EXERCISE
TIME TRAVEL

1. Visualize the source of anger or pain: To begin, sit quietly by yourself, and close your eyes. Visualize yourself in a painful scene from the past. You will learn how to correct the scene, take care of yourself, forgive whoever created the problem, and forgive yourself for your own participation. Allow the troubling scene from your memory to appear around yourself. You may get a mental picture, or if not, just imagine the scene as you remember it. Remember to use your senses, to establish your scene clearly. If your scene is very painful, or frightening, view the scene as objectively as you can, as though it is a story about someone else.
2. Enter the scene as a hero. Like a time traveler from the future, visualize yourself in the scene as the person you are today. There will be two of you present, your self who had the original experience, plus the you from today, who will fix things.
3. Take charge of the scene. Now it’s time to take over the story and protect yourself. Do whatever is needed to stop whoever is upsetting, hurting or neglecting you. If the other person is too badly behaved, you can make them leave—you have total power here, in your imagination. Use that power to protect yourself. It often helps to surround yourself with loving people, or to call in the police if the scene is violent.
4. Take care of yourself. The early version of you may be frightened, angry, confused, feeling helpless, or overwhelmed with grief—the “heroic you” can be rational, effective, competent and reassuring. You may encounter some resistance to doing this, in the form of feeling incapable of taking care of yourself. You can do this over and over in your mind until you get it right. You can try to fix the situation in several different ways, before you decide which is best. Remove yourself from danger; comfort and reassure; correct any lies you were told by telling the (positive) truth and establish a friendship with yourself. If your former self needs some information or help, provide it. Promise that you will never be left at the mercy of ignorant, malicious, incompetent, or uncomprehending people again.
5. When you feel safe, consider forgiveness. When you have corrected the scene enough that you are out of danger and feeling safe, think about what happened. Analyze what went wrong and who made mistakes, and decide how to avoid being the victim of those same mistakes again. Once you know you will not be hurt again (because you’ll do what it takes to protect yourself), you’ll find that you are ready to forgive whomever hurt you, and will understand that they just don’t know how to behave.
6. Go to a safe place. Close the scene by visualizing yourself in a safe, secure place, completely out of danger. Promise yourself that you’ll be there when you’re needed, and you’ll be careful, strong and self-protective. This means that you will not leave yourself alone, dependent, or at the mercy of people who are hurtful, and you will not be “nice” and allow someone to hurt you. Do not leave the scene until you feel calm and secure.
6. Repeat regularly. After you have done “Time Travel” the first time, you can keep your promise to keep yourself safe (and build self-trust) by checking in with yourself as often as needed, until it becomes an unconscious habit. Doing this exercise repeatedly, whenever old, painful memories arise, will eventually clear out traumas and correct the damage done while helping you practice the autonomous skills needed to take care of yourself. You’ll find that you instinctively know when someone or something is hurtful to you, and when you’re being hurtful to others. You’ll also know what to do to correct the situation, (don’t be alone with violent or emotionally hurtful people, don’t allow yourself to be in tempting or dangerous situations, and so on) and you’ll feel safe enough to forgive those who are confused and behave in hurtful ways, because their behavior will no longer be dangerous to you.

Overcoming your resistance to facing yourself and becoming aware of your inner feelings and beliefs, and learning how to care for yourself effectively, and to release the hold the past has on you, helps you develop emotional autonomy. The more adept you become at self-awareness, learning and forgiveness, the more autonomous you can be. The hurts of the past can be healed, and you can feel capable of taking care of yourself. When you feel stronger than those who attempt to hurt you, forgiveness comes naturally.
(From The Real 13th Step)© Tina B.Tessina, 2007