Defining Oneself

    I've come to the conclusion that one of the many talents of my ego is that it redacts my life story...it focuses on all the ways in which I feel I have failed, it focuses on all the ways in which things didn't work out for me and completely ignores all the good things that have happened in my life. I've had a lot of successes and done a lot of things right. I successfully overcame an awful lot to get to where I am and my ego insists that my efforts were clearly not enough due to what my circumstances currently are. It takes a whole lot of will-power, energy, and perseverance to get through all the emotional upheavals I've gone through.
    I keep forgetting to acknowledge how much strength it has taken to get here...even if 'here' isn't seen as ideal. I still fought for every moment. I fought my shadows and insecurities and fears. There have been times when I truly felt that I wasn't bringing enough and wasn't capable of bringing enough to the world and that it might be best if I gave up. I thought "how can someone so warped by trauma be of any use here?" What was the point? What could I possibly give to the world from so broken a heart, so devastated a soul? But I am trying to see that although trauma sculpted me in so many ways, it's not my identity. It may feel like it since scientists have been able to put together a list of behavioral traits/patterns common among those who have suffered from the same forms of trauma as me, but we are all more than the sum of our history. Being a survivor of trauma doesn't make us any less lovable, any less deserving, any less sacred. It doesn't make us less valuable.

There is nothing inherently wrong with being a survivor.
Your history has nothing to do with who you really are.
You are the light who overcame the darkness.

Nothing you went through has the power to define you;
You get to define you.
Will you choose to be your trauma or will you choose to be the light that you are?

Own your story, don't let your story own you.
Own your story and you will see yourself as the light that you are.
You were always the light. You just forgot.