How Do You Want to Be Treated?

"You get treated in life the way you teach people to treat you."

"How people treat you is their karma; how you react is yours."

- Wayne Dyer 

     Being a survivor of multiple layers of trauma involves a lot of soul searching, discovering, and serious choice making. I grew up resenting the way people treated me, yet I continued to put myself in situations to being abused, exploited, or robbed of my dignity. How does one go from no boundaries and allowing people to walk all over them to a having the life they can only dream of? I'd say the only way to begin this healing process is to make a determined decision everyday to give yourself what the world did not give you: Love, Appreciation, Gentleness, Belief, Hope, Comfort, Guidance, Adventure... etc. When you start discovering yourself on the inside & building yourself up... love can't help but exude out of you & people are drawn to that. 

     The people who treated me poorly just happened to weed themselves out. Darkness cannot survive where there is so much freakin light! I've watched loving, kind, generous people surround me year after year & shower me with there love. I know this is because I began to love myself & open that love up to the world. I realized I let those people abuse me... & I abused them in one way or another. I thought I was a good friend, but I had been selfish, flaky, and deceitful at times due to my partying life. I wanted to be this radiant human being, yet I was blocked by fear & self loathing. 

     After I began this journey, I started dating & that showed me many more deeper layers of how I needed to alter the way I treat people (especially men). I saw how I placed unrealistic expectations & began to digress from loving myself to wanting a father figure to love me. Wow. That was a huge revelation... I had three people in a row create so much pain in my heart. The pain that I needed to see & face. So, I started looking at each painful experience as a lesson... took the weight out of feeling rejected & started seeing that I was being taught lessons & redirected. Looking back now, I would never put up with the bullshit that I used to in the past with dating. No way, no how. It's like when you start treating yourself & others with love, you can no longer pretend or sacrifice what you really want just to be loved by someone. As a result of this work, relationships & dating aren't that intense or scary. Who cares... I say just love everyday, love with all your heart, love your enemies, love your friends out loud,  drop to your children's level & love them til you explode, serve the heart of your partners & not ache for them to serve yours, give & give & give, & then let yourself receive. Let go of social/cultural norms & just follow your heart. Treat people this way & the love & magical things will come back 10 fold. I see it everyday!