As I'd mentioned before, I really did believe that I could handle all the curve balls with a healthy dash of Xena and Oprah - mimicking strong women in control of their lives, successes and destiny. In my youth, I never sought help (although in hindsight I remember a campus doctor asking me if I wanted to speak with a counselor after I had described a date rape incident. I brushed her comment aside. I now wish she had been more insistent that I speak with someone).

Part naivety, part ignorance, I never read anything on the subject of rape, abuse, victimization or how one really heals from such traumatic experiences. It was definitely not discussed openly among friends and family. Instead I smiled through the pain, laughed when I was numb and lived for everyone but myself. When I was feeling low, I had friends tell me I was a Phenomenal Woman and I would read Maya Angelou's poem trying to convince myself I was.

I projected to the world an image of a woman in control of her life, but shame and guilt were like the devils sitting on my shoulders. I was terrified that the world would see through the smoke screen. There's a whole industry now helping those in search of happiness and finding their way to a more fulfilling life. I have a handful of friends and colleagues who have become certified life coaches or leadership consultants. One day, one of them offered me a free consultation and I thought to myself, "What have I got to lose?" 

The Wheel of Life, The Coaches Training Institute

I was given some homework to complete before our meeting - the Wheel of Life assessment. The Wheel covers eight areas:

• Physical Environment
• Career
• Family & Friends
• Significant Other/Romance
• Fun & Recreation
• Health
• Money
• Personal Growth

Rating myself in each of these categories with an honest perspective was hard. How I see and feel about myself is different from how I want the world to see me. My ratings ranged between 6 and 10...all except for one area of my life. After I completed the wheel, I sat back and looked at the flow - for the most part, it looked stable. Except there was a blip. Glaring from the page, I faced my shame.

Secret Reveal #3: Significant Other/Romance rating - 1 (lowest score).

My life coach asked me why I had rated Romance with such a low score. But I evaded his questions and talked in circles - I wasn't comfortable sharing my secrets with him.

When it came to romantic relationships, I was in denial and never confronted or acknowledged my past, which created a warped sense of what I wanted in a relationship and what part I played in a relationship:

• "What's the point?" - my attitude when it came to dating, relationships and sex, creating the destructive cycle where I would find myself with someone unsuitable further chipping away at my self-respect and self-worth.
• "I could rescue him! Then comes need, then comes love!" - my approach as I tried to validate my worth in a relationship, but I would still remain hopelessly distant as I didn't believe love was possible.
• "He must be powerful and heroic like Christopher Reeve's Superman/Clark Kent; honourable, just and good like Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch; boyish, devoted and loyal like Anne Shirley's Gilbert Blythe; funny and good father like TV Dads Dan Connors, Tim Taylor, or Steven Keaton; he must also appreciate the arts; and bonus points if he plays hockey!" - my impossible dream man living on a pedestal, can't possibly exist but I would keep looking and comparing.
• "I'm too busy" - I would keep myself busy with work and an active social life to prove that nothing was missing in my life.

I've always put ME last on the priority list - artists/causes, work, friends and family came first - so I never really dealt with my past experiences with abusive and manipulative men, nor the impact it had on me as a woman, both body and spirit. So many barriers - clearly irrational - but fully ingrained in my beliefs about myself.

I didn't continue my sessions with my life coach - he's an executive leadership coach - not quite the coaching I needed to help with my healing process, but he was gracious and respectful when I informed him I needed to seek help elsewhere. But I'm happy - the Wheel of Life assessment achieved its purpose - I was ready to do anything to raise the score in my romantic life. I was ready to tackle my past.

I was wrong...starting the second post is harder than the first. I've no outline for this blog, and being that I'm still new to all this, it's taking me a little while to find my own narrative voice.

I've kept a journal since I was 8 years old. So you'd think I'd know my own voice after 30 years of writing. But with my journal, i'm writing with only one reader in mind - myself. For work, I write a lot, but I often "borrow" other people's voices - I get in and get comfortable in someone else's mind, bringing to life their artistic visions and intentions.

But here, it's different.

I had a friend who used to perform in coffee houses covering popular rock and pop songs. He had a beautiful voice with this ability to sound like the artists who performed them -  an expressive Bono, to a raw and gritty Eddie Vedder. I asked him once if he would be performing any of his original songs. He replied, "No. I've been covering songs for so long that I don't know what my own voice sounds like." At the time, I thought that was a ridiculous answer, but I get it now.

When you keep secrets, the stories you share don't always mirror what you really want to say. For me, I coped by self-censoring everything I said, what I expressed, what I voiced. Most of the time, the narrative remained at surface level, and I navigated the world by presenting different voices and facets of myself. I've been doing this for so long that digging to find my own voice beneath all the layers of secrets, shame, guilt, and anxiety has been challenging.

A few years ago, I participated in a vocal workshop lead by Tyley Ross, a Grammy nominated recording artist, co-founder of the East Village Opera Company, and an instructor of voice at NYU's Tisch and Steinhardt schools. I was a classically trained opera singer in my youth, but a friend recommended that I take Tyley's workshop as a refresher. His approach to voice was different and required a greater awareness of body, thought and feelings. One of his exercises required everyone in the workshop to anonymously submit a secret. Each student was then assigned someone else's secret  for study and vocalization. We walked around the room freely, vocalizing in different ways - whispers, hisses, fast, slow, articulated, emotively. We said the secrets under our breaths, we said them to one another as we passed each other, we said them to the walls, we sang them.

The purpose of the exercise was to not let the body and mind hold you back from vocalizing what we would instinctively internalize. I don't remember the secret that was assigned to me - I never embraced it as my own. But I do remember feeling quite self-conscious yet detached when I ended up face to face with the person assigned with my secret. At the time, I didn't truly understand or appreciate Tyley's workshop - to give into the process and express, confront and release what holds us back or is blocking our lost voices. In hindsight, the secret I submitted was quite superficial in comparison to the others. But at the time, it reflected where I was at in my own personal journey and what I was coming to terms with.

Secret reveal #2 - My secret submitted for the voice workshop - "I'm in love with a clown."

Yup, that's what he does for a living - he works in a circus - red nose, clown costume, mini-bike, juggling, etc. There's a story there too, but that's for another day, another post...