Healing for most sounds like a simple task of overcoming and becoming. Some would describe it as let go and let God; others might recite a scripture that might reference something different but make it relevant. You might deal with the uncertainties of having to tell someone your deepest pain or only confine in God. One thing that I discovered is healing can be broken down into different stages. In this post, I am bringing up three that I believe are crucial the fairytale syndrome, avoidant personality disorder, and imposter syndrome.
Most childhood or teen trauma includes the fairytale syndrome not to be confused with the princess syndrome or fairytale relationship. I am speaking on it more along the lines of escaping reality. You would often try to mask what is around you and paint a more desirable picture to the outside world. Most people still live in this bubble as adults where they are painting a situation one way to feel less hurt internally. For me, this included silence and pretending like it wasn’t happening. As you get older you might notice very similar attributes to avoidant personality disorder or just demonstrating avoidance for lack of better words. You might put your feelings in a box, lose the key, and forget where you hid that box to avoid getting hurt again. In my case, I managed to convince myself that hiding my emotions was what I needed to do for personal growth and I was letting go of things that hurt.
Trauma has a disturbing way of keeping you hostage; it continues to expand and grow based on the generational cycle occurring. For example, if you lived in a toxic home and are conditioned to believe that it is normal; you as an adult will start to manifest those attributes in your family dynamic. Your child will follow in your footsteps until someone breaks that cycle. We have normalized toxic interactions to continue the pattern of fairytale syndrome and avoidance. Every traumatic experience should be healed rather it is relationship-based, comparison-based, abused-based, etc.
Now here is where it gets interesting. Let’s say you took the next steps towards healing yourself; you have pointed out your triggers, you have done your homework, but now you are left confused and unsure. You have established an idea of what healing will look like or feel like and yet only sometimes you feel accomplished. Imposter syndrome has a way of making you feel like you are not living in your truth. You can be looking directly at a healed version of you with evidence and references to prove it, but you feel like a total imposter. When you have lived for so long in an unhealed state comfort sinks in and anything other than the trauma beings to feel unauthentic. Here is where the battle truly begins because it is your willpower vs. your trauma; only you can decide who wins. Healing is not for the weak but, why would you ever want to live in weakness. You are powerful and you were created to conquer.
Yes, Healing looks easy at times but being honest with where you are in your healing journey will allow you to take your power back and will allow you to live in fullness. You will have moments where you are unsure, where you are angry and ready to wave that white flag; the beauty of that is that you’re no longer living in a fairytale or avoiding the process. You might feel like you should be way ahead of the game because of how others view you but, what good is that when you can’t believe your growth.
Here’s a challenge:
Write down three stages you have encountered while you healed. Write down what you did or experienced in these three stages.
I encourage you to use it as a guide to continue your healing journey!
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