Healing.

note: Some trauma is well outside of one’s control, and I recognize that one could be stuck in situations of trauma because of this. This post should be read with this in mind, and any reader should feel free to take what they can from it and leave the rest.

The weight that seems to enter through your shoulders and your mind and your heart and your stomach at the same time is suddenly lighter.

That day in which you no longer feel it, whatever “it” is, could happen tomorrow. We keep telling ourselves that we will be completely healed when we no longer feel anything toward a situation, person, or place. The truth is, trauma, problems, and pain will recur, but the healing will as well.

The healed state of being is not a destination to reach, but rather a moment that arrives with a new day and disappears with another. You should do whatever you need to do to feel like your best self as this happens. Not everyone in your life will support you or show up for you in the way that you need, and some will reprimand you for your hurting or “taking a long time” to recover. You have every right to take space (whether for a day or forever) away from these folks. You have every right to distance yourself from places, writings, songs, photos, and foods that hurt you. You have every right to express how you feel (in a safe way). Acknowledging that the process could be lifelong is a necessity. You should never be expected to simply forgive or forget, or to thrive every second after something happens. One cannot wash away a moment or person.

Sometimes, the hardest thing to do is to heal from yourself. As I stated previously, we focus on healing from external situations, but your own mind is what reinforces the pain. We keep reliving these moments to find answers or to pinpoint where we made mistakes, even if the situation did not occur because of us. I was reminded recently that I might still feel achy because this is what keeps me tied to situations, and prevents me from letting go of them. I tweeted this back in June 2019: “you search for your own healing in someone else (often the one who tore you apart in the first place) only to discover that this healing is found within yourself.” While I know exactly to what these words were referring, I still find it helpful to view things this way now.

Honestly, I still feel like I am healing from situations that happened months or even years ago. A part of this is because some moments feel as though they occurred just yesterday, and I find difficulty in processing how much time has passed. These situations range between relationships, work, health, and much more. I still feel frustrated and hurt, and sometimes I just want to hide. In most ways, I am in a much better place than I was during some periods of time in the past, but I cannot completely shake some emotional scar tissue even so. I have spent so much time trying to reach a destination, but now I just try to coexist with the bumps in the road.

check out my healing playlist on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1CWVBiLHgtjSxqtq9xKpXQ?si=mYruuANGSeeJ94DMO97Hnw