Transforming Wounds into Scars Through Radical Self Love
“When I look a certain way I am lovable”
“When I have an open heart I am lovable”
“When I am articulate I am lovable”
“When I am in the light I am lovable”
“When I am perfect I am lovable”
Do any of these sound familiar to you? If so, welcome to the experience of being human! Humans are seduced by the belief that certain emotions and parts of ourselves are more lovable than others. We may feel once we achieve a certain status then we’ll be worthy and whole. Many of us are terrified of our shadows because society convinces there is something wrong with us if were aren’t ‘happy’ or ‘stable’. We may believe that we are ‘bad’ when we feel bitter, sharp, cold, and dull. As long as we are human we will be light dancing with shadow although. Our flaws are just as lovable as the idealized parts of ourselves. As poet Rumi states, “The wound is where the light enters.” Within the bloody gaping wound is where we get to embody the love of the Divine within.
It is difficult to embody the ‘higher version’ of ourselves if we don’t accept exactly how we show up in our raw expression.I would love to offer a reframe that the higher self is merely radical self acceptance. What could be ‘higher’ than unconditional love! You see, when we place certain parts of ourselves on a pedestal we end up rejecting the others and they are suppressed into the unconscious. Our unconscious is the shadow realm. These parts will continue to surface to our conscious awareness, aka the light, until they are integrated and held. Radical acceptance of our imperfections is expansion. It is light. When we allow whatever is presenting itself to be there without resistance, it organically shifts and transforms. The warmth of acceptance is like the beaming sun shining it’s rays on a frozen iceberg. The iceberg (or unprocessed memory) in our nervous system begins to melt into fluid energy. From this space other parts of ourselves are discovered like a hidden treasure chest in the depth of the ocean.
The light of our awareness is the same magic which allows the beast to transform into beauty. In the fairy tale, Beauty and the Beast, the beast represents the shadow and Belle represents the light of our loving awareness- the true self. There was a spell casted over the prince and Belle was forced to stay with him. At first she rejected his ‘ugliness’ which only made him act more vicious. Once she fell in love with him for who he was the spell was broken and the beast transformed into beauty. This is an archetypal story of the alchemy which happens within the human psyche when we cast love to our darkest shadows and deepest flaws. We don’t have to like them. We don’t even have to love them. We just need to be willing to trust they are worthy of our acceptance.
One of the reasons it is challenging to accept our inner beast is because we identify it as who we are. Our shadow is wounds from the past which were left unprocessed in the nervous system. When we experience pain and it is past our window of tolerance (our ability to contain our experience with regulation) it then gets locked into the amygdala (or fear center in the brain). Life will continue to trigger us so that these unprocessed memories, aka shadows, can heal until there is no charge. The big misconception about our shadow is that it is ‘bad’ or ‘unlovable’. We are taught that it needs to go away, or the worst, ‘be destroyed’. Is this the way a parent would talk to their sweet baby crying though? The shadow is merely a cry for emotional attunement. It want’s to be held. It is a call for radical self-love. Our true self is not the shadow, it is the regulated parent.
The parts of ourselves we often reject are not just our hurt inner child- but the wounded child within our mother, grandmother, and ancestral line. When these shadows are not integrated(or held with love) they continue to get handed down from one generation after the next. The child within is a mirror of the collective pain. We are a host for all of the collective wounds. Every time we choose to meet our shadow with kindness, we are quite literally healing the collective psyche. We are embodying the Divine parent who loves all of it’s children’s the same no matter how naughty or obnoxious they are.
We intimately know and embody our Divinity as we choose into radical self love. Self love is the medicine which heals our bloody wounds into scars. It restores the sight of our intrinsic wholeness and beauty. We are always whole within every experience- no matter how raw, shattered, and dark it may feel. As we see our shadow as an innocent child we realize we were never broken and don’t have to be ‘fixed’. We were perfect all along because perfection is our loving awareness which contains all with a warm embracive hug and kiss. Remembering radical self-love is the magic which transforms beasts into beauty and shame into sovereignty. It is the miracle which reminds us that we are and always were lovable.