Emotional Pain – Process It To Heal

You might notice that emotional pain comes and goes. Emotional wounds are similar to physical wounds. At first physical pain hurts constantly, then with time the pain subsides and eventually with adequate care the physical wound heals.

Likewise, with adequate care emotional wounds heal. Adequate care for emotional wounds is open, honest and direct discussion to process the feelings. Unfortunately, humans seldom attend to emotional wounds and if attention is given; it seldom is an open, honest and direct discussion or feelings are seldom processed adequately.

It is when we do not heal these emotional wounds that we get stuck in the pain that it becomes detrimental to our well-being and development. If you notice that you feel closed-off, resentful, heavy-hearted, or that you work very hard to avoid being hurt again, it is the signal that a part of you is still stuck in the pain from yesteryear.

You might notice that you are continually connecting with the same familiar patterns of pain. Consider embracing your feelings and letting them flush through. Whether your pain is from childhood or from an experience yesterday, see if you can process it. When you process it, you will reconnect with a wonderful source of your own vital energy.

You can become stuck in emotional pain for a variety of reasons. As children, we sometimes cry or yell when we are upset, and the emotional issue moves through, unless our parents or other adults admonish us for expressing our feelings. Allowing yourself to feel the emotions gives the pain an opportunity to flush out, leaving you open and available for the next experience.

Unfortunately, well-meaning parents think that as children mature, they need to learn to shut down or ‘get over’ feeling upset or angry. Thus, children develop a variety of coping strategies to deal with the discomfort. Generally, the child learns to stuff the feelings down or run away from them or use something to sooth or numb him/herself. Often times, these coping strategies are role modeled by the parent. Thus, we take on this adaptation as the best alternative to feeling and expressing the emotions as they occur.

In addition to the emotional burden the child carries forward, the child soon becomes used to being in pain and the experience of having peace of mind becomes distant. Thus, the child carries the syndrome of needing to be in emotional distress to feel connected to him/herself. This may be the ultimate tragedy of not being allowed to feel the emotional pain and processing it to let it flush through, so the emotional pain can heal.

Dorothy M. Neddermeyer, PhD, Life Coach, Hypnotherapist, Author, “101 Great Ways To Improve Your Life.” Dr. Dorothy has the unique gift of connecting people with a broad range of profound principles that resonate in the deepest part of their being. She brings awareness to concepts not typically obvious to one’s daily thoughts and feelings. www.drdorothy.net.