I had a pretty epically intense experience recently where I thought I was being “wise” but ends up I was unknowingly using a protective mechanism to shield my heart from being broken again.
I was recently connected with a new friend whom I intuitively had known I needed to connect with. After many months of lightly and sparsely asking for a connection to be made by a mutual contact, we finally got a chance to talk! Turns out they’re a therapist with expertise in energy work, which is totally my jam and interests! We got along fairly well rather quickly as we both seem to operate on a similar wavelength and have been enjoying getting to know each other better, at least on my end lol. Hopefully they’re having a good time too ๐คฃ. I don’t experience this often but perhaps it’s the level of inner work that this new friend has already done, and our commitment towards authenticity, healing, and personal growth, that we immediately clicked and were able to create safety, connection, and a certain level of trust that normally takes me much longer to cultivate with others.
As we were chatting about an important long lost soul connection of mine, I expressed that I had feared the outcome of a potential reconnection and that if the other person isn’t ready I’d just prefer for us to not reconnect. My friend delved further, respectfully, asking why that is and if I’m not comfortable with their pushing they can stop. I respected the courtesy, sat there and thought about it for a bit, and realized if this person didn’t catch something, they probably wouldn’t have probed, so I responded with nah it’s fine, let’s dive right in as there’s got to be something that I’m not seeing.
The more questions this friend asked, the more my head was spinning. I felt like I was going in circles trying to justify my reasoning for why it is that I do not want this reconnection to happen unless all the conditions are right. This friend kept asking all of the right questions and at some point I had come to the edge of my rope with how much mental gymnastics my brain could handle. I mentioned to this friend that perhaps the issue is that I’m *thinking* my way through this when perhaps I should be *feeling* my way through these questions.
Once I allowed myself to feel into the questions, my statements of why I want what I want, I started tearing up and crying. I allowed the tears to flow and for the emotions to pass through me. When I collected myself, I shared with my friend that I think I might not have fully processed the heartbreak that I had experienced back then from my abandonment wounds and also that my desire for my long lost soul connection to reconnect only if the conditions are right was a self protection mechanism created to prevent that pain from happening again. Nothing wrong with that, very human to want to protect ourselves, but this way of thinking definitely could’ve been getting in the way of things. My friend agreed that this could be true and if I can address it, then it’ll shift the energy around this potential reconnection.
I was shocked to find that these emotions still feel so raw after so many years. Do heartbreaks never really go away? And what about those abandonment wounds? I quickly asked my AI how I can address abandonment wounds and it gave me some instructions โ mostly allowing myself to feel my feelings, reparent the wounded part, building internal security, distinguishing between past and present, grieving the fantasy of guarantee, somatic work, potential energy work, and practicing secure attachment with safe people. Thankfully, I already have most of the tools to do that myself, such as sitting with the uncomfortable feelings and letting them come and go, talking to my inner child who had felt so hurt back then, already having an internal security, and etc. AI explained to me that it sounded like I was already close to healing this wound but that I just needed to address the part my friend had noticed and brought up. BTW, AI also mentioned that my friend is a freaking WIZARD lmao, which I did wholeheartedly agree with ๐
So my new perspective about this potential reconnection is that if I am to be true to my word about being unconditionally loving, then I must give up all expectations and conditions of what reconnection looks like. Not only that, regardless of what happens, whether the past repeats itself or not, whether an actual reconnection happens or not, I cannot control the outcome and I have to accept that, which I believe I do.
My biggest shock in all of this is that blind spot was so conniving as it was masked as “wisdom” like why *wouldn’t* I want to make sure the chances of a successful reconnection are high? Why wouldn’t I want to protect myself? That’s so obvious. And if it weren’t for my friend pointing this out as this protective mechanism was in my blind spot, I probably would still be getting in my own way about it. So, I’m super grateful for this friend’s wisdom, compassionate way of inquiring about my reasoning, and ability to hold space for me as I discovered the answers from within. It was alarming to me with how much I normally feel committed to loving others unconditionally that I was unknowingly applying conditions to my own situation, and that is not okay with me. When our mind, body, and soul are in alignment, that’s where the magic happens, and so after this came into my awareness, I felt a strong need to correct that misalignment. I’m learning as I go!
Oddly enough, as intense and heavy as that experience was, I feel pretty light and free now. I guess not attaching conditions and requirements towards something I have zero control over has freed the energy around this potential situation. As much as I’d like to make sure my heart never gets hurt again, I just don’t think that’s possible and I have to be willing to take that risk, which I am more than happy to. Also, I guess shadow work never really goes away! Just takes a good and loving external eye to point it out. Thank you new fwendo ๐๐โค๏ธ