Healing Our Inner Child
Hearing the concept of healing or talking to your inner child might cause lots of us to roll our eyes. Like some sort of mystical task, talking to someone who is not physically present might seem like a silly concept causing it to be really hard to even get started with. So why is this such a common practice? Let's find out.
What is talking to our inner child?
Let's start with what talking to our inner child even is. Talking to our inner child involves using our imagination and the feelings we might be experiencing to spark a new level of tenderness within ourselves. It involves imagining younger versions of ourselves and speaking tenderly and lovingly to what those younger versions of ourselves might be experiencing and needing. Talking to our inner child is a strategy that gives us the ability to help us observe the feelings that arise within us throughout the day. The feelings that many times lead us to impulsive, unkind, or paranoia driven behaviors. We’ve all had those moments where something makes us feel a strong emotion and next thing you know we are lost in the moment going down the rabbit hole of our own making. Sometimes these behaviors can be exaggerated, impulsive, or possibly irrational, unkind, and unthoughtful towards others.
Talking to our inner child helps us accept and be non-judgmental of these feelings we experience. You may be wondering why would I ever be accepting of my anger or of my sadness or of these feelings that sometimes make me feel irrational or over the top? The truth is, when we are not accepting of certain feelings it causes us to suppress or push these feelings down and as we all know there's only so much pushing down or suppressing before a bolt comes loose. Accepting and practicing non-judgment of our feelings is a crucial step in continuing our journey towards healing and growth. It allows us to learn more about ourselves and have the opportunity to change an experience we might be having. It helps us have less moments of, what in the world was I thinking?
How does our inner child get created?
Now you might be wondering how our inner child gets created. You see when we were younger we all, at one point, came to experience hurtful feelings at one point or another. Things like neglect, dismissal, and even cruelty. As children we highly depended on the adults around us. Of course with work, bills, and meals to take care of our parents might’ve not always been able to attend to our many needs. These moments of hurt and pain might’ve seared our small child self. Forming and shaping important things within us like the way we deal with conflict, stress, affection, among other important things. As children we of course may not have been able to advocate for ourselves since we were dependent on those around us. Many times we might not even remember many of these memories but nevertheless these memories have a huge impact on things like the way we view and carry ourselves, the way we face problems, etc. As we start to think about this we may start to notice the way many of these hurts and pains are reflected back to us in the entity of our struggles or current problems.
Why is inner child work important
As we may also know, the emotions that get stirred up in our body influence the thoughts that start running in our mind. When these thoughts come from a place of unresolved pain or open wounds that we have not been able to look at or observe we may choose decisions that may not represent the person we’d like to be. Many times these behaviors we took on as children were behaviors that protected us. These protecting behaviors' sole purpose is what it sounds like, to protect us. To be protected is to be saved from danger. When we are reacting from a place of such fear the last thing in our mind is to be a good spouse or friend. The first thing in our mind and biology will be to take care of ourselves and survive. This is why many times these behaviors we choose to take on during moments of extreme distress, anger, sadness, etc are not the most prosperous to our relationships or future.
These unhelpful or harmful behaviors that can sometimes occur when we are feeling strong emotions is when strategies like talking to our inner child are the most important or can be highly helpful.
How do I start talking to my inner child
Now you might be wondering, well how do I even do this, how do I start forming a relationship with my inner child? It feels very silly and unnatural? Starting to make communicating with our inner child a more natural process involves slowly forming a relationship with those younger parts of ourselves. This means thinking back to when we were younger and getting to know this past version of us, forming a relationship. This means gathering details and information about who we were, what lit up our heart, what our dreams and wishes were. The following two ways are some examples of how to get the connection with our past self started.
Gather pictures of yourself, preferably before the age of 6. Look at yourself in these pictures and think about your wishes and dreams. Jot these things down in your journal
When feeling activated vent the story your inner child is telling you onto paper, what is he/she believing about themselves right now?
It’s also important to remember that a therapist is a great resource to help one dig deeper into moments or memories. Sometimes sharing with another helps us look at an event through a new perspective or angle. This new angle might be the perfect one to discover something new about ourselves.
