w w w . p an i c - s t o p p e r . c o m
Getting Started
By Joshua David
Turning an emotional scar into an emotional strength may seem like
INSIDE THIS ISSUE it`s something that’s next to impossible. I use to feel the same way
when my wife was going through her period of anxiety disorders. You
1 Getting Started name it, she had it. Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Social Anxiety
Disorder and Panic Disorder… and this was just up until her late 20`s.
2 What`s Inside An Emotional
Back in 2006 when she was diagnosed with schizo-affective disorder I
Scar?
knew something had to change. I wanted to help her so much that I
3 Removing The Emotional was willing to try anything, and yes we went through all types of
Scar medicine, therapists and positive affirmation techniques to help her get
rid of her anxiety issues. I was so heartbroken because I felt
4 Turning The Emotional powerless as my wife was going through this.
Scar Into A Strength I don’t know how many of you believe in fate or destiny, but I was
surfing the internet one day I just so happened to run across this audio
with the speaker Dan Kennedy and he was talking about how powerful
Psycho-Cybernetics and the research of Dr. Maxwell Maltz was in
By Joshua David
helping you to take back control over your life. The thing that sparked
my interest was when he said something about the self image being the
driving factor for a person`s success or failure. This seemed like a
revelation to me at the time. I remember watching Oprah when she
was talking about the movie “The Secret”, and how powerful your
thinking is. I remember when I saw this I was thinking, “Huh? Yeah
right… wolf-tickets!” Then when I heard of this research from Dr. Maltz
about the self-image being the driving force in humans, I realized in
myself that the reason why I do a lot of things , the way I dress, talk,
and act is all directly related to how I look at myself or the self-image.
After stumbling on this concept I couldn`t wait to tell my wife who was
having major issues at the time.
Let me try to describe it …..It`s like, when you scrape your knee on a
pavement, a wound appears on that area where ,eventually, a scar forms
in order to protect that same area from further wounding. The same can
be applied for people when they get wounded emotionally. When you
get hurt from what other people say about you or when you find their
actions rubbing you the wrong way, it`s only natural for emotional scars
to form in your mind and you tend to build a protective wall around you
in order to prevent from getting wounded again. But the problem with
this is that the same wall that you build to protect you can also stop you
from feeling true happiness, contentment and other genuinely good
sensations that life brings.
For example, if you had an experience where you were riding a bus and
as you sat in one of the seats, someone you didn't know placed their
How To Turn An Emotional Scar Into An Emotional Strength Page 3
hand on your thigh as if it was a normal thing to do. This kind of experience can
cause you to believe that all men or women are like that. You may end up never
getting close to anyone physically or emotionally as you feel that you cannot trust
people.
The prevailing concept of beauty in our current society can cause emotional scaring
as well. “They say” a person must have a proportional face and at the same time,
they must be tall, slim and fair in complexion in order to be considered “typically
beautiful”. Anyone who does not fall under this umbrella is deemed ugly. Worse, if
you have a scar on your face due to an accident, you would feel and believe that
people would reject you and they would not take you seriously because of the way
you look. Unfortunately, if you believed this without any question, your self-esteem
would surely drop to zero. You would withdraw from society so much so that you
would become reclusive leaving yourself even more vulnerable to insults, hurts and
criticisms.
People gain emotion scars primarily because there are people in their past who have
wronged them in such a way that they just can`t seem to let go of what happened.
This is especially true when the people whom you love and respect were the ones
involved in that wrongdoing.
Let`s say you had a controlling parent who constantly told you what to do and
criticized you often for every little mistake, you`d probably become this person who
sees their self as a failure and this may also lead you to defy any person of authority
later on because of the loss of trust from your authority figure from the past. By
building an emotional wall that`s meant to protect you from any emotional hurts and
criticisms is also denying yourself from ever feeling the power of true love, kindness
and other awesome feelings that that are difficult to encounter with a hard heart.
So, you must realize that you need to be thick-skinned, and a bit vulnerable all at
the same time, so you can prevent yourself from getting upset and stressed easily
but still be able to feel warmth, happiness and all the wonderful things that life has
Page 4 How To Turn An Emotional Scar Into An Emotional Strength
to offer. Whatever criticisms that you may get from other people, you must take
them in a constructive manner. For example, if people constantly tell you that you
are fat, don't get insulted. Just simply ignore it and tell yourself that nobody has the
right to judge you, especially in terms of one's physical appearance. You can stay
unaffected by what the others tell you and once they see that you don`t get
bothered by what they have to say, their criticisms would eventually stop as they
learn to accept that you are happy with what you look like and how you are as a
person.
Or, you can also use the criticisms that you receive from other people about your
physical appearance and turn it into motivation for you to get physically fit. You
would be able to drop some pounds and at the same time, increase your self-
confidence and self-worth. And in so doing, you would be more comfortable with
who you are as a person and you would feel more mellow and relaxed so much so
that little things won`t even bother you anymore. Did you know when we are
relaxed, there is a lesser chance for us to get insulted because it`s easier to ignore
threats? Being relaxed is what enables people to have “a sense of humor” about
things that would normally make the anxious person upset.
Other than preventing yourself from being overly sensitive, you need to realize that
you possess a responsible attitude naturally . We all do . It`s part of human nature.
By responsible attitude I mean you need to realize that YOU are in control. You need
to be prepared to do something to get what you want rather than waiting for things
to just happen but not at the expense of other people of course. You also can't rely
purely on other people to do things for you. You need to take charge of your own
life as well as your emotional needs. So, to ensure that you get what you need, you
should be ready with a plan of action, then take action while at the same time
anticipating the little twists and turns that may happen along the way.
Another key in order to turn your emotional scar into a strength is to realize that you
can`t please everybody. It`s just down right impossible. Even if you try to make
everyone accept and love you, there will always be people who don`t, it`s just a fact
of life. Accept that there are people who will not be able to like you for who you are
and if you do this, then, you probably wouldn`t ending up feeling frustrated,
disappointed and angry.
You must change the way you think. How? By focusing on a past success that
you`ve had in your life. It could be anything great or small. Remember the feeling
that you had when you were able to accomplish that past success. And you know
what you should do about all the times where you may have failed…? Forget them.
It is naturally difficult to forget a bad experience, but you don`t have to constantly
think about it. Constantly reliving a bad past experience only does one thing…… It
teaches your mind and your self-image(how you think about yourself) a pattern to
follow. By beating yourself up about a failure and reliving those emotions teaches
your mind to follow the same pattern all the time. It`s true. Realization of this fact
is key to your recovery.
Strive to change your attitude towards things and how you react to people and
circumstances as this would surely enable you to achieve the life, happiness, inner
strength and peace of mind that you have been looking for.
In addition, you need to learn to forgive yourself and other people with no strings
attached. Did you know that forgiveness is phony if you hold on to the bad
How To Turn An Emotional Scar Into An Emotional Strength Page 5
memories of people who committed some sort of wrongdoing against you? If you
don`t truly “forgive and forget” you`ll find yourself feeling that the person who
offended you owes you something for forgiving them and you would appear self-
righteous in a bad way towards that person if you cannot let go of the fact that you
were right and they were wrong.
For example, if you made a mistake such as being absorbed with your own life and
failing to be there for your close friend, especially when they needed you, just let it
go. Stop laying guilt all over yourself. Stop mulling over whose fault it is that your
friend turned out that way due to what they went through. Forget the days you
made a mistake by not being there for your friend when they were in trouble. Live
and learn. All you can do now is to lend a helping hand and an open ear to your
friend and provide them with all the support that you can give starting now. Live for
today not yesterday.
Forgiving is key to turning your emotional scar into a strength. When you forgive,
you must never have a reason to forgive a person. Rather, you should forgive with
an open heart and an open mind. You must be willing to let go of his indiscretion
and stop condemning them for what they did to you. If you are able to do this, then,
you would be able to obtain true peace of mind and real happiness.
Removing emotional scars is a major step in becoming the person who you really
want to be as you would generally live happily and freely because you don’t feel
worried or frustrated. Have you ever thought of taking a personal crisis head on and
convert it into an opportunity for growth, especially those circumstances that remind
you of how you reacted to your painful experiences?
For instance, in the above example, you take the criticisms that you receive from
other people regarding your weight as a motivation and allowing it to fuel your desire
to become physically fit. Thus, you would have the determination and the
commitment to see to it that you accomplish your goal. And once you accomplish
that goal successfully, this would bring about a stronger self-confidence and self-
worth for yourself which will be more defined than ever before.
If a person has a bad experience where his peers made him the butt of the jokes in a
social gathering and he was made to look like a fool, it’s highly likely that he would
avoid attending all other social events in the future. This is because he feels that if
he goes to a gathering, nobody would take him seriously and that he would just get
himself embarrassed.
Page 6 How To Turn An Emotional Scar Into An Emotional Strength
However, there are people who thrive in situations filled with pressure because they
can convert that pressure into a motivation that would help them perform better
than ever before. That same pressure makes them more determined and more
driven to focus in accomplishing their goals never ceasing until he achieves what he
wants to achieve.
For instance, theater actors may feel nervous and agitated before the start of the
play but they can use that nervous energy to psyche themselves up to become more
focused in delivering a stellar performance, call upon whatever abilities they may
have that are not usually obvious and be able to actually achieve that throughout the
show.
A crisis can either make or break you. Reacting to a crisis in a positive manner can
give you more confidence, inner strength and wisdom so much so that you become a
better and more mature person. On the other hand, if you react to a crisis in a
negative and defeatist manner, you would become more frustrated, empty and at
the same time, it can undermine your skills as you discover that you are not capable
to handle such situation.
So, if you want to transform your emotional scars into emotional strengths, you need
to possess a winner’s approach. It is all about:
3. Attitude – A defeatist attitude can cause you to feel that nothing goes your
way. This kind of negative attitude makes you feel that life has cheated you
from everything that you feel you deserve. However, a positive attitude
allows you to accept whatever challenge life gives you and to exert your best
in overcoming crisis. In addition, you need to be practical when you analyze
crisis and stop treating it like it is a do or die situation. Crises may seem
difficult and unsolvable in the beginning. But if you are able to step back to
analyze it realistically, you are willing to give your best shot to overcome it
and you actually carry out what you planned to do, then, it’s highly likely that
you would be able to triumph over that particular crisis. And in the process,
you would emerge with more confidence, inner strength and grace than
before.
As mentioned before, crises can happen everyday that may seem difficult to handle,
especially those that remind us of painful experiences in the past, which caused you
to have emotional wounds. But if you are going to accept these situations positively
and be proactive about them, then, you would be able to embrace crises as
opportunities for you to not only eliminate whatever emotional scars you may have
but also grow as a person.
This is just a part of what the Panic-Stopper Psycho-Cybernetics program is all about.
Psycho-Cybernetics fills in the blanks for you and helps you to understand and learn
how to work your own mind. Now, I am by no means taking any credit for
discovering psycho-cybernetics principals. Dr. Maxwell Maltz discovered these
principals decades ago, but because these principals can actually help you recover
for good and can`t be easily bottled and sold to you every two to three weeks, this
information has not been popularized by the mainstream. Since psycho-cybernetic
principals have made such a difference in my life as well as my loved ones, it gives
me great joy and a feeling of self fulfillment to share it with you.
Take Care,
“Stop stressing and
Joshua David start living”
-Dr. Maxwell Maltz