How to HEAL EMOTIONAL WOUNDS from the past

Healing emotional wounds from the past is not an easy task since it is about returning to lived experiences that were painful for us. However, although it is not very encouraging to experience negative emotions again, it is an essential step if we want to definitively get rid of these hurts.

In reality, it is a very courageous decision that allows those who decide to carry it out to erase past regrets that, like ghosts, continued to condition their current life. In this way, the people who decide to face this process free themselves from this heaviness and return to recover your true strength to go through your life in a much more joyful, serene and cordial.

In the following Psychology-Online article we are going to tell you what emotional wounds are, how they are produced, we will talk about how to recognize if we have childhood emotional wounds and how to heal emotional wounds from the past through psychological techniques and exercises.

Index

1. What are emotional wounds
2. When the wounds of the soul are created
3. How emotional wounds occur
4. How to know if I have emotional injuries from childhood
5. How to heal emotional wounds

The emotional wounds They are soul wounds that occur as result of personal experience of some situation that makes us feel great discomfort, anguish or sadness. One of the factors that causes these emotional wounds is that this situation is not dealt with, in a individually or through the accompaniment of third parties, in an effective, positive and constructive. Therefore, it is not so much about the traumatic experience experienced as the way in which the person copes with it, which will depend finally, the personal resources and social support available to the person at that time and in the years after that experience. Depending on the situation experienced and its interpretation, the wound may be different type, among which we find the wounds of rejection, abandonment, humiliation of betrayal and injustice.

Emotional wounds produce a big pain and its consequences cause the person to close their heart and, with it, their openness to the world and allow themselves to be invaded, unconsciously and permanently in his years to come, for all the fears experienced in the experience of bliss situation. This causes that, in a generalized way or in situations similar to the original, the real potential of the person (his essential being) disappears and is controlled by the small shadow he has created. It lives inside apparently with the intention to defend you in dangerous situations but it nevertheless deprives you of his natural joy and vital energy and leads you to live his life in "defense-flight-attack" mode. In conclusion, the 5 wounds of the soul prevent being oneself or oneself.

Most emotional wounds develop during childhood. This is because it is the period of increased vulnerability while children are in a state of total openness to the world, without any type of defense or shield to protect them. Given this, when they experience a situation full of negativity (rejection, abandonment, mistreatment, violence, etc.) if they have not received prior instructions on how to defend against these attacks or if they are not properly accompanied during or after the event, what happened is burned in his soul generating great pain that will cause emotional injury.

It is not necessary that the rejections, abandonments, mistreatment or violence be of great intensity to cause such injuries (When negative events occur with great intensity and prolonged in time, they end up creating real trauma). However and unfortunately, the origin of emotional wounds is the order of the day since children, who are in a state of openness and total trust towards life they are not cared for on many occasions as they need based on their primary needs and suffer, with it, continuous rejections and abandonments (insofar as they are not cared as they deserve) and mistreatment and violence (many adult frustrations are unfairly discharged on the kids).

The situations that give rise to these emotional wounds are created by the people who interact and live with the children (parents, family, educators and relationship with other children). On the other hand, people who can provide protection and defense tools to correctly face these situations are mainly parents, family, friends and school, constituting their support network Social. Other factors that determine the creation of the emotional wound and its degree of intensity will be:

• The child's age: the smaller it is, the more serious the emotional injury presents since the child's experience is totally sensitive and inability to reason what happened causes the discomfort to be recorded at the unconscious level being, therefore, more inaccessible to its awareness of it.
• The severity of the event: the greater the severity, the greater the intensity of the wound.
• The duration in time of the event: the longer it lasts, the bigger the wound.
• The post-trauma experience: depending on how this moment is faced (if what happened is communicated, if external support is received, if real awareness of the unfairness of what happened, etc.) the wound will remain for more or less time and its consequences on the person's life will be greater or minors.

However, and despite these factors, each and every one of the emotional wounds leaves a mark of great pain on the human soul. For this reason, it is important to identify the wounds that are possessed and to know the techniques to heal emotional wounds.

To know if we have emotional wounds from childhood, it is enough to look at these four aspects:

• If we react with fear, flight, avoidance, aggressiveness or any other negative behavior repeatedly in certain situations. If so, this reaction is surely the defensive response provoked by our unconscious in response to an internal emotional wound in order not to suffer the same thing again. vivid.
• Another clue to recognize if we have childhood emotional wounds is to detect that these mechanisms they do not allow us to act in a happy, fluid and spontaneous way, just as we would if we were not afraid or defend ourselves from anything.
• A third evident manifestation of childhood emotional wounds are the physical symptoms that our body produces in such situations: distress, twitching, sweating, trembling, paralysis, stuttering, etc.
• Finally, clear evidence of the wounds of the soul are the negative mental rumination that is activated in these situations, that causes all the physical psychological symptoms by reproducing all a series of internalized irrational beliefs that reproduce the fears experienced in the original situation

Seeing to what extent the 5 wounds of the soul hurt and condition us, it is important to know how to carry out emotional healing. Next we will see exercises and techniques to heal the soul. The definitive healing technique involves a process that consists of several phases that begin in different moments but then necessarily occur simultaneously during the whole process of healing:

Perform self-awareness exercises

Perform breathing and relaxation and meditation practices that allow you to connect with your true voice. In these articles we talk about self-knowledge and the introspection.

Become aware of the experience that created the wound

To heal emotional wounds, it will be enough to remember when said wounds were created. Such a simple job, apparently, for the internal liberation that involves releasing all the fears and false beliefs associated with them but that causes great resistance.

Understand the behaviors that are due to the injury

The awareness of these two parts, our essential being and the character or ego, and knowing how to differentiate them. It is precisely this wounded part that has believed all the lived history so true that it sees no other way of life possible outside of its own hiding place that, although it causes the worst discomforts of his life, is the best defense not to relive the painful situation original. In the healing process, it is essential to help the person become aware of how the external danger no longer exists and that, in reality, his worst enemy is within himself, in that scary part that reproduces repeatedly a whole series of misconceptions and, consequently, defense mechanisms to protect you from a danger that it is gone.

Refuse those defensive behaviors

It is important to indicate to the person that within him there are two parts: his essential and authentic being, which has great potential pending to offer to the world but silenced and limited by fear, and the part created from the pain experienced, which prevents the spontaneous expression of the person, censorship and limits it according to the opinions of a series of internalized false beliefs as a result of the original traumatic experience.

The rejection of the created character inasmuch as it is a part that does not belong to him and only corresponds to a defense created from the fear that the only thing it does, to this day, is to harm him. The lament for all the pain created in himself and around him for having kept this mechanism active.

Implement alternative behaviors

Do the opposite of what is indicated by the voice that comes from the ego, thereby reducing its strength.

Practice self-acceptance

The opening of heart real and sincere that will allow you to open up to the world, trust it and give it all of its beautiful potential. Here you will find information about self-acceptance and self-respect.

Practice self-care

Investigate your greatest interests and motivations and make an action plan that allows you to develop a small project related to all of this. In this way, he strengthens his virtues and his soul feels strongly rewarded.

Have a good diet and practice some moderate exercise regularly.

Forgive and ask for forgiveness

Practice sincere forgiveness with respect to the people who caused you these injuries and, much more important, regret and apologize to these people for the pain that their resentment caused them. Forgiveness, when it is sincere from the heart, has great healing power even if the process is not carried out directly with the person involved.

In this article we explain how to forgive yourself.

Ask for help and help

Ask for help and, at the same time, offer to help those who need it. This allows you to see the beauty that lives within all people, including himself, which will give you the confidence necessary to relate in a cordial way and abandon fear and judgment definitely.

The practice of all these techniques and exercises should be integrated in a natural way as a way of life to, in addition to healing the emotional wound, strengthen our spirit and prevent any other unpleasant situation from causing us new wounds and regrets.

To correctly carry out the steps of emotional healing and to heal the soul, it is essential to have the guidance and accompaniment of a specialized professional.

This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

If you want to read more articles similar to How to heal emotional wounds from the past, we recommend that you enter our category of Emotions.

• Bourbeau, L. (2011). The five wounds that prevent being yourself. OB STARE.
• Bourbeau, L. (2017). The healing of the 5 wounds. SIRIUS.
• Gutman, L. (2008). Parenting, invisible violence and addictions. Editorial Integral.