Let’s examine these six triggers. See which ones you recognize.

"I'm not lovable." A.k.a. – No one is ever going to love me the way I need and want to be loved. I’m never going to be adored and cherished like I dream to be. There is something deeply wrong with me that is blocking me from finding full, unconditional love. I’ll never be enough.

"I'm a burden to those around me." A.k.a – I’m defective. I bother people around me. I get on their nerves. I’m a loser. People really don’t like me that much.

"People can't be trusted." A.k.a. – I can’t trust anyone. Eventually everyone disappoints me. Why did I think this person would remain loyal to me? I need more from people than what I get.

"I can't be trusted." A.k.a – Here I go again making another mistake. I wonder if I’ll ever get things right. Why am I in charge, I mess up.

"I don't deserve to be happy and successful." A.k.a. – I just can’t believe that I can really have what I want. See! Here is more proof that what I really want most is always going to fall short of what I get. There is no such thing as a fairytale life.

"Life isn't worth living." A.k.a. – Life is just too hard. I don’t think I’ll ever have the energy to make the effort this life demands. I’m really tired of all this. I want to give up.

When a fault line gets disturbed and they do on a weekly, sometimes daily basis, it takes an immense amount of courage and honesty, a huge amount of maturity and awareness to NOT begin to spin a story. What usually happens often plays out like this:

We make an error in calculating how much we just racked up on a credit card. When the statement hits us we get a gut punch that evokes an, “Oh my hell!” response. TaDah! The quake beings. We start to doubt our ability to trust our own judgment. A story pops into mind about some sort of gruesome deficiency in our financial intelligence. There we go spinning out of control with wicked thoughts of self-deprecation. We are telling a scary story.

I have two reasons for sharing this topic: First, my hope is that you will find solace in the fact that you are not alone. We all share common quake lines. Second, I wish that you would also see where your own scary story telling begins. We can’t avoid the fault lines. We can determine how much they shake our own personal Richter Scales.