Self-loathing: How I was taught to feel guilty in a past life

In some versions of Christianity sinners are warned against hell and damnation. Photo by Marc Schaefer.

Maybe in a previous life, I was taught to feel guilty and to believe in a version of Christianity where sinners are warned against hell and damnation. This is my personal story.

At a small gathering with a few of my closest friends, one of them, O, told us about a nuisance that tormented him for long periods of his life. He described it as a recurring pain in his forehead and also came up with a possible explanation: “It may be caused by an old belief that I am not allowed to feel good”. 

“Furthermore”, he said, “I think that in a past life, I preached sin and guilt and that a remnant of this sense of guilt is left there in my forehead like a dark stain”.

I doubt that O would get into that rather unusual explanation in other settings but the four of us share mostly everything. Since we are spiritually inclined, we are also very familiar with the concept of reincarnation and receptive to ideas about how past lives may have influenced this one.

I had no problems imagining O preaching such a medieval version of Christianity in a previous lifetime. I envisioned him filled with holy wrath taking his audience to task and warning them about the flames of hell and eternal damnation.

Then suddenly, to show what kind of a preacher he once was, he turned towards me, pointed his finger at me and said in a very decisive manner: “You are a sinner!” And more stuff like that. I was sort of paralyzed and felt as if I was taken back in time. I don’t believe in sin at all but for a moment there, I was captured by his words as if I was one of his past followers.

Feeling guilty and unworthy 

I didn’t get any religious upbringing and words like God, sin and hell were hardly even mentioned in my childhood home. Today I do believe in God but my concept of God is very different from the traditional Christian one.

To me God is certainly not wrathful, but all-loving, forgiving and benevolent. To think that sinners are unworthy and subject to God’s judgment, hell and damnation, is far from my beliefs.

Therefore I was baffled by the ease with which I responded to O’s words and suddenly adopted such unfamiliar ideas. 

How could that be? 

Looking for a plausible explanation, I asked myself if traditional Christian dogmas are actually not unfamiliar to me after all, but only forgotten; maybe I was once a true believer of them and maybe I was really present there in the flesh listening to O’s sermon several lives back.

If that’s the case, then, like O, subconsciously I may still hold remnants of those dogmas even if my conscious beliefs about God and the afterlife are totally different now. 

And then my present day self-esteem issues would make better sense; for instance the fact that I sometimes hate myself for no good reason at all.

Hidden causes of low self-esteem

O’s story and my reaction to it made me wonder if self-esteem (or the lack of it) is not just taught in the formative years of our present lives, as psychologists would have it, but also something we carry with us from past lives. 

The story also pointed to how opposing ideas about the self and its relation to God may coexist in our mentality: 

On the one hand a conscious belief that God is all-loving and that each one of us is absolutely worthy of that love, and yet on the other hand subconsciously we may fear to be unworthy and undeserving.

Even if we were not taught to believe in a wrathful, unloving God in this life we may still harbor that unfortunate idea and along with it a hidden “talent” for looking down on, or even hating, ourselves. 

The unconscious God image may possibly lay dormant or it may actively undermine our self-esteem even if our conscious beliefs are well suited to make us feel good about ourselves.

If that’s the case, then I think it is important that we become aware of our subconscious God image and try to counter its negative influence. Being aware of self-hatred, and its causes, makes us better equipped to handle it. Even just naming it has, in my experience, a very beneficial effect. 

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Get to know more about handling self-esteem issues and further investigate the connection between worldview, God image and perception of self: HIGH SELF-ESTEEM: YOU NEED AN ALL-EMBRACING WORLD VIEW

Let’s talk about sex baby! Sexual Alignment

 

Story 1

Imagine that you are lying on the bed and your partner is kissing you from your neck to your chest all the way down to your toes. Your partner touch you so hard that you can’t even move. Your mate is stretching your hands so you become completely strength less. You can hear your partner’s desire from the left and right ears. You are just lying, listening and observing because you don’t actually feel anything, and then you say to yourself: “When it’s gonna be over?”

 Story 2

Imagine you are looking into your partner’s eyes, then you feel some sexual desire. Your partner is kissing you on your lips, you close your eyes and enjoy the sensation. You both forget everything around you. You don’t care about anything else. You explore each others bodies … then suddenly you utter these words: “I love you Baby” because you reached the soul of your partner.

Written by Suzette Lyn Michaelsen and Jens W. Pedersen

There is one very important basic principle in The Law of Attraction and that is “contrast”. Above you find two contrasting sex stories. From contrasts we learn, so that knowing one contrast will allow you to wish for the opposite. For instance from experiencing unpleasant sex arises the wish for loving and fulfilling sex.

But sometimes we get stuck with the unpleasant part. Then you will think about that very bad sex all day long – maybe feeling sorry for yourself, maybe angry with that partner of yours doing it all wrong. Or maybe jealous at a friend of yours having great sex.

None of this, however, will benefit you since those negative thoughts create more negativity attracting again those unwished for experiences. For that reason do not use much effort and do not get preoccupied with that which was unpleasant.

But use it to understand what you really like and put your focus and energy into that – by doing so, you direct your thoughts into a good vibrational pattern and in turn those vibrations will attract what is desired. This is how you turn story number one into story number two.

What may hold you back?

When you are making love with someone without any sensation it looks like you are just a puppet following the moves of your master. You may want to change that, but some beliefs, taboos or lack of knowledge hold you back. Those kind of reasons are called “resistance”.

Some people stay that way because they are married and believe that it is our obligation to please our partner. Some pretend to be happy to avoid problems in the relationship. Some obtain this behaviour to avoid judgement from society because of sexual taboos. Some accept this predicament because they are unaware of what they really want.

But the unsatisfied person experience unworthiness, insecurity, sadness, depression and restlessness. So let us further introduce to you sexual urges and liberation so that you may achieve the most exciting and intimate sexual experiences.

We attract our own energy

You need to communicate with your inner self and identify: “What do I really want?” But you may be confused. Then it is like: “I want ice cream but I don’t want to eat it!” We attract our own energy. So if you are confused about sexual desires that will reflect itself in the sex-partners you meet. This may be annoying, but is also useful since that reflection is a mirror. You may use it to understand better yourself.

Take one example:

A man is sexually aroused when he see women with sex appeal and he is very much into them. But at the same time something is off, and so when it comes to real life sex with a woman that matches his desire he is holding back. Hesitating. Feeling insecure about that.

So, there is two opposing energies: The one is sexual desire and attraction, but the other one is hesitation or confusion about those wishes.

The result being: Those attractive women that he desire seem to vanish in front of him. They appear and attract him. He will connect with them over and over again, and they talk or chat for a while, but for some reason those connections never seem to turn into something real and tangible. They appear and vanish, appear and vanish over and over again and it is a reflection of his confusion or not knowing what he want.

So, how will you use that?

You must think again about your own desires. Go through them as many times as needed. Think about what you want and then feel. So, when you think “I want this specific kind of woman” or “I want a same sex partner”, or “I like to have multiple partners”, then notice how it makes you feel. Good? Bad? Safe? Scared? And so on and so forth.

Noticing that will gradually increase your self awareness and balance your thoughts about what you want with those inmost desires of your inner being. When finally they are balanced, you let go of resistance and are able to attract and meet in real life exactly what you want.

Remember, that your present perspective is a narrow one compared to that of your inner being – so, in order to align yourself with your inner being you must always change your perspective from narrow into something broader or all-embracing. Your “guiding system” will help you do that:

Understand your guiding system

When we were young we were told from our parents: “You should not do that, because it is bad”. Some of us who went to church learned that: “It is forbidden to do this and that because it is a sin”. For instance in some cultures it is forbidden or sinful to be a homosexual and due to that a truly homosexual person may reject that part of him or herself.

However, following those directions you may not get what you want because you are controlling yourself based on a worldly perspective. So that’s why it is very important to value your inner being and follow your own guidance system that holds a broader perspective of this existence.

So what is your guidance system and how does it work?

The guidance system is an inner connection with your higher self, your soul or what is in Law of Attraction called your Source. It works through your feelings, so that if you feel good you are in alignment with your Source. In the words of Abraham it is like this: “Until you decide to focus your thoughts into alignment with the Source within you, you will not feel good.”

Now, this might cause some misunderstanding – in order to feel good you might try to change or control your surroundings. You may think: “My lover should not say this or that!” Or: “My partner should not do those things that I dislike!” You may very well think (most of us do) that your husband or wife is the reason why you are not in alignment and therefore not feeling good.

But it is not about them. And to focus your thoughts on what they did wrong, and correcting them, will only make you feel worse – or it will be like peeing your pants. You correct them, and they behave for a while, so you feel good. But then again they will do something stupid, husbands and wives always do. So, after some time, you are back at square one feeling bad again because of what he/she say or do. Correcting them is Sisyphean.

Feeling good is about aligning yourself with the perspective of your Source which is always loving – towards yourself, your partner and everything. So, coming from there sex may be both tender, caring, intimate, wild and free. It is all up to you, your choices and whether or not you are in alignment with your inner being.