At times I wonder why things that happened to me a very long time ago still can usher in a gnawing hurt in my heart. Have I not worked hard in recovery to gain an understanding of pain from my past? I know I have. I like to think of my relationship with my past using a word picture. It helps me keep things in perspective.
I imagine myself sitting in a car that has a heavy film over the front windshield. The film is the hurt, pain and shame from my past. It is a film that I see all of life through, what I engage the world around me through. I have done much work in recovery in identifying and dealing with my shame, and I have gained the ability to remove the film of past hurts and pain from the front windshield, and place them in the rearview mirror. I know they are still there. I see them every time I glance in the rearview mirror. However, they no longer are the film across the front windshield that hides the beauty of life. I do not deny that my hurts and pain from the past exist, but I have worked hard to put them in a proper perspective and not allow them to have the final say in how I want to live my life today. This has been a large part of my recovery journey.
Tammy Smith, PhD, author of Soul Satisfaction, has given me a better understanding of why the ache in my heart is there. I have a hole in my heart where the hurt from my childhood is, and no one can fill it except God. Dr. Smith says, “It’s when we expect ‘longing for God=childhood needs all fixed and satisfied’ that we are in trouble. Soul satisfaction in Jesus is a reality, but it does not mean that all wrong done to you on this planet will be righted. Not by any stretch” (p. 46).She goes on to say recovery entails knowing the difference between soul longings from childhood ones. I have to understand that childhood wounds will most likely never be completely settled in my soul this side of heaven. We live in a space between “Eden and eternity”. We live in a place where hurts exist and our souls long for perfect connection with God.
When I first read this I found myself angry at God. It was not fair that I could work so hard in recovery, and my heart would still feel the “little girl” pain. Why would God only lessen it and not completely take it away? It has been a process for me to understand and trust God. Living with the residuals of childhood pain in the here and now has driven me to lean on God as my Sustainer, the only One I can truly give everything to, and find grace to continue. It has increased my empathy for others’ pain. It has taught me how to live fully present today, holding the anticipation for the day when all the pain of living on this planet will be done away with.
I have someone close to me in my life who continually reminds me to interject the little word AND into my thinking. It has proved to be a small but powerful word to me. Here is an example of how it might look:
“I am really struggling today with that longing to have a mom pull me in close and have me feel safe.” My friend says, “AND what else do you feel and know?” “I know I have a heavenly Father who loves me with an unfailing love, and I can see and feel how that love gets played out every day in my life.”
Do you see how AND does not negate the little girl need and longing? It ushers in a duality of thought and feeling. I acknowledge my unmet longing, AND remember that God cares for me while that pain exists this side of heaven. I also have the solid hope that someday in eternity that need and longing will be 100% gone as I rest in the presence of Jesus.
Often, my heart surges with love and deep connection as I play, laugh, hug, and converse with my children, and yet in that same space I feel a deep sadness, a kind of longing for something that never was. You see, I do not have a close relationship with my parents. Honestly, I never have. That is simply the truth. The ability to let both of those truths be present is a measure of maturity I have gained in recovery. It is a sense of allowing both of those realities to exist. It is not stuffing down those feeling s of hurt from the past, but acknowledging them and letting God lessen them. For many years I stuffed feelings of hurt, pain, anxiety, shame and fear. That was the bedding ground for my eating disorder, my alcoholism, and my self-harm. Today, I am better at letting joy and grief hold the same space, even at the same time.
So what about you? Are there hurts and longings from childhood that seem to overwhelm your heart, and keep you from engaging in life? Dealing with your shame, putting it in the proper place of the rear-view mirror, and learning how to use the power of AND in your feeling and thinking can bring wholeness to your being. It is not an easy process. It will take time. God will meet you there to do the work. He wants us to live in the reality of His Love, and to remember that He is with us through everything. We will be in His presence someday for eternity, AND He is also with us now as we walk this time between Eden and eternity.