How to Overcome Emotional Traumas in Childhood?

There are many problems and stories that repeat very often in your life. Some people feel permanent dependent on others, have problematic relationships, feel lonely and rejected by community, other people periodically suffer from depression and chronic dissatisfaction, whereas other people feel afraid and diffident in themselves which is an obstacle in all spheres of their lives.
Sponsored by:
Virtual Assistants

It is never too late to live through a happy childhood.

In most cases, the source of those repeating problems issues from past events and experiences in childhood, which left a lasting track in your mind.

The core of all fears and the feeling of insecurity, uncertainty, inferiority complex, permanent feeling of guilt, loneliness, tenderness, aggression, feeling state of neglect and non-acceptance of yourself and other people is hidden in the childhood.

The child who was hurt still continues to live inside yourself.

No matter what age you are, there is a little boy or a girl who is hidden inside yourself and longs for love and attention. In the same time the child is easy to be scared, feels insecure and needs support.

That is the so called inner child. The inner child is an emotional side of yourself. Adult person acts, whereas the inner child feels emotions and goes through feelings. All ages that you went through are hidden inside yourself. According to me, the dominant age is the one when you  lived through a trauma.

Your thoughts, behavior and reactions are mainly lead by what your inner child feels. You subconsciously project your childish needs in the present and you require that your partner and friends satisfy those needs.

If a child was hurt, it will always feel need of a protector when it grows up. In the same time it often attracts violator, through whom the trauma is repeated once again. 

If it was rejected or neglected, it will always need attention and approval by other people. The child may even express aggression in order to get the attention it needs.

If people around you criticized and offended you, if you were underestimated, you subconsciously continue to do that now, following the previous role model of your parents.

Considering my previous experience and observations, I am fully convinced that most barriers and problems issue from your childhood and they have a strong influence on your psyche and life, as well as other people around your. If you were often ashamed of yourself when you were child and guilt was stroke into you, if you felt uncertain, unloved and non-estimated, if your parents were too strict or too yielding, that would definitely have an effect on everything that you attract in your life and go through now.

Of course, there is no use in blaming it on your parents and fate, or feeling sorrow about yourself. That is so because:

“No matter what was your earliest childhood – the best or the worst – you are the only one who is responsible for your own life now.” as Louise Hay says.   

To work with your inner child is a wonderful method for curing traumas in your past. 

That is a powerful instrument that is used for uncovering the hidden sides of your subconsciousness, which hinder your life and make you go around and round in a circle. After you discover the unknown obstacles in your mind, you set yourself free of the negative emotions. Then you should give to yourself all that you need while transforming your limiting beliefs into new that would work better for you. Then you can start your life from the very beginning in a quite clear way.   

How to get in contact with your inner child?

Firstly, it is necessary to feel it, to realize its existence inside yourself and let it express itself. It needs your acceptance, approval, understanding and love. 

Concerning the love for yourself, I have recently read something in a forum that impressed me very much. There was a boy asking: “Is it possible to love myself when I have never been loved?”. One of the participants in the forum responded him: “Yes, it is possible. That is one more reason for you to feel even greater love to yourself.”

Just the right words!

So, if you were not loved in your childhood, that is one more reason to accept the child inside yourself and give it all your love.

The child had enough deprivation from love. Louise Hay recommends us to read a book by John Pollard II “Self-Parenting”. There are practical exercises and activities dedicated to the child inside yourself. The author of this book teaches you how to become a parent of yourself and give to yourself all that you needed in your childhood but you did not receive. I have not discovered this book in Bulgarian language but in all cases, it would be extremely useful to everyone who reads it.

There are very many ways describing how to treat your inner child. Here are some of them:

• ·         Try to find a picture of yourself since your childhood.

Look at the child on your picture. What do you see in its eyes? May be there is pain, loneliness, or fear of being abandoned? May be it needs to be hugged, caressed, or to speak to somebody?

Ask it what it feels afraid of, what it needs. Try to visualize how you hug this small child with all your love. Tell it all the things that you have always wanted to hear, but you have never been told. Let your inner child feel loved, secured and accepted.

•  Another way for communicating with the child inside you is to do that in front of the mirror.

Stand in front of the mirror and imagine that you see the small child inside yourself in the mirror. Imagine those moments of your life when you were hurt, ashamed or offended, try to feel what the inner child feels.

Try to speak to it. If you had a nickname when you were a child use it and turn to your child affectedly. Let it feel your support, love and understanding.

Ask your inner child to tell you what it felt like, let it share more with you about the pain that it is still feeling. You should be the parent whom you have always wanted to have at this moment. Listen to it, calm it down, give it a hug.

Tell your inner child what it needs to hear, explain it that you are already an adult and you will never abandon it, you will not allow anything bad to happen to it. Tell your inner child that you love it.

In fact if you get in contact with your inner child daily and you tell it that you accept it, love it and believe in it, that will bring a surprising change in all spheres of your life for one month.

• ·          You are able to communicate with your inner child in written as well.

You may write a letter to the child inside yourself, ask it what it wants, what it needs, what it feels, what would make it happy. Then, you should respond in written with a pen of a different color, using your left hand which is not dominant.

Do not think about what you would answer, just let your memories overwhelm you, imagine all the feelings of your inner child and let it write down everything. This method will disclose to you  a lot of information that you have never considered. You will be surprised to understand what leaks out of yourself. 

• ·         Let the child inside you draw (with your left hand).

You should not think about what you will draw, just let your inner child express its feelings. Let your left hand freely scratch. Look what comes out of your painting.

That will help you reveal a lot of negative feelings that were hidden deep inside yourself. It is possible to discover something about yourself that you have not known or at least have not realized.

• ·         Second birth and rewriting of your childhood.

You can rewrite your childhood if you were not desired when you were a child, if you felt that your parents did not accept you (for instance they did not wanted you to be the same sex), if they have always been nervous and you have not felt calm and cozy, if your parents underestimated you or did not have enough leisure time for you, if they impressed on you that you are good at nothing or the world is dangerous place, full of bad people.

Sometimes, psychotherapists practice the so called second birth, when they help you go through your coming into the world in a new way, which you would love to.

Louise Hay recommends that you live through different stages of your childhood through visualization and meditation.

You should arrange a celebration of your birth, to visualize your parents, who are happy and smiled for having you, imagine the feeling of being loved. May be it is impossible for you to imagine your parents loving you. Then you are advised to look for pictures of people who would be close to your idea of loving parents and put it next to your own picture of a child.

Visualize the child inside yourself smiling, feeling happy, satisfied and secured while its parents are taking a very good care of it. You can go through the different stages of your childhood and concentrate on the periods of pain and suffering. Try to be the best parents of yourself – the ones that you have ever dreamed of.

Speak to the child who is 7 years old, who felt lonely and scared, when it was it first time to go to school and nobody was there to calm it down. Tell it what you wanted to hear at that moment. Try to speak to the teenager inside yourself, who was hurt and neglected.

• You should communicate with the child inside yourself, play with it.

Take its hand, ask it what would it likes to do now. Take it out for a walk and do whatever you have always wanted to do since you were a child.

The most important thing is not to forget to tell it that you love it.

Louise Hay writes in her books:

“Daily communication with the child inside you – which you used to be – contributes to your prosperity. You should devote some of your time to your inner child, take its hand and lead it on his way, at least once a week. Try to get yourself involved in special activities that you loved to do when you were a child.”
Did you enjoy whit this article? Donate:

Author: Rosica- www.sebepoznanie.com
Translation: Vanya Osmanlieva www.VirtualAssistants.bg