Re-Defining Your Defining Moments

There are moments in our lives that are seared in. Memories anchored. Stakes driven deep into the ground — flag waving events. When you look back on the horizon of your past you see them there. You skip over the mundane and leap frog from defining moment to defining moment.

Perhaps they are firsts — like the first time you were kissed, the first time you drove in the car by yourself, when you graduated from high school, your wedding day, the birth of your children.

Some are good, happy moments. Some were shockingly hard.

Some run deep and still haunt you today. Ghosts that taunt you, accuse you, remind you of moments you might rather forget. Your deepest regrets, a loved one who's passed, a wound from abuse or betrayal.

Humans don't enjoy pain. We search for pleasure so we don't have to feel sadness, disappointment. We are looking for the next high, the thing that will fill us. We hate to suffer.

I tried denial. Denial was like administering local anesthesia. It was numbing. Denial helped me forget for a little while. But anesthesia wears off. And then there is pain.

Whether we acknowledge it or not, something did happen. And the wound inside hurts. The longer you go without treatment, the more infected it becomes.

No matter how I tried to outrun the pain, it caught up. For a while I thought I was dealing. I thought I was okay, that I was in control. I tried to chase the memories away, but no matter how far away I thought I had pushed them, they were still right there.

Childhood sexual abuse, a spouse that's betrayed you through adultery or pornography or both, whatever past pains you are running from, these are defining moments. Unchecked the negative experiences will wind up defining you — lies and all.

Healing became my only choice. I had to face the truth about my past and about my marriage so that I could actually move forward. So that I could focus on a future filled with hope and healing.

And I want that for you, too.

Acknowledging the defining moments of my past and seeing them in a new light, helped them lose their power to haunt and accuse. Because I am not what happened to me. I am not shame or guilt or to blame.

Healing helped me to re-define my defining moments, so by grace, I may accept my whole, beautiful and scarred story.