THE SPIRIT OF DANCE: The statute of limitations has expired on most of our childhood trauma

"The stories of our lives, far from being fixed narratives, are under constant revision. The slender threads of causality are rewoven and reinterpreted as we attempt to explain to ourselves and others how we became the people we are. Certainly we are shaped by them and must learn from them if we are to avoid the repetitious mistakes that make us feel trapped in a long-running drama of our own authorship. Because acceptance of responsibility for what we do and how we feel requires an act of will, it is natural to blame people in our pasts, especially our parents, for not doing a better job. No child escapes unscathed from parental abuse or neglect. It is important to go about examining this sympathetically, in a way that emphasizes learning but rejects the assumption that even the most awful experiences define our lives forever. All of us have endured events and losses about which we had no choice. These include the families into which we were born, the way we were treated as children, the deaths and divorces of those close to us. It is not hard to make a case that we have been adversely affected by events and people outside our control. The idea that we have to sit and talk about the problems we face and the things we have tried that have failed implies a slow and unwieldy process that has at its core an uncomfortable assumption: We are responsible for most of what happens to us."

G. Livingston

I was born without a silver spoon. However, Independent of what happens during our childhood we always have the power to control our future. We can have dreams and work towards them with all our energy and make the rest of our lives an incredible turn around.

I must say that I was very lucky as a child to have good, caring parents and family, have the opportunity to go to school and have no traumatic experiences. (Sarcastic) But i so wish my childhood was not as bad as it was back then.

However I believe that a person that came from a traumatic childhood also has a shot at making it in life, some of them have even more will to do so and achieve more great things in their lives than some that had all the support systems in place. Of course the opposite also happens, but the possibility is still there.

I guess those with the will to change and make their lives better will not only improve their lives, but break a vicious cycle that would go on from generation to generation.