Wholeness Healing Center

Engage Your Story

In my office I have a picture that hangs on my wall that says, “Let’s Explore”. Why? Because exploring one’s own life story is extremely important to healing. Our story contains the beginning of our understanding of relationships. The relationship with our parents greatly impacts the way we react and how we feel in our relationships today. Neuroscientists are researching how functions in our brain are impacted by early attachment patterns and that our initial attachment experiences are significant to our own emotional health and cognitive patterns in adulthood.

The Place We Find Ourselves is a podcast I love to listen to, as it supports this idea of engaging in your own story for healing. In episode 129, Adam Young, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker who practices in private practice, addressed four factors that are obstacles to healing: minimizing your story, spiritualizing the bad things that have happened to you, self-contempt, and the frenetic pace of your life.

Minimizing our own story can sound like, “My parents did the best they could; they had their own issues they were dealing with.” Spiritualizing the bad things that have happened to you can sound like, “I had cancer, but God works for good, and because of my scare with cancer, my family is closer than ever before.” Self-contempt sounds like, “Why can’t I get it together? I’m always wrong. I should’ve known better.” The frenetic pace of life, ugh, which, unfortunately, I think many of us understand too well.

You matter, your story matters, and your emotional experience in this moment and the next moment matters. The emotion you have when you reflect on a hard part of your story matters. Please consider making “I matter” a routine expression towards yourself, and please consider engaging your own story and being mindful of how your emotions and beliefs now are tied to the child in you. Until next time…

Young, Adam. “Why engaging your story is the best thing to do for your brain.” The Place We Find Ourselves. March 18, 2018. https://adamyoungcounseling.com/podcast/

Tags: Exploring one's own life story for healing, healing through understanding your life story