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In simple words, emotional healing is the art of processing emotions. It involves a level of acknowledgement, identification ,and transformation of emotions. The end goal is to promote emotional well-being and foster inner peace.
Emotional healing uses emotional intelligence. This involves identifying, accepting, and addressing emotions in self and others. We don't often realize the impact of wounds from past experiences. Emotional healing process is not linear and can cause significant distress for the individuals. In a world fixated on physical healing, are you willing to try emotional healing?
How to Heal Yourself Emotionally?
There are many theories around emotional healing. However, one common thing in all the approaches is that they are multi-step processes. While the steps have been numbered in theory, it may not be the case in real life. You may start with step 1 and circle back to this step after step 4. These stages are just for your understanding and for your reference to follow a direction.
1) Awareness
We go about our lives not acknowledging the potential childhood emotional trauma that we have experienced. Fortunately, we have come a long way in our understanding of traumatic events and trauma responses. It is any event that causes threat to our emotional and psychological safety.
2) Acknowledgment
Coming face-to-face with your trauma is an incredibly difficult realization. It can take a lot to acknowledge the experiences you have gone through. For some individuals, there is a sense of relief of knowing what they have experienced and giving it a name.
3) Acceptance
Acceptance is a tough one and can also be exhausting at the same time. Something that helps with acceptance is that you are not the only one who has gone through traumatic experiences or the one that requires emotional healing. All of us at some point need healing. For some, it comes earlier than later.
4) Experience
After accepting that you have undergone a traumatic experience, we move towards experiencing it. Sounds counter-intuitive right? Healing can’t take place without fully experiencing what you have gone through.
Certain defence mechanisms in our body like dissociation and denial can stop us from fully experiencing the trauma. While this works temporarily, in the long run, we need to completely experience them.
5) Understanding
The word trauma suggests that we have lost something or something has been taken away from us. Understanding this loss is very important in the healing process. In terms of emotions, we may become devoid of feeling positive emotions. In addition, we may also lose our sense of safety.
6) Compassion
We blame ourselves for what we have gone through. However, the truth is that we have little responsibility for what we have experienced. It takes an immense amount of compassion for yourself during the healing process.
7) Moving forward
Moving on from the trauma may not be easy, but you can learn to move away from these experiences. A mental health professional can guide you in this process of self-discovery. You will meet with some challenges and barriers, but sometimes you need to go backwards to move forward.
Top Reasons To Begin Your Emotional Healing Journey
Emotional healing has many benefits for your overall psychological well-being. If you want to feel motivated, here are some top reasons for you to work on your well-being:
1) Mental health
It is understood that many mental health issues stem or their symptoms get exaggerated due to repression of certain thoughts, memories, and emotions. The father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, believed that all mental health issues are rooted in our unresolved past. All of us are vulnerable to the dangers of the future and hurt of the past. Emotional healing can help us step up.
2) Relationships
Mental patterns are like footprints in our brain. The patterns that we grew up with as children affect our current relationships and living. Think of these footprints or impressions going deeper as we grow up. The greater the number of footprints, the greater the impact of trauma on us.
3) Physical health
Even though the mind forgets sometimes, our bodies remember. Across various studies, it has been seen that trauma of the past can be stored in the body. Trauma has been linked to various physical health issues and especially gastrointestinal concerns.
4) Self-awareness
When you begin your emotional healing journey, you become aware not only of your negative or traumatic patterns but also of your core strengths and traits. Overall, you become more aware of your emotions, thoughts, and behaviors.
5) Coping skills
Emotional healing is necessary for you to enhance your well-being and learn coping mechanisms along the way. We all use various coping strategies to deal with the stressors. It is only through healing that we learn healthy coping mechanisms.
The main aim of healing is to discover your internal resources and move towards a better life. For some emotional healing takes place through spiritual endeavors, while for others it takes place with the help of a mental health professional.
Janvi Kapur is a counselor with a master's degree in applied psychology with a specialization in clinical psychology.
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