Roadmap to Healing (or Paris): How Revisiting Old Memories Can Heal Old Wounds
Revisiting old emotional wounds may require revisiting old people, places and things — and a healthy dose of self-love and compassion
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Do you believe you can you go back in time, revisitrelationships and places and collect forgotten pieces of yourself in order toheal?
While there are likely bits of ourselves we’d like to leavein the past, they’re all essential parts of the whole, our whole. Together, thesum total paints the canvas of our story in all of its complexity and allows usto show up as the fullest expression of who we truly are. When we are afraid todo this, when we are afraid to share who we are…we instead spend a lifetimedeveloping tools to hide ourselves. And the path only grows longer, windier andharder to find our way home.
Greatness takes guts — and there’s nothing greater thanshowing up for yourself, for who you are here to be and to manifest all you aremeant to bring forth…and yeah, that can be scary. That kind of stuff doesn’tnormally happen in our ‘comfort zones’.
I don’t know if you are anything like me, but I like to knowwhere I’m going whether in the car or in life…I mean all the directions, signposts, bumps in the road (if only). Aaaah, the Universe sighs…silly girl.Hey, you can’t blame a girl for trying, can you?
I recently returned from a trip to Paris with my Mother andsister. It was our 3rd trip together and yet, I spent many yearstraveling, living and working there as a young fashion model. So the streets ofParis are paved with the memories of my youth into young adulthood — some fullof great anticipation and excitement, many others full of sadness, fear andconfusion. It was within this glorious city that I adore, where much of mylimited thinking and disempowering beliefs were bred and grew tenacious roots.
Is there a place like this in your life?
Would you go back?
Are there unhealed pieces to reclaim?
It would take me decades to piece it all back together againand see it differently. It would take me decades to forgive that young girl fornot having the tools, the information or the support to navigate some trickylife stuff — or to know that that was even an option. It took me even longer torealize just how much I had to thank her for. Instead of seeing all that shedid wrong, I had to focus on where it all led, where she had gotten me.
Showing up for yourself requires accountability,self-compassion, trust and a willingness to shift, to cease from replaying theold records in our heads that tell us we aren’t good enough, thin enough, richenough, smart enough, whatever enough.
Remember, needles were meant to be pulled from records.
It starts with getting real about what’s going on in yourlife and clear about where you want to go — and what steps you are taking toget there. Part of that is seeing the truth.
Despite the command I have of my life and present day self,I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that my regrets of years past still blowwhispers in my ears when I visit Paris. All those ‘should haves’ taunt me likebullies on a playground.
On this recent trip I laughed to myself remembering whatlife ‘back then’ was like — no Internet, no mobile phones, no Google and noSiri to ask, How do I get to Isle St. Louis by metro? Better yet, Howdo I navigate through this sticky life situation?
Each night in our hotel room, as I navigated my way throughinformation and plotted routes via my computer and smartphone, I was actuallyquite stunned imagining how in the world I had ever done this as a young girl.How did we operate in a world without constant connectivity? It’s actually hardto even remember.
Constant connectivity doesn’t necessarily equate to connectionto self. No one ever taught me to read that roadmap — to listen to myintuition, to trust my gut, to check in at any point and hear what my body wastelling me. From goosebumps to butterflies in our stomachs — we need to learnto follow that GPS system.
Today, we’re bound by a text thread…I’m running late,I’ll be there in 2 minutes, I’ve got a table, should I order you a matchalatte?…etc. And at 16 years old with a small book in hand, Plan deParis, I navigated Paris by myself sans Siri. And somehow I got fromappointment to appointment and photoshoot to photoshoot — from adolescence tohere.
But I digress.
Though the emotional charge and grip upon me has faded withyears, I now see what had been missing. I recognize the lack of nurturing, themissing tools and skills to rely upon and the people to guide me.
My Best Self Magazine journey is a constanton-the-job refresher, rejuvenator, re-booter, reminder. I like to believe ithelps me be a better Mother to my 19-year old son and it helps me nurture mywounded inner child. Denying her hurts doesn’t make them go away. Pretending weare something we are not, doesn’t make us so.
I witness pain in people all the time in both my personallife and professional one. And I wholeheartedly believe we need to heal thewounds of our past to set ourselves free so that we can step into thatgreatness and keep on stepping.
And I know that can sound overwhelming, like undergoing amajor house renovation — but it needn’t be. I also know, it can make us want torun for shelter and hide. Don’t be afraid. If something hurts — look at it.It’s calling you. It’s here because you are ready to see it. It has somethingto share.
Could you take one step in that direction? Remember as a kidwhen you were afraid of the dark or looking for the monsters underneath yourbed? I literally used to take a leap into bed after brushing my teeth at nightbecause I was convinced something would grab my bare ankle. I don’t know howlong I tortured myself with this notion, but the moment I muscled the strengthto look…I realized there was nothing there.
What’s binding you? What are you allowing to take uppermanent residency in your mind that sabotages you? Maybe you should justdeclare…I’m ready to look. I’m ready to shift. I’m ready to be done withthis.
Life doesn’t come with a foldout map to guide us, but there is much we can do to support ourselves and each other through this precious journey. Let’s show up and do this! That’s the stuff that your Best Self is made of.
Let me know in the comments below if there’s a place that comes to mind for you, somewhere you would go to heal some old emotional wounds.