Time Does Not Heal All Wounds
I recently heard someone say that old school phrase: "Time heals all wounds" and it'd been a minute since someone around me had said it so when I heard it, it was almost like I was hearing it for the first time.
Why?
Because at this point in my own healing journey and also witnessing others' journeys, it feels shockingly incorrect.
I understand the comforting intention of the phrase, I really do, but the truth is that time really does not heal all wounds. Time may certainly give space, perspective and clarity, lessen intense reactions / emotions, make the memory less clear........but time on its own does not heal.
And if we fall into the trap of believing it does, we miss the opportunity to heal in the ways that we probably actually need.
Because you see when something traumatic happens to us - big or small - our brain may forget the details or the memory all together, but the body does not. The body keeps the score (highly recommend this book btw).
Sometimes our bodies can metabolize and process the trauma and we can move on from whatever happened but sometimes it cannot and the stress of the situation, job, relationship, conversation, incident, etc. stays stuck in our nervous system.
It's like our body takes a recording of the trauma it experienced and even if we have physically moved on, it's like that tape is still running in the background and filtering our experiences in ways we may not even be aware of.
Our energy, a piece of us, is still stuck somewhere in the past and if we're lucky, something triggers us, wake us up and reminds us that that pain is still there.
Why is that lucky?
Because that trauma - that stuck energy - is no longer hiding away in the shadows wreaking havoc on our nervous system and our life in known and possibly unknown ways.
We cannot heal what is not revealed.
When something reveals itself we then have choice.
We can choose what Resmaa Menakem calls "dirty pain: When we avoid pain and discomfort, we also create more of it for ourselves and for others" or we can choose "clean pain: the pain that mends and can build our capacity for growth. It is the pain we experience when we don't know what to do, when we are scared, and when we step forward into the unknown anyway, with honesty and vulnerability."
When we choose clean pain, we choose to liberate ourselves from the shackles of our past. We can create, or at least begin to imagine, a future that is independent of what happened to us; a future that expands us and is filled with freedom and possibility not just for ourselves......but for the collective as well.
So, when/if time reveals to you a trigger / a pain / a trauma, what will you choose?
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