When Your Inner Child is Running the Show

How you can take charge of your emotional life by soothing and healing your inner child

We may have a wounded inner child who is running the show

• where we tend to overreact to triggers, or
• where we often feel anxious and insecure and unable to take decisive action.

When our adult coping mechanisms to stress fail to work, we often return to the space that once felt unsafe for us when we were young. Our survival instincts kick in and we are prompted to protect ourselves. We begin to view the world from the lens of the wounded child. It is how we take on her reactions and behaviour. Even though we are grown ups, we feel like traumatised kids on the inside due to our unresolved wounds.

Should our wounded inner child take over, our adult self is no longer in charge. As a consequence, we may actually experience life as a soap opera, with little handle on our emotions. This can have a negative impact in many areas of our life. With all that I had been through, I am committed to creating awareness about the need to reparent and heal our inner child. I’d like others to know how we can address our emotional issues at root cause.

Creating Awareness When My Inner Child Has Taken Over

For the longest time, I have had little idea about how best to manage my emotions after being badly triggered. In the aftermath, I would feel rather disappointed with myself for overreacting. I regretted not acting more wisely.

What I did not realise was that I was carrying the pain of an inner child in my heart. When badly triggered, I was her hurt, disappointment, sadness, anger and so on. I reverted back to beliefs of being unlovable and “not good enough”. My heart would ache badly on the inside.

After finding out that I could be reacting from the space of a wounded inner child, I was in utter relief. Finally, I had answers. My growth journey led me to discovering ways to heal my inner child energetically. These days, I am better able to manage my emotions, be more at ease, and love myself (including the inner child) even more. Consequently, I experienced an improvement in the relationships I have with my loved ones and an improved ability to show up in work with greater authenticity and confidence.

A Wise Adult Responds While a Wounded Inner Child Reacts

As adults, we have the choice of meeting a situation that is upsetting with a reaction or a response. A reaction often arises out of impulse and the need to protect oneself, whereas a response is usually made with more thought and consideration. A wise adult responds but where our coping mechanism is not adequate to meet with the stress, we begin to react from the wounded-child space.

When our wounded inner child reacts rather than responds to triggers, she has taken over. She’s feeling threatened and unsafe. Thus, she may go all out to defend or protect herself. She feels trapped, powerless and acts out in ways to get attention.

It’s not hard to visualise the extent of how an inner child can be like when she is in charge. One way is to imagine a toddler who bawls in order to get attention for her unresolved needs. She doesn’t stop crying and yelling till she gets what she wants. For the toddler, she takes any rejection personally. She does not know that getting a rejection for something she wants is not the same as being rejected for who she is.

A child who has been emotionally neglected learns that her needs are not important. Thus, she bottles up her anger, resentment and frustration for years. Then, there comes a tipping point (usually happens in adulthood) where she can’t contain her emotions any longer.

When we allow our wounded inner child to run the show, we are at risk of harming the relationships we have with our loved ones and creating sabotage to our dreams. We are expressing her unmet needs through our unconscious reactions. If we are to dig deeper, we will find out that it’s our inner child who is really needing help.

Taking Charge of Our Lives by Healing of Our Wounded Inner child

Indeed, if we can understand that there are two parts of ourself — the wise healthy adult and the inner child, it can potentially help us with experiencing a breakthrough in our healing journey.

All of us have the ability to tap into the wise adult self. Our wise adult self is conscious about a better way forward with navigating life. It is from the space of being the wise adult self that we embrace the little child within us.

Since we are the only person in the world who know her well, we are in the best position to soothe her. She is after all, inside us. We are able to provide a space of safety for her as we actively listen to what she has to tell us.

Our inner child may need to express her grief where she had no opportunity to process previously. Or that she may need to know that she is not alone anymore. If she is having difficulty with her feelings, we offer guidance on how best to let go. Thus, instead of bottling up, she is now able to experience a release.

We take back control of our lives by not allowing a wounded inner child to run the show. With gentleness and firmness, we help her in releasing her emotional burden. Taking charge, we reparent our inner child on aligning with values, setting healthy boundaries and in letting go of what no longer serves her.

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