Heal Trauma Conditioning, Discover Your Mission
The Swiss psychoanalyst, Alice Miller, wrote of the “gifted child” and the conditioned roles children learn to play for their caregivers. By “gifted,” Alice truly meant highly attuned to one’s environment and able to detect and absorb emotion energy like a cat in the jungle. With such gifts, children inevitably take on a myriad of learned emotional protections against vulnerability, as well as unconscious responsibility for the caregiving of their caregivers. All caregivers are children in adult bodies carrying a lineage of unresolved emotional conflicts, and their children, in child bodies, learn to survive and adapt to these conflicts through their little nervous systems. The child brain becomes wired to support the learned survival strategies, complete with wired beliefs about themselves, others, and the world, and associated emotion states deemed acceptable or unacceptable. Children will attempt to hide or punish any surfacing of characteristics, emotions, or behaviors that do not support the reception of love and care, while spotlighting those that do. In distorted and disturbed home environments, and even in supportive ones by all accounts, children’s brains become conditioned to pursue the emotional attunement and associated behaviors that reep such loving rewards, though the “love” is conditional by nature. As a result, the child’s capacity to recognize the emotional needs of their environment takes precedence over the emotional needs within them. They sacrifice the emerging emotional, physical, and spiritual gifts within themselves to play the “gifted” role in the family.
This description is a classic understanding of early attachment dynamics and the conditioned roles children learn to play within the family unit. As you grow into adulthood, you may stumble on you conditioned life path since your strategies continue to be based on what is necessary to receive the love and admiration of those around you. Consciously or not, your true gifts may remain hidden. Sometimes this brings success in many forms, sometimes not. Regardless of the success rewarded for such a mission, it cannot truly be the mission of your soul until you recognize the conditioning that has created it. After that, if your mission remains the same, you may follow it out of your own free will and choosing with renewed awareness and intention. The process of cracking open and deconditioning is messy and may come with the disapproval of others, but consider your messiness a worthy price to discover the whole power of who you are. You may temporarily rupture the family dynamics that have become so engrained, so accepted, and so comfortable by other family members or loved ones, but consider this as a necessary invitation for all to heal the conditioned roles they have learned to play. You are giving others the same gift you give to yourself, that of the invitation to discover who you are without the expectations of others. Some may live very comfortable lives never exploring their conditioning and I wish them well, but for you, me, and others, your lives may hang in the balance and it may be as dire as a life of suffering or of freedom.
Personally, I never felt there was much of an option. I grew debilitatingly sick and dis-eased the longer I tried to pursue conditioned roles for love and approval, continuing to re-enact long held beliefs about what it means to be “good enough.” But the brain is not conditioned for joy, only for survival. And, ultimately, there is no “good enough” for others. Until I recognized the roots of my conditioning and aimed to transmute this power at all costs, my gifts remained hidden, deeply afraid of the light. As I continued to uncover the expansive nature of my service, beyond the traditional boxes I had known, some disapproved, some did not understand, and some were disappointed, and some continue to be, but to say “Yes” to the truth of your own soul is nobody else’s business at the end of the day. You are here for a reason and you can trust that the universe/Spirit/Source/Creator wants you to find out what that is! Ultimately, you are a child of Spirit and this is the only authority you need hold dear on your destined path.
Healing involves learning how to harness these gifts in a way that serves the whole of your being, not just the behaviors that get rewarded by others, and is aligned with your highest intention and service to the world. The point is not that others do not want you to succeed or be of highest service, but others may not yet be able to recognize what is emerging out of the role you have played for so long. All of our brains become conditioned to identifying people in certain ways, and when those images begin to change, it can be frightening for us to adapt and we may question those changes out of fear. Family may want the very best for you, which is why they may struggle to see you taking “risks” and exposing new parts of yourself previously ignored or walled off. Not only may others be frightened, but you will be terrified as well! All of the doubts and fears your brain has internalized about disappointing others over the years will emerge in full force. The practice of healing is the practice of quieting, exposing, and disproving those deeply rooted limiting beliefs over time. As you move through these fears, you chart a path for others to do the same - this is how true inner change is enacted and modeled. This is how leaders are born, destinies fulfilled.
The invitation in this, at times, confusing and messy process is to see through and let go, as much as you can, of the conditioned love that has come to define your most intimate relationships. Your parents are not the beholders of love nor do they get to choose how it is disseminated. Love resides within you, unending and ever-growing. As you take steps toward a truth only you can know with gifts only you possess, a love of self will flourish in the absence of the conditioned love you have relied upon up until this point. Your brain will concoct all kinds of fears around what your life may look like in the absence of such supports. Maybe you fear you will be homeless, outcast from society, and a leper to all. Notice the catastrophe that such fear-based stories present in your mind and remember that you are not the one choosing to live in fear, anger, sadness, or hate. If others choose to do so, that is their choice and freedom, but it is none of your business. Your business can and always will be to love, your self first and then the world, as disapproving and harsh as it may seem at times. As you grow toward this loving place within, you may notice others adjust course and begin to meet your frequency with their own love. You may notice others begin to see the powerful and passionate light emerge from your being and decide they want some of that to. You may notice you now have something to give others who are also attempting to learn of and break free from conditioned roles. In time, with patience and grace, you will align with those meant to support your journey and to be of greatest service to you. Those who are willing to grow with you will amplify your true mission as it comes into view.
If you have read my work, you know I consider the elements of trauma we carry to stem not only from early life roles but from ancestral lineage, and even past lives as well. Using intuitive guidance, you can uncover this “soul map” of trauma conditioning and allow it to bring a life path and soul mission into focus. As you clear the conditioning of this “soul team,” you are able to learn from the resilience and resourcefulness of your ancestors and all who came before you to support your vision. If you think you are a separate individual floating in space, recognize the long lineage of supporters you carry within you who have shaped you and watched you every step of the way. You only must clear the conditioned traumas of this supporting cast of inner children, ancestors, and past lives to receive the full weight of their gifts. From this expanded view of who you are, you will begin to see with clarity and conviction the purpose you have on this earth and the true mission laid out before you.