How to Free Your Inner Child For Deeper Healing

Have you started doing inner child work and found yourself resisting it? Maybe you’re sleeping more than usual, finding reasons to skip a session, or feeling an uncomfortable heaviness you can’t quite name. A part of you knows there’s healing waiting in your early years, and another part of you just doesn’t want to go back there. If that’s you, you’re not doing it wrong, and you’re not alone. I received this question on a recent Healing Center coaching call. It was from a member who was going through my childhood wounding course, Nurture: Healing Your Inner Child, for the second time. She was going deeper than ever with her healing, and her body was pushing back in the ways described above. Here’s what I told her.

Your little self isn’t the one doing this work

This is the piece so many people miss. Your inner child is not supposed to be doing this work. They are a child. They lived through the initial trauma. They can’t do this work, and they were never meant to. You are. So the first thing I want you to do is remove them from the process. In your mind, invite your angels to come and take your inner child, every age and stage, to a safe place. Then tell them: “I’ve got this. I’m the adult, and I’m feeling this for you. I’m lifting it from you. You’re not involved anymore. You’re free. You’re whole. Go have fun!” When your little self believes they have to go back through the pain, of course they resist. And that resistance shows up in your body as fatigue, avoidance, and sabotage. Take them out of it and much of the resistance goes with them.

Affirmation: I am the adult, and I do the healing. My inner child is free, whole, and safe.

Give them what they never got

Once your inner child is safe, ask what that younger you really wanted and never got to experience, and then create it for them in your imagination. My 16-year-old self felt ugly and insecure, with no self-esteem at all. I grew up with a father and three brothers and never felt recognized by any of them, so I was desperately needy for a boyfriend. When I asked her what she wanted, she said she wanted to feel confident and attractive, so sure of herself that she didn’t need a guy’s validation. So I gave her that. I let her be, at 16, the woman I am now. That’s not pretending. You are sending your younger self the energy of what was missing, and that energy is real. Try this today: choose one age that feels tender for you, ask what that child longed for, and let yourself see them living it.

Affirmation: I give my younger self everything she needed and didn’t receive.

How to handle resistance and rest

Your inner child has to learn to trust you. Many of our younger parts don’t trust adults, and why would they? The adults weren’t there for them in the way they needed. You build that trust by showing up, again and again, as the grown-up who’s got it handled. Be gentle with yourself while you do. Years ago, when I was deep in my own healing, there were days I could barely function. I had to rest and let the emotion be felt. I knew I was being productive in my doing nothing, because the production was healing. We don’t give ourselves credit for that. We think we have to be busy creating an outcome, but this outcome is internal. You are reparenting yourself and building your connection with your core self. So if you’re more tired than usual, that may simply be your body integrating energy it has carried for decades. Rest, and then come back to the work.

Affirmation: My healing is productive, even when I am resting.

If this is stirring something in you, please know you don’t have to do it alone. Inside the Healing Center, my course, Nurture: Healing Your Inner Child, walks you through clearing each stage of your life, step by step, which you complete as the adult your younger self has been waiting for. Watch or listen to this most recent live coaching call here. And when you have questions or a breakthrough, share it in our members-only Facebook group. Your story may be exactly what another member needs to keep going.

Your inner child doesn’t need you to drag them back through the past. They need you to step in, take it from them, and set them free. Every time you do, you become more whole and more grounded in who you truly are, and that changes everything, including your family. I know you can do this!

Bless you,
Carol