“It requires a tremendous leap of faith to imagine that your own childhood—punctuated with pain, loss, and hurt-­may, in fact, be a gift. Certainly the unhappiness you felt was not, in itself, a blessing; but in response to that pain, you learned to cultivate a powerful intuition, a heightened sensitivity, and a passionate devotion to healing and love that burns deep within you—and there are gifts that may be recognized, honored, and cultivated. You are not broken; childhood suffering is not a mortal wound.” Wayne Muller

I believe most of our emotional pain comes from experiences and misconceptions that happened during our childhood. One of the current books I’m reading is The Inner Child Workbook: What to Do With Your Past When It Just Won’t Go Away by Cathryn Taylor.

Her book is about our inner children. The inner child has been a subject of study for several years. But Cathryn suggests that we have several inner personalities. She specifically has chapters about the infant self, the toddler self, the young inner child, the grade-school child within, the young teen within, the adolescent within, and the young inner adult.

In the introduction by Rokelle Lerner, she mentions that inner child work demands courage and tenacity. She writes “the goal of inner child work is not to blame; rather, it is to awaken the childlike wonder and spontaneity and integrate them with an adult sense of responsibility and protection.”

The tools she recommends for healing are : (1) guided imagery, (2) verbal and written dialogues, (3) mirror work, (4) drawing, (5) using pictures from magazines, (6) activities, and (7) rituals.

For beginning, she recommends that this book not be used if:

1. Do not use this book if you are not interested in being able to feel your feelings.

2. Do not use this book if you are on prescription mood-altering drugs unless your work is supervised by a professional.

3. Do not use this book if you are in early recovery from chemical dependency. She recommends that you have twelve to twenty-four months of abstinence.

4. Do not use this book in isolation.

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