In my work as a pastor and spiritual director, many people have told me stories of their childhood traumas. Most of these people had never told anyone about these incidents before, and some had not even remembered these events before the memory appeared in a session with me while exploring their emotions. I would ask them what the strongest emotion they were feeling right now. Then I would ask what was the first thing that popped into their head when I asked them what their earliest memory of that same feeling was. So many said something like “You know, I have never remembered this before, and I have never told anyone about this, but the first thing that popped into my head was about this time when…” Then they tell me about a horrific event that they had experienced as a child, while I held the space with non-judgmental, non-anxious, silent empathy. After telling me about the event, they all asked, “Was that abuse?” I say, “Yes. And you are safe now, and it was not your fault”, and many of them break into tears. Every man I have experienced this with also said the event took place when they were about 8 years old. This makes sense, as it is at about age eight that individuals develop a sense of self in differentiation from their parents and other caregivers. It is also when one begins to be more conscious of the wounds that shape us. Bessel van der Kolk writes,
“There are deeply entrenched, wounded little boys inside so many who are simply seeking validation and safety. Our earliest caregivers don't only feed us, dress us, and comfort us when we are upset; they shape the way our rapidly growing brain perceives reality. Our interactions with our caregivers convey what is safe and what is dangerous: whom we can count on and who will let us down; what we need to do to get our needs met. This information is embodied in the warp and woof of our brain circuitry and forms the template of how we think of our-selves and the world around us. These inner maps are remarkably stable across time.”[1]
Richard Schwartz has developed the school of therapy known as Internal Family Systems. In this approach, the multiple “parts” of one’s inner world are related to as separate aspects of oneself. One common type of “part” inside us are “Exiles”. Schwartz says,
“These are often the younger ones that have frequently been called inner children in our culture. Before we get hurt, they are the delightful, playful, creative, trusting, innocent, and open parts of us that we love to be close to. They are also the most sensitive parts, so when someone hurts, betrays, shames, or scares us, they are the parts who take in the extreme beliefs and emotions (burdens) from those events the most. After the trauma or attachment injury, the burdens these parts absorb shift them from their fun, playful states to chronically wounded inner children who are frozen in the past and have the ability to overwhelm us and pull us back into those dreadful scenes. They move from feeling "I am loved" to "I am worthless" and "No one loves me", and when they blend with us that belief becomes our paradigm and we feel all their burdened emotions. It feels unbearable to reexperience those emotions and to believe those things, and, often, those burdens impair our ability to function in the world.”[2]
This my book, "Five Invitations: Engaging Your Five Core Emotions for Healing and Growth" is an attempt to help us unburden and grow towards more healthy true selves and develop healthier inner maps through learning to recognize, acknowledge, and engage with our emotions. I am interested in doing this, not just to educate ourselves about this important dimension of human experience, but also to explore what may be a healing opportunity for myself and many others. The point is not to avoid the “darker” emotions and just be happy, nor to try harder to control one’s emotions, but to fully and deeply experience the invitation to live authentically with all of life’s experiences, including all our emotions. I am concentrating on just these five “core emotions” to simplify things for people like me who are just starting to comprehend this complex dimension of life. I want to grow in wisdom and health. Do you?
[1] Bessel van der Kolk, The Body Keeps Score: Brian, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma (Penguin Random House LLC, New York, NY, 2014), p. 131
[2] Richard C. Schwartz, No Bad Parts, p. 73-74.
