What's stopping you from making a new start?

I've used some of my nectar points on a subscription of Psychologies, a monthly magazine which otherwise sells for £3.40. That's relatively expensive, I guess, but I would totally recommend the magazine. Every month I have several 'aha' moments when reading the articles. I don't know whether this just means that I'm very much like the majority of humans, but in any case, I recognize myself in most of their articles.

In the January issue (published in early December) there is an article on 'What's stopping you from making a new start?' A question that I've asked myself a LOT of times. Having taken the little test, my result was as follows:

You feel hard done by
Your view: You've been badly hurt - physically or emotionally - by a friend, family member, colleague or lover, and they haven't made it up to you.

Your behaviour: Prone to bouts of explosive rage or brooding fury, you are hypersensitive with an inability to trust others and a destructive habit of turning events over and over in your mind. Your tendency to think of yourself as a victim who has been exploited, mistreated or neglected has the potential to dominate all your relationships, creating a negative view of the life and other people's motives.

Decoding the issue: No one expects you to be able to turn the page straight after a major disaster such as an accident, attack or illness; only therapy can help in these situations. If you're in pain - after a divorce, for example, or having been let down by a friend - this may be because you've reopened an old wound (prompting feelings of abandonment or betrayal). If you invest too much in a dream scenario or build up your hopes too high in a new relationship, the pain you feel when it goes wrong is way out of proportion. A series of minor setbacks can end up denting your confidence and focusing all your fears on a relationship or scenario that's going badly. This problematic relationship may then spiral into a full-blown sense of inadequacy or failure.

How to move on: Play the whole episode over in your mind as though you were watching a film about someone else's life ... . The goal is to take the sting out of the situation while identifying any benefits from it: most importantly, accept your responsibility for what happened and learn something useful from the event.