Talking to your inner child. Who is the Inner Child and what to do when he is terribly lonely? Rules for working with the Inner Child

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A storm of emotions caused by a seemingly innocent remark, a sharp and persistent feeling of sadness that cannot be explained by events or circumstances, an all-consuming need for recognition or protection... All these are manifestations of our inner child - that part of us that has not matured and which expresses its needs all the more insistently, the less it was listened to in the past.

The concept of our inner child is familiar to anyone who is interested in personal development, but for the rest it remains vague and even mysterious. “This child has a psychic reality,” explains psychoanalyst Moussa Nabati. 1 - He embodies the foundations of our being, everything that has not been erased from our childhood - fears, traumas, anger, joys and desires.

“When our inner child is in its proper place, and its needs are met, we begin to act on our desires”

The psychoanalyst draws an analogy between what the inner child means to us and the impact the first pages of the book of our lives have on us: we do not remember the time when these pages were written, but they are imprinted with such force on us that they continue in us to act. “Awareness of the existence of the inner child helps to live in such a way as to be more active and speaking face and to a lesser extent, an object through which others speak and act,” explains coach Geneviève Caillou. 2 - When this child takes power over us, we are driven by the need to be loved, recognized, hugged, listened to. When he takes his rightful place, when his needs are listened to and satisfied, we act according to our desires, we have the opportunity to make choices, to enter into relationships from subject to subject. From the point of view of inner freedom and mental well-being, this is a fundamental difference.

When we listen to and understand our inner child and thereby become good parent for him, it completely changes our relationship with ourselves and others. Clamps disappear, fear, shame and anger can be recognized, listened to and "put in place." The adult in us begins to think more clearly and becomes more free. Then he can deal better with himself and with others.

Instruction

Make yourself comfortable in a quiet place where no one can disturb you. Imagine that next to you is the child that you once were, and establish contact with him. Ask him to find out how to take care of him.

Choose one of these four patterns

Cheerful child

• What makes you laugh and cheer? (Let an incident from your childhood come to mind.)
• What usually makes you the most happy?
• Are you happy often?
• If this is not so, then what prevents you from rejoicing more often?

Discover Your Sources of Joy Today: what gives you physical and mental pleasure (alone or in relationships, with what people, under what circumstances, under what conditions...).

Try to appreciate them more(taking "freeze-frames" to fully experience them). If you feel that there are too few of them, try to create moments of joy, instead of waiting for them to appear in your life. Notice and replay those moments of intense emotion when you feel joyful, calm, and collected.

frightened child

Questions for your inner child

• What is it that scares you so much? (Let an incident from your childhood come to mind.)
• What usually scares you? Are you often afraid? What do your parents, teachers, friends do with your fear?
• Are you comforted? If not, how would you like to be comforted and encouraged?

How to be a good parent to yourself

First, accept your fear. without shame and guilt, without trying to minimize or reject it. You can say out loud to yourself, "I'm afraid."

Breathe in and out through your nose as long as you can.

Understand the nature of your fear(fleeting, constant, vague, concrete...). It can be a phobia (fear of flying), an anxiety that generates negative scenarios (fear of failure, fear of being abandoned...) or a reaction to a sense of threat (riding the subway alone at one in the morning).

Get back to the reality of the here and now. If your fear is the result of projections, remember that emotions are the result of thoughts, which in turn are the result of beliefs.

Crying baby

Questions for your inner child

• Why are you crying? (Let an incident from your childhood come to mind.)
• What usually makes you sad the most?
• Are you sad often?
• What do your parents, teachers, friends do with your sadness?
• Are you comforted? If not, how would you like to be comforted?

How to be a good parent to yourself

First of all, accept what you are experiencing. in this moment, accept that this emotion is present, sharp and painful. You can say out loud to yourself, "I'm sad."

Try to find its cause as accurately as possible.

Look for what could make this emotion less intense, less long, less frequent (talk to a loved one about it, change the situation or relationship that is causing the sadness; consider therapy if you feel the cause of the unhappiness is deep and old).

Support yourself, comfort yourself Take pleasure in taking care of yourself the way you would take care of your best friend.

Angry child

Questions for your inner child

• What makes you so angry? (Let an incident from your childhood come to mind.)
• What usually makes you angry? Are you angry often?
• What do your parents, your teachers, your friends do with your anger? Are you comforted? If not, how would you like to be calmed and "cooled"?

How to be a good parent to yourself

First of all, accept the emotion that you are experiencing at the moment, accept that it is there, poignant and painful. You can say to yourself out loud: "I'm angry, I'm angry, I'm furious."

Breathe deeply to relieve stress: inhale and exhale through the nose and as long as possible.

Find what caused your anger(unfair criticism); figure out what particularly hurt you (“I had a feeling that I was devalued”); ask yourself if your emotion was justified but excessive, or justified and commensurate with the occasion.

To make anger your ally start by not jumping into conflict-prone conversations right away so you can calm yourself down with breathing and relaxation techniques. Then calmly consider how to reduce or negate the factors that provoke your anger.

2 Personal and organizational development specialist. Co-author of the book Understanding Self and Others (L’Intelligence de soi et de l’autre, InterÉditions, 2014).

Meditation is the key to the formation of reality, a way to influence the subconscious, the formation of oneself, as new personality. Revealing their weak sides and fears, they can be eradicated by meditation. One such problem that needs to be worked on is our inner child. There are many practices, the task of which, just the same, to help your child. All of them have a common name: "Inner Child Meditation". These are truly deep, rich meditations, the virtues of which will be described below.

Once I found a meditative diagnostic technique, which I will share below. Her results amazed me. Such a simple, literally ten-minute exercise, opened my eyes to something that I did not know. About what drives my actions, what I try to get from the world and from other people, and what I miss the most. Later I realized that I subconsciously knew about it, but did not want to admit it to myself.

The essence, possibilities and limitations of this meditation

Meditation practices related to the inner child have tremendous power. Just imagine. Once upon a time you were a child. Sometimes your relatives offended you, denied you something, punished you for something, and categorically forbade something. All these memories sit in us, albeit unconsciously. They will continue to rule us. Did we have enough attention and love of parents in childhood? Did they cherish and spoil us, or, on the contrary, constantly scolded us and were dissatisfied with everything? What image of self-assessment did they instill: did they say how beautiful and wonderful you are, or how stupid and naughty?

It often happens that people whose low self-esteem was formed in childhood by parents, in adulthood they believe that they are not worthy of love and acceptance. And they begin to please others, adapt, patiently endure everything that does not suit them. Even within your own family. After all, love does not just happen, it must be earned.

It is with these attitudes that meditation on the inner child struggles. It helps to find the source of uncertainty and pain, to rebuild the attitude towards children's problems and traumas. Learn what self-worth is. Give yourself the much-needed love. And start living a new life. Such practices leave nothing unchanged. Having identified the problem that drives us, we can begin to deal with it.

Our inner child often lacks love, attention and care. These gifts should not be expected from other people. You can make yourself happy.

Meditation Techniques for Working with the Inner Child

The very first thing to start with is a meeting. It is thanks to her that you can open your inner world, fill it positive emotions and understanding that all grievances need to be let go and sent away from yourself. The technique presented below will help you improve your condition, open your subconscious, believe in yourself and let go of resentment.

Meeting the Inner Child Meditation

Meeting your inner child is your first meeting with yourself. For those who are just starting the practice, it may seem that such meditation is some kind of vision that a person should not have, but in fact this is not so. Meeting with the inner child will help you look at yourself from the outside:

1. Find ten minutes for yourself. Make the illumination dim. Lie down on the bed. If you feel that you can fall asleep, it is better to sit with your legs stretched out in front of you. Breathe a little. Turn off the flow of thoughts. If not, focus on the surrounding sounds.
2. When you are completely relaxed, imagine that a golden beam of light is descending from the sky into your head. Gradually this light fills your body. It penetrates all your organs and cells. And now it goes beyond your body, enveloping the space around you.
3. Now imagine that you are at the edge of a forest. There is a bench here, and on it sit ... your parents. They are quite young. What are they doing? Hug or fight? Are they happy or sad? They don't see you, but you see them. What do you feel? Suddenly, a child appeared next to them. Beautiful, Small child. He showed something to his parents, and then ran to the forest. Follow him.
4. So you went into the forest and saw that the child was sitting under a tree. Look at it carefully. Is he happy or sad? Perhaps he is offended by someone? Or are you afraid of something? Or is he completely fine now?
5. Now look the child in the eyes again and understand that this is you. You, once upon a time. Approach him. He smiles and holds out his tiny hand to you. Take his hand, hug this lovely sweet child. Feel how strong love is reborn in your heart. Now tell him how much you love him, that you fully accept him. Promise that from now on you will take care of him and support him in everything. Kiss the child on the crown and open your eyes. What are your feelings?

And now I propose to carry out the following practice. This will help you find out what you missed as a child and what you still want to get.

Meditation on the inner child

Follow the first two points from the previous meditation and, when relaxed, proceed to the following steps:

1. Imagine that you are walking down a dark, gloomy street. She's booked. There are no people, no animals, no birds. There are only abandoned houses and shops here.
2. Choose one of the buildings and enter it. Walk along the corridor near the doors or counters.
3. Look around. Is there anything that grabs your attention. But on your way there was a certain object. It could be anything. Take it with you and put it in your pocket. Now leave this building and this street.
4. You have returned home. Take this thing out and take a closer look. It can be a toy, a drawing, a pillow, an animal, anything.
5. What is this item? What do you feel when you look at it? Lay the item out in the light in a cozy place. How do you think he feels? What does he lack? Maybe care and love, or maybe loneliness or peace? What would you like to get this item now? Give it to him. And see if he gets better. Perhaps he has changed, become brighter, cleaner? Feel if he needs something else to be happy? What exactly? Give it all to him. And then, when the subject is satisfied, open your eyes.

The subject from practice is the state of your inner child. Is it clean, well-groomed, beautiful or broken and old? What the subject asked of you is what you yourself need. Write these things down and start giving them to yourself.

Healing the Inner Child Meditation

Now that we have met our child and learned about his needs, the next technique will be waiting for us. This is a particularly important part of all our work. Its focus is clearly expressed in the book by Evgenia Pogudina: "to go into the past and give the inner child what he needs to grow up." Follow the two points already known to you.

1. After relaxing, return to forest clearing to your inner child. You've already met there.
2. Take him in your arms. Tell him again how much you love and admire him.
3. Surround him with your love and care. Hold him tighter to you and ask for forgiveness for not paying attention to him, forgetting about him, limiting him.
4. Feel the light in your heart. This is the light of love. Pass it on to your child. Tell him about what you are afraid of and what you worry about. Ask him about his dreams.
5. Start playing with it. Have fun, spin, run. Let your child make the most of it. Now watch how this baby has become happy. You are seized by a surge of love and tenderness, a desire to take care of him.
6. Feel that you are happy now. Then kiss the baby, promise that you will take care of him and be sure to return to him. And open your eyes.

What emotions are you experiencing? Now repeat this meditation as many times as you need. These practices will help you understand yourself, your behavior and needs, and connect with your inner child - the most important part of you. These meditations bring powerful healing and cleansing. Start paying attention to your inner child and watch the world around you change!

AT modern psychology fashion for children. On the inside. Different directions and techniques offer to recognize your inner child. To meet with something forgotten inside, in need of support and giving inner strength. Talk, learn, accept and start listening to his needs.
The wonderful golden child is so seductive. Its purity, spontaneity and innocence give strength and beauty to our lives. AT romantic relationship experts of the most different directions. They explain this phenomenon each in their own way. Although in one thing, they seem to be similar. The “inner child” is primarily a metaphor that helps to open access to the creative, authentic, wise, joyful and tender part of yourself.
But ... even such a golden baby can turn into an insidious werewolf.

Being carried away by “working with the inner child”, we run the risk of falling into the old trap. Idealizing our bright sunny child, we forget about his reverse side- about a dark and eternally unsatisfied offspring. Approaching our inner world with the help of clear rational schemes, we ignore the hidden irrational. By focusing only on the positive, we unleash the negativity dormant inside.
And at the same time, a well-known paradox turns on: as soon as you discover some efficient technique(or when something becomes a technique), that very technique stops working.

The old French fairy tale "The Magic Log" will help to understand the reverse essence of the inner child.
Once upon a time there was a grandfather and a woman, and they had no children. “Why do you need a baby, you are already poor, he will eat you,” the neighbors told them. But they really wanted him, their baby. So much so that one day the grandfather and a piece of log seemed like small child. He brought it to his wife. And they began to nurse him. But Log was very hungry. It constantly, constantly wanted to eat. Ate grandma. Ate grandfather. And then their omniscient neighbors.
In general, this insatiable kid walked around the village and said:
I am a hungry stump
I ate the whole pudding cold,
Drank a glass of milk
Ate a slice of bread.
But the food is over
Swallowed mom and dad.
And I'll eat you!
And swallowed everyone he met on the way. Such Kolobok is the opposite. And peasants, and their cattle, etc., etc. Until one quick-witted peasant woman in a cabbage field plunged her hoe into his stomach. And all the eaten villagers with cattle and equipment fell out of his belly. Including the woman with the grandfather, his parents. “And they didn’t want a baby anymore,” that tale ends.

A fairly well-known Czech film "Log" was shot based on this fairy tale. Its creator, Jan Shvankmajer, is not only a film director, but also a screenwriter, artist, set designer, sculptor, and animator. In his manifesto "The Magic of Objects", he calls for the return of the irrational to its space, "the adequate place that it occupies in the human psyche."
This film is scary, strange, absurd and ridiculous. And emotionally accurate. It makes us feel like we are caught up in our dark irrational experiences. How we pass before them. As we drown in their hopelessness. And we get eaten.

And the psychotherapist Stephen Wolinsky has a book on this subject, “ Dark side inner child." “One day I was invited to give a presentation to a group of about forty psychotherapists. I asked the participants, “Have any of you healed your inner child? Do you know anyone who has done this?" I did not hear a single answer, ”Wolinsky writes.
The bottom line is that the wounded inner child doesn't really need to be healed. He's stuck in the old psychological mechanism protection. Left in the past and does not intend to get out of there. There is his bread and his song. Such a child sees the world frozen, he resists the present, he does not perceive reality as it appears here and now, because he is not now and not here. He is stuck in the old system of beliefs and stereotypes.

So a wounded child is not only a baby in need of our support, but also a monster ready to devour us. (About this duality of the mechanism of traumatic defense there is another good book, « Inner world Donald Kalsched injury.)
Such a baby does not have a feeling of fullness, like a shark. And he is ready to endlessly absorb that psychic energy that you are willing to give him. He needs your fears, anger, resentment, hatred, dissatisfaction with yourself ... More and more. And he will never be fed up with them.
Moreover, each significant deep traumatic experience generates its own protective mechanism. Every painful story creates its own little disgruntled offspring, says Stephen Wolinsky. And there is more than one joyful and needy baby living in us. A whole orphanage.
Whose inhabitants can be even those pranksters. Capricious blackmailers. Eternally hungry gluttons. Even cannibals. They can prevent us from taking even a step. Binging. Treat us. Put in an awkward position. Chew resentment. And spit on them. Feed on anger. Pull down, back. They can take us hostage to our own past. Our traumatic experiences. Strakhov. And hate.

But most of the time we just don't notice it. Because when a wounded inner child wakes up in us, we fall into a trance. We turn on the usual protective automatisms that we do not control. We are indeed being eaten by this baby. Together with all our reality - with a cart, with a horse, neighbors, etc., etc.
And here it is important to understand what is happening. Understand that you are now covered by all this. Stick a hoe into the belly of this mechanism so that everything that was absorbed falls out from there. Our awareness flooded with childish feelings. Feeling yourself. The ability to manage yourself. The ability to make decisions and follow them. Our big me.

In general, miracles, of course, happen. But relying only on them is not The best way on the way to them. Even Blessed Augustine ordered to pray as if everything depends only on God, and to work as if everything depends only on you.
To find genuine treasures, you have to go through difficult adventures. If you don't believe me, re-read Stevenson.
So meeting with the inner child is not only magical holiday With colorful balls, strawberries with cream, soulful songs, dances and kisses. This is a whole company of hungry orphans inside.
And it is important not only to hope for a miracle within oneself, but also something else, also important. Attention to what is happening. Awareness. Honesty towards yourself. And acceptance. And also the ability to recognize internal trances when a little cannibal begins to hypnotize you. The ability to tear it from the chest when it starts to devour you. An inner opportunity to see what the needs are behind it all. The determination to meet these needs. In general, it is attention, love and compassion for yourself. Internal discipline and constant practice, too.

So the golden baby inside is often just an illusion, the sweet house of Baba Yaga. And if you go into it imprudently, you risk being eaten. However, there is always the opportunity to show a wooden stump instead of your own finger to the witch. There is always a chance to be saved.
To do this, you just need to wake up, get out of the trance. And take responsibility for what happens.

Svetlana Gamzaeva psychologist Nizhny Novgorod#spicesouls

inner child- this is a part of our psyche, our personality, which expresses the image of our true "I", the potential of the personality, its balance, integrity and vitality, direct self-expression, the ability to find a way out of any situation, acceptance and openness to the world.

A person with a healthy part ( Inner Child) behaves at ease, creatively, playfully and joyfully. He knows how to sincerely laugh at himself and what happens to him. He is in harmony with himself and the world around him.

Each of us has an Inner Child. This is a girl or a boy, each inner child has its own age, more often this is the age when the wound occurred, when he began to experience pain. Sometimes it's a whole Kindergarten if there were many traumatic episodes.

All that a child needs is a complete acceptance of him as a person, understanding and satisfaction of his true needs, laying positive images yourself and future life. If parents provide him with these conditions, the child grows up safely and becomes happy and successful person, realizing your creative potential.

If your parents' needs were not met when they were children, it will be difficult for them to meet your needs. Well, this is of course ideally, in reality we are all traumatized, some to a greater extent, some to a lesser extent.

Parents may make fun of their children, prevent them from expressing their true feelings. They find it difficult to respect their children as individuals. As a result, they lie, beat, threaten, isolate, disbelieve, despise, coerce, humiliate and invade their personal space: “Your hands are in the wrong place! Who needs you like that! It would be better if you didn't! I wish I'd had an abortion like I was going to! I sacrificed everything for you, and you…!”

In the subconscious of such a child, a negative image of himself is formed. And then many renounce themselves in childhood. We don't want to have anything to do with that scared and stupid kid anymore. This is how self-loathing and self-loathing arise. Contact with the real self, the inner child, is lost, and we stop hearing ourselves.

"Wounded" children grow up and begin independent life. But they only look like adults. They suffer from countless wounds, not easy to heal, but easy to touch and irritate already in adulthood.

Almost every child makes a “secret oath” to himself that, when he grows up, he will not say to his children those words or do things that were said or done towards him. Unfortunately, as adults, many find themselves breaking this oath, saying or doing to their children exactly what they did to them, and often using the same methods or words. Why is this happening?

In the internal structure of our psyche, there is also an Inner Parent - this is a projection of our real parents, image. and it may happen that the real parents are no longer in the world. But in the psychic structure of a person, the "Inner Parent" still "nurtures" the Inner Child.

Such vicious circle cruelty will be passed on unhindered from generation to generation unless this pattern is changed. To do this, you need to heal your inner child. Therapy and a good specialist can help with this.

And you can groom and cherish your wounds and scars for a very long time. This provides a number of benefits. You can not grow up, not take responsibility for your life "to spite your mother." You can endlessly prove something - and so it seems that the goal in life appears. And a lot of the time, that's exactly what we do.

We constantly remember how unfairly our parents treated us. How we were offended or humiliated. And here I do not justify the parents, this is their responsibility, and our responsibility is to make our life happy (as far as possible) from the “legacy” that we got.

The position of a small offended child can be very advantageous. If not for one but, while we chew our grievances and claims, our life passes. We cannot live full life. We can't be ourselves. We don't know how to build relationships. We become not the most the best parents.

You can do nothing in your life and put all the responsibility for it on your parents. After all, it is much easier to do nothing - and the extreme ones have already been found. Yes, our parents gave us less than we needed, and this is already irreplaceable ... Our task is to accept what they gave, and do the rest for ourselves, take care of ourselves.

You can take a piece of paper and write everything that we didn’t get from our parents, what we needed, write as much as is written so as not to forget anything, maybe even a sheet is not enough for you, take another one. After that, at the very top of the piece of paper we write: "I can do this for myself." Reading the list...

Find the lessons that your parents taught, they definitely have a resource for you and your later life maybe our Mission...

Accept your parents for who they are. In some cases, this can really be difficult if a very traumatic experience was experienced in childhood. They are people with life experience, character, troubles, with their strengths and weaknesses. They are human beings, and like everyone else, they are not perfect. Perhaps they were far from rainbow childhood.

Most likely, parents do not have what we need. And that's why they don't give it. They just don't have it. They themselves did not receive this flow. Nobody liked them as children. But still they gave us a lot. Everything they could. Sometimes it's just life. But after all, this is already a valuable gift and an invaluable lesson.

Stop waiting for them to change. Accept that this will always be the case. Even if it hurts so bad to admit it. Find a source with which to fill the deficit, because the world is abundant. And it has what you need. Moreover, there is a lot of it - and enough for everyone. You need to learn to take care of yourself, see the resource to meet your needs, and allow yourself to assimilate. Sometimes this is a long process requiring the support of a psychologist, psychotherapist.

What do you want most from your parents? Love? Understanding? Support? Look for it where there is a lot of it. After all, who said that we should and can get all this only from our parents? Through our parents we get our lives - and this is already more than valuable.