Abundance
The 2 gates, 3 bridges and 4 goalposts on the path from abuse to abundance
By Helen Miller
Apr 22, 2008

The 2 gates, 3 bridges and 4 goalposts on the path from abuse to abundance

This path is sometimes rough and paved with sharp stones, and sometimes dark and steep.
Sometimes it is gentle and crosses through a beautiful green parkland. Often it turns a corner to reveal a fantastic panorama. It divides and there isn’t always a signpost to show the kinder route.

Sometimes there are bridges built by those who went before. Other times you cross a gulch, then turn to build the bridge for those who come behind. This path is necessary, if you want to walk away from abuse.

This is the path I took for ten years and continue to take. Here is the bridge I build for you to cross. This is the path I want to share with you. I want you to know that you don’t have to walk alone any more, and you don’t have to take ten years.

In abuse

About eleven years ago, I was driving my car home from work when I realised that I was ready to drive it into a bridge and put an end to all my pain. I had three children waiting for me to come home. They are the only reason I kept driving across the bridge.

The pain came from a deep sense of worthlessness that started in my childhood. Some of the things that contributed to this belief may be familiar to you.
• I was born with a disability and many children were very unkind, so I grew afraid to get close to people.
• My family kept telling me that my disability made it impossible to do a lot of the things I wanted to do, so I believed my dreams could never come true.
• I was constantly unfavourably compared to my sister, so I lost my personal sense of value.
• I became sullen and was repeatedly in trouble with my parents, so I felt I could do nothing right.
• I developed friendships with people who were as insecure as I was, and my family rejected them, so I didn’t keep friends for long.
• I gravitated into a stream of abusive relationships, some physically abusive as well as emotionally abusive, as I felt that was all I deserved.
• I took a job where I was badly bullied, but stayed in it because my husband said I was fickle and would never stick at anything.
• I kept trying to please my family and failing, because I lived my life to please others and felt like I had no choice but to fail.
• I ended up having a nervous breakdown, which was not treated until years later, because I had no support network.

Then one day, I was a middle aged woman with no idea who she was and considering suicide. I knew I had to do something to change my life. I found a job in another town, moved away, and walked out of an unhappy marriage of eighteen years.

In abundance

Ten years ago, I started to walk this path, and now I help others walk it in my calling as a life purpose coach.

Would you like to have something like what I now have?
• I have a post graduate education.
• I own my own life coaching business.
• In the workforce, I rose through six promotion levels from a base administration clerk to managing Learning and Development for a government department.
• I am financially independent and own my own home.
• I am healthy and whole, physically and mentally.
• I talk and share with people who respect me and seek me out.
• I have good close friends. Three of my very good friends are my children.
• I have a new husband, my best friend, who loves me, supports me and values me.

I know that as long as I love and accept myself, I cannot be hurt by the actions of others. Whether others have changed does not matter. I have.

The 2 gates

At the start of the path are two gates. If you do not go through them, nothing will change. You will continue to seek acceptance and approval while, all the time, believing that you do not deserve it. This is because, in the long run, the greatest abuse you suffer is the abuse you give yourself.

The first gate is to know what you don’t want.

Because of my beliefs, I looked for the qualities in people that were the very things that ended up hurting me. I did not want those things any more. I chose to not look for them again.

I now know how to look at the bigger picture of my life to know what I don’t want. At the time, it was enough that I did not want to be hurt any more. It took me through the first gate.

The second gate is to know what you do want.

I passed through this gate when I stopped and thought about the things that were missing in my life. I would not have felt they were missing, if I did not really want them.

A big part of this was recognising what I had lost and what I still had. I did not want to focus on the things I had lost, because that made me feel lower than I could cope with at the time.

There were things I clung to all my life and did not lose – my appreciation of my intelligence, my ability to love, and my determination to achieve whatever I set my mind to. These gave me hope and the strength to pass through the second gate.

The 3 bridges

The three bridges are crossed in order. I spent a long time arriving at the first bridge, taking many false paths on the way. Now I know how to get there, I help others cross this bridge.

The first bridge is to know who you are.

It is a very special place you come to when you realise that you can think whatever you want, without fear. It doesn’t matter if someone else disagrees with you, so long as you are honest with yourself.

When you let others tell you who you are or who you have to be, you lose your identity. This is the way that other people hold power over you, when they are afraid to be that person themselves. You do them a service when you refuse to live their lives for them.

There are many ways to make your way back through the fog to find yourself, the person you were when you were born. Quite often you are not permitted to be that person from your very early childhood. You are conditioned to think and act in a certain way. You are told what to believe by your family, your teachers, your culture and your peers.

People are generally encouraged to use their values as the basis for describing who they are. When you are in abuse, this is not a good place to start, because you are most likely to compound the problem by saying your values are the ones you were told to have. You will describe yourself as the pitiful shadow of a person that you became.

Values analysis is crucial to understanding yourself further along the path, after you have come to believe that you and your life can be different.

Often a good starting point is to research the universal vibrations that impact on your personality.
This is because it is neutral and non-threatening to you as an individual.

For example, the ancient sciences of astrology and numerology interpret the vibrations that the heavenly bodies and numbers have on you. This is not about reading the stars column in the daily newspaper or about fortune telling or predicting the future.

This is about recognising that everything in the universe is composed of atoms, and within every atom are protons, neutrons and electrons that vibrate continually. This creates the energy that permeates everything and impacts on everything, including our lives and personalities. If you are willing to accept that there is order in our universe, the logical consequence is for you to acknowledge that the vibrations in play at the time of your birth are the ones that make you who you are when you are born, the real you. Talk to the experts in these fields and you’ll find that what they tell you rings true deep within you, because it is something you have known since that day of your birth.

Then there are your genetic predispositions, the traits that pass to you from your grandparents and great grandparents. These are not just medical conditions. How many times do you hear someone comment on how a certain person is just like their grandmother or great uncle? Then there is your birth order and the impact this has on your behaviours and relationships. These predispositions have been studied widely and can help you to understand why you are like you are.

By combining a number of different views of yourself, you can build a multi-dimensional picture that helps you to clarify your values and beliefs. It also helps you when you are coming out of abuse to feel that you are part of the whole and not as alone or different as you thought.

This is the time to analyse and recognise your core values.

The second bridge is to know why you’re here.

It is only when you know who you are that you can understand why you’re here. As a little child, you were taught to live by the ideas of your parents or other care givers and were expected to live a certain kind of life. You grow up believing this terrible lie. It isn’t the fault of your parents or care givers. They were told the same lie.

How many of you grew up being told to get a real job? I was. How many of you get that real job, wonder why you’re unfulfilled, and end up having a mid-life crisis?

As long as I can remember, I have been fascinated by how people think and wonder why they say what they say or do what they do. I used to dream of being a wise hermit living in a cave and people would come and talk to me about the deep and meaningful things in their lives. Because it did not align with what I was told to believe, it’s only recently that I actually told another person about my dream.

Instead, I got a real job. I became an accountant. I went into financial learning and development. I loved the learning and development, but the finance left me cold. Now, I’m doing what I dreamed all those years ago in my life purpose coaching and I continue to provide learning and development, but the content has changed considerably. Please note, there’s no cave and my husband would object to me becoming a hermit.

It’s not so much a matter of finding out why you are here as a matter of deciding why you are here, that is, choosing your purpose. With the basis of knowing who you are, you can choose the values that you don’t want to live without and brainstorm a plethora of ways that you can live with those values safely intact. Then you have the great fun of deciding which way you want to express yourself, your values and your dreams.

This is very exciting, because you can do it over and over again throughout your life. When you fulfil one dream, you can move on to the next way you want to express your purpose, and fulfil another dream. The ways will be different depending upon which stage of your life you are living. For example, when a young woman changes into a mother, then changes into a grandmother, she wants different things but her core value of family does not change.

The third bridge is to live your life on purpose.

It’s all very well to decide why you are here. The next step is to live your life on purpose. You made a decision, so value that decision and plan to achieve it. Set yourself goals that align with your purpose and make action plans to achieve those goals. Then, clear yourself of the beliefs that are blocking you from achieving your goals. Motivate yourself and get cracking on a life lived on purpose.

As I mentioned above, we are all part of the energy that vibrates throughout our universe. This wonderful reality links us to every other person. You can be guided by those who have gone before you, trusting that they know what this sort of journey is like. They may not have had the very same experiences as you, or feel exactly the same way as you, but they still want to help you.

It took me a long time to trust people again, but I learned that this is a very important part of the journey from abuse to abundance.

Two essential ingredients in the abundance mix are trust and gratitude. It was the patience and love of a number of people through the past ten years who wanted to support me that made the journey so rewarding.

I started on the pathway alone and I kept a wall up between me and other people for too long a time. It was the persistence of my present husband that broke that wall down, and his endless support and love that taught me to trust again.

Since then I have had a range of mentors, coaches and counsellors. My gratitude to these people is beyond words.

I don’t want any of you to try walking that path alone. It is horrific. Please, dig deep within yourself and find the trust to let someone walk with you. When you have done that, trust that the right person will be there for you.

When I was at my lowest ebb, I would lie awake each night praying for someone who would love me for myself. I used to think that somehow God would change my husband at the time. I eventually gave up that hope.

After my marriage was over, I met a man who offered to be someone I could talk to if I wanted a man’s point of view. He became my friend, then my best friend, and seven years later, my husband. My prayer was answered, but not in the way I expected.

During your journey, learning how to live your life on purpose is helped considerably by the four goalposts.

The 4 goalposts

The four goalposts are the safe secure things that you cling to on your journey along the path. They are inside you, nobody else.

In your earthbound existence, you have a mix of spiritual, mental, physical and emotional attributes that interact with themselves and each other within your body. Because each of these attributes affects your whole being, I think of them as your spiritual, mental, physical and emotional bodies.

You think about what you want these bodies to represent to you and you give them substance by making a firm decision to make those thoughts a reality. In a time of constant and radical change, your plans for your bodies do not change. As you focus on them, they become your safe shelter.

When you eventually achieve your plan for a body, you reach a goalpost. Then, you can make a new plan for that body and move that goalpost further along the path. You have already reached that goalpost. You know you can do it, and you look forward to reaching it again.

The first goalpost is your spiritual body.

In your spiritual body is where your intuition, love and wisdom lie. Your spiritual body is your life force, your link to all other things on earth and beyond. Your spiritual body expresses itself through your feelings.

When in abuse, you tend to ignore your spiritual body or confuse it with religious dogma. There are many abused people that cling to religious rules in a hope of finding relief. There is nothing wrong with them practising their religious faith. The sad thing is that too many people practice religion in their mental body, not their spiritual body. The true home for faith is in the heart, not the head.

A healthy spiritual body is in tune with all things. It is your guidance in life. These concepts are very hard to accept when in abuse.

My first goalpost for my spiritual body was to make a point of treating other people the way I wanted to be treated, that is, the traditional golden rule. I had no idea at the time that I was setting myself a spiritual goal. I was afraid to communicate with people and I thought that doing this might make things a little easier for me. Because I didn’t understand that my spiritual body was leading me out of the darkness, I thought I was manipulating people and felt bad about it.

After a while, people began saying nice things about me. Whenever it happened, it surprised me, because I still thought I was worthless. Eventually, as I became aware of and began to accept my spiritual body, I realised that I had become a person who treats other people the way I want to be treated. I wasn’t pretending, and other people saw that as one of my strengths.

It all happened in my spiritual body, in spite of what my mental body was saying to me.

The second goalpost is your mental body.

In your mental body is where your beliefs, thoughts and knowledge lie. It gives you the ability to express yourself in words and be creative.

When healthy, your mental body is the bridge between your spiritual body and your physical body. It interprets the feelings of your spiritual body into the actions taken by your physical body.

When unhealthy, your mental body claims supremacy over your spiritual body. It declares itself your protector. Whereas memory for the spiritual body is every experience you ever have, accepted as is, without judgment, memory for the mental body is selective and judged on its merits, according to your beliefs. The mental body will block or create memories in an attempt to protect you from unhappy experiences.

My first goalpost for my mental body was to start a career, in the belief that professional success would reward me with acceptance from others. At the time, this gave my mental body a focus that freed my spiritual body to start challenging my beliefs. During this process, I met a number of people whose wisdom and knowledge helped me to clean out my negative beliefs and replace them with positive ones.

One of the most interesting things is that as your mental body becomes more positive and more accepting of your spiritual body, your physical body changes as well.

The third goalpost is your physical body.

In your physical body is where your signals and actions lie. These signals indicate the health of your spiritual body. The actions indicate the health of your mental body.

Whenever your mental body refuses to interpret or accept your spiritual feelings, it shows up in your body as pain or ill health. Now, whenever I get sick, my first response is to think about what I am thinking or doing that caused my physical body to send out that signal. I very rarely get sick, but when I do, I know it is because it is time to clean up another limiting belief.

You act according to your mental body’s instructions. Whenever you are taking actions that seem to be getting you nowhere, it is because your mental body is not interpreting your feelings accurately. This often happens when you limit your perspective because of your limiting beliefs. The old saying that when one door closes another one opens, is very true, but you may find it hard to look around for the newly opened door.

It took me a long time to set my first goal post for my physical body. I was so busy living in my mental body and getting sick all the time. When I did set a physical goal, it was about losing weight. I achieved this goal when I realised that the most important thing in weight loss was the way I thought about myself. I wasn’t born a fat person; my spiritual body isn’t fat. My mental body was using my silly beliefs about being unworthy to protect me with a cushion of fat.

When you live in your feelings, your spiritual, mental and physical bodies are healthy. A problem arises when you confuse your feelings with your emotions.

The fourth goal post is your emotional body.

In your emotional body is where your justification and behaviours lie. It is good buddies with the mental body. When you have a feeling in your spiritual body, your mental body picks it up and decides whether to accept the feeling or reject it, then tells your physical body how to act.

When your mental body accepts the feeling, your emotional body will express the feeling. When the feeling is rejected, your emotional body jumps in to justify what your mental body is telling you by acting out the feeling that the mental body wants to replace the real feeling with.

In past hurtful experiences, your emotional body experienced pain that caused you to display a certain protective behaviour. Whenever that emotion is triggered by subsequent experiences, you will again display the same protective behaviour, whether it is in your best interests or not. Your mental body supports the behaviour, which cannot change until you change your beliefs about that experience.

My first goal post for my emotional body was to stop flinching every time someone brought their hand up near my face. I changed my belief that people were going to hit me.

The path

I took small steps at the start of this path, and reached my four goalposts many times during the journey, but it all started with one step.

I know who I am, the person I was when I was born. I know why I am here because I listen to my feelings. I know what I do and don’t want.

The path from abuse to abundance is challenging, which is why I don’t just help my clients. As my client, I challenge you to find your own power and peace. I walk the path with you, but it is your journey that makes the difference.

Once you get to abundance, the path does not just stop. You continue to set goals and keep your bodies healthy. The difference is that life comes to you with ease and joy.