He was poking me. Not physically. Emotionally. His words landing like shards of glass in my throat and chest.
The pain was unbearable. It was a suffocating thing. All consuming and deep.
So, I did what typically happens when we are in this level of suffering: I lashed out with biting words of sarcasm. I knew my words were wrong and irrational, but rationality takes a back seat when pain is in the driver’s seat.
And then came the tears. My tears. Deep, guttural tears that had nothing to do with his poking words and everything to do with the unaddressed wounds within me.
The pain in my heart lasted long after he hung up on me. It ached between my bones and clung to the pores of my skin, stinging my eyes with unshed tears.
There is no greater pain than living with unaddressed wounds.
Emotional pain holds on greater than a rabid Rottweiler biting down on a pant leg. It’s unwavering, unrelenting and feels like your soul is coming apart.
Break Out to Break Through
The pain I felt was so intense that I knew there was only one thing left to do: explore it.
“When you squeeze an orange, orange juice comes out, because that’s what’s inside. When you are squeezed, what comes out is what is inside.”-Wayne Dyer
I looked at the wound within me. And there I found a history of wounds. I unravelled each wound until a pattern began to form.
The wounds were from a lifetime of false narratives, all of them being told by unhealthy, narcissistic, insecure men.
The pain I felt was a lifetime of me contorting myself to fit their narrative.
We each have the power to transform our pain to empowerment.
The man goading me was just another manifestation of that false narrative. He was able to “get a rise out of me” because of the unaddressed wounds that I’d bandaged up, with psychological pus oozing out of them.
A peace arrived within me when I addressed the root of the wound:
I was a victim of abuse. I am not the abuse. The power is always within me. I can choose to love and be love, regardless of what others do.
This doesn’t mean that I don’t experience moments of sadness or grief, pain or disappointment. It means that I allow those emotions to rise and fall within me, no different than waves in an ocean.
“Don’t think you’d be free if you just didn’t have these kinds of feelings. It’s not true. If you can be free even though you’re having these kinds of feelings, then you’re really free — because there will always be something.”-Michael Singer
When I allow the pain, it passes through and doesn’t stick around to form a new wound.
Emotional pain arises because of the unaddressed wounds we carry. It’s ripping off the figurative Band-aid that allows us to heal. It’s allowing ourselves to feel the pain and breathe through it that brings us true peace.
The need to poke another emotionally is sourced from an unaddressed wound. Those who manipulate, lie, and deflect responsibility are walking around this planet with significant unaddressed wounds.
True peace arrives when we realize we can only be responsible for our own inner healing.
I cannot get sick enough to make that man healthy. You cannot get poor enough to make someone else feel wealthy.
Freedom means allowing another to choose their own path, however destructive that may be.
A peaceful life begins when we embrace the four C’s: I will not control, change, cause, or contribute.
But we can choose to be light and love to others. We do this when we prioritize our own healing.
Sheri Jacobs 