The Hidden Way Trauma Blocks Gratitude And How to Feel Joy Again

Understanding how brain patterns shape us and how to rewire them to experience more joy.

Feb 03, 2026

Hi beautiful soul,

When preparing my weekly article, I typically go into a Shamanic Journey to discover what wants to be written. What does the collective need to hear, and how can I deliver it with grace and loving-kindness? Tuesday mornings have become my weekly ritual for connecting to Divine Intelligence. Candles call in my Guides. Sage clears the air. Buffalo drums from the Insight Timer app create a high-frequency vibration that opens the channel.

Today, as I sat in my meditation chair preparing for the journey, my heart swelled immediately. Intense gratitude for my life, the people, the experiences—all of it. Glancing back at everything I’ve been through, I wondered: how could I feel this grateful after such a horrific childhood?

I was taken back to my birth. A screen appeared—a movie playing in fast forward through the past 48 years. I questioned: how did I make it this far? How did that child, who spent her first 18 years in pain and suffering, become this person—successful, abundant, thriving instead of just surviving?

It was 1978, I was 10 months old, and my mother died in an accidental fire. My two older sisters and I were rescued, but we didn’t have a stable father to care for us. We bounced from one unreliable adult to the next—until my father met his new girlfriend. A Puerto Rican woman with a child of her own. Long black stick-straight hair, a skinny, scrawny build, eyes like the devil. My father moved us in with her, and that’s when the torture began.

She beat me and my sisters with a baseball bat, even turning it over to us to abuse one another—as if she got sick pleasure from watching us hurt each other. Any misstep meant kneeling on rocks; we were forced to gather from the yard. For days. Upright, hands behind my back, nose to the wall. I watched the sun come up and go back down, over and over, hoping someone would rescue me. I was 3 years old.

The abuse and torture continued for several years. At five, I started kindergarten at the local Catholic elementary school, where the nuns noticed the obvious neglect and abuse. My sisters and I showed up in tattered clothes, with greasy, unbrushed hair and bruises covering our bodies. Those nuns became the saviors I’d been praying for since I was a toddler. They called CPS. Eventually, I was placed in foster care all alone.

I bounced from one home to the next for 5 years. At 10 years old, the very first night in a new home, the foster dad sexually assaulted me. My Guardians and Higher Self gave me the strength and courage to tell the foster mom the next morning. She called the police—thank God—and I was immediately removed, sent to yet another foster home.

Through it all, the only person I could rely on was myself. Even my sweet and caring social worker couldn’t protect me from these animals.

Eventually, I went to live with my oldest sister’s foster family. When my father refused to leave my abuser, we were placed up for adoption. That family decided to adopt both my older sister and me. I wish I could say I felt relieved—no more moving, finally stable. But what I actually felt was abandoned and unloved. How could a father just give up his rights to his children? Where was the love, the devotion? Why was his loyalty stronger to the monster who tortured and abused us?

I was always the strong one. The kind one. The likable one. But secretly, I was hiding all that pain inside. If I could just hide it long enough, maybe no one would realize the truth: I was unwanted, unlovable, unworthy

I carried my strength as a shield of protection—strong and unbreakable. If I stayed adaptable to my environment, I would belong. I would be seen as the nice girl. This survival strategy became imprinted in me early. It took decades to take down that armor and face the truth of my circumstances.

After finding my way into spiritual groups with their ‘come as you are’ mottos, I realized I had some deep inner work to do. All that pain and suffering I’d been carrying my whole life needed to be acknowledged.

I can say now with 100% confidence: my Guides, Guardians, and Higher Self have been walking this journey with me the entire time. My kindness isn’t a result of my abuse—it’s my ability to see life from a higher perspective. Grace is one of my strongest attributes because I know what it’s like to live with neglect, abandonment, and torture. There is no pain like it.

Seeing the glass half full isn’t spiritual bypassing, though I’ve been accused of it plenty of times. It’s my natural way of living. There was always a small whisper within me: you’ve got this. And no bullshit—I did.

I excelled at school. Made friends easily. Adapted to my environments—often because I had to, but also because I wanted to. I didn’t want to experience resistance to what is.

Today in meditation, mascara-filled tears rolled down my cheeks onto my gray sweatsuit. Drops reminding me of all the pain and suffering I endured as a child—yet somehow I feel immense gratitude for it.

It got me thinking: how can someone like me go through unthinkable abuse yet feel incredible pride, joy, and peace?

The revelation came instantly: ‘You’ve lived through your higher heart your whole life. You’ve been connected with benevolent beings even in the darkest of times.’ The truth of it vibrated through my body, hair standing up on my arms. But that’s not the whole story.

After a decade of healing my complex trauma, I still felt resistance within my body. In fact, I completely lost my voice in May 2025. Several visits to specialists, extensive testing, and finally a diagnosis: Muscle Tension Dysphonia—tightness of the vocal cords. I was at a complete loss. My business went on hold. I left my spiritual mentorship and started to distance myself from friends and family. For the very first time in my life, I wasn’t focused on anything but getting to the root of the problem.

Because I do healing work professionally, I knew my body was reacting to old traumas—traumas that kept me reaching for safety by staying hidden. The book, Your Brain Is a Filthy Liar by Bizzie Gold led me to her private course and mentorship, The Break Method. There, I discovered my primary brain pattern type: Abandoned—Hold It All Together. Everything I learned about this rang true.

The Abandoned - Hold It All Together type develops from disconnected parenting, in which children experience chronic letdowns from adults and learn to deeply distrust others to stay safe. This pattern develops when parents disconnect emotionally.

Children in these environments grow up without proper emotional guidance and learn to subconsciously distance themselves from others. And this would explain why I have always been labeled as the strong one and why I have considered myself hyper-independent.

Key Characteristics of Abandoned-Hold It All Together:

Deep distrust of others developed from being chronically let down (the foster care system)
Emotional distance as a protective mechanism (daily neglect and abuse)
Having to “hold it all together” on their own without reliable adult support (death of my mother)
Attachment issues resulting from disconnected, “quiet quitting” parenting (my father)
Difficulty relying on others due to early experiences of unreliability (my entire childhood existence)

This pattern formed as my main survival strategy. I avoided asking for help, distrusted humans to follow through, and became hyperaware of my surroundings. I had to learn to trust one person: me.

I became hyper-focused on external success to keep me safe. Top seller at a nationwide fitness center. Top-selling real estate agent in my mid-20s. A dozen successful businesses grossing over $30 million in sales. I believed success equaled worthiness, love, belonging—things I’d never experienced as a child. My worth was based on how much I could produce.

The thing is, my primary brain pattern type, which formed in early childhood, helped me become self-sufficient and extremely successful from the outside looking in. But my body was dropping clues that I ignored until I could no longer look away.

You can imagine when you lose your voice, it’s not just the audible sound that you lose. It was confidence. Self-expression. My willingness to push harder, faster. All the things that kept me rolling along with the unchecked program.

There is another brain pattern type, the Rejection-Oriented Pattern type, which develops differently.

The Rejection-Oriented Pattern type develops when a child feels chronically ignored or rejected by their parents. Unlike the abandoned types who learned they couldn’t rely on others, rejection-oriented individuals received inconsistent attention, which taught them they had to constantly earn love and validation.

Key Characteristics of Rejection-Oriented:

Constant second-guessing of their own judgment and decisions
Difficulty making choices without external input or approval
Requires constant validation and reassurance from people around them
Glass half-empty perspective - tends toward pessimism
Can experience emotional instability and reactivity
Can trigger easily in conversations or trigger others unintentionally

This type’s brain tells them they need others’ approval to be worthy, creating a cycle where they constantly seek external validation while simultaneously fearing rejection, which often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The Rejection-Oriented type may struggle with boundaries, over-function in relationships, experience anxiety when others don’t respond quickly enough, and have difficulty believing they’re truly loved, even when shown consistent affection.

The irony is that their desperate need for connection often pushes people away, reinforcing their core belief that they’ll be rejected - which is exactly what their brain has been lying to them about all along.

The difference between the two brain pattern types is that the abandonment type can say, “I have this, and I built it” and feel true satisfaction.

The rejection type thinks, “I have this, but do they really care? Will they leave? Is it enough? What if I lose it? Am I worthy of it?”

Gratitude for the rejection type gets filtered through the lens of their relationships and their fear of loss, making it nearly impossible to simply appreciate what is without anxiety about what might happen or what others think.

Breaking the Rejection Pattern: How to Rewire Your Brain for More Gratitude

The rejection-oriented brain has spent years running the same exhausting loop: scan for danger, seek validation, brace for disappointment. What most people don’t realize—you’re not actually changing your thoughts. You’re interrupting the pattern that creates those thoughts in the first place.

Start with Pattern Opposition Through Self-Trust

Your brain defaults to low self-trust and high reliance on others. Pattern opposition means intentionally doing the opposite: building self-trust while loosening your grip on external validation.

When you catch yourself thinking “Do they really mean that?” or “What if they change their mind?”—pause. Ask yourself: “What do I think about this situation?” Not what you hope they think, or what you’re afraid they think. What you actually think.

It feels weird at first. Your brain will protest because self-trust wasn’t safe as a kid. But you’re not that kid anymore.

Rewrite Your Subconscious Language

The rejection pattern lives in specific phrases your brain repeats on autopilot. Listen for them:

“I hope they’re not mad at me.”
“Did I say something wrong?”
“They probably don’t really like me.”
“I’m too much/not enough.”

Each time you notice one, replace it with a real factual observation: “They haven’t responded yet, but that doesn’t mean anything about me.” Or simply: “I don’t actually know what they’re thinking, and that’s okay.”

You’re not doing affirmations. You’re breaking the neural pathway that assumes the worst and creating a new pathway.

Practice Gratitude Without Permission

Here’s a weird one: pick three things you’re grateful for, but don’t tell anyone. Don’t post them. Don’t text your friend about them. Just sit with them yourself.

Why? Because your pattern wants to outsource validation. When you share gratitude, you’re often unconsciously checking: “Will they agree this is good? Will they validate my feelings?”

Let something be good just because you say it is. Your opinion counts, even if no one else witnesses it.

Interrupt the Comparison Spiral

Comparison is how the rejection pattern stays alive. Someone else’s win feels like your loss. Their relationship looks better than yours. They seem more successful, more loved, more secure.

Catch it happening and literally say out loud: “Different situation, not my business.” Then redirect your focus to one concrete thing in your own life right now. Not what could be different, not what you wish you had—what actually exists in this moment.

The goal isn’t to force yourself to feel grateful. It’s about stopping comparison from hijacking your ability to see what’s real and true.

Build Self-Trust Through Small Decisions

Make one decision every day without asking anyone for their opinion. Doesn’t matter how small—what to eat for lunch, which route to take, what to watch. Then don’t second-guess it.

Your brain learned that your judgment couldn’t be trusted. You’re teaching it something new. Each time you trust yourself and nothing terrible happens, you’re rewiring your brain.

Sit With Good Things Without Catastrophizing

Something good happens. Immediately, your brain goes: “How long will this last? What’s the catch? When will they leave?”

That’s the pattern talking. It’s trying to protect you from future disappointment by refusing to let you enjoy the present.

Try this: when something good happens, give yourself permission to enjoy it for exactly 30 seconds without adding commentary. Just feel it. When the “but what if” thoughts show up, acknowledge them: “Yeah, you’re trying to protect me. We’re okay right now, though.”

You’re not pretending bad things can’t happen. You’re refusing to let fear of loss prevent you from experiencing what’s actually happening.

Track Evidence of Your Own Reliability

The rejection pattern tells you that others are unreliable and that you need them anyway. Flip it. For one week, notice every time you follow through on something you said you’d do—even tiny things. Texted back when you said you would. Showed up on time. Did that task you committed to.

Write it down. Your brain doesn’t naturally track this because it’s too busy monitoring everyone else’s reliability. You’re building a new dataset that confirms you can count on yourself.

Recognize When You’re Testing People

Ever pull back to see if someone will chase you?

That’s the pattern running a test: “If I make this hard, will they prove they really care?” But here’s the trap—even when they pass the test, your brain moves the goalposts. There’s never enough proof because the issue isn’t them. It’s the pattern.

When you catch yourself testing, try just asking directly instead: “Hey, I’m feeling insecure. Can we talk?” Vulnerability feels scarier than testing, but it actually interrupts the cycle.

Accept That Rewiring Takes Time

You’ve been running this pattern for decades. It won’t shift in a week. According to Bizzie Gold’s work, rewiring takes about 16-20 weeks of intentional pattern opposition work.

The goal isn’t to never feel insecure or need validation again. It’s to stop letting those feelings control your entire reality. You can feel uncertain and still trust yourself. You can want connection without making others responsible for your sense of worth.

Gratitude gets easier when you stop waiting for permission to appreciate your life. Your brain will keep scanning for rejection—that’s just what it does. But you don’t have to believe everything it tells you anymore.

Here’s what I want you to hear if you’re the Rejection-Oriented type: you can learn self-trust. I know your brain tells you that you need others to validate every feeling, every choice, every good thing in your life. But that’s the pattern lying to you.

Building self-trust doesn’t mean you stop caring about connection—it means you stop making others responsible for your worth. When you learn to trust your own judgment, gratitude becomes natural instead of impossible. You don’t need permission to appreciate your life. You don’t need confirmation that something is good. You get to decide. And that single shift—from seeking validation to trusting yourself—changes everything.

For those of us with the abandonment pattern, gratitude comes easily for what we’ve built and accomplished. We can look at our lives and feel genuine pride. But there’s a loneliness in that gratitude. A voice that whispers, “Yes, but I did it all alone.” The rewiring work for us isn’t about building more self-trust. It’s about learning that letting people in doesn’t make us weak.

When I lost my voice, my body was telling me what my brain refused to hear: you can’t hold it all together forever. And you don’t have to. Learning to trust others, even just a little, transforms gratitude from “I survived this” to “I’m fully living. That simple mindset shift changes everything.

We all have survival mechanisms ingrained in our psyche. They aren’t all bad; they were our safety net when we were in danger. Even when the potential threat is long gone, our brains are hardwired with habits and beliefs that keep us from living in alignment with our True Self. The Divine within. But the good news? You can rewire your brain no matter where you are in life or how old you are. It’s all possible.

To receive weekly insights from Soul & Mind Alchemy Publication, make sure to hit the subscribe button.

Love what you’re reading? Share the love by restacking and sharing this post.

Share Soul & Mind Alchemy

Let me hear your thoughts. Share them in the comments!

Soul & Mind Alchemy

Discussion about this post

Ready for more?