With difficult memories relating to traumatic events, this process doesn’t happen normally and the mind gets stuck trying to process the memory without success. With time, the mind gradually learns to process all emotions in this unhealthy way resulting in chronic nightmares. Many victims of childhood trauma endure daily nightmares without knowing that it is a habit that can be broken.
The best technique for overcoming nightmares is to write out a description of the nightmare exactly as you remember it, then rewrite it but with a different ending, i.e., the kind of ending you would have wanted if you were the one writing the script. As you continue reading and rereading the dream journal, the nightmares will eventually just fade away. It’s almost as if processing the nightmare during waking hours is exactly what was needed to allow you to move on. We may not realize it but we are in charge of our minds and we have the right to decide that we are tired of having nightmares and we do not want to continue experiencing them. Many of us go through life feeling that our minds are outside our sphere of control but this is not the case. It’s unfortunate that people suffer for decades with chronic nightmares without knowing that there is a simple solution to their problem.
2. Lack of Self Love
Many people who have experienced some form of childhood trauma over time learn that they are not worthy of love and so they stop loving themselves. They view themselves as unlovable and try as they may, they are not able to see anything in them that someone could love. Lack of self-love manifests as a pattern of toxic relationships with toxic partners and toxic friends who treat you the way you subconsciously feel you deserve to be treated. Someone who does not love themselves will feel lucky just to have someone in their life as they do not see anything in them that may cause someone to want to be with them. They may cling to unhealthy relationships in the belief that they will not be able to get anyone else if they let go of the person they have. They will endure bad treatment from their partner and the thought of leaving never even crosses their mind. They do not love themselves enough to believe that they deserve good people in their life who will treat them with love and respect. They surround themselves with toxic friends who feel better than them and treat them accordingly. To these “friends”, they are nothing more than sidekicks, there to listen and admire and play the role of the lesser person who only exists to make them feel superior.
When we wake up to the fact that we do not love ourselves, the first thing we need to do is let go of all such toxic people from our lives and realize that it is better to be alone than to be with people who do not value us. This may not be as easy as it sounds because the lack of self-love also blinds you to the fact that you are not being treated well. It may take a long time before we start seeing the truth about our relationships and even though the thought of cutting out people from your life may be painful, I cannot emphasize enough how essential it is to ruthlessly cut out anyone who pulls you down rather than build you up. People who mock you or make fun of what you want to do, people who make you feel as if you need to keep explaining yourself and people who drain your energy and cause you pain simply need to go.
3. Burying your Authentic Self
When we are abused as children, it causes us to hide our authentic selves because we learn that there is something wrong with us. We blame ourselves for the treatment we receive because we do not have the maturity to realize that we are not to blame for the actions of someone else. We learn to hide our anger, our hurt and our real feelings because showing them is not safe. When we live with cruel or unpredictable people, we learn early on that anything we do could result in an explosion of anger directed towards us. So, we try to contract ourselves, to become as small as possible and to be as bland as possible, all to appease the abusive adult. A child has no defenses against an abusive adult and will believe whatever they are told about themselves. In the end, their authentic self gets buried and forgotten and they lose touch with who they are.
When we bury our authentic selves, we no longer know who we are or what we want and so we end up living lives that don’t make us happy. We go along with whatever society tells us we are supposed to do or want and we never explore what makes us truly happy. We never dare to choose ourselves, even if it means going against what society wants. We learn to be “good” people, just going along with everyone and never daring to take a path that does not conform to what is expected of us. When we bury our authentic selves, we feel that we don’t have a right to have what we want or to express what we feel. Even though we have a rich inner life, we learn that it is never safe to express ourselves and so we keep this to ourselves.
To retrieve our authentic selves, we need to start reflecting on which parts of our lives don’t make us happy. We need to believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that we deserve to be happy even if it means making drastic changes. We need to start acknowledging our feelings, for example, feelings of anger or shame and ask ourselves where these feelings came from. We should look at our feelings as clues or breadcrumbs that will lead us to the core of our issues. We need to honour those feelings if we are to work through them; we have to feel them and allow them to lead us to the depths of our soul where the unresolved issues dwell.
4. Low Self Esteem
Low self-esteem means having a low opinion of yourself. It means that you view yourself in a negative light and are overly critical of yourself and your abilities. Your inner voice constantly criticizes you and never has anything good to say about you. You see yourself as incompetent and less than others. This causes anxiety and lack of confidence and unwillingness to extend yourself in any way. When you have low self-esteem, your baseline view of yourself is negative and anything that happens to you leads to this idea you have of yourself. It could be something like “I am unworthy,” or “I am a bad person,” or “I am inferior.” This view of yourself is unconscious but it is the tape running in the background and it is the foundation upon which your entire life is built. Can you imagine living life on a foundation that says “I am unworthy”? You will never expect anything good to happen to you and if it does you expect it to quickly disappear. You will always have low expectations for yourself regarding what you can accomplish.
When we experience childhood trauma, it may result in low self-esteem. We become unable to see ourselves in a healthy way i.e., as people who are loved, valued and worthy. Healthy self-esteem does not come from outward things e.g. I am worthy because I am successful, I am worthy because I am beautiful, I am worthy because I have a high IQ, etc. It comes from the inner knowing that I am a human being placed on this earth by my creator; I am loved by my creator and therefore I am worthy and I have a right to experience life just like anyone else. I do not need to prove my worth or to add on anything to myself to be worthy.
Healthy self-esteem does not come from outward things e.g. I am worthy because I am successful, I am worthy because I am beautiful, I am worthy because I have a high IQ, etc. It comes from the inner knowing that I am a human being placed on this earth by my creator; I am loved by my creator and therefore I am worthy and I have a right to experience life just like anyone else.
Overcoming low self-esteem is a long process that starts by looking inwards to see what is the baseline belief we have about ourselves. Do we feel loved by those around us? Do we feel worthy of having good things happen to us? Do we feel like we have to prove ourselves to others? Listen to your inner voice and notice what it defaults to. If it defaults to a negative view of yourself, challenge that view and know that it is not the gospel truth but just a belief you have taken on and which can be replaced with a positive belief. You could start a thought log where you list down some of the negative things you tell yourself, write down examples of events in which these negative thoughts come up and then think of an alternative way to view the events that is not negative or critical or judgemental of yourself. Write down a new belief to replace the old belief about yourself e.g. “I am loved,” “I don’t need to prove myself,” “I am worthy,” etc.
5. Living below your potential
When we experience childhood emotional trauma, our image of ourselves as capable individuals is affected or even destroyed. We lack the confidence to pursue goals and achieve them as we don’t see ourselves as having what it takes. We become afraid of dreaming big and instead settle for much less than we are capable of. We fail to see ourselves as being capable of growth and instead view ourselves as static beings without the potential to improve ourselves. This static view of humans is, unfortunately, something that society programs us to accept. We are taught to believe that some people have what it takes and others just don’t have it and we should accept that some of us were never meant to be successful. The reality is that no one was born with the inability to grow; we all have the potential to be more than what we are today.
Childhood abuse makes us feel as if we are meant to remain small and hidden in the shadows. It makes us feel as if we are less than others. People who experienced childhood trauma are reluctant to challenge themselves because of the fear that they are not good enough or will never accomplish what they set out to accomplish. They see success as something only others can achieve. They set modest goals which don’t require much of them and then shy away from overextending themselves. They have a pessimistic view of the future because they don’t believe that good things could happen to them. In case they achieve some success, they are tormented by imposter syndrome, feeling as if they shouldn’t be there or as if they will be exposed at any moment for the frauds they are.
How does one overcome this tendency to live below one’s potential? A good place to start is to set goals for yourself that seem unrealistic to you, preferably in written form. Some of us may not understand just how hard it is for someone with low self-esteem to write down a goal that feels too big for them. They have to battle with themselves before they can even write down the goal. If you feel reluctant to write down a goal that feels unrealistic or impossible, just force yourself to write it down no matter how stupid it makes you feel. Tell yourself that no one will see it except you and God. Just that act of overcoming that thing in you that tells you that you’re stupid for having such a goal is the first step towards healing that low view of yourself. You may be surprised when many years later you read through what you wrote down and discover that you accomplished everything to the letter.
Violet Flame blog 