How do I stop dwelling on my past and move forward with God?

You can't entertain those thoughts, because that's not who God created us to be. God created us to be proactive, seeking a solution, putting our faith in him. We are supposed to be like the prodigal son who runs back to the father and says, Father, I can't deal with all the circumstances I've gotten myself into. I need you to help me and heal me. And the crazy mystery of this universe is that this is what God thrives at.

He says, I love it, I want to help you, I was just waiting for you to stop being so prideful, and now you've come home. I can kill the fatted calf, put the gold ring on you, and bring real peace to your soul. But you have to get out of the victim mindset, out of the pity party, and look toward Christ. God's mercy is mercy on top of mercy on top of mercy. All he wants is to heal us and bring us to wholeness.

When we enter into this relationship with Christ, we don't need to focus on our childhood or all the adversity in our life. The only thing we need to focus on every single day is Christ Jesus himself, in our prayer life, in the Holy Liturgy, in the sacraments. When we focus on Christ, everything else becomes background noise. If we're looking at the past or the future, we're never in the present, and when we're never in the present, we're never looking at Christ.