/ We all have, with in us, an Inner Child, and yet for those of us who have been abused in childhood, that inner child is very often a hurt andfrightened inner child.
Inner Child work, and inner child therapy, are a means by which we can start to learn to love ourselves, feel safer within and reduce the nightmares in order to recover from that childhood sexual abuse, and indeed other forms of childhood abuse.Inner Child therapy and inner child work, is growing in popularity as the therapy is both less invasive of exactly what happened and helps survivors to understand their own behaviours.
Inner Child work can also help us understand any disassociate tendencies that we may have as well, no matter where we are on the disassociative scale. Becoming a friend to your inner child can also help with self harm tendencies, comfort eating etc.
This can also be one of the more fun parts of recovery from childhood sexual abuse.
For us to be fully human, the Child Within must be embraced and expressed!
Unless we connect with our Inner Child state in a safe setting, the Child Within will remain isolated and alone.
Unless we reclaim our childlike feelings, sensitivity, wonderment and aliveness, our Inner Child will remain wounded.
Unless we do this now, we will find it so difficult to feel WHOLE.
People with persistent problems such as addiction, depression, troubled relationships and chronic dissatisfaction can transform their lives with Inner Child Work and find a new joy and energy in living.
The source of their problems can be in past events which get triggered in the present. We’re made up of many parts and inside we still have the little child and adolescent we were with all its experiences and feelings. This can lead to this Inner Child / adolescent part of us reacting strongly to certain experiences and situations and the feelings we’re having in the present can be the feelings of this little child / adolescent from the past, it is a reactive phenomena . The process of opening to the world of you Inner Child and getting to know where these feelings come from can change that and enhance your choices in miraculous ways.
Carl Jung called it the "Divine Child" and Emmet Fox called it the "Wonder Child." Some psychotherapists call it the “True Self” and Charles Whitfield called it the “Child Within”.
The Inner Child refers to that part of each of us which is ultimately alive,
The Inner Child is the emotional self. It is where our feelings live. When we experience joy, sadness, anger, fear, or affection our Child Within is coming out. When we are being playful, spontaneous, creative, intuitive and surrendering to the spiritual self, our Genuine Authentic Self, who we know deep within us, our Real Self is being welcomed and encouraged to be present. We all have an inner child and the wounds our inner child received can and do continue to contaminate our adult lives. Our parents helped create this Inner Child part of us, society also helped with the creation. When this child self is not allowed to be heard or even acknowledged as being real, a false or co-dependent self emerges. We begin to live our lives as victims.
Then we have situations that arise in our lives which develop into unresolved emotional traumas. The gradual accumulation of unfinished mental and emotional business can lead to and fuel chronic anxiety, fear, confusion, emptiness and unhappiness through all of our life.
Besides the Inner Child / adolescent part, we have many other selves which are trying to be heard and take control, without us really hearing the voices until we make an effort to do so. Initially, it is very important to tame the Inner Critic part of us. That voice from the past often keeps beating up our Inner Child. This voice invades whatever trauma and pain there was in our childhood. The wise Nurturing Self part of us can learn to stand as a protector self for the Inner Child. It’s the job of the Nurturer to be loving and self-affirming. This part of us can also teach the Inner Critic a new job of support instead of beating the Child self up, and can love the Inner Critic so that the Inner Child self can relax and not have to work so hard.
This is often where the internal battle begins. The Inner Critic has been keeping the Inner Child muffled and secluded. Often, it is a case of transforming the Inner Critic to be a good internal parent, beginning to listen to the Inner Child and to allow it to have fun and be heard.
Denial of the Inner Child and the co-dependent self are particularly common among children and adults who grew up in troubled or dysfunctional families. This is where chronic physical mental illness, rigidity, frigidity or lack of nurturing is common. Yet, there is a way out. There is a way to discover and to heal our Inner Child / adolescent part and to break free of the bondage and suffering of our co-dependent or false self.
Through Inner Child it’s the easiest thing in the world to turn our feelings inwards and connect directly with that part of us that can offer comfort and support.
This is called self-nurturing or re-parenting which allows us to reclaim that wounded child. We can provide for ourselves all the love and support and positive regard we never had and grow up again.
It is not the past as such that effects us – it is our images of it. By re-parenting or reclaiming that wounded child, we uncover any conscious or unconscious mythology of ourselves and begin to re-evaluate and transform it. Linear time does not apply when we work internally and with the unconscious. It is possible to bring our present wise and loving self, to meet and help our young Inner Child and offer comfort and support and find a new joy and energy in living.This process to discover and heal our Inner Child can be quite astounding.
For many people, the Inner Child begins to say things that they have wanted to say `forever`!
Through guidance, understanding and love we can learn to know how to form healthy and loving relationships by learning tolove ourselves primarily.Because we have dysfunctional relationships internally, we have dysfunctional relationships externally. Loving ourselves isabout unconditional love which means no judgement and no shame.
"it is never to late to have a happy childhood".
Examples of some of the parts of the Child you might find inside are:
The Abandoned Child
This child part that has been left in some way through divorce or adoption or just left because the parents were kept busy working. This part is always fearful that it will be abandoned again and again. This part of the self is starving for extra attention and reassurance that it is safe and wanted.
This self is very lonely.
The Neglected Child
The child self that was always left alone without much nurturing and love.
It doesn’t believe it is lovable or worthwhile. It finds it difficult to express and doesn’t know how to love.
It is depressed and wants to hide and cry.
The Playful Child
That self that is naturally playful, creative, spontaneous and fun, the loving child. This part longs to play. Many of us have forgotten how to do this and be free without guilt or anxiety because as adults we must be doing something that is `worthwhile`.
The Spoiled Child
That part of us who wants what it wants and it wants it now, and if it doesn’t get what it wants, it throws a temper tantrum.
The Fearful Child
This part has been overly criticised when young. Now it is anxious and in panic much of the time. It needs lots of encouragement and positive affirmations.
The Disconnected Child
This Inner Child part which never learns to be close to anyone. It is isolated and dissociated. Intimacy feels alien and scary. Trust is a basic issue.
The Discounted Child
This is a part of the self that was ignored and treated as though it did not exist. It feels invisible. It doesn’t believe in itself and needs lots of love to assist and support it.
These are all possibilities of the different Inner Child parts that might be inside us and they need support which will allow us to embark on a journey of profound healing, indeedInner Child work is fundamental to healing!
NOW is the best time to do it.
On an emotional level the dance of Recovery is owning and honouring the emotional wounds so that we can release the grief energy - the pain, rage, terror, and shame that is driving us.
That shame is toxic and is not ours - it never was! We did nothing to be ashamed of - we were just little kids. Just as our parents were little kids when they were wounded and shamed, and their parents before them, etc., etc. This is shame about being human that has been passed down from generation to generation.
There is no blame here, there are no bad guys, only wounded souls and broken hearts and scrambled minds."
Inner child work is in one way detective work. We have a mystery to solve. Why have I have I been attracted to the type of people that I have been in relationship with in my life? Why do I react in certain ways in certain situations? Where did my behaviour patterns come from? Why do I sometimes feel so: helpless; lonely; desperate; scared; angry; suicidal; etc.
Just starting to ask these types of questions, is the first step in the healing process. It is healthy to start wondering about the cause and effect dynamics in our life.
In our co dependence, we reacted to life out of a black and white, right and wrong, belief paradigm that taught us that is was shameful and bad to be wrong, to make mistakes, to be imperfect - to be human. We formed our core relationship with our self and with life in early childhood based on the messages we got, the emotional trauma we suffered, and the role modelling of the adults around us. As we grew up, we built our relationship with self, other people, and life on the foundation we formed in early childhood.
When we were 5, we were already reacting to life out of the emotional trauma of earlier ages. We adapted defences to try to protect ourselves and to get our survival needs met. The defences adapted at 5 due to the trauma suffered at earlier ages led to further trauma when we were 7 that then caused us to adjust our defences, that led to wounding at 9, etc., etc., etc.
Toxic shame is the belief that there is something inherently wrong with who we are, with our being. Guilt is "I made a mistake, I did something wrong." Toxic shame is: "I am a mistake. There is something wrong with me."
It is very important to start awakening to the Truth that there is nothing inherently wrong with our being - it is our relationship with our self and with life that is dysfunctional. And that relationship was formed in early childhood.
The way that one begins inner child healing is simply to become aware.
To become aware that the governing principle in life is cause and effect.
To become aware that our relationship with our self is dysfunctional.
To become aware that we have the power to change our relationship with our self.
To become aware that we were programmed with false beliefs about the purpose and nature of life in early childhood - and that we can change that programming.
To become aware that we have emotional wounds from childhood that it is possible to get in touch with and heal enough to stop them from dictating how we are living our life today.
That is the purpose of inner child healing - to stop letting our experiences of the past dictate how we respond to life today. It cannot be done without revisiting our childhood.
We need to become aware, to raise our consciousness. To create a new level of consciousness for ourselves that allows us to observe ourselves.
It is vitally important to start observing ourselves - our reactions, our feelings, our thoughts - from a detached witness place that is not shaming.
We all have an inner critic, a critical parent voice, that beats us up with shame, judgment, and fear. The critical parent voice developed to try to control our emotions and our behaviours because we got the message there was something wrong with us and that our survival would be threatened if we did, said, or felt the "wrong" things.
It is vital to start learning how to not give power to that critical shaming voice. We need to start observing ourselves with compassion. This is almost impossible at the beginning of the inner child healing process - having compassion for our self, being loving to our self, is the hardest thing for us to do.
So, we need to start observing ourselves from at least a more neutral perspective. Become a scientific observer, a detective - the Sherlock Holmes of your own inner process as it were.
We need to start being that detective, observing ourselves and asking ourselves where that reaction / thought / feeling is coming from. Why am I feeling this way? What does this remind me of from my past? How old do I feel right now? How old did I act when that happened?
One of the amazing things about this process is that as one starts to become more aware of our own reactions, we also start to become more aware of others. We start seeing when the people in our lives are reacting like a little kid, or adolescent, or teenager, or whatever. The more we become aware of their reactions, the easier it becomes to stop taking their behaviour personally - which then makes it easier to detach from our own reactions and observe ourselves.
It is an amazing, miraculous process that can help us to change our relationship with our self, with other people, and with life. Becoming more aware, becoming conscious of a new way of looking at ourselves and life is the beginning of a process of learning to forgive and Love our self.
A detective always looks at cause and effect. By becoming a detective, solving the mystery of why we have lived our lives as we have, we can start to free ourselves from our past. By doing the inner child healing, we can start to learn how to really be alive instead of just surviving and enduring.
Intervene in our own process to protect ourselves from the perpetrator within - the critical
"It is through having the courage and willingness to revisit the emotional "dark night of the soul" that was our childhood, that we can start to understand on a gut level why we have lived our lives as we have.
It is when we start understanding the cause and effect relationship between what happened to the child that we were, and the effect it had on the adult we became, that we can truly start to forgive ourselves. It is only when we start understanding on an emotional level, on a gut level, that we were powerless to do anything any differently than we did that we can truly start to Love ourselves.
The hardest thing for any of us to do is to have compassion for ourselves. As children we felt responsible for the things that happened to us. We blamed ourselves for the things that were done to us and for the deprivations we suffered. There is nothing more powerful in this transformational process than being able to go back to that child who still exists within us and say, “It wasn’t your fault. You didn’t do anything wrong, you were just a little kid.”
"As long as we are judging and shaming ourselves we are giving power to the disease. We are feeding the monster that is devouring us.
We need to take responsibility without taking the blame. We need to own and honour the feelings without being a victim of them.
We need to rescue and nurture and Love our inner children - and STOP them from controlling our lives. STOP them from driving the bus! Children are not supposed to drive; they are not supposed to be in control.
And they are not supposed to be abused and abandoned. We have been doing it backwards. We abandoned and abused our inner children. Locked them in a dark place within us. And at the same time let the children drive the bus - let the children's wounds dictate our lives."
When we were 3 or 4 we couldn’t look around us and say, “Well, Dad’s a drunk and Mom is real depressed and scared - that is why it feels so awful here. I think I’ll go get my own apartment.”
Our parents were our higher powers. We were not capable of understanding that they might have problems that had nothing to do with us. So it felt like it was our fault.
We formed our relationship with ourselves and life in early childhood. We learned about love from people who were not capable of loving in a healthy way because of their unhealed childhood wounds. Our core/earliest relationship with our self was formed from the feeling that something is wrong and it must be me. At the core of our being is a little kid who believes that he/she is unworthy and unlovable. That was the foundation that we built our concept of “self” on.
Children are master manipulators. That is their job - to survive in whatever way works. So we adapted defence systems to protect our broken hearts and wounded spirits. The 4 year old learned to throw tantrums, or be real quiet, or help clean the house, or protect the younger siblings, or be cute and funny, etc. Then we got to be 7 or 8 and started being able to understand cause and effect and use reason and logic - and we changed our defence systems to fit the circumstances. Then we reach puberty and didn’t have a clue what was happening to us, and no healthy adults to help us understand, so we adapted our defence systems to protect our vulnerability. And then we were teenagers and our job was to start becoming independent and prepare ourselves to be adults so we changed our defence systems once again.