Annie Knoth

 

There was a time in my life when I lived in a state of fear, abandonment, heavy guilt and shame. 

 

I attracted abusive relationships through my internal belief-system, found myself co-dependent and limited. I used alcohol to avoid my pain and promiscuity to feel loved.

 

I was always searching outside myself for love and acceptance from others.

 

I never felt truly accepted, pretty, smart or the big one,  good enough.

 

I grew up in New Zealand, being the youngest of five kids. Two of my older brothers and sister had a different mum, who passed away suddenly when they were little, and my mum met my dad soon after this tragedy, and had my older brother and I.  

 

From the day I was born, we moved ALOT. By the time I was fifteen years old, I had lived in three different countries,  and 17 different houses and been to 8 different schools.

 

Those first few years of life was stressed. Being raised in a Baptist Christian household and always feeling like I wasn't the "true" children of the family. I felt like I was an offcut from the real family, and we were treated this way by certain extended family members.

 

I was four when my mum and dad split up, which I remember being the greatest thing. My mum left the oppression of the Church and we started to form this strong bond. Just my mum, brother and I.

 

My relationship with my dad always felt stiff. I never remember getting hugs from dad or love. It was more like a principal-student relationship. 

 

He was a sweet and innocent man, but stifled by suppressed emotions of grief and pain, he was unable to relate to his daughters. 

 

Growing up, I watched my dad favour my older brother and this hurt my heart in ways I couldn't process. 

 

I craved the acceptance of my father, but always felt let down but his lack of connection and love. 

 

It's so funny through the eyes of a kid, we don't see all the hard work that goes into being a supportive parent. Being a parent myself, I have so much respect for my dad, he provided and supported in other ways, and that is not a small feat. He was also the solid
 

I couldn't understand why he couldn't just show me love. 
 

I would watch my friends dad's dote on their daughters with such loving care and protection, I craved that. 

 

One of my secret dreams was pretending that my dad was Arnold Schwarzenegger. Growing up in the 80s and early 90s I would absorb myself in his movies and daydream about Arnie being my dad and swooping in and protecting his baby girl, Annie.

 

And I know where this insecurity of safety came about. 

 

Just after my parents split, I remember I would hate going over to stay the weekends at my dad's house, because I felt so abandoned and alone.

 

Dad was always busy at work, and it ended up being  a free for all us five kids to run rampant. I remember being subject to watching Nightmare on Elm Street when I was five and not sleeping for days.

 

During this time, I was sexually abused by a family member and it was the ripple effect of my deep root of shame and guilt. 

 

It wasn't until in my late teens that I remembered an incident when I was very little, maybe 4 or 5 years of age, when I had a family member, make me do things sexually to them. 

 

 I remember the next morning waking up and feeling this deep, intense guilt and shame. I was too young to process and understand what had happened, so I internalised it as my own. I Made it my problem, my secret, my badness. 

 

It wasn't until I was older enough to go back and review the reality of what happened, that I could understand the pain that event caused me throughout my life, and the circumstances I chose because of it. 

 

After much deep work and meditation, regression therapy, I could heal, break-down and transmute that suffering I caused MYSELF all those years, and unleash myself from a non-existence burden. 

 

Allowing myself the permission to be all, and everything I ever wanted. Without somebody else's approval, acceptance or love. 

 

Because I gave myself FULL 100% love, approval and acceptance in every.beating.minute. I realised I was to become my own parent, my own mother, and father, and love the shit out of myself, on a daily basis.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Money was always tight, but she sheltered us from that as much as she could. It was around a year after my parents split, that my mum met my soon-to-be step-dad. A very tall Dutch money-orientated businessman.

 

From the time of 5 to 10 years old, which were the years my mum stayed with my step-dad. We had lived a juxtaposition. Living in grand houses and relocated to Kent, England where we lived and thrived for two years. 

 

I remember one of the beautiful houses we were lucky enough to live in, right on the water of Lake Okareka, in Rotorua, NZ. I was around eight years old and felt this weird push in me. 

 

I almost felt hypnotized, it's hard to explain. But I just knew I had to go into my room, turn off the lights, put on candles and sit in the middle of my room with a pad and pen to write. 

 

In those couple of hours, I automatic wrote down pages of universal truths and wisdom, some words beyond my own innocent understanding. 

 

After I came out of the trance-like state, I remember showing my mum and step-dad. My mum was so impressed and knew instantly that I was connecting to a higher truth, a wisdom, a universal love. But my step-dad kept questioning where I plagiarised the material? And he didn't believe that it was my own work. 

 

Well, it wasn't. Now I know I was automatic writing, a form of streaming consciousness, internal - universal wisdom that is inside, around all a part of us. 

 

From this moment, I knew I wanted to share this message. This love and connection to others and the world. 

 

But not before I went on my own hairy journey into transformation and expansion.

 

 

 

 

But I didn't come to this awakening and transformation easy. 

 

I spent my late teens and 20s being in relationships. Trying to feel that void I felt of not being loved. 

 

I would go out and party, like most 20-something-year olds, sometimes black out on the bad days, and find myself in some random's bed.  Lost, broken and more guilt-stricken then before. 

 

It wasn't until the end of a serious break-up on the cusp of my Saturn Return, at 27 that I started to finally sit down to get quiet to work out where all this guilt, shame and pain was coming from. 

 

And as I began to do the work. Finding time to meditate, breath and get still with yoga and healing foods. The pain started to bubble up and it was an explosion no one could ever be ready for. 

 

I remember moments before my boyfriend, (now husband and father to my child) would be on his way home to the house and I would be overcome in guilt and fear. I would have huge panic attacks and episodes, leaving the only choice I could do was to lye on the bed, focus on my breathing and try to get myself to get present and "let go".