The Breakthrough

I have spent my life trying to figure out what is wrong with me, and for most of my life I framed it (consciously and unconsciously) in those terms. Now, I know that the question itself was part of the problem, and what I needed to be asking was, “What is at the core of me that keeps me from believing in myself?” I have been circling around the answer for a long time, always afraid, to one extent or another, of finding it. Today, I did, and it hurts like hell, and I could keep it tucked away in my journal, for my eyes only, but publishing it here is part of the process and needs to be done.

My steps on the path could be retraced, to a certain extent, through these Ruff Draft posts, but the reality is that I could never begin to articulate everything that got me here. The 16+ healing journals filled since February of 2022, when I began the healing process in earnest—spurred by the death of my dog and the health crisis caused, at least, in part, by my eating disorder; the hundreds of books I have read; the Instagram posts I consumed; the art journaling; the poetry writing; the scattered sessions with a trauma-informed coach; the ways in which I’ve put myself out there and opened myself to new experiences; the risks I’ve taken; the boundaries established and maintained; the fights with my husband; the Psychosynthesis ideas and techniques I’m learning in my coach training program; the Jungian books and studies; the Emotion Code training and sessions on myself; and the flower essences. Lately, it has been so much the flower essences, which have, at times, literally delivered insights within five minutes of taking one.

Dennis articulated how the process generally works in his post, essentially stating that, until you open yourself to new possibilities, you won’t be able to see the path you must take because it doesn’t look like paths you’ve already taken. We tend forget this simple but profound truth, expressed slightly differently by a fellow named Brian McGreevy: “If a problem can’t be solved within the frame it was conceived, the solution lies in reframing the problem.”

Most directly, what I got this morning came from reading and imbibing again the words of Psychosynthesis therapists John Firman and Ann Gila on pages 13–14 of The Primal Wound. Based on what was shared there in the opening chapter on addiction and abuse, I asked myself: What do I find at the core when I sit with the fear and discomfort that drive me to find something smaller to fear? My life has been almost nothing but fear since the moment of conception, and that’s no exaggeration. But because the Primal Fear/the Primal Wound was far too big and because I had not yet built an ego container strong enough to hold it, I needed to spend my time and energy fearing smaller, more manageable things like food, mold, driving, spending money, getting fat, getting sick, ending up in hell, social situations, displeasing anyone, something bad happening to my kids. An addiction is anything that distracts us from what we are too afraid to face, and we can be addicted to anything: drugs, alcohol, sex, food, television, our phones, books, controlling our weight or how our body looks, schooling, violence, politics, environmentalism, work, even being afraid.

So, here’s the answer to my question (What do I find at the core when I sit with the fear and discomfort that drive me to find something smaller to fear?), in the way in which I got to it in my journal this morning:

Losing control = punishment
because
You—your very self—is not wanted and never was.
You are lucky to stay here in:
this family, this marriage, this class, this book group, this . . .
but, if you lose control and misbehave,
you will be ousted, exiled, rejected.

That sums up what was communicated to me, through words, actions, neglect, and other trauma-inducing experiences, right from the get-go, and I have unconsciously carried that message with me my entire life. But no more. I have made the unconscious conscious, and it no longer controls me.