How do we heal from trauma? - growing pains :( childhood trauma, shadow work, toxic relationship anxiety)

Most of us have been through some dark shit in our lives. 70% of Americans have experienced trauma but somehow we're trying to laugh our pain away but I don't know if we are actually doing okay. When we talk about a self healing journey - we always talk about yoga, bubble baths, drinking wine - BUT the truth is it isn't always rainbows and butterflies. it can actually be ugly.

To truly heal from childhood trauma and negative experiences, you need to do a lot of shadow work and reflecting on your emotional wounds, and although confronting some of your most painful memories is tough, is something you can grow so much from- because growth happens outside of your comfort zone. Like what makes you tick, who you are and you enter the relationship with clarity.

Self healing journey is the BEST gift you can give yourself.

I'll break down my own personal healing journey in stages

1. Awareness
2. Acceptance
3. Forgiveness
4. Transformation

I'll share with you my own experience and how each stage impacts your life and I will give you question prompts to make you reflect on your journey

Quick disclaimer : I am not a therapist or a psychologist I am just someone who is going through a healing journey

Trauma is a lasting emotion and physical response that originates from living through a distressing event or a certain circumstances in your life that overwhelms your body beyond is ability to cope

Some of the most common traumas :

1. Abuse
2. Abandonment
3. Neglect
4. Lost of Loved ones
5. Accidents
6. Natural disasters
7. Injury

It totally changes you - it is the lens we see ourselves - at the end of the day you're the only person you're stuck with for the rest of your lives- you've to intentionally get to know yourself deeply - doing this is the first step of Awareness -

Awareness - You ask yourself why the way you are/ what makes you sad/ what is your love language / what is your attachment style/ what triggers you - those answers are rooted from trauma - mainly childhood trauma and can be dark and triggering and uncomfortable to face - and most people go through life distracting themselves in denial / they throw themselves into relationships / parties before they become workaholics - they shuffed it down till it doesn't exist.

For me I felt like a rebirth of a new version of me / I had a full identity crisis - I always love working hard - but I realise that came from an overachiever and be perfect because I didn't feel good enough without those success and accolades - because I felt my worth was contingent to good grades and success.

Here are some awareness questions prompts for you to reflect on your life

• What are your earliest childhood memories
• What thoughts do you try to block out
• What are your triggers
• What's your inner narrative

Acceptance - During my shadow work, I believed that people had let me down as a child and I didn't want to believe that I came from a messy childhood home so I just pretended that my childhood stage didn't bother - the love that I felt was unstable , anger and the people around me - if you don't feel your emotions you can't heal it.

Forgiveness - I had to learn to have compassion for those that hurt me and ultimately forgive them to have a closure - you can't sit around and wait for the people who hurt you to do that to give you the closure - sometimes they will never reach the emotional intelligence - compassion was about understanding generational trauma - I had to step into the shoes of the people who hurt me because they couldn't understand the emotions that I deal with. Forgiveness is about burning down the cool - letting go of the anger - forgive yourself and forgive the people around you - to have a peace.

• what does closure feels like for you
• what did your younger/ traumatised self need
• what would you tell them

It has been said that time heals all wounds. The truth is that time does not heal anything - it merely passes - it is what we do during the passing of time that helps or hinders the healing process.

The transformation stage > social impact

You have to decide how the negative experiences shape you, this is about changing the narratives you been telling yourself , this is rewriting your limiting beliefs, this is about setting new boundaries - this is called the repairing stage

when it comes to the relationships and the people involved for some people it might mean confronting them, or building a bridge - for others the healthiest thing you can do is cutting them off.

My experience that shift - was about prioritising myself - I stop pleasing people / I stop bending myself - I set more boundaries - and to keep everyone happy - finally prioritising myself make people unhappy - and I think after years of putting others before myself - when you are 100 percent accessible and bending over backwards to please people - I think theres a natural entitlement that develops over time the people who benefit me from all the people pleasing did miss the old version of me - and said they like the old version of me - but yeah that old version of me is dead.

You can explain yourself to the people who don't like the new version of you but if they don't understand than maybe they aren't for you. If they are not willing to accept the new stage of growth than maybe they are not for you.

How are you going to change

• unhealthy coping mechanisms
• toxic narratives
• unhealthy boundaries

This would help you to break generational trauma. Everyone's on a different stage in their life but I hope that these would give you insights in your healing and growth journey.