Many of us, carry experiences from our past, and unfinished business like resentment, regret, grief, or unaddressed anger that can profoundly colour our present perception. When this happens, it shapes how we act, how we show up in the world, and ultimately, it can prevent us from creating the life we truly desire.
Someone once said: “Until you heal the wounds of your past, you’re going to continue to bleed.” If we never heal what hurt us from the past, we might unintentionally inflict some pain on those who didn’t hurt us in our present life.
It’s a powerful truth that many of us try to bury our past, hoping that by not talking about it, the pain will magically disappear. Yet, we can’t simply shove our pain inside and expect it to vanish; it just doesn’t work that way. A band-aid won’t stop a bullet wound from hurting, and similarly, if you don’t address the wounds of your past, you’ll continue to hurt in your own way.
An Approach to Healing: Beyond Just Talking About the Past
Over my 35-year career as a therapist, I’ve explored many different schools of thought in counseling and psychotherapy. While some approaches are incredibly effective, others, particularly those that solely focus on “digging up” the past or endlessly reliving it, can be less helpful.
It’s true that our current struggles often have a connection to the past. However, there’s no bottom to the pain of an abusive parent.
Approaches that focus only on revisiting past mistreatment can sometimes consign us to a never-ending cycle of re-experiencing hurt, anger, and feelings of unworthiness.
Simply talking about the past, while it has its place, isn’t enough to bring about transformation. True healing occurs when this discussion is accompanied by interventions and strategies designed to help you transform your experience of the past. This is why we at Alpine Clinic utilize a variety of effective modalities such as IFS (Internal Family Systems), EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), BSP (Brainspotting), Body-Centered Therapies, EFT (Emotionally Focused Therapy), and SP (Sensorimotor Psychotherapy), to name just a few.
Your Past Always Shows Up in Your Present
What’s crucial to understand in healing the past is that your difficulties from yesterday are constantly being replayed in the present moment. Your present life offers continuous opportunities to see where old wounds are still impacting you.
For example:
- When you set an important goal, what thoughts come up? Are they the same critical, hopeless thoughts you had as a child, or those you heard from your parents that have now become your own inner critic?
Your Past Always Shows Up in Your Present What’s crucial to understand in healing the past is that your difficulties from yesterday are constantly being replayed in the present moment. Your present life offers continuous opportunities to see where old wounds are still impacting you. For example: • When you set an important goal, what thoughts come up? Are they the same critical, hopeless thoughts you had as a child, or those you heard from your parents that have now become your own inner critic? • As you enter a new relationship, do familiar fears emerge? Are they the same fears you felt when your parents left you with a babysitter, or when a parent was emotionally unavailable? • Does your current partner trigger the same fears of trust that arose when a parent confided in you about another’s infidelity? • Does your inner critic today echo the voice of a parent who told you that you’d never amount to anything? • If you grew up believing “love hurts no matter what,” observe how you show up in relationships today. Do you find yourself walled off, overly cautious, or struggling with intimacy and connection? Perhaps you’ve developed fierce independence, giving off the message that you don’t need anyone, as a way to protect yourself from those early narratives about love. These situations aren’t just random events; they are profound indicators that your past is alive and well in your mind TODAY. You Can Only Heal the Past in the Present The only way to truly heal the past is by addressing it in the present moment. Realize that when you experience pain today, it’s a clue pointing back to wounds of the past. This is an invitation to explore what thoughts you might still be harbouring that are causing you pain in the present. There’s no need to endlessly dredge up anger towards an unavailable parent, a critical figure, or an abuser. It’s usually your current thinking that keeps the past alive. To truly heal the past, you must face your current thinking and interpretations of present events. The past will always offer you opportunities to confront your old wounds. This isn’t a sign of pathology; it’s a perfect mechanism for growth Life is always happening FOR you – rather than TO you. That’s why it’s so helpful to begin to think of life as happening FOR you, rather than TO you. Your present life is continuously offering you opportunities to face the fears, shame, and pain from the past within your current circumstances. So, instead of endlessly recounting your childhood on a couch, once you’ve shared your story a few times, it’s time for intervention. Simply telling a victim of childhood sexual abuse that “it wasn’t their fault” can be like talking to a brick wall. It often doesn’t make a real difference until that individual can see how, in a current relationship, they might still be blaming themselves or victimizing themselves with self-hatred. Only when they can recognize the need to reclaim their self-worth by standing up for themselves in the present can they truly let go of and heal the past. Embrace the Present Moment for Lasting Healing Look at your experiences in your present life as opportunities to look deep inside yourself, to see where you’re still stuck in the past. These events are not just confirmations of old belief systems (like “love will always hurt” or “you can’t trust anyone”); rather, they are gifts holding up a mirror, showing you exactly where your healing of the past needs to happen today. See them as opportunities for profound personal and spiritual development. While we are creatures of habit and largely a result of our past conditioning, this doesn’t mean we need to rehash the past endlessly, which can keep us stuck. We must find a way to honour the experiences that have happened to us, without minimizing their impact or invalidating our experiences, while simultaneously moving into the realm of the present. If you want to create a better life or better relationships, then please look at how you can heal your past. In my upcoming workshops, I will provide an elaborate understanding of how the past dictates our current life, along with some of the most powerful tools to release and move on from old wounds. Please join me if you are ready to learn how to be free from past wounds. |
