Episode 55 - Guided Journey to Forgiveness

Transcript

“Inside Out Weight Loss” Episode 55

Renée Stephens:  Welcome to Inside Out Weight Loss.  I am your host Renée Stephens and together we are accessing and adjusting the control panel of your mind, body system, bringing ease and joy to your weight loss journey and fullness to the rest of your life.

On today’s show a guided journey and an open door to indulgent, selfish, forgiveness.

[Music]

Forgiveness and slimness and open your awareness to the fellow travelers on this journey, listening to the show and also to those that have not yet found it.  Those that have not yet found their path, those that are still struggling without hope, without the knowledge of what’s possible.  Seeing an image of someone or some being that you feel unconditional acceptance for and typically it’s a child or a pet and I love what Giselle has done, is taking image of her younger self.  An image of herself that she feels wonderful love and acceptance towards and flipping that with the image of her current self, my guess is that it’s bringing huge benefits and joy to her life even as we speak now.

That’s right, you’re floating off into the sky, on that beautiful cloud that carries you and you’re looking and you see yourself down there.  There you are, sitting there, standing there, lying there.  There you are, alive and well.  Then you look and you see that person that you have the resentment, that person that you’re thinking about forgiving.  There they are or don’t like that person.

But for just moment, what I would like you to do is float down into their bodies.

[Music]

Let’s go ahead and take these moments to dropping side and checking, be present with you, as I share a moment of bliss courtesy of blisstrips.com where you can sign up to get these daily vignettes delivered to your inbox, free of charge.

Today’s secret word is ‘luscious.’  Close your eyes and breathe in the scent of this tantalizing word, almost as if it were a flower all its own.  Let lusciousness fill your body with a soothing sensation as if you were bathing in a pool of delight.  Let the word roll around in your mouth like succulent fruit.  Feel how tempting it is, how alluring.  Let a delectable poem rise from your subconscious and carry you on in invisible wings as you move this journey and your day forward.

Now, take a moment to think of something for which you were grateful, something that you truly love.  It could be an opportunity, a person and experience, a resource, path to follow and as that sense of gratitude expands simply because it’s nurtured by your attention and your awareness.  Notice how luscious it really is.  Feel the richness and lightness of it.  Let it swirl through your consciousness and through your subconscious, bringing waves of opening.  Opening to awareness of that stream of light and love that is here now for you, that always has been here and always will be, in this present moment that is a turning.  Align yourself with that light as you let your intent for this episode arise within you this episode about forgiveness.  Forgiveness and slimness and open your awareness to the fellow travelers on this journey, listening to the show and also to those who have not yet found it.  Those that have not yet found their path, those that are still struggling without hope, without the knowledge of what’s possible, without the knowledge that they too can be naturally slender, the knowledge that they too can be naturally slender in any moment.  To those that haven’t yet seen that pinhole of light in their future that can expand.  This episode is dedicated to them

Feel their presence and open your heart and share your light with them and feel how your light energy, your life energy expands and brightens as you do this.  Feel how good it is for you.  Now my intention for this episode is to awaken you to the joy and the gifts of this moment and this body that lives and breathes and works for you.  The magic of having a body that allows you to be alive, that allows you to love and be loved.

My further intention is to walk you to the door, to the freedom and lightness of forgiveness.  Forgiveness of others and ultimately forgiveness of yourself.  But I’m getting ahead of myself here, aren’t I?  We’ll get to the why and wherefores of forgiveness and the ‘what-the-heck-that-does-it-have-to do’ with weight loss later in this episode.  Right now, I would like to share with you this comment that was posted on the blog at personallifemedia.com\renee.  I had made a posting about the journey that we did, the self acceptance guided journey, episode 40.  And a listener named Giselle comments on the blog she writes, she writes that the image that came to her when I asked her and all of you to identify an image of someone or some being that you feel unconditional love for was a photo of her when she was about 7.

She writes, “This is my all time favorite photo of me and when I think about it or look at it I’m filled with so much love and admiration for that little girl.  She has been my most faithful friend and constant companion.  She has dealt with so many things and survived them. She is beautiful and trusting, strong, resilient.  I just love her.” She writes, “Reflecting on those experiences had given me not only amazing insights into my own strength and resilience but just being peaceful with the idea that that child has done the best that she could throughout my life with all that she has encountered.  How can I possibly mad at her? How can I do anything but love and be grateful to and for her.  Today, I listened to episode 40 and the image that came to me was that of that same little girl at my sister’s party.  She was smiling, beaming actually, looking at my sister and my cousin cut the birthday cake, I was so filled with love and so delighted by the obvious joy and love on her face and I almost started to cry while I was walking to work.  I flipped that image with one of me this morning, my final glance in the mirror before I left for work today and practicing bringing the love and acceptance that I feel for little me to the current me is an absolutely joyous blessing.  Thank you, thank you, thank you Renee for all that you do.”

And thank you Giselle for posting that amazing and inspirational comments on the blog.  We had talked in episode 40 about the power of seeing an image of someone or some being that you feel unconditional acceptance for and typically, it’s a child or a pet and I love what Giselle has done is taking an image of her younger self.  An image of herself that she feels wonderful love and acceptance towards and flipping that with the image of her current self, my guess is that it’s bringing huge benefits and joy to her life even as we speak now.

It is actually time for us to take a break now, to support the enlightened sponsors who support this show and make it possible.  I want to express my gratitude to them for supporting the show as well as my gratitude to you for listening.  When we come back more on forgiveness, what the heck does it have to do with being naturally slender?  Why bother and a guided journey to bring you to that door.

This Renee Stephens and you are listening to Inside Out Weight Loss on Personal Life media.

[Advertisement]

[Music]

Renée Stephens:  We’re back now.  Before the break we were talking about the comment from a listener about how she is bringing self-acceptance into her daily journey.

Now, let’s talk about forgiveness.  We have already talked about how forgiveness is an incredibly selfish thing to do.  It is enlightened selfishness.  Why?  Because we get so much back from forgiving others.  Because forgiving others lightens our load and encouraged to set your intent that as you forgive others as you forgive yourself that you in fact lightened your physical load.  That you become evermore naturally slender and that the weight melts off your body like snow on a mountainside in the warm sun of the spring.

Now back to being selfish and forgiving for a few moments.  Perhaps you wrote your list of people against whom you had resentment, people where you carry resentment and anger against them with you wherever you go, whenever you think of them that’s there with you.  That was a homework assignment that I suggested a couple of episodes ago.  And as we think about those people on that list, we think “why do we bother with forgiveness?”  I just said that it’s really selfish.  But here’s another objection that often comes up to forgiveness.  We think surely, our offenders don’t deserve it.  Surely they don’t deserve it.  They have done horrible things and chances are they don’t deserve to be forgiven.  Chances are they really don’t deserve because what they did was so horrendous, so horrible, so offensive that we think, “My God that person really doesn’t deserve it so why should I give it to someone who is undeserving?  Doesn’t that set things askew in the world?  Doesn’t that mean that I have to pay again for what this person did against me?”  And I asked to that does it?  Does it really?

Think about what it feels like in your body to carry that resentment and anger with you wherever you go.  Whenever someone mentions that person or someone reminds you of that person or that offense, there it is fresh for you.  Now allow your attention to drift to someone that you have forgiven.  Perhaps, it’s even a small offense, perhaps it’s someone that you love, a child or a pet for example always great examples.  Someone who has done something that really bothered you and yet you just forgave them.  Some a child spilled milk, pet messed up in the house or someone at the office, a friend, a relative of yours and you forgave them.  Now, how does that feel?  How does it feel when you think again to that person?  When you think again to that situation?  Something you reminds you of it, how does it feel?  How does it feel in your body?  And I want you contrast that feeling to the feeling of carrying around that anger and resentment.  What feels better?  What feels worse?  How would you rather feel?

Now, I have this other question to ask.  You’re carrying around anger and resentment for someone that has hurt or offended you, who carries that burden?  How does it affect the person who offended you?  How do they live that offense on a day-to-day basis?  How are they hurt by you carrying around anger and resentment?  How are they hurt by you keeping alive that situation?  Because what the mind does when we are angry and we are resentful is that it keeps on repeating that situation, kind of like what happens in trauma.  What happens in trauma when we have a traumatic event, it’s almost as if we have one of those old-fashioned records.  You know vinyl you may have heard about it in the museum or seen a dusty vinyl record.  Actually, there are some new vinyl records being created now, I just have learned.  And if you had a scratch on a vinyl record, what would happen?  Well, it would play this endless loop, it will repeat the phrase or the song or the bar of music over and over and over again.  It jus keeps on going over and over and over and over again.  And that’s really what happens with trauma, with trauma we think of the situation and it’s almost as if our minds are trying so hard to process it so they keep on bringing it up for us here.  Process it here, release it here, process here, release, release, release and it repeats it over and over and over again.

Unfortunately, what happens is that we re-traumatized ourselves every time we review the situation and it is kind of the same way with anger and resentment over someone else.  We keep repeating the event over and over in our minds in an endless loop as it were on one of those old-fashioned vinyl records that had a scratch on it and it just repeats again and again and again and so we get hurt again and again and again which is what happens in trauma.  We re-hurt ourselves because we’re in that endless loop.  So the question of course is what do you do?  With the vinyl record, it’s as easy as giving a little nudge to that needle, giving a little nudge to the thing that plays the music so that it moves on and plays out the rest of the record, happily taking you on a journey of the ups and downs and the highs and lows and all of the enjoyment of that music or that recording that you’re listening to.

I always feel so good when that happens and of course, when that happens we really kind of forget about that scratch back then and we just move on to the enjoyment of the rest of the album.  Imagine of course, that it could even be a favorite album, something that we really enjoy and oh it feels so good to go to the conclusion to just go on a journey through the rest of that music, the rest of that symphony, that pop album whatever it is.

So, honestly what feels better?  Being in that endless or moving forward and playing out the rest of the music?  I sure know the answer for me.  And I have one more important thing to share with you about all these but I am pretty tempted given that we’re running out of time here to go ahead and take you on this guided journey to the door of forgiveness allowing you to walk through, because you know what it’s like when you get to a door and it opens before you and you don’t even know what’s on the other side, it’s so exciting to just walk through.  So go ahead and allow yourself to drop even further inside.

If you’re driving a car or operating heavy machinery of any kind then it’s time to pause this episode and wait until there’s a time that you can pull over or be in a quiet place as you become more and more present with you, present tour current experience, present to the lusciousness of gratitude that we discussed earlier in this episode.  How that expands and carries you like a cloud, floating off into the sky.  But for a moment, what I’d like you to do is think about a person that you like to forgive and you can start wherever you like, you could start with someone that you have a big chip on shoulder about or you could start with someone that you have just a minor.  If you wan to practice and start with someone that you have in minor bit of resentment or anger against then go ahead and do that or heck, choose a politician, choose a public figure, anyone you want.

Now, what I’d like you to do is imagine seeing them, get an image of them in your mind’s eye, imagine seeing them and you can think about them or makes you growl, and angry and upset.  You may feel badly in your body.  But as you see that person, the image of that person, what I’d like you to do is just allow yourself to float up into the sky on that cloud.  That’s right, you’re floating up into the sky on that beautiful cloud that carries you and you’re looking down and you see yourself down there.  There you are, sitting there, standing there, lying there.  There you are alive and well, then you look and you see that person that you have the resentment, that person that you’re thinking about forgiving.  There they are or don’t like that person but for just a moment what I’d like you to do is float down into their bodies, float down into their bodies and you’ll be seeing through their eyes.  Imagine for a moment that you are them.  Imagine for a moment that you have their history, their childhood, their lives, their position at work, their family situation, their struggles and challenges, their perspective, their hopes and their dreams, their fears.  They maybe ruled by fears who knows.  Just take a moment to really be that person, seeing through that person’s eyes and feeling what it’s like to be in that body.  Is it pleasant?  Is the body a nice place to be?  What does it feel like?  Are there any chemicals or drugs coursing through the veins causing mood swings?  What are their fears?  What are they so afraid of?  What is it that they want that they don’t even know that they can have, that they are so afraid of losing, perhaps?  Just notice.

Take a moment here to learn, to find out what it really is like to be in this body.  What is it like to have this history? To have these hopes, these fears, these concerns?  And from this place look through your eyes as this person and see yourself.  Look through the eyes of this person and see that person there in front of you, that person who is angry at you, or resentful at you and notice what you think.  What you feel in your body.  What is that other person there represent to you?  You are the one who made the offense but what is that person represents?  Do they represent a threat?  Does that person remind you of something from your own life that really annoys you and bugs you, that you haven’t been able to resolve yet?  Just notice.

Take a moment and notice everything there is to notice here, in this other person.  This person that you may not know that well.  Or perhaps, you though you knew them well but seeing from their eyes, feeling their body having their history, their hopes and fears.  There’s something new here.  Perhaps, there is something that you haven’t noticed before.  When you really get into their skin, perhaps it’s not what you expected.  And with that, allow yourself to float back up, leaving the body, leaving the perspective of that person that you resent or had felt anger for, just float up, glance back down and see that person there and see yourself there, notice the relationship between the two of them, notice the dynamic and then float back down into your own body.  Ah, it feels so good to be back into your own body.  That’s right with your history and your life, it’s all so familiar.  And yet, perhaps you bring with you something new, perhaps there’s something that you’ve learned.  Perhaps there’s an opening here, reminding yourself of those things for which you are so grateful.

We are out of time for today.  On the next episode, we’ll take this forgiveness business a step further through another guided journey of discovery, of release, of lightness.  Did you know that Personal Life Media continues to expand by bringing you even more quality shows?  On topics ranging from photography to genealogy to enhanced intimacy.  Check it out at personalilfemedia.com and while you’re there click through to the blog at personallifemedia.com\renee and post a comment sharing your journey with us.  From the blog you’ll find links to Inside Out Weight Loss logo gear, including journals with a butterfly logo, tote bags, t-shirts and more.  There’s also a link to the products available for sale on my website to deepen your progress and your journey as well as a link to Bliss Trips where you can subscribe for those free daily guided bliss trip journeys.

As you know, you’ll get so many, many more times out of this program than what you put in but you must put in to get out.  Join the Yahoo group, form a support group of friends or family and enter your 5-star review for this show on itunes, by putting Inside Out Weight Loss into the search box and commenting at the show’s page.

This is your host, Renee Stephens and I am on a mission to eradicate the weight struggle from the planet, enabling you to share your souls’ gifts.  Join me as we evolve the world by evolving ourselves.  Take great care.