Before you read, go play the song “IT HURTS!” by San Holo to check the vibe😊
[Killer Intro]
“I still can’t find the right words…
The only thing that I’ve learned….
It’s only real when it hurts.”
This vibe >>>
A positive, eerie tune with an upbeat tempo, leading to a quietly freeing chorus. To me, this so beautifully speaks to a journey of feeling your emotions and healing them. A sweet sadness with tinges of hope.
It popped up on my playlist in perfect timing as I left my therapy appointment this morning, my first one after a year hiatus.
Today’s topic of discussion; my avoidant attachment style. How this has been presenting itself in my relationship, parenting, and work life. I reached out to her because after a while of going through life lessons on my own, I am stuck on this one. I have all of the awareness that this is the problem, and no idea how to move forward in changing it.
Well, we did some EMDR and found some deeper roots of my attachment to rejection. Memories of doing theatre in middle school, but when it came time to audition in high school there was absolutely no question in my mind that it was too terrifying to even consider. And the pain in this coming from the fact that no one caught this lapse in my judgement; no one seemed to notice that I was no longer doing something that I loved and was good at, while slowing starting to binge and watch TV in it’s place.
A majorly expressive part of me was seen for a moment, and lost in the wind the second I began to doubt myself and let fear creep in. No one stopped to notice and talk to me about it, encourage me to move forward and take the risk of doing something I love, letting the chips fall where they may if people didn’t like me for it.
I was rejected through a series of missed opportunities in my developmental years. As my therapist put perfectly today; I was rejected through avoidance. There are so many of my childhood memories this fits for, but rather than spiral into a woe is me mentality, let me bring in my handy dandy healing tools.
This created a protective part of me that became attached to the feeling of being rejected or avoided, and used this as motivation to accomplish my goals with the ever so fueling mentality; “I’ll show you.” Little did my adolescent brain know, this continuous pattern led me to chase goals that kept me in the box people expected of me, having no awareness of the creative-self starving below the surface.
The somatic awareness that came with these feelings were a deep heaviness in my vulva and a spiked fury at the edge of my throat bursting to scream. Metaphysical translation; a heavy energy stuck between my root and sacral chakra, and the burning sensation of wanting to speak my truth.
After going through a visualization to release these feelings, I felt a relief come over these spaces and now have an awareness of how to move forward in having a dialogue with this protector and integrating her into myself.
So, as I listen to “IT HURTS!” on repeat for the rest of the day, the message here is that the patterns we break and the healing we do, hurt. Revisiting those feelings of rejection and loneliness, experiencing the pain and limitations in my body, hurts.
But the fruits of this labor are waiting to be ravished, the fulfillment I crave requires this hurt to be felt. The best things in life, hurt. It’s only real when it hurts.
