We've all been abused, in one form or another. Of course, the word conjures up images of sexual and physical abuse - frighteningly common in our society. But there are other forms of abuse - ranging from overt bullying through to less obvious 'slights' against the individual. These all carry a price of some sort, and if we allow it, these historical acts of abuse will also affect our future lives.

Abuse, and similar traumas, cast very long shadows. They blight people's lives. We carry irrational feelings of guilt after abuse and bullying episodes, and it's important to learn to let these feelings of guilt and shame go.

This is where counselling can really help. Because it is difficult to gain an accurate view of one's history without outside help - we are, by nature, very hard on ourselves. I would like to describe one of the mechanisms which I believe is responsible for some of this difficulty.

We have a gift, as humans, for finding patterns. If I were to present you with some randomly-generated numbers, or colours, or shapes, you would somehow find a connection between them - it's part of our human genius. Likewise, when a person is abused on a number of occasions, they instinctively construct a 'theory' about this - and the 'theory' often involves seeing themself as the common denominator. So acts of abuse don't just hurt at the time, they also change the way we see ourselves.

Nobody should feel trapped by their history - it isn't fair, and it isn't reasonable. This instinct for finding patterns means that we construct a fiction about our personalities, based on our experiences. Two or more bullying episodes in your past say nothing useful about you as a person. Nothing. Yet their presence in your history may lead your inner mind to construct a self image which is inherently vulnerable. In a similar fashion, two or three completely random accidents can lead to a person judging himself 'clumsy'. By these accidents of history we build an image of self, and it can be quite a random, unreliable process.

So if you feel trapped by your past, perhaps you will summon up the courage to seek outside help. Maybe not today, but at a time when you are feeling calm, and strong enough to face difficult memories. Because a skilled outsider can help you not to find the connections, but to break them, and to recognise that sometimes we are not the common denominator, we simply happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.