My family took me skiing in Colorado on Mother’s Day weekend.

I could tell you about how badly haunted the hotel was, and how my family supported my need to leave it. But, I’ll save that story for another time.

This article is about standing up for yourself; which I’ve had a lifetime to learn to do.

I was raised to keep my mouth shut, turn the other cheek like a good Catholic girl; take a pounding from people that love you and people that don’t.

And words; well, people can call you any name in the book. To be better than them; you must not say anything ‘mean’ back.

This weekend on the mountain, all the years of practicing how to stand up for myself came together in this one moment.

It’s late spring. The slopes were busy and the snow was icy. Though we’ve lived in Colorado off and on for over a decade, we leave the state to ski because of the crowds.

We convinced my 10 year old to go on his first blue run which is faster and steeper then the green run he’s been on since he learned to ski. I promised to stay with him.

That promise cost me the strength in my legs. By the time we got to the bottom of the crowded mountain I was shaking trying to keep the slow pace with my little boy.

The crowd bottlenecked one last time between melting snow, rocks and mud. People passed us at 100-miles an hour though there was no space for them.

I knew (psychic) if I didn’t get to the left of my son, someone was going to nail him.

As predicted, I moved left and a guy made zero effort to slow or stop on his board.

He slammed into me. I stayed strong. He did it again. I braced. Instead of stopping, he attempted to use my body to push off against.

Really man?

What?

What the hell?

You’re taking up too much space.

(As if women don’t have the right to take up space in this world. That’s another story.)

Everyone is taking up too much space.

My husband notices I’m in it with some guy. He and my daughter turn to pay attention.

He’s got my back. I can feel it.

Maybe next time you can say you’re sorry instead of blaming the person you slammed into.

You’re being a great role model for your kids.

You’re damn right I am. I’m not raising them to get hammered and just look the other way and force a smile on their face.

All of the sudden his girlfriend started yelling some mumbo jumbo that had nothing to do with anything.

I answered her with a firm, “Shut up.”

My family circled around me.

And we finished the hill.

That Monday, my son, was home sick with a sore throat. On the drive up to the doctors appointment he wanted to talk about it.

He said, “Mama, you know when the guy sarcastically said ‘you’re being a good example to your kids?’”

Yes

“Well I think you are THE EXAMPLE for us.”

My eyes welled with tears. He got it.

This was the moment I had been reaching towards throughout the decades of trying to heal myself.

Up there, on the hill, I stood up for myself. I calmly said what I needed to say to someone who was hurting me.

I didn’t:

• Make excuses for the man who slammed into me
• Make false assumptions that he didn’t mean to
• Yell in rage or loose control
• Tremble and cry
• Let it ruin my trip
• Play it over and over in my brain
• Hate myself for letting a stranger hit me & not call him out on it
• Feel sorry for myself and be a victim
• Be sad that people are mean and wish they wouldn’t be
• Hate everyone just because of one asshole

I could look my son in the eyes and tell him he always has the right to stand up for, and protect himself no matter who is doing the hurting.

When I say to him: “I’m always here for you. I’ll always protect you. I’ve always got your back,” he knows I mean it.

Thank God he didn’t know the little girl I once was - that let people punch her in the face; slam her head into walls; stomp on her head because someone else wanted to use the phone; sit quietly while people lied about her and made false accusations; and much, much worse.

People hurt me growing up and I hated myself for it.

I hated being voiceless. I hated how I let people get away with it and turned the rage towards myself.

I wanted to take my life, the pain was so bad when I was a little girl.

People hurt me and convinced me it was my fault.

When I became a mother, I promised myself I wouldn’t be a doormat anymore. I couldn’t be, I had babies to protect.

I learned to stand up for myself but shook with rage. I’d loose it.

I didn’t have the ability to be in control of something I felt I had no control over. I didn’t know how to stand up and take care of the situation.

It was ugly for many years.

Then I got skin cancer in 2010. That healing crisis forced me to figure this shit out.

My Spirit Guides demanded that I stand up for myself.

You have no self respect because you let everyone walk all over you. You can’t do it because you think you shouldn’t have to - all the while people are hurting you.

People hurt people. There is evil in this world and you are being called to deal with it.

Accept it.

After hearing this for 6 months, I finally understood.

Since then, I’ve had to confront both giants and demons; outside myself and within.

I was afraid, but I knew the Spirit World was there for me.

I trusted them and if they said, “Confront your mother,” that’s what I did.

If they said, “He’s lying to you,” I called my dad back and told him I knew he was lying to me.

You’re right, he confessed.

Get the darkness and confusion into the light. Over and over and over again.

Over the last few years my Guides have called me to confront my family on a grand scale. They tell me it’s coming. I brace myself for the moment it arrives.

The spring of 2018, it came all at once. The email came in from an aunt.

“It’s time to stand up for yourself,” said the Guides.

I responded the way I was instructed from Spirit, knowing that no matter what I have to do it’s for the good of everyone involved, especially my own Spirit whom needed to learn this lesson.

The retaliation was grand and multigenerational.

Everyone in the birth family against me. The lie - the abuse - all coming against me.

I did not falter. I did not give up.

I shared each moment with my family and close friends.

“You’ve got this. You’re brave. You can do this. We’ve got your back,” they said.

I shook. I cried. I showed my family and friends every attack that came my way.

Witness - what could not be witnessed so long ago due to lack of technology.

I took care of each step until I did what I had to do.

My children watched in horror as they saw with their own eyes a taste of what my life had been like before I had them.

Finally, I drew lines in the sand and created boundaries where boundaries needed to be, and I cut ties with people that were too dangerous to continue to deal with.

The storm passed and I was still standing.

I could feel self respect and trust coming into my Spirit like never before.

I wasn’t a scared 12 year old little girl anymore.

I was a 40 year old woman who was no longer going to take shit from anyone; not a close family member, and certainly not from some selfish jerk on the mountain.

Moving through this world as a Medium I have to confront:

Death, Evil, Demons, People’s Pasts, Energy of Suffering and Abuse, Poverty, Hatred, and everything else in this dimension.

We can either do it with confidence and enough self respect to know that no matter what comes our way - we’re going to stand up for ourselves and the people we love; or we can get beat up by all of it.

Either way it’s here. It’s a natural part of being alive. It’s a natural part of the landscape of this dimension.

Heaven is on our side. Heaven wants us to be brave. Heaven wants us to tell someone who’s hurtful to stop, not encourage them to get bolder by our silence.

This Spiritual-Law must be corrected.

Yes, if people are just being irritating and there is no danger -  turn away and do your own thing. It’s not our job to lecture the world.

But, in those moments when something is really wrong and your Soul won’t trust you if you don’t stand up for it - you must.

The cost of not saying something is far greater than the cost of whatever truth you will speak.

Be discerning to the truth of the situation.

And, never, ever turn the other way when you’re being called to speak your truth.

It may be the perfect situation set up by your Guides/God, testing you to see if you’re faithful to the calling of your Soul and the lessons you agreed to learn while here on earth.

You were built for it.

Peace is earned through knowing that you can deal with life in such a truthful way, the battle in the mind and in the Soul is over.

Peace is created with trust.

Not trust that you can control the entire world, but trust that no matter what the world hands you, you can and will go through it with Grace and come out victorious not matter what victory may look like for you.