Dear Nicole:
I am working on this very issue presently, just now before I read your post. SO I am going to think it as I type this here.

I do not like radishes. they taste bitter to me. What your ex boyfriend gave you was a radish. it tastes bad. You don’t like it. You so dislike it, you call it “horrible” and “vicious” “rude” “unkind.” You feel “shame”. you are “upset”. (quotes around words you used). You try to think about it so that it stops tasting bad. You try to visualize and take care of yourself so it stops tasting bad.

You hear his words over and over again in your mind: “monster” “selfish”

I think I am getting it- you keep eating the radish. You dislike it. It is “horrible. Vicious. Rude. Unkind” but you keep eating the radish. You want to forget it but you keep eating it. I think you can’t stop eating the radish. If you could – you’d stop.

I think that you cannot forget his words, if you could- you wouldn’t remember his words.maybe you can tone down the volume of what he said. Maybe you can stop disliking it THIS MUCH.

Maybe you can dislike it less. By removing the shame from it. By removing the horrible from it. By removing the vicious from it.

A radish is just a radish. His words: monster. Unattractive. These are just words. They mean so much to you but in themselves they don’t mean that much. If said to someone else they wouldn’t have hurt you that much. If a total stranger, a psychotic, let’s say, told you that- it wouldn’t mean that much…it is not in the WORDS themselves.

Strip down the layers you added to his words, the layers you automatically added to his words. What you have left is the bare words- unpleasant but not THAT bad.

If I eat the radish without thinking: Oh, I hate this radish. I hate the farmer who grew this radish. I never tasted a radish THIS bad. I wonder if I am going to get sick eating it. Eating this radish reminds me of (other unpleasant experiences). Etc. If I don’t think these thoughts and don’t feel the corresponding extra anger, disgust, shame, etc. in those extra thoughts and just think:

I am eating a radish. Oh, it didn’t taste good. I drink sweet tea and oh, the taste is gone.

Strip an agitating experience to its bare minimum then you see it for what it really is. his words are just words.
anita