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“Be grateful for every scar life inflicts on you. Where we’re unhurt is where we are false. Where we’re wounded and healed italics is where our real self gets to show itself. That’s where you get to show who you are,” wrote Sara Gran, in her New Orleans mystery Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead.
In 1951 Carl Jung used the term “wounded healer” meaning that only one who has been wounded can heal others effectively.
I talk with my clients about the concept of the “walking wounded.” In essence, you look around you and mostly see people that look like they’ve got it all together. But the truth is that most of us have been wounded in some way: emotionally, physically, sexually, spiritually.
So what do you do with your own wounds? What options do you have? Since most people are “good” at covering up their wounds, you often don’t see how others work through their wounds and healing. How are you to learn your options?
Based on your own experiences, hence how your brain is wired, and therefore the attitude you have (optimist/pessimist; cup half-full/half-empty), you are somewhere on the spectrum of:
Hide it, deny it, try to forget, think it’s unfair, lash out, feel shame, resentment, anger, and so on . . .
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. . . Learn from it, gain compassion and empathy, realize it’s part of life, acknowledge one’s shared humanity, help others, feel gratitude for making it through, and so on.
Where are you on this continuum today?
Your wounds are the flip-side of your strengths. Your strengths are the flip-side of your wounds. Why am I repeating this?
The experiences that lead to your scars and healing are not fun. You will be exhausted, vulnerable, and at times, pushed to your limits. Yet you must go through your feelings and integrate them — somehow — to heal. This leads you to your real self, to your humanity.
