I have always loved the idea of the hero’s journey. I love the idea of the adventurer going off on a quest, overcoming a series of challenges, and coming home completely transformed. If you’re a literature nerd like me, you’ll know Odysseus didn’t become a hero overnight. Rather, it required him to overcome many obstacles and hardships along the way. The hero’s journey was long, difficult, and exhausting. He was painted out to be the bad guy once or twice. At some points in his journey, it didn’t look like he was going to make it. The journey of healing is very similar. Much like everyone’s trauma is different, everyone’s journey to healing is also different. Healing from anything is difficult, and healing emotionally is no exception. Since it takes a tremendous amount of energy to do, it can be exhausting. The path to healing is enlightening, and you learn so much along the way. The most difficult lesson I’ve learned in the healing process is that you can’t take anyone with you.
What is Healing?
Before I dive into it, I want to clarify what I mean when I’m talking about healing. Everyone knows what the word ‘healing’ means regarding getting better from a sickness or mending a broken bone. When I talk about healing, I’m referring to putting an end to the emotional reactions caused by triggers. I’m talking about peeling back each part of your trauma and consciously healing it, layer by layer.
Getting rid of your triggers is never going to happen. They are there because of that trauma in childhood. However, you can control how you react to them if you choose to react at all. By becoming aware of them, we can do our part in
The Journey
Since everyone’s emotional trauma is different, the path to healing is also different. People discover their emotional wounds at different times in their lives, and they choose to do something about it at different times, as well, if they decide to do anything about it at all. The process can be so uncomfortable at times that some people choose to never take the first step.
I agree that the experience can be uncomfortable, and at times even seem impossible. There were parts in my healing journey when I had convinced myself I was getting worse instead of better. Occasionally, you will feel like you’re going backward.
Although everyone’s paths vary, a majority of healing starts the same: rock bottom. I’m sure it’s an expression you’ve heard before, but have you ever had one? A moment of clarity so powerful that you realize you can’t go on living the way you’re currently living. I’ve had a couple, and only one ever prodded me in the ass to do something about it.
When I realized at the age of 30 that I didn’t know who I was, I knew I needed to do something about it. I knew I was a mother of two girls, a wife, a student, and a daughter. But these were just the names of the hats I wear on any given day. These are my surface-level identities. Who am I? After this moment of clarity and many crying sessions later, I began my hike toward wellness.
For me, it was about discovering spirituality, a change of diet, adding in exercise, and learning as much about myself as possible. For the first time in my life, I put myself first and everyone else second, because I knew that this was the only way I would be able to be successful in getting better.
Exhaustion
Physically healing takes a toll on your energy levels, but what about emotional healing? There’s no exception there, either. Emotional healing can be just as draining. Working toward feeling better can affect your mind, body, and spirit.
There were a few times along the way that I’ve been so close to turning back. I’ve been so tired that I didn’t even want to get off the couch, and I couldn’t pin it to anything. Was I getting sick? No. I just was so worn out, I felt like I couldn’t go another day. Fatigue had me in its maw, and I couldn’t get away.
On other days, I would be ravenous. I would eat so much that I didn’t really know how my body fit it. I now know that my body needed all that food for energy, and that energy was focused on making me feel better.
Have you ever heard of the term ‘social battery?’ I’ve heard several people say, after being in a crowd, that it drained their social battery. Your social battery is even smaller than normal when you’re going through this. There were periods, like currently, when I had to sign myself out of social media and disappear for a few weeks. I keep a few close friends and family members within contact, but I ghost everyone else. I don’t do it to be rude or mean; I need it.
The only situation I can compare it to is the craving for solitude, being comparable to a monk closing himself up in a temple. The need to be alone startled me at first, but once I began researching it, I discovered that several people could relate. It’s called a spiritual awakening, or enlightenment, and it is absolutely necessary to getting through this.
Healing is Enlightening
Beginning to heal will open your eyes in ways you never thought possible. One of those ways that it starts to affect you is your relationships. Even quick encounters with people will be different.
I have always had anxiety, which was a result of growing up in a household where my dad yelled constantly. My anxiety was so bad in my 20s that I would tremble, and once, when attending a friend’s party, I had to sneak off to a bathroom and barf. I know, not pretty. But you get the picture. Terrible, knee-quaking, teeth-clenching anxiety, and when I began healing, I realized that it was because I was projecting my feelings onto other people. I was uncomfortable in my skin. I felt like an imposter, so I assumed everyone else could sense that about me and that they didn’t like me because of it. Healing that part of me cured a good portion of my anxiety, and now I know that anything I feel is internal and doesn’t have much to do with the outside world.
Not only does it make you more self-aware, but it puts a perspective on people around you. You can spot toxic behaviors from a mile away, whereas before if you were like me, you were blind to them.
With your relationships, you will become aware of what your triggers are so that you can manage them more effectively. This brings your relationships to a whole new level. Your confidence grows. People can’t affect your mood the same as they could previously, and that is powerful enough on its own.
For me, I became better at holding myself accountable. This contributed to me being a better mom, a better wife, and an overall better person.
A Lone Experience
Healing is for you and you alone. There will be a point somewhere in it that will make you want to grab someone, maybe a few, and take them with you. For me, it was close family members and a couple of friends. I can’t even count how many times I wanted to grab someone and shake them to make them open their eyes to what was going on in their life. If you could only see from my point of view, I would think.
Not being able to force them to see things from my point of view caused me a lot of unnecessary suffering. I wanted to sit them down and teach them about narcissists, boundaries, and how people can be so hell-bent on manipulating one another. I must have used the term ‘narcissist’ hundreds of times in those couple of months.
Your healing will make people uncomfortable. The people you were close to before may put you at arm’s length because they don’t recognize you anymore, but that’s okay. You’re not doing this for anybody but yourself. I decided early in my journey that if I had to boot everybody who was unsupportive out of my life and start over, I would. Thankfully, that hasn’t been the case too often. I’ve only had to cut off a few people. I’m now more careful about who I give my time to.
Just because this is a lone journey doesn’t mean that it must be a lonely one. Surround yourself with people who are like you, people who are trying to heal or have already healed. You need support and positivity, especially on the days when the molehills feel like mountains.
Journal!
I have been into journaling since I was a teenager. Journaling helps me get everything out of my head and onto paper so that my mind isn’t so weighed down. I have used it to track the good things, but mostly I have used it as a way to vent without anyone having to bear the burden of my negativity. These days, I have a venting journal and a manifestation journal. The venting journal is self-explanatory: I vent about everything in it. The manifestation journal holds my goals and more positive content.
Investing in a journal will help during this process.
To someone who has been writing for over a decade, picking out a journal is a sacred act. Picking out a special little notebook is one of my favorite things to shop for. I have a journal I keep now, because it’s refillable, but I do pick out new pens every time I start on another filler book. I see it as an act of self-care because for me, it has become exactly that, and I notice a mood difference when I go for a long time without venting to my journal.
Journaling can help by holding a space for you to get all your daily frustrations out. Also, if you get to a roadblock, you can look back through some of your first entries and see how far you’ve come.
Recap
The decision to heal is a big one, so don’t take it lightly. Just because it’s a long road ahead doesn’t mean you can’t have fun, though. The journey is for you and no one else, and when it’s over, you’ll be so glad that you took the step to do it. Just a note: not everyone can do it on their own, and that’s okay. I’m not a professional by any stretch of the imagination, and my advice is simply that: advice. It is not meant to replace professional advice or medicine. If you decide to embark on this awesome hero’s journey, know that the obstacles are challenging but well worth coming home transformed.
Invoke the wonder, command the power.