Understanding Your Inner Wounded Child
This month we are exploring the 3 Parts of Self as taught by Terry Real and his colleagues at the Relational Life Institute. As a reminder, the 3 parts of Self are: The Wise Adult, The Adaptive Child, and The Wounded Child. Today, we’ll explore a bit more about the Wounded Child and how it shows up.
Our inner Wounded Child is often a very young and vulnerable part of us. This is a part of us that really wanted and needed to be loved, seen, and soothed. In the present, when this part of us gets activated, you might have thoughts like:
It’s happening again.
I can’t handle this.
I’m all alone.
This part of us often carries lots of hurt, sadness, disappointment, fear, overwhelm, etc. It desperately wants to be cherished, and when it is evident that it doesn’t feel this way, it can trigger big emotional reactions in us in the present.
We can become needy, angry, or withdrawn when old wounds get poked.
Big Idea: Your Wounded Child is still with you. And it still needs love and attention. But it is primarily YOUR job to give attention to your Wounded Child.
Caring for your Wounded Child is your responsibility.
The main thing that our Wounded Child needs is compassion and comfort. For example, we can speak to this part of ourselves kindly, saying something like, “I know this hurts. I’ve got you. You’re going to be OK.” We can also care for this part of us by engaging in mindfulness, yoga, journaling, prayer, or any other soothing and/or reassuring activity.
If we don’t learn to notice our Wounded Child when it gets activated, it will handle relationships in a very immature way. Unfortunately, that is likely to push others away, and then things will just feel all the worse. Like a self-fulfilling prophecy.
But if we can pause, breathe, and reassure this young part of ourselves, then we can take a moment to think, come up with a loving, relational way of speaking up for ourselves, and increase our chances of getting more of what we want in our intimate relationships.
But here’s the tricky part.
The Wounded Child doesn’t want to take responsibility for itself. It wants to be rescued.
It wants to be scooped up, loved on, and delighted in.
That’s not all bad. But if we expect another human being to be responsible for soothing our own inner distress, that’s precarious. On a good day, they might. On a bad day, they won’t. Or they might simply not read our minds perfectly—cuz nobody can. Then, if we get all bent out of shape, we’re adding to the dysfunction.
The good news is that we can give our Wounded Child everything it wants. But we have to be the ones to do it.
A Challenge: Consider this. What is the deep longing in your heart? If someone could say the perfect words to make your heart soar, what would those words be? And if someone could do something to help you feel like you’re cherished, what would that look like?
Pay attention. And commit to being generous with yourself in these ways.
Speak kindly. Act kindly.
Learn how to be a good friend to your Wounded Child.
Good luck!
Happy to be in your corner,
Tom Page, LCPC
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