A crucial method of healing has recently come to light for us, and it involves how we humans behave in order to protect ourselves. We recreate what we’ve done in the past in order to prove that how we originally handled things was right. We do this to prove that we are lovable and valuable instead of how the experience made us feel—unlovable and not valuable. And we do this until we become strong with self-worth.

We recreate painful experiences until we truly get that we are cherished in the universe and that we are unconditionally loved. 

This is why you might leave a job or relationship and then find yourself repeating similar painful experiences in a new job or new relationship. This is why you might repeat the same painful interactions with your Beloved over and over again. You are trying to justify your worth, your integrity, and your abilities one more time, through a situation that you are familiar with. But if you are stuck in the need to justify anything, you are stuck in the painful past. And you are likely to repeat it. 

So how do you stop repeating painful experiences? Start by taking a good hard look at what those experiences have taught you. Then take those lessons to heart. For example, if you felt disrespected in a prior relationship, left that relationship, and then found a new relationship with the same dynamic of disrespect, you are trying to justify that you were right to leave then and now. You are trying to assert all over again that you deserve respect. The lesson is to give yourself respect right now and to insist upon it in all of your interactions without needing to repeat the past.

Once you take the lesson to heart, you don’t need the same experience to teach you that lesson any longer. You are free to move on to higher experiences.

So ask yourself, what painful situations have I repeated in my life, and what have they been trying to teach me? 

As you gain awareness of repetition in your relationships, you will see that some people repeat being hurtful to others. Why? To justify that they were right in being hurtful the first time around! What’s worse, such people shift the blame to the person whom they hurt. They do not have the gift of self-awareness (yet) which is the key to healing yourself.

Fortunately, there is always healing and wisdom to be gained on the other side of your experiences—once you stop repeating them. And again, once you let self-respect sink in, you are able to move on to new experiences. You just don’t resonate any longer with past patterns and can’t go anywhere near disrespect. 

But if you have struggled with self-respect in the past (and who hasn’t?!) how do you truly grasp and embody it now? You do so by facing yourself head on in the mirror. You take a brave look into all the dark corners of your humanness, and you admit why you do what you do. You look at how you judge yourself inside, and you heal that judgment with self-love. I explain this healing process in my guide, “You Are Infinitely Loved.” 

Please know that you don’t have to prove a thing to anyone on this planet, most especially to yourself. Repeat after us: you are perfect just the way you are right now. You have never done anything truly wrong from the larger perspective of creation. You have always done the best you could with all that you were handling. You don’t need to justify that you were right in the past because you actually really were. Let this feeling of being fully accepted sink in, and then realize that you don’t have to prove yourself ever again. You can go forward with new uplifting experiences.

Then something sublime happens. You don’t need anyone else to prove themselves to you either. And you don’t need your Beloved to prove their love because it has always already been there.

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