Lisa Hansen offers a truly unique style of Mindset Coaching that powerfully blends Spiritual practices, Manifestation teachings, Somatic Release techniques, and practical Life Coaching skills. She has helped hundreds of clients feel empowered to manifest the life they dream about.
Imagine being out with friends enjoying a cup of coffee and pastry at your favorite cafe. The sun is shining, there’s been lots of laughter, and you feel joyful. You’re thinking about how blessed you are to have such wonderful friends. A moment later, one of your friends casually mentions she recently bumped into a mutual friend. Upon hearing this friend's name, your heart sinks. You feel the heat rising in your face. You are no longer capable of hearing the conversation. Your heart starts racing as you think about all the pain this friend caused you. Your mind immediately travels back in time to the betrayal and all that pain. Even though you broke ties with this person years ago, she is still having a tremendous effect on your well-being today. Your mood sours, and you can’t seem to shake it off. Somehow, you get through the rest of the coffee date, but the story of the betrayal consumes you, replaying in your head over and over. The story even continues into the night, perhaps interrupting your sleep. All you feel is that hurt, anger, and pain all over again.
The powerful impact the past has over you
Your past no longer exists except in your mind. The past is over, and the future is only in your imagination. All you have at this moment are the thoughts you currently are thinking. If you’re thinking about your past, that actually isn’t your past. It’s just an illusion, for it is entirely impossible to be living in the past. All your past experiences are over, and the only way they still exist is through the stories you repeat. The truth is when you aren’t focusing on these stories, your past isn’t affecting you in any way!
Bring to mind a similar real-life scenario to my example in the coffee shop. You were having the best time until your friend brought up the person who betrayed you. You weren’t even thinking about that ex-friend until then! But the moment you started thinking about that story of your past, it immediately affected you in the present moment. And it completely ruined your mood and present circumstances. This is because your thoughts generate your feelings, even your thoughts about past events. It’s an illusion because your past no longer exists except in your mind. The memory is only a movie or daydream in your head. It is no longer real. The only thing that happened was that your mind traveled to the past, and you followed it. If this is new to you, it can be a very mind-altering truth to grasp at first!
Why changing your past is liberating
What is the story you tell yourself about your past? How do you tell it to others? Consciously becoming aware of the stories you tell and then deciding to change them can be very empowering and liberating. With time, changing how you think about and tell your stories will reduce current anxiety, stress, and suffering.
Humans have the beautiful gift of being able to direct thoughts, choose thoughts on purpose, and change them at will. You can use your wonderful imagination to focus on what you want at any given moment. For those who don’t learn how to harness this power, their egoic mind will remain in charge and replay the same old painful memories over and over. Choosing whether or not to rewrite the stories of your past is entirely optional. You can cling to the past and let it define your future, or you can decide to create new versions of your past. The way to free yourself from the pain of your past is by changing the narrative.
The narrative of your past experiences empowers or disempowers you
Let’s stick with the example of a person who betrayed you. That person is no longer in your life, but every time you think of her, you feel agitated, angry, hurt, and resentful. You are convinced that it's the betrayal that is still affecting you today. But in truth, the only time that situation can affect you in the present moment is when you are thinking about what happened in a particular manner. It's only the story that you've created about the betrayal that is keeping the pain alive, over and over. And the good news is you can choose to change any story at any time. You get to decide whether you are the hero of your stories of the past or the victim. You also get to decide how you want to feel about whatever’s happened in your life. You can choose to believe that your past made you stronger and wiser and taught you valuable life lessons or if it made you a fool, a victim, and unworthy. You have the power to decide whether something was an experience that was part of your destiny or whether something went terribly wrong and ruined your life.
Freeing yourself from reliving a painful past experience in the present moment is entirely possible. It requires awareness, rewriting, patience, compassion, understanding, and practice.
Arguing against reality creates suffering
Most people spend a lot of time arguing with their past without realizing it. We believe it should have been different. This causes a tremendous amount of anxiety and regret. Regrets about the past typically include a lot of “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts.” She shouldn’t have done that. They should have been different. My childhood should have been better. I shouldn’t have said or done that. I should have done this, and I shouldn’t have done that.
However, as one of my spiritual teachers, Byron Katie, taught me, the past should have been exactly as the past was. How do you know? Because if it “should” have been different, it would have been different. It happened exactly the way it was supposed to.
Succumbing to your past and allowing it to define yourself leads to suffering and self-sabotage. It depletes your life force and holds you back from future success. Embrace the wisdom you learned from your past and leave the rest behind.
The practice of rewriting the stories of your past
Whenever you find that you’re thinking about a past experience, pause and ask yourself: how have I been thinking about and telling this story? The first step towards change is always awareness. Whenever you notice that anything from your past is causing you pain in the present moment, gently remind yourself that it’s because of the story you’re telling about it. Decide if you want to keep this story or change it. Start by asking yourself: “Am I willing to think about what happened another way?” "Am I the victim of this story or the hero?" "Is this story empowering or disempowering me?" "Is the way I am talking about this affecting my future success?"
Next, grab your journal, make yourself a nice cup of tea, and use the following journal prompts to begin. I have also included an example to help guide you through this practice.
Journaling steps
Choose one painful story from your past to rewrite: Write a few sentences stating the facts of what happened.
Write the current story you have been telling about this situation: Don’t hold back. This is supposed to be messy. Get out all your anger, shame, judgments, and resentments. Take your time, and take a break if you need to. There’s no rush.
Rewrite the new story: The goal is for this story to be empowering. Remember to rewrite the story where you are the hero, not the victim. Let go of anything disempowering and shift your attention away from it. Those parts no longer matter. Focus only on the lessons that made you stronger and wiser. Focus on what you learned from the experience. Remind yourself you did the best you could with what you knew back then.
A powerful example of this work
In my coaching practice, I find it helps my clients to show them an example of how powerful and life-changing this work can be. I received permission from one of my clients to share how she transformed a painful circumstance from her childhood. Once she practiced telling the story from an empowering perspective, where she was the hero instead of the victim, she freed herself from the pain. As a result, she felt more confident and capable of manifesting the life she really wanted.
1. Choose one painful story from your past to rewrite
My father punished me for getting a C grade in 5th grade. He told me I was stupid and would never be successful if I didn't work harder. I felt unworthy, misunderstood, and ashamed.
2. Write the current story you have been telling about this situation
My father was a terrible parent and made me feel stupid. He was mean and unfair. He should never have punished me and said those hurtful words. I can’t believe a father would do that to his child. It was abusive and cruel. This is the reason I am an overachiever and perfectionist. But deep down, I always feel stupid and don’t speak up for myself. And it’s all his fault. This is why I always feel that I am not good enough. I wish he had accepted me and loved me no matter what grades I got. If he did, I wouldn’t be struggling so much trying to prove myself all the time. My whole life, I have resented him for this.
3. Rewrite the new story
My father thought he was helping me. He didn’t want me to get low grades because he thought it would lead to poverty. He wanted me to try harder in school because he didn’t want me to struggle to earn a living like he did. I can understand why he did this, even though I don’t agree with his parenting approach at all. As an adult, I now know grades don’t define you. I pledged not to do this to my kids, and I am so proud I didn’t repeat the pattern! This life lesson helped me do things differently with my kids and not put that kind of pressure on them. That's pretty heroic! Of course, it was very painful as a child to hear "you’re stupid" from my dad, and I am doing the work to validate how it felt and heal the inner child wound. But I have made the decision to not believe those words as an adult because they simply aren't true. I am the one who gets to decide what to believe about myself. This experience also helped me to examine where my father was coming from. He did the only thing he knew what to do: punish me to push me to try harder. His parents did the same to him, so he thought it was the right thing to do back then. He thought he was protecting me from future failure. As a parent today, I now know we all make parenting mistakes. This has all been a part of my life journey to learn how to accept myself no matter what and not tie my worth to achievements. I am smart, and I have evidence all around me for that. It’s liberating to free myself from believing that I am stupid! I never realized it was optional to keep believing this! I am choosing to focus on understanding and forgiveness. I am choosing to let go of resentment, bitterness, regret, anger, and wishing it never happened. I am letting go of feeling like a victim. I will no longer carry this belief into my future.
As an adult, I now know grades don’t define you. I pledged not to do this to my kids, and I am so proud I didn’t repeat the pattern. This life lesson helped me do things differently with my kids and not put that kind of pressure on them.
This helped me to examine where my father was coming from. He did the only thing he knew what to do: punish me to push me to try harder. His parents did that to him, so he thought it was the right thing to do back then. He thought he was protecting me from future failure. This has all been a part of my journey to learn how to accept myself no matter what and not tie my worth to achievements. I am smart, and I have evidence all around me for that. It’s liberating to free myself from believing I am stupid. I am choosing to focus on understanding and forgiveness. I am choosing to let go of resentment, bitterness, regret, anger, and wishing it never happened.
Be gentle and patient with yourself
This practice will take time. The more time you spend telling your new stories, the quieter the old ones will get. Read your new story to yourself over and over. Commit to being patient, gentle, and compassionate with yourself. I have one rule in my coaching: do not beat yourself up for being human! Everyone has painful conditioned stories they tell from their past, but not everyone knows we have the power to change them. Now you do! The impact of this work can change your life. Isn’t it completely empowering to know you get to choose how to think about your past so you can stop bringing it into your future?
Please note if there has been severe trauma or abuse in your past, seek professional help from a qualified therapist.
Read more from Lisa Hansen
Lisa Hansen, Life Coach, Conscious Parenting Coach & Spiritual Mentor
Lisa Hansen has over 20 years of experience as a Life and Mindset Coach, Conscious Parenting Coach, and Spiritual Mentor. She believes anyone is capable of manifesting the life they truly want to be living, whether it’s to feel a greater sense of purpose, earn more money, improve their relationships, or become a more peaceful parent. Her passion is empowering women to live confidently, intuitively, and authentically. She helps her clients shed self-limiting beliefs, end self-sabotage, overcome their inner critic, and transform their lives into one full of self-love, self-acceptance, and empowerment.
