03/13/2024
How To Overcome The Trauma Of Being Scammed And Feel Confident Again
In 2023, my partner and I packed up our residents in Toronto and started our journey of creating a self-sustainable community in Costa Rica. In August, we found a fantastic land with a beautiful river at the bottom of the hill. We were delighted as everything seems going the way that we wanted. In Septemeber, we got a road, electricity and running water into our property. And, in October, we hired a young contractor who promised us that he would be able to build a home and a cabin within our budget in three months. We were excited about the smooth development of our property.
However, soon after signing the contract for the home & cabin construction project, the contractor started asking for extra money for materials and labour. He said "To complete the construction, I need this much money for the labour and also materials from this hardware store today." Initially, we thought he was a professional, and listening to the contractor would help to build our home smoothly. We also wanted to avoid a conflict with him after already investing our money by putting a deposit on this construction.
By the end of November, we started seeing significant delays and poor quality at our home site due to a workforce shortage. He asked for another payment to hire more people and complete the construction on time. We agreed to send him more, believing that he was being honest.
In December, our suspicion about the contractor grew like dark clouds. Our trust in him and optimism faded as his attitude and energy towards the construction disappeared. On December 31, our home was about 60% completed; however, we moved into the house with a half-open roof, no kitchen and hot water because the rental home's release expired that day. We practically moved into a construction site.
In the next three days, we saw almost no progress with the construction. However, he asked for another deposit. We knew he had no intention of completing our home project by then, so we had to let him go.
We lost the deposit and material costs of the cabin that he promised to build. We were hurt, disappointed, cheated, lied to, and betrayed. We were angry at the contractor and at ourselves. We blamed him, "Why did he lie to us?" and ourselves: "Why did we allow this man to take advantage of us?" We felt shame and guilt.
In January, as we lived in the half-built home, we reflected on the process of hiring him for our project. There were many signs screaming, "NO, Don't go with him."
First, when he rushed us to pay the first deposit, we found that his bank account was locked, and we could not transfer it. Second, when we did a reading about this person, the cards said, "His heart is not in it. He needs money." Alarming!!
However, our ego said, "Well...he gave us the lowest estimate, and his timeline matches our plans." We listened to our ego, and we trusted him unquestioningly because it was convenient at that time.
This was our learning. We also cleared the negative emotions, including shame and guilt. Then, we worked on forgiveness for the contractor, the event, its sequence, and ourselves.
In February, we found a great team of contractors and they completed our home.
Now, we literally have "a complete roof" over our heads! We live in our home with peace, healing, love, and joy.
This is how:
Step 1: Identify negative emotions that you are feeling after the unpleasant events. The negative emotions are anger, frustration, sadness, fear, shame and guilt. Feeling betrayed is a type of anger; anxiety is caused by fear; loss is a kind of sadness. They all are healthy negative emotions after being scammed, cheated or lied to.
Step 2: Ask yourself what you learned from this experience.
The negative memory of being scammed is wisdom. Ask yourself what you would do differently next time. You have the answer!
Step 3: Clear the negative emotions to move forward with the lesson.
“A memory without the emotional charge is called wisdom.”
Dr. Joe Dispenza
Let go of the negative emotions that do not serve you. In order to move on with your life with the learning, you need to clear the emotional charge using modalities of your choice: yoga, meditation, hypnosis, NLP, etc.
Step 4: Forgive others and yourself.
Forgiveness is the last step. Take all the time you need to forgive the person who hurt you and forgive yourself. Use the ho'oponopono mantra to work on forgiveness. "I am sorry, Forgive me, Thank you, I love you." Repeat this as many times as you want whenever you want.
I hope this story lifted your spirit today!
Which of the steps resonates best with you?
If you want to free yourself from the trauma of being scammed with the magical experience of mental and spiritual healing to transform your life, send me a DM with the word "HAPPY," and I will share more about how my work can help you.
