Hell is something you carry around with you-Give yourself permission to dump it

“I think hell is something you carry around with you. Not somewhere you go.”   Neil Gaiman

I read these lines by Neil Gaiman a few years ago. They intrigued me and piqued my interest; and this piece got written. My personal interpretation of my encounter with hell.

The ‘permission’ I speak of is the kind that I learnt about in psychotherapy – an offering of sorts that I or you choose to accept/receive to rewire our thinking. Permissions play a crucial role in our healing and transformative journeys.They can be received from another, but ultimately you gift them to yourself.

So here goes….

Hell is something you carry around with you – Give yourself permission to dump it

I reckon hell is in your head.

 It is in your thoughts; in fact it is your thoughts.

 It is what meaning you make of your situation.

 It is the rubbish you are fed as a child.

 That which was fed to your parent as a child,

 and theirs and theirs – all through time.

That you take as the gospel truth,

 The stuff you don’t have permission to question,

 To analyse for yourself for validity and truth.

 To subject to reality testing as you grow older.

 That you cannot therefore discard, trash, dump…..

 So you carry it around with you – hell!

It torments you – pokes you, prods you,

makes you different degrees of miserable.

 It is your thoughts, that imprison you in bars,

 that is the lack of permission to question.

 And your thoughts can be contained, trained, reframed.

So, here – take this permission,

 To question the “unquestionable”.

 Take this permission,

 to start shedding light on your truth.

 You have permission to discard 

 and dump what isn’t working for you.

 To take a deep dive into you –

 not the you projected on to the world

 – the “you” you.

 Who you are on the inside

 – maybe you don’t know this “you” very well.

This is an invitation for you

 to begin this journey to selfhood.

 To start aligning with your core.

 Don’t look to me – check in with your body,

 she holds all the answers.

 She will guide you – never a mis-step will you make,

 should you listen closely.

To do, sometimes, is to do nothing.

 So do nothing. Wait, move, seek …….listen.

 You already know how you feel;

 and now you have the permission,

 to feel your feelings….. fully!

 Take it!

Hell is in your head.

 And the key to freedom is the permission

 to challenge and change your thoughts.

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