A lot of us are walking around with children deep within us that are guiding our way, without us knowing it.
We all have had our own experiences, our memories of our childhood, of what it’s like to “be human”. We can sometimes forget that we were all children once and that sometimes in challenging moments, we can act from this place, as opposed to the place (and the person) we are today.
For instance, if you were a child who got bullied and are now an adult, you may still carry the coping mechanisms you developed to “stay safe, accepted and loved” as a kid. You are not a kid or “that bullied child” anymore but that bullied child might be inside still - wanting to be seen, be heard, BE FREED.
We sometimes forget that the bullier really has the same pain as the bullied.
Oftentimes, we all just wanted to be seen, accepted, heard and loved as children - and we didn’t all have those positive experiences. Sometimes we need to go “back to the past” to come to the present, without the past getting in the way anymore (*cue Journey to the Past* from Anastasia...a movie my own inner child enjoyed with my grandma at the movie theatre).
She said the line “Home, love, family - there was once a time I must have had them too. See, these three things might be the three things that were not fully *there* for a child or where there biggest pains, traumas or challenges started. So sometimes, we need to “go back” to go forward.
Kind of like a slingshot.
I am always reminded that life and HEALING is not *linear*. In my life - the biggest breakthroughs happened right after what “seemed” like a huuuuge breakdown. So stay open in those hard moments, ask for the shift or the miracle and get ready.
I set the intention to fully free myself from my inner child’s pain and BE the TRUE ME so I can no longer carry those pains, and only the love, lessons and beautiful memories. But the thing is, for a while, I wanted to reject the “bad” (ps no such thing as bad), I wanted to “fix” or overcome the shadows, the shame, the guilt, the “broken” parts. Which PS. were never really “broken” to begin with and I guess the best thing for me to be fully free was to come back to present moment while also seeing the past with a new perspective.
One day last week ended up aligning to do just that (and to also JUST BE).
I spent the day with someone super important to me - and what started out as a quick trip a couple hours away turned into a TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE. Like a day visiting all of “Amanda’s past”, my last school I worked at, the first two childhood homes I lived in, where I used to be in a painful time in my life and also where I went to “find me again”: my happy place, high park and doing this with someone who cares about me, who is there for me and with me - who also PLAYED the way through it all.
We giggled, I cried, I listened to the parts of me that wanted to speak and be heard. And I went back with a new perspective. Seeing those places, feeling the happy times in my heart, the lessons learned and all the love that WAS there brought me back to here.
It brought me back to her too. To the real Amanda, the Amanda that has integrated her past, no longer needs to live or be afraid of going back there and has all the wisdom and the playfulness that she once started her life with - with the grown adult who has learned a lot and is here to hold her, to support her, to stand for her, to understand her and empower her.
You see, that’s the work I LOVE to do and support people with and often “we teach what we are learning”. We don’t always do it from a “perfectly healed place” because there is no perfect. We are all imperfectly perfect and yet, I have done A LOT of re-parenting, supporting my inner child, *play therapy*, therapy, coaching and lots of learning to be the *best* and truest real me, and some days, I can still fall short of where I want to be.
My perfectionist inner child would have been hard on me - and my wise adult knows that mistakes are a beautiful thing and that I can love and accept myself no matter what and take actions to do things differently.
The past is gone, be here now:
Could your inner child use that too?
Could you use some support in your life to release the past (receive the lessons and the love) and let go of the guilt, the shame, the blame and perceive your past with PLAY and find a new perspective in it?)
Could you use a safe space to “make friends with your feelings” and find a new way, that prioritizes play and you feeling safe to connect, communicate and JUST BE YOU! (And find you if you’ve been feeling a little stuck and lost lately?)
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