Wounded Self Fights Back

“I felt awful last week. My wounded self was telling me I would end up homeless and broke. I just wanted to crawl away and hide”.

This is how my client started her session. She was very concerned and worried. She even doubted her inner bonding was wrong.

When we explored what happened before this negative episode it turned out she was learning how to take care of her finances, got a job, and was taking loving actions. She also said: “I felt very connected with myself and others. Even things that usually tick me off could not do that. But then I woke up and all this negative talk overwhelmed me”. She could not even identify this part, it did not sound like her wounded teenager.

Anyone on growth part will before or later have a similar experience. When we start practicing inner bonding we discover different part of our selves, start building the loving adult, release deep fears and false beliefs, and for a while have joyful time.

While we are in the loving adult mode, the wounded self contemplates how to gain power back. She simply cannot stand loosing it, and the best way to gain it back is to throw a lot of fear and doubt at us. This kind of attack happens after we did some deep healing, had breakthroughs and experienced glimpse of joy and peace in our life.  Then one day we open our eyes and our wounded self blasts us as hard she can, for all the past mistakes, and ones we are about to make. The tirade goes on, and on, and on. The blast is so unexpected and paralysing. It always leads to concern: What did I do wrong? And God forbid you ask this question out loud she will provide a long list of facts.

There is no coincidence what is the topic of wounded self talk. It is always some deep false belief or our deepest fear. She holds a repertoire of our false beliefs, fears or worries and pulls out one that is very scary, blows it out of proportion, and delivers it with huge drama, guilt or shame, and of course demands to get back to our senses and do things as we used to do before.

People usually try to talk to this wounded part and that may increase the intensity of the attack. The other option is to ignore, but again it just keeps talking, and talking. It just cannot shut up. This part can be with you for days. The voice is there when you open your eyes, during the day, or while falling to sleep. It is very exhausting. It really means that you are doing some deep loving change in your life, and wounded self is not happy with it.

In situation like this talking, ignoring, bargaining does not work. But there is one remedy that works. It is the Loving Adult. Bring your loving adult to be with this wounded part. Do not leave even when the wounded self tries to intimidate and get rid of your loving adult. Just stay with the wounded child, and lovingly tell her: I know you have reasons for your concerns, and some changes in our life are scary for you. But I am now in charge and I would love to hear your reasons. This may provoke a shower of false beliefs, blame and list of disasters past and future ones. Do not blink, and do not leave. Even if the loving adult does not talk, the presence will do the work. Every time there is an opportunity let the loving adult ask the wounded child for the reasons of her outbursts.

The wounded self will continue with her talk and demands but the intensity will slowly start to fade away. It seems that the presence of loving adult melts away the tough wounded shield. You will see that behind the powerful monster that knocked you down for a while is very scared and confused child. Embrace her with compassion and she will tell you her side of the story. My wounded self broke into tears and told me when and why she absorbed a specific false belief: Because she had no options back then. And why she was trying to save me now.

Let loving adult bring Spirit’s love to this child, and reassure her it is safe today to make loving choices that will bring more joy, love and fun in your life. Let her know that there are options, and you will be looking for them and you will make sure that they are all safe so that the wounded child does not need to be on guard any more. Let the wounded child know that you will be handling demands coming from other adults so that she can relax. That seems to be her major concern: How are others going to accept the change? Are you going to be punished and rejected? Are you going to end up alone? Is she going to die?