Our brain likes familiarity. A lot. While listening to a podcast where the topic was the traumas from our childhood, I couldn't help not to wonder how come people don't realize how their own patterns of thinking brought them in a place of pain. Just like in a puzzle, the final image doesn't change unless we change the pieces. But somehow we always end up surprised by the same endings. We change the people but the grand finale remains the same. Everytime. Why?
We learn attachment very early on in our relationship with our caregivers. If we felt abandoned, we are going to recreate the feeling in the romantic life. For example, a man will most likely sabotage a good relationship only to end up how he always believed he will be: alone, with no one sticking around. That feeling of abandonment from early childhood triggers many things and makes us prone to pick the partners who will strike the familiarity chord. This is the same reason why women can choose emotionally cold partners, unresponsive, unreliable and unpredictable. If they were used to a cold dad, who was never there, they learned to fight for any signs of love, usually leading them to frustration and resentment. There are three attachment styles and way too many people do not know how a secure way of loving feels. Too many do not know how healthy love feels like. The kind of love that you don't have to beg for and accept the unacceptable. The kind of love which feels safe and soothing. A lover who can listen and understand you. Sounds like science fiction, right?
Healthy loving relationships will take us in a place of vulnerability. Those who have issues with opening up due to childhood trauma will always run before things get too deep. Vulnerability demands self awareness and an ability to cope with emotions. If nobody taught that person as a child to speak about what he/she feels, adulthood will be tough. Romantic relationships will be pain. How can we override our emotional code and choose the right people in our life?
First of all we all need to do our own digging in the family yard. We need to understand what our mother and father did not provide and have conversations about it. There are many adults who think that their childhood must have been horrible if the word trauma is included. But you don't need a horrible family to have trauma, in many cases most parents were clueless about the damage they did to their kids. Talking about it and understanding the roots of your attachment style can help a lot. We can't pick our parents, but we have the power the select the partner with whom we ourselves will test parenthood.
Second of all we need to constantly observe what triggers us and understand the cause. We need to observe why we feel attracted to a certain person and take small steps to modify our emotional world. Relationships are always a challenge but with the right emotional baggage it can become a beautiful journey as soon as we understand that both people come with a painful past eager to be healed. We can't heal wounds unless we expose them to the light. Light is communication, respect, vulnerability and willingness to step into your own world so you can make sense of the others'. If you can understand your own pain and heal it, you will most likely be able to see the pain of the other. Because in the end, behind the adult facade, there is always that small inner child hiding, wanting to be heard. Sing him love, so he could come out and embrace it.
Have a blessed day and toodle loo!
Excellent insights here. Delighted that you upvoted my post, as it made me accidentally find your blog.
This is so true and you go on to talk about ones inner child too, which i definitely agree with. Society forces us away from that inner child feeling of freedom, fun and no consequences. Those of us who enjoy a drink, often embrace our inner child by messing around and letting our hair down a bit.
I feel we shouldn't need that as an excuse, and should embrace our inner child more freely and laugh at the silly things, play with something childish and embrace your inner child.
I completely agree with you, it is the social pressure of acting like a serious adult all the time, this causing people to become dull, bored and lifeless. If our body has grown and aged, that doesn't mean that our spirit has to. I think of us all as being big kids. Some hide it and suppress it, some embrace it. I have noticed that those who embrace it are happier, more energetic and couldn't care less about what others think and believe. In the end, this is the ultimate freedom. To be what you want when society wants you to be otherwise. Thank you for reading and leaving such a well thought reply!
As smart as we've become, we still can't outsmart out good old subconscious and lizard brain and it drives so much of what we do daily. Since we live in a world of instant instant we hardly take time to reflect and think about what we do, why we do it and where we going. I tend to do it, but it just leaves me with more questions than answers which is why I think people don't bother lol
We do have a lizard brain, the one which is very irrational and emotional. And it is quite an irony that it also rules so much of our behavior. It takes training and a lot of mental work to wash away old lines drawn in the mental sand.
Questions and answers.... I know what you are saying and I do think that we need to take ourselves out of the comfort zone and ask. Ask ourselves, ask relatives, ask. The answers might not always satisfy us, but getting out of our old story is what it counts.
The past generations didn't know about emotional nurturing. It was all about survival: I have given birth to you, I have fed you and I provided a shelter. Too many parents think of themselves as Gods for doing that, forgetting that a child also needs spiritual food. And this is how adults end up messing their love life, professional life, everything. They function with the conditioning they were taught as babies.
The work on ourselves is very hard, but I guess that change comes when the pain of staying in the same pattern is bigger than the pain of changing and wanting to see what else can this thing called life be.... This can explain why we see many divorces now. Some stay in decades of pain, thinking that is love. Some awake and realize that abuse is not love. Tough lessons a child should not see from the parents, but so very often they do. Our society needs more people to ask questions. To themselves.
Tag #mentalhealthawareness and #naturalmedicine. That is on point. Digging is hard though, you have to be brave to do so and fear is a strong antagonist. Also the time needs to be right for you to discover certain things. But I know the longer you wait the more desperate you are with the findings. It feels like you lost half of your life.
Good tags, I will use them!
Fear is the biggest issue. People are afraid to change old patterns.I know that so many adults still fear a serious conversation with their parent. A lot of the trauma and bad decision making come from the unhealed wounds.
The time is never right if you think with fear. We always can find an excuse to lock things up and accept the status quo. This is how it has always been and that is it.
In a world where more people are depressed, I think that taking a closer look to mental health and patterns is so very important. A child needs two parents who can function in a normal healthy way. Imagine how a society will end up if the majority of couples are unhealthy emotionally, creating more trauma further down the road. A spiral of pain.
I observe myself, I observe my choices. I can understand so much more with the passing of time. A great motivator in making changes and having tough conversations is the fact that life is trully short. We can both not be here tomorrow. How many things left unsaid would remain? How many dreams not accomplished? How much love never shared or received?
I guess that waiting is a game where you can never win because you keep on returning in the same house of pain you have been living. If we become aware of the trauma and heal, we will most likely change the entire house and enter other doors. It is just a matter of awakening.
Thank you for reading!
It always depends on the trauma and I wouldn't talk about it with my parents. But I forgave and made my peace, at least for now. I cannot turn back time and the mistakes they made I have to live with, so do they. Talking wouldn't help in that case.
True, but there are times for certain things. It sometimes is not a bad thing to push stuff away but sooner or later it will creep up again.
That would be the ideal case, but you can also be healthy and normal with just one parent. It's more a matter of love, care and empathy.
It's a diverse topic and each individual carries its own burden and therefor own way of dealing with stuff. That's why I like Alfred Adler. He founded the Indivdual Psychology where every single person with its different experiences is taken into account. Psychology is just as diverse as each person on this planet.
Great writing though, enjoyed reading it 🤗
Being able to forgive without being able to sort things out.... This is a tough one and I can admire people who manage to do this without having tension and anger inside. It is very difficult.
Kids do need parents, but often enough it happens that they don't have them around. Mentally or physically. My grandmother raised me and my sister as soon as my parents separated and she did a great job. I would not be what I am today if she wouldn't have taken the burden. It helps if one parent can be responsible, but if both of them are, the kids are lucky to have anyone take care of them. Single parenting is tough and it takes a lot of effort, my hats off in front of anyone doing that because I have seen it with my own eyes at my grandmother.
Thank you for reading and have a great week ahead🤗💐
Yeah...some times our childhood trauma remains with us till our adulthood.
As we know it is compulsory to teach ourselves at childhood that how can we share our feelings and emotions to others or with a person with whom we are in love relationship.
A very nice article @creativemary ❤️❤️❤️
Trauma is there almost in all of us. Becoming aware of it and working towards healing is the toughest part. It is easy to sit in denial and act surprised, sad, angry when life doesn't go your way. But realizing that your choices put you there and understanding why... This can be liberating.
Healing from trauma is not easy. It can take years. Both partners can struggle. But they can evolve and grow together or destroy each other in the process. I have observed that you can't love above your level of self awareness and love. This is why so many don't even know how to love. It is trully sad and a reality. This is why I think that emotional education in school should be a thing. Teaching children to observe what they feel. Showing them how to cope with parents. Emotional education is more important than a full meal and I wish more parents stop overfeeding the child forgetting of how much emotional food they require.
Thank you for reading!
Yours welcome buddy ☺️❤️...Keep posting these type of things ❤️❤️
I had re blogged your post😊
Would Love to read more of your thoughts about how this state of vulnerability can heal the wounded self and about what conceptions of love can help us to find a way towards a more compasive experience at human relationships of all kinds.
Namaskar to Hive and beyond 🤍💜Tysm for sharing @creativemary
Thank you for the appreciation! Vulnerability is inevitable if we want meaningful connections with other people. If we hold a mask and never reveal what we feel, our life can feel like a role. It is not authentic and it can be exhausting. There are people who have many friends, but almost no connection. We see this often playing out in social media, where happy online people are depressed, almost suicidal in real life.
Having compassion is a learned skill. I think it depends on how deep you went within yourself in order to do the same thing for others. We do need compassion more, we have become solitary creatures when it comes to emotions. We learned how to bottle them and pretend everything is alright because of the pressure to be the same with our peers. It is wrong and it does more damage.
What I think it's tougher now is the fact that we have so many distractions at our fingertips that you can run an entire life from yourself and your trauma. You can get so busy doing nothing just to avoid emotional work. Have you noticed how many people avoid solitude as in being with themselves in a healthy way? Also having conversations with parents about the childhood looks like a weird thing to do for many. This is again not beneficial.
No compassion towards the self can't build compassionate people. We need more self awareness
Thank you for reading!
Nice and correct article. Childhood traumas can create many problems in adulthood, whether we are aware of them or not.
Thank you! Being aware or not. Good point. I think that the more you are aware, the more you can interrupt the pattern of pain and regain power over your life. Life doesn't just happen, we make it. We build it through our choices. And most of the times it is trauma and not the conscious self making decisions. And this is the best part to work on.
I appreciate you reading this!
Congratulations @creativemary! You have completed the following achievement on the Hive blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Your next target is to reach 6750 replies.
You can view your badges on your board and compare yourself to others in the Ranking
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPSupport the HiveBuzz project. Vote for our proposal!
Have you ever read 'The Body Keeps the Score'? It sums this up perfectly.
No, I will add it to my list, thank you for the recommendation🙏