Do you ever feel like you can’t move forward?
Have you asked yourself why you end up sabotaging yourself?
Do you also find yourself feeling anxious or self-critical (or both!) easily?
If you answer YES to all of these questions, you likely have a wounded inner child you haven’t addressed yet.
The thing with our inner child is that it can be ignored easily growing up. But you know what they say when things are left unaddressed; it will always catch up with you.
These unaddressed issues, especially concerning our inner child, live in the unconscious mind.
As it lives (rent-free) in this part of the mind, it will always have a “say” — from how you make choices to how you live your life.
I have witnessed this in my life.
A close friend suffered verbal abuse from her mom, who eventually left them when she was 8 years old. When her mom left, she spent her growing-up years with her dad. She felt relief then, when her mom left because she couldn’t take the verbal abuse anymore. But she felt this immense pressure to make her dad proud.
She did well in school, had good friends, and has a fantastic job. Everything was going well in her life until she took a trip abroad and decided that’s where she belonged. She told her dad about this, and she said, in all the years she spent with her dad, that was the first time she saw her dad upset with her.
She still went through with her plan (currently, she still lives in the country of her choice, and she now has a family of her own). When she got to her new place in a foreign country, she was seething with anger with her dad because he didn’t support her.
But she had this nagging feeling that that’s not the real reason she was angry with her dad; the truth is, she was agitated because she was scared he would no longer love her.
That’s when she went all the way back, found a therapist, and eventually, she realized it was her inner child talking. Her inner child’s wounds made her feel fearful and insecure, and she never thought her mom abusing and leaving her would have a significant impact on her life up to this day—until that confrontation with her dad.
That’s when she took action to heal her inner child.
Dealing With Your Inner Child
If you feel your inner child is peeking and is trying to claw its way out and devour you, don’t let it. You can deal with this by releasing the child-like parts of your personality. It’s a lot similar to self-care, which means it won’t feel like a chore.
Acknowledge Your Inner Child
The first step to heal your inner child is to acknowledge it. This is going to be difficult for some, specifically those who experienced a traumatic childhood. Hence, take it slow. Acknowledging the inner child involves recognizing things that caused you pain in your childhood and accepting them. This acknowledgment will help you gain a better understanding of its impact on your adult life.
Listen To It
As you get in touch with your inner child, listen to your feelings. It’s common to feel anger, rejection, insecurity, anxiety, or vulnerability. If you can, trace these feelings back to specific childhood events, and you’re in for a surprise. You will realize that you have similar situations in your present life that triggered the same responses.
Indeed, listening to the feelings that come up is an enlightening experience. It will allow you to identify and validate what you have experienced.
Write To It
It’s time to start the healing process, and what you can do here is write a letter to your inner child. By writing down your feelings, you get the chance to let all of them out, which will make you feel lighter. Moreover, it’s an excellent opportunity for you to offer messages of reassurance and comfort.
If it’s your first time to write down your feelings, make it easier by creating a dialogue with yourself—and from there, things will just flow.
Be Open To Healing
When dealing with your inner child’s wounds, you must be open to healing. Remember, there’s no specific timeline for healing—we all heal differently, and that’s okay. It’s never too late to heal.
Right now, what you can do is release the pain because you deserve to heal. Everyone does.
Recent Comments