Are You Healing or Hurting?

Mom and dad. Or mom and mom. Dad and dad. Grandma and granddad. Whomever you lived with as a child that is who modeled your first lessons on self-respect, emotional availability, and self-love. If any one or more of these people did not provide a fertile, yet safe ground for you to learn how to take care of yourself or your spirit and your relationships, you may be feeling somewhat insecure about who you are today.

I know that there are a lot of people who do not want to blame the people who raised us for not giving us self-esteem. And while we may not have gotten the things we wished we did sooner, we can still love the people who left those parts of us out while we heal ourselves and forgive them amid it.

Are we able to feel pain and love at the same time, and for the same people who hurt us? Yes. Can we heal one without losing the other? Yes. As we look ahead and into our willingness to find peace in reconciling what we missed, we might be able to rebirth ourselves anew. I suggest trying the following steps, and in no particular order:

1. 1. 1. Forgive. And forgive often. Make forgiveness a daily companion.
         
         
      2. Turn your attention towards how you will directly heal yourself today, tomorrow and every day after.
         
         
      3. Write down the things that hurt you, not the people’s names necessarily who hurt you. Then mourn those losses as you will. Following those moments, tear up the paper and throw it out, or burn it, whichever ritual you prefer to do.
         
         
      4. When you are asked about someone or something that changed the course of the life you thought you should be living and you feel anguish over it pause, breathe, exhale, maybe cry if you need to but either way,  exorcise those feelings out of your body before they make you or keep you stuck in the illness of reliving the past.
         
         
      5. Channel your hurt into helping other people to heal. It will transform you in ways you could not imagine.

I know this may sound ethereal but before you judge it or toss it out as foo-foo try these techniques first. Do it over repeatedly, then tell me how you feel once you’ve committed to doing some of these things for a while. I’ve added a special tool to start the process of sitting with yourself and getting better acquainted with your feelings. It’s my new Compassion Journal. Use it alone or with the download on my Coaching page for a guided course in self-compassion. 

Are you ready to create a new and transformative life, starting with the story you have in your mind?

*This blog is about becoming free. It’s a reflection of introspective thoughts and experiences that have crossed miles of self-discovery. I created this blog to inspire others to live life with less self-criticism, judgment and openness to new experiences. May you find that you learn how to live a life by design and on your own terms!*