What are your wounds?

By looking at what things get you upset and angry you can identify what your wounds are. For example, in my early years of marriage, I would have a "temper tantrum" if I thought my husband was spending too much time with his family. I had abandonment issues and these feelings would get triggered by this situation. One way to know that an old wound is getting triggered is by the intensity of the response- obviously my response was over the top for the situation, other emotions were being called up or my response would have been in proportion to the situation. When we have a super strong reaction to a seemingly small situation, an old wound is getting triggered.

We are all wounded. We all get triggered.

It's good to try and know what our wounds are so that our wounds do not dictate our life. When we are unaware of them consciously, we act them out unconsciously (my temper tantrums over my husband spending time with his family). One common theme for wounds, is that at any sign of perceived rejection we become extremely upset, angry or demanding. If we can take a breath and have some acknowledgment that we got triggered, we can take care of our self and not allow our wounded part to create chaos.

As Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes has said, we want our wounds to be in the background, not the foreground of our lives. We can accomplish this by knowing that when we get flooded with emotions, recognize that there is something else going on- we need to be kind and patient with ourselves as we reveal the real reason for the distress. Ask yourself: when have I felt like this before? Does this remind me of something? What am I afraid of? Writing this down is powerful in helping us to understand ourselves. Sharing with another safe person is also healing.

There are gifts in our wounds. Our wounds have helped make us who we are today. In my next post I will explore the gifts in our wounds.

For today, be gentle with yourself and all your wounded parts.