Over the years I noticed a pattern of processing painful experiences that allowed them to be healed. This process has been consistent in my own life, throughout all sorts of challenges. As you read through these stages it is important to note that each stage is experienced and cycled over and over. As I became more skilled at managing the stages, the healing occurred in a spontaneous manner. The stages became more defined when I brought my awareness to them. Here are the five stages of my own emotional healing.
Note: The stages often overlap each other and blend together. I have separated them for ease of understanding.
Avoidance
The first stage of my emotional healing always begins when I notice that I am avoiding something. It may be that I find myself unfocused on my work, or that computer games and television shows have a little more sway over my willpower than usual. Something that I notice in myself, is the craving of food when my body is not hungry. This lets me know that some emotional issue is emerging and will need to be processed and honored. There are many methods of avoidance and it is important to discover what your particular methods are and what avoidance looks like in your own life. I avoided looking at my emotional issues for years but I was not aware that I was avoiding the issues. My most common methods were reading books, talking incessantly on the phone, texting, overeating or watching too much TV. Without awareness nothing can really move forward, nothing can really change. So the first stage is noticing that you are avoiding something and paying attention to the methods used. I am careful to gentle with myself during all these stages. Avoidance isn’t bad it is natural. Awareness helped me see that avoidance was prolonging my pain instead of healing it.
Confrontation
The second stage is confrontation. That doesn’t mean engaging in a personal conflict with someone that I believed had hurt me. Instead it was a confrontation of the emotional issue that I had been avoiding and noticing myself avoiding. I found this stage to be a great relief. Running away can be wearying and stressful in its own way. By recognizing when I am ready to confront an emotional issue and then facing it, is the second stage of my healing. Confrontation will look different for each person. For me, sometimes I find myself having a heart to heart conversation with myself; an honest investigation of my actions, behaviors and motives of my avoidance. I often do this in the car, while driving. I will talk out loud to myself as if I am speaking with a friend. The shower is another great private place to talk it out. Writing is highly effective as well as doodling on a paper and letting myself draw images that come to mind. This helps me get a handle on the truth of what is going on inside of me. Another method may be looking at old photos that conjure memories where the issue is stored. This confrontation happens on its own too with simple awareness. You may notice yourself crying during a movie that wouldn’t usually elicit such strong emotions, or you may notice that some small image or item has a strong effect on your emotions or your thinking. Once you are aware that you are in the confrontational stage it is important to be able to name the issue. For example, I have had this old issue of having to go it alone. As I have worked through it and continue to do so I find it helpful to think about it as separate from me, from who I am as a person. It is my “do it alone, don’t ask for help” issue. Being able to name the issue and feeling clear about it, ends the second stage.
Staying with the Emotions
The third stage is working with emotions. Emotions are powerful movers of energy. It is the emotional stage where the real work gets done. It is often the most challenging. Be patient with yourself as you may become overwhelmed in this stage and revert back to stage one. This is perfectly normal. Stage one allows you to work back toward the strong emotions in degrees and with a level of safety and distance. Staying with the strong emotions requires a high degree of awareness because intense emotions can hijack our reasoning powers. Maintaining awareness during the emotional processing will allow you to “ride the waves.” The obstruction of emotions creates blocks in the energy system. The emotions themselves are teachers and guide us directly to the source of healing. Understanding the messages that our emotions are trying to communicate can expedite this stage dramatically. Anger can signal a breach of boundaries. Grief and sadness tell me that I am getting ready to let go of something. Shame asks me to look at my integrity, hatred points me toward my own self rejection. Staying with the strong emotions of healing doesn’t have to take a long time. Once emotions are no longer obstructed and are allowed to flow naturally the process can happen very quickly. I think of my emotions like a train ride. In stage one, I am deciding whether or not I want to ride on the train. In stage two I decide on a destination and buy my ticket. But it is stage three where the movement happens and sometimes that train ride can be a little bumpy but as long as I don’t jump out of the window I will eventually get to my destination. Some destinations are further off than others so learning patience and gentleness while you travel is good advice.
Clarity and Action
After working with the emotions, I gain the insight that allows me to know what I need to do. Sometimes the doing means talking to someone that I have a difficult relationship with, or it means de-cluttering my closet. It might show me that I need to change my behavior toward a person or I may need to separate myself from a toxic relationship. It might be something small, like drinking more water or sleeping in late on the weekends. Whatever the action is, in this stage I am absolutely clear about it. I know what I need to do and how to do it. I have the confidence to move forward with purpose toward an action or goal. To stay with the train metaphor, this stage is where you get off the train. You have arrived at your destination and the purpose of your travel. I have found this to be a very exciting stage and the action needed is not something I shy away from. I feel ready and able to accept the consequences.
Epiphany and Gratitude
The fifth and final stage of emotional healing is a spontaneous shift of perception or viewpoint. It is the “aha moment” when the world as you have always known it (regarding the issue) turns on its head. Everything looks and feels different. This stage sets everything firmly in place. Once this epiphany or shift in thinking occurs, the old way of thinking, feeling, reacting and behaving is over. This results in a release of old pain, thoughts or other hurts that have lingered and I feel lighter, freer and less encumbered. These moments have always been highly charged and incredible turning points in my life. All of us have experienced the power of having our eyes opened to a new way of seeing an old issue. The epiphany is almost always a ridiculously small event that packs a powerful transformational punch. This is the No Return Zone. I don’t have to worry about falling back into the old pattern and getting stuck there. I am fundamentally changed. If I do revert to the old pattern out of habit I notice it simply doesn’t work. The power of the epiphany keeps me grounded in a different truth. I usually experience intense gratitude during this stage; gratitude for the whole, gloriously messy process that has brought me to a beautiful new understanding of myself and others. Gratitude allows me to be open and willing to do more emotional healing. It brings a sense of grace and purpose to the whole process. The pain and the healing become one.
Questions to Consider
- What does avoiding feel like in me?
- What is my preferred method of avoidance?
- How do I practice awareness without judgment?
- What do I do when I am ready to look at an issue?
- Are there patterns in my own life that I can discover?
- Can I name the issue I am confronting, can I separate it from me?
- What are the most consistent emotions I deal with regularly?
- What can those emotions teach me?
- What is the message these emotions are conveying?
- What does resistance of my emotions look like behaviorally?
- What does flowing emotions feel like in my body?
- Are there times in my life when I have known exactly what I needed to do?
- What were those times? What led to this clarity and willingness to act?
- Can I take a moment and remember a recent or life changing epiphany?
- Can I see how it has altered the course of my life, leading to greater change?
- What does gratitude feel like in my body?
- What kinds of thoughts are connected to gratitude?
- How does gratitude affect the quality of the healing process?
In conclusion, I want to reiterate that this process is my own experience and is in no way a definition of yours or anyone else’ healing path or experience. But I hope that my experience and this article about healing will get you thinking about your own process.
