The Journey to Self Discovery

Anger is not a bad thing, if it is APPROPRIATELY EXPRESSED. Expressing it inappropriately will usually get us nowhere and can badly back-fire. However, its appropriate expression is often most effective. As we begin to realize that what was done to us as children was wrong, anger often emerges (especially when we start to understand all the ramifications of how we have subsequently been affected by it). Repressing anger (‘bottling it up’) is often painful and stressful. We can also get to the point when we can contain it no longer and this might result in it being MISDIRECTED (expressed against the wrong person) or in it being expressed in a DESTRUCTIVE and DAMAGING way (to both ourselves and those we interact with). It is much better if anger is MANAGED and only expressed in a manner which is beneficial. For some, expressing anger gives rise to a feeling of power, the power that was denied us in childhood, and can therefore feel that by expressing this...

The auditions were harsh and the requests even more difficult. I showed up to a modeling job interview only to find a pompous SOB sitting behind the desk giving me the once over, to walk the imagined runway to sit on his lap. I didn't want to believe that just being who I was, was enough. It was enough, yet no one told me or the pompous SOB! I had power and to scream out, to refuse his advances and to report him. That was my final interview for Vogue. His advances scarred me. I lost my power but now I am super again just because I see others who may end up where I was. So I run back down the road I got off of so many years ago, just to scream!!!!!! I am enough and I don't deserve your grooming or abuse. I can be a woman the sexual being I was born to be... and so can you. My story is this story.... The depiction of these girls is not prudish , but it’s also not fraught with a kind of anxiety that seems to hold young girls implicitly responsible, by t...

Today I was going over my morning affirmations and one particular affirmation and after I said it, it triggered a memory. The affirmation was "All the money I could possibly want pours into my life daily."  I want you to pay close attention to the symbolism in this truth. It has always been stirring in me and on reflection until now inhibited most of my financial success. When I repeated the affirmation, I was quickly reminded and actually transported back to my childhood of age 9 years old. I remember coming from "the basement" of where my perpetrator would violate me and after getting up and feeling dazed, he would:"hand" me a few dollars. I remembered thinking "why?"   I would take it from him, then go upstairs to the bathroom and shower along with "the money". As I washed, I also scrubbed myself with Brillo until I was red, but I washed the money gently until it looked new.   After I got out of the shower, I remember...

From Silence to Strength: Reclaiming Your Life After Abuse I was only five years old when it began – just a child. I was an expressive, lively, yet serious little girl who loved to laugh and sing around the house. To him, however, I was merely an object for his depraved desires. He always had his eyes on me, and what I now refer to as "the incidents" became a disturbing routine. It became so routine, in fact, that I believed it was normal. He touched me at every opportunity he had. He didn’t care the time of day or who else was home; all he needed was a five-minute window, and he took advantage. Afterward, I always felt dirty, scrubbing my skin raw and painful with a Brillo pad in the shower. I knew what he was doing was wrong, but he would always look me directly in the eyes and tell me never to tell. I kept his secret, even when my spirit longed to speak, silenced by the deceptive allure of the gifts I received. Then one day, a few months before my ninth birthday, I final...