The Inner Child is your Inner Child

INNER CHILD WORK

Ask yourself this ... If you felt happy and completely in balance, do you think your choices and decisions would be different?  Do you think your life might change?  

 

“We are not what we know but what we are willing to learn.” ~Mary Catherine Bateson

 

Recapture the sheer joy of childhood and live life to the fullest.

Sometimes we just do not live the trouble free life we had hoped for, we can find ourselves lost on our life journey and frustratingly we cannot put our finger on why life unfolds the way it does. We can become angry, ill, have accidents, suffer relationship breakdowns, and have problems at work and thousands of differing scenarios all of which creates additional but unwanted stress that impact on our happiness.

Rather than being victims to life events, being angry or becoming depressed we should step back and learn to see what is really happening in order to finally break the patterns that limit our potential.

 
But how?

Understanding that life works on many levels is essential when planning our own life journey.

Like a map there are many routes available to reach a destination, yet often we are blindly unaware of most of them when it comes down to how we journey through life. Many just let life unfold as it presents itself and then feel let down when things do not go as well as expected. Notice I use “expected” rather than planned because I found I had no plan in place, as so many do, as I had been unaware that planning is an essential part of managing a route to peace and happiness!

Realising that there is a common thread in everyone’s life was a vital part to changing my perspective of life and how I lived it. I realised that everything in my life was connected somehow, absolutely everything and everybody in my life was connected to………. Me! So maybe when things “don’t go as planned” it was because I had not set in motion any planning and I had not been taking sufficient or any responsibility for my involvement in my own life. Countless people do not realise this very simple concept, we influence every single aspect of our life and if it is not going well, then, our involvement is contributing to the “upset”.

So maybe rather than blaming everything and everyone else it is time, as it was for me, to take some serious responsibility for the part we play in our life. When we lay out a plan we are committing ourself to a direction and that means we are beginning to set a subconscious blueprint, an intention, to taking responsibility for ourself.

When we begin to take responsibility for everything in our life, the real journey can begin. The can of worms can finally be opened and I did not even know I possessed a can let alone what was to be inside of it.

Just by scratching the surface of life, as empowering as it is, can be simply described as to what or who I am, and without going into great depth, we and life consists of the mental, the physical and non physical and these three parts are all connected by us.

 
Many fear looking at these 4 parts because it means putting a greater meaning on life, but by taking responsibility for ourselves requires a modicum of understanding of all 4 parts. You may more familiar with the perhaps overused terminology: Mind, Body, Spirit and the connection with them all; Emotions.

A core human emotion embedded in our DNA is fear. Fear changes our internal biology as anxiety takes over from our intelligent brain paralysing our logical reasoning ability to think clearly as panic sets in, our body becomes an automatic defence system, a reflex action we have no power or control of. We become disconnected from ourselves as we blindly protect ourselves in the battle for self preservation at the expense of our true self and others people in our life.

The Subconscious Minefield

We cannot simply accept that we have freewill, our subconscious drivers will dictate most of our life and sadly, until we pick at them, we will be directed to continue our potentially dysfunctional behaviour until our inevitable demise. When asked if he believed in freewill, the famous philosopher William James replied; “Yes, what choice do I have!”

Freewill is about freedom of choice. We think we have freewill to make choices for own good, but those choices are directly influenced by what we believe in. Unfortunately our belief system is quite flawed as it is consists mostly of our parents, our peers and our society beliefs and most of it has been formed from our social conditioning. At the subconscious we have little or no freewill.

Much has been written about the subconscious and there are detailed chapters in my book “I am Ok! But is that Good Enough?” so I will not go into specifics here, suffice to say that our subconscious influences every single waking moment of our life, as much as 95% of the time. That means that unless we are aware of our own subconscious power we will never have the chance to alter its perceptions.

So if our subconscious mind is so powerful, how can we harness its power for our own good? Besides where does the core of our subconscious belief come from?

We now know that as children, between birth and around 6 years old, in spite of its small size, the brain has twice as many neuro pathways as that of an adult. Recording everything during its waking hours, the brain looses the neuropathways it finds it does need, and reinforces those that it uses. Thus by 6 years old, the map of the brain becomes the guidance reference for the adult, and that is when the problems really start.

Our 6 year old self becomes the subconscious guide of each adult that is living today. The subconscious emotions of our younger self are the core guidance signals that influence 95% of our waking day!  Our child’s self esteem at 6 years old becomes the fundamental core of who we believe we are today, and unsurprisingly, we fail to “update” its programme as we grow older.

What are Your Childhood influences?

We look into a mirror for many reasons, often to check something or to do something. Usually we use a mirror to see how we look or appear to others but rarely do we really look into a mirror as if it is for the first time. To truly look deeply at and into ourselves we have to consciously stand in front of mirror and become our own observer.  To see ourself in a new fresh light and be aware of how we feel and of what actually is going through our mind when we do so.

When considering our childhood and working with our deep rooted subconscious, a mirror is not necessarily required.  Although our memories will be clouded by time, our childhood will have an overriding theme; it can range from brilliant, good, happy, OK, indifferent, unhappy, not good, terrible and everything between. It all depends of whether your childhood was supportive, secure, loving and open-minded upbringing or whether you experienced varying degrees of pain, abuse, neglect, rejection and abandonment.

It does not matter if you think you had a wonderful childhood; there is a great chance that your younger self remembers something that today deeply influences the relationship you have with yourself and therefore others.

Much of our inner subconscious limitations arose through our early childhood and the influences of our families. It is not that they deliberately taught us our limitations, it is that we absorbed our parents and peers characteristics and in turn they became the blueprint of our personality, the core of your self esteem. Working through the limiting beliefs we hold are explained in “I am Ok! But is that Good Enough?” in detail.

Sadly, many people are in denial of their subconscious feelings, just as they are of their family’s influence over the life we all currently lead. Understanding our childhood influences is NOT a blame game, it is just something that always happens because we are not perfect, and neither were our parents. They tried to do their best and, on the subconscious level, their best leaves traces of discontentment or something lacking or deficient in some way that persists through to our adult life.

That part of our younger self that took these messages is called the inner child and it is that part of us that resides within our subconscious. To make matters worse, with our subconscious influencing 95% of our apparent waking life it means that our inner child is continually influencing the majority of our adult life unless its power over us is dealt with.

The Inner Child

Make no mistake; the inner child is our younger self that lives within our adult psyche, it may really be our true “self”. Even in adults who had a healthy childhood they still have an inner child that still exists within them.

However, a happy and safe inner child is sadly an idealistic concept because in reality any form of upset could result in a lasting subconscious wound; there being very many degrees of childhood trauma from the innocuous to the most traumatic.

Try to understand that the most innocent situations from a parent’s perspective will not have the same meaning from a child’s perspective; they are not adults. A child’s core needs are warmth, safety, love and to be heard and anything that does meet these core needs evoke emotions of trauma and rejection that can reside within the child’s self esteem for the rest of its life. For adults today being smacked as child by a parent or grandparent can be the first occasion that fear and physical pain inflicted by another person created a wound but it does not have to be such a deliberate act of control, it can be much more subtle event.

As an example, I frequently hear clients talking to their children when they are on the phone to me: “David, I am on the phone with Jonathan, go and play for a moment, I will be with you after the call” or “David, I have already told you once, (getting annoyed) go and play when daddy is on the phone”. From an adult perspective these exchanges are only a straightforward setting up of boundaries establishing that daddy or mummy is occupied and requires space.

However this is only the adults’ view, the child’s perspective is something quite different all together. A child has an egocentric view of life in that everything should revolve around them and that is final (that’s how they learn). When the parent creates the boundaries in this manner the child’s perspective can interpret the situation as “I cannot be heard” or “I am not important” “I am being rejected” or “I am not good enough”.

The most innocent forms of boundary setting by parents can have far reaching effects. “Clear up your room”, “don’t walk on the grass” right through to “you are naughty” “don’t be so lazy”; all are two edged swords that if not used respectfully may have really strong unintended consequences in the future.

The problem I have found for most adults I treat with ill health or life issues such as destructive behavioural patterns, is that their unequivocal love for their parents clouds the subconscious issues that have arisen through their inner child and without help, those negative patterns could destroy their life. They find it very difficult to truly believe that although Mum and Dad may have been saints in their eyes, everyday circumstances could and often create such emotional conflict in the child, that the ensuing emotional confusion embeds itself as a trauma scaring a child’s future to potential emotional growth.

Exacerbating the problem is that life has become increasingly stressful in the last few decades and we have apparently much less time on our hands, compounding our ability to manage our time and explain things to our children in a patient understanding way that will not leave them emotional bereft.

When it comes down to the more serious events in childhood; physical, sexual, emotional and mental the wounds will be much deeper resulting in a severe disconnect between the body and the mind’s ability to register or express emotions. However this deep repression of emotions on the subconscious level is not healthy and builds up mental stress creating low self esteem. This deep inner wound of the inner child will trigger some or all of the following in the adult; depression, anxiety, phobias, destructive behavioural patterns and unless consciously dealt the emotional trauma will physically manifests as a chronic illness.

 As a form of protection, the inner child withdraws permission for its brain to register or “feel” hurt and pain and becomes numb to some deep emotions. Often, I found that this disconnect is seen when people are not able to cry or show emotions at the loss of friendships or death of those near to them. It is the inner child rationally controlling the brain to not revisit something it relates to on the hurt and emotional pain level.  

How our life is at home and generally how we live our life massively influences our children at the subconscious level; parents arguing, taking out their unresolved anxieties on each other all lead to childhood wounds. A divorce can be lead to same emotional abandonment as a death because the child cannot emotionally recognise the difference; the same applies if a parent is away for long business trips away as the child cannot comprehend what “going away for work” means. Family life creates the abundantly fertile environment to deeply screw up children all because we as adults did the best we could but were not aware that we do have to take full or partial responsibility for everything in our life including managing the emotions of our own inner child.

Of the other more serious traumas, common inner child wounds can be the result of having an emotionally unavailable parent who withholds affection others can be attributed to physical abuse when being “punished” like slapping, hitting, shaking, biting, hair pulling, pinching, having objects or liquids thrown and “washing out the mouth” with soap.

The list of potential traumatic triggers is rather long, but briefly if as child and you were given adult responsibilities it can result in stunted emotional growth. This can also include caring for a sick or disabled parent, a parent with such low self esteem that it depends on the child for emotional support, or not being fed or deprived of meals as a punishment, not being nurtured or supported, having “treasured” belongings being lost or thrown out, being called names or verbally denigrated and abused, being humiliated, being forced by parents to attend events (religious, funerals, gatherings) that you do not want to go to or forced to eat foods that are not liked.

The extremes include death in the family, serious accidents, being sexually molested, shown pornography, or any other type of sexual contact; all create deep subconscious wounds.

A wound though, is a wound, irrespective of its depth, and our inner child has them. As a rule of thumb you should adopt a much greater awareness that irrespective of how loving our parent or parents were no matter how small or how big an event was, all of us experienced some kind of emotional trauma as children. We all hold a wounded and hurt inner child within us that subconsciously undermines our adult self.

The good news is that by understanding our inner child, we allow ourselves the opportunity to become a better parent to our own inner child.

How does knowing what our inner child feels, help us?

As a child and even as an adult, we react differently to different stimuli at one level depending on our life experiences and yet, as a child, at the emotional level the body’s subconscious reaction can be identical in all manner of situations.

Events like loosing your favourite teddy bear or doll, being lost in a shopping mall, being shouted at, being physically, mentally or sexually abused can all carry the same basic emotion. A pin prick for a child with low pain tolerance and the pain of breaking a bone falling down stairs for another can carry the same “pain” and emotional reference.  

As a child we protected ourself and sought a comfortable safe place for our safety to avoid future hurt, and that safe place is often in the deep recesses of our brain. That fear the inner child numbed itself to secretly resides within us all until identified. As an adult, you are able to reconnect to your inner child and identify its wounds. Often the hurt inner child is just dying to be recognised, and once connected you can explore the root causes of what has been frustrating and confusing you; your ill health, fears, phobias, insecurities and many of your self sabotaging life patterns.

Identifying these deep rooted emotions from the variety of differing interpretations of childhood trauma is key to inner child work, as they will open you to understanding why you do what you always have done and why you think like you have always thought. It was and is always about the fear reflex to protect ourselves.

Humans are vulnerable and when threatened want a safe place to feel comfortable and secure, it is quite natural to seek comfort in a protective environment. Protection by its very nature is a survival reflex and its power can govern our life if left unchecked. However, the counter intuitive approach is not to seek that safe place, but to accept what is. By surrendering our thoughts and our attachment to “needing” a safe place we actually become more open to being vulnerable.

With true vulnerability comes immeasurable strength and power.    

Knowledge of your inner child allows you the choice to experience the feelings again and work through them, only this time as an adult, allowing you to surrender your protective subconscious thoughts thus releasing their power they have over you thus avoiding them subtly and unknowingly hijacking you in your life in the future.

The bottom line is that it is never too late to have a happy childhood whatever age you are, we just have to be better parents to it.

The 4 Layers of your Inner Child

This short guide will help you understand your inner child on all 4 levels, they are the stories created by the lack of understanding of the adult world. Stories are stories and may not contain any grain of truth, so it is always a good idea to question every story you hold in case you actually believe them.

1.  Emotional

If you believe your parents were distant from you, you may think that they did not show sufficient interest in you. This can manifest itself, subconsciously, as them not paying sufficient attention to you and ignoring your emotional needs for attention and not meeting or denying your emotional expressions of need from you. Subconsciously they did not meet your emotional needs for love, support, protection and/or guidance.  The likely outcome of this was that:

• You developed low self-worth and esteem for yourself.
• You began ignoring your emotional needs.
• You learnt to hide from, avoid or repress your emotions as they were associated with feelings of neglect from your childhood.
• You developed psychological or physical sicknesses connected to your inability to listen to, accept and deal with your emotions in a healthy manner (e.g. emotional repression).

2.  Psychological

If you believed your parents did not listen to you, unconditionally accept you or nurture you, you likely have developed any variety of these symptoms:

• You developed low self-esteem issues due to forms of abuse such as ridicule, put-downs, overly high expectations, being ignored, rejected, or constantly punished.
• You developed deep-seated anger issues both from unresolved childhood trauma, and an inability to love oneself.
• You developed addictions and neurosis to create a misguided sense of comfort and safety within your life.
• You developed psychological and/or physical illnesses.
• You have problems sustaining healthy and respectful relationships.

3.  Physical and 4. Environmental

At a basic and fundamental level, physical safety and nourishment is one of the most intrinsic elements of a loving relationship.  As can be seen in nature, with mothers and fathers nourishing their chicks, pups and cubs with food, shelter and protection.  When this is lacking, however, the following issues can develop:

• Low self-worth resulting in physical neglect/abuse of oneself, e.g. eating disorders (anorexia, obesity), maintaining an unhealthy diet, self-harm.
• Intense safety-seeking behaviours (psychological complexes such as OCD) or extreme risk-taking behaviours (e.g. unprotected sex, obsessive daredevil feats, etc.)
• Addictions to drugs, alcohol, violence, food, etc.
• Sexual dysfunction or promiscuity (often due to sexual abuse).

It’s important to remember that while some, or even many, of our problems stem from childhood neglect, grudge-holding, blame and self-pity only prolongs the process of victimhood and gets us nowhere. People are victims of victims, meaning that the reason why our parents/guardians behaved the way they did was most likely because of their own neglected upbringing, and their parents were the way they were for similar reasons – and so on and so forth.

When you release the power of inner child victim consciousness you break the cycle, not only for yourself but for your children.

Becoming a better parent to our Inner Child

If we really want to take responsibility for our life that means we must work on the core levels of ourself. Even if our parents may have not fulfilled all of our inner child’s needs, the good news is that we can and heal our own wounds. 

The benefits of dealing with our inner child’s wounds include;

• Greater happiness and optimism.
• Healthier mind, body and spirit.
• Stronger friendships and relationships.
• Development of essential life skills: acceptance, forgiveness, vulnerability, compassion, self-love.
• Greater awareness of purpose.
• Improved creativity.

For more information or for a 1 to 1, please contact me.

Blessings and Love