Picking the Scab

This article is about picking at the past, memories of that unwanted experience, and at any undesirable present condition. We all have this propensity to pick at the unwanted memory, experience or condition. Like the scab on your body from a previous experience. We don't like that it's there and are uncomfortable with it, we don't like how it looks and feels and know that doesn't reveal who we really are; divine, beautiful and perfect. We want the scab gone, like the past unwanted experience and the feelings that accompany them, so we pick at the scab. But picking at a scab, an old wound, only irritates it, reopens it and brings it back into our present experience.

It reminds me of a funny thing that happened a couple of years ago. I went to the doctor, here in Germany before I learned any German. I had injured my knee slipping on an icy sidewalk and I went to the doctor because the swelling was not going down. First of before I continue, all over the same leg I have a birthmark and it looks like someone beat me.

Well the doctor, a sweet woman, didn't speak a lot of English. I didn't speak any German. She took a look at my leg, after we tried to discuss the problem with an English/German dictionary, and said, "Uh, um, you have angered your knee" I understood that she was saying that I have irritated my knee, but got a giggle out of it non-the-less. From then on my husband and I referred to irritation of any body part as angering it.

This is what we do to scabs, to memories and conditions, we anger them. We rile them; reopen them to harm us again. It is the same thing as resentment.

Resentment can be triggered by an emotionally disturbing experience that is being felt again or relived in the mind. When the person feeling resentment is directing the emotion at their self it appears as remorse.

Resentment is reliving the same experience over and over and over again. And of course it's always reliving something undesirable and painful; picking at the scab reviving it to its original pain and condition; often to a worse state getting infected. In this action we are reigniting the thoughts and emotions, previously experienced and in turn keeping it active until it manifests something similar to the original experience. The wounds from the past, like a scab, left alone or put out of your mind heals and falls away.

Often the scab we are picking at is the wound that we carry about something someone else said about us. We carry the wounds of abandonment, criticism, guilt and rejection like a sack of rocks; carried heavy upon our back and it doesn't occur to us to just drop the bag of rocks and move on. Some might call it our baggage.

Put the sack of rocks down. Replace the thoughts of the past with new and better thoughts. It is almost impossible to make yourself stop thinking about something in order to rid yourself of the thoughts. It's much easier to just decide on something else better and grand to think about; and eventually, like the scab, the old thoughts fall away and are replaced with the new and better thoughts.

Why do we pick at the past, the scab of previous wounds or the unwanted memories; usually because the person that inflicted said wound had been deemed as an authority. We had given that person a lot of power. We had decided long ago that we should care about what others think and gave them the authority on us our lives. We considered what others thought of us as true. So each time we come upon a thought or experience, that reminded us of that past experience, we brought to mind the scenario of the past experience, relive it and continue to conduct our lives in the same way; because we believed the person we gave the authority to; be it a lover who decided we were not enough, the parent who decided we were inadequate, or the so called friend who criticized.

It's time to lay the past to rest, "the you called" authority figures to their own business and let the scab heal. That Resentment, according to popular belief, hurts the other person is not true. Resentment only hurts you.

I am reminded of a scab/resentment I picked at for a long time, keeping it alive and active; my mother's life long romance with being a victim and self hatred. Her constant manifestation of illness and constant attempted suicide's preyed on my mind as often as she felt sorry for herself. I was consistently angry over the calls to rescue her, her threats of abandonment (suicide) even when I was a child, and the guilt I allowed myself to feel through it all. When my anger culminated into a rage, speaking and thinking of her behavior often I realized that I was reopening the scab and keeping it alive. I realized that in my expectation of her behavior I was co-creating, with her, the same experience over and over. I was participating and perpetuating her behavior. I was really just afraid. In my fear I drew her experience into mine. I expected she delivered. I so often worried that at any moment I would get another call, about her negative manifestations, that I did.

She, in her believed inability to create a happy life, thrived on the attention she got when ill in a hospital or recovering from a suicide attempt. She could only feel good about herself when others ran to her side, which to her meant they cared. She didn't know how to feel good any other way. So when she felt bad she recalled how she was able to feel good, siting the past as proof, and re-created the situation. Don't believe for a minute that I didn't, almost every day since I was able to reach the kitchen cabinets that I did not try to help her. It encouraged, cared for her and was her cheerleader for as long as I could remember. Ultimately it stole my childhood and much of my adulthood.

I finally made a decision to no longer entertain her negative possibilities. I made a decision to focus on my life and think of only that which I desired. I also visualized my mother healthy and happy. I did not talk to my mother for a period of time in order that I not focus on her unhappiness and get re-centered. I told her that I would no longer take care of her, I would no longer RSVP to her shows of illness or attempted suicides and until she made the decision to enter a hospital and get help I would not talk to her. It was difficult and I received much disdain from family members. One family member passed onto me from another family member who actually said, "That's blackmail" I told the messenger, "You bet it is"

Within months, my mom who had landed herself in a nursing home at age sixty after an attempted suicide took charge. She decided she would not die in a nursing home and made calls from her hospital room until she found a government assisted apartment complex that welcomed her. She arranged to enter a psychiatric hospital and received help. She recovered physically, started her mental recovery and moved into her own apartment, after years of being taken care of by her family, and is moving towards, little by little, a new way of thinking and living. She still struggles with her long ago physical illness that she manifested, but is ever moving closer and closer to becoming happy, healthy and self-reliant. She practices often thinking only of that which she desires and with all her might avoids picking the scab.

We talk now all the time. She appreciates that I insisted she stand on her own two feet. We talk all of the time about Law of Attraction and manifesting, she embraces the concepts, and is manifesting a life experience she desires. And she absolutely loves and watches the video I produced for her. Her Fantastic Life Video where she can see herself doing, being and having all that she desires.

And I am focusing on that which I desire for my experience. I no longer pick at the scab of my mother's previous behavior. Truly until this moment that I translate to you the story of my mother I had not given thought or attention to the way it was for many years now.

In conclusion; pay attention to, only give thought to the now. Decide on what you will think about, how you want to feel and what you prefer as your life experience. Leave the scab alone and it will heal. Replace previous negative thoughts with new and exciting thoughts. Dwell in the possibilities, the visions of a beautiful joyful healthy abundant life.

The possibilities are unlimited, the experiences boundless and the joy is yours. You are divine energy in physical form. You are full of astounding ideas, magical inventions, and craftiness creations.