Showing up authentically means being comfortable with ourselves - with all of ourselves. C.G. Jung wrote in this context “ich will lieber ganz sein als gut” (I prefer to be whole over being good). If we try to only be “good”, if we can only accept ourselves being good, the other parts of ourselves have to go into hiding. There could have been a time when this was necessary in order to feel any self-worth and to protect ourselves from over-critically and shaming parts (introjects) within ourselves. However, this becomes a trap.
Janina Fisher talks about this form of splitting and structural dissociation in trauma survivors: "By holding out some sense of themselves as ‘good’ disconnected from how they have been exploited, abused children capitalize on the human brain’s innate capacity to split or compartmentalize."
She continues, "That ‘good child’ might be precociously mature, sweet and helpful, perfectionistic, self-critical, or quiet and shy, but, most importantly, he or she has a way to be acceptable and safer in an unsafe world."
This adaptive strategy becomes a trap and costs us our authenticity.
"To ensure that the rejected ‘not me’ child is kept out of the way (i.e., out of consciousness) requires that, long after the traumatic events are over, individuals must continue to rely on dissociation, denial, and/ or self-hatred for enforcing the disconnection. In the end, they have survived the failure of safety, the abuse, and betrayal at the cost of disowning their most vulnerable and most wounded selves. Aware that their self-presentation and ability to function is only one piece of who they really are, they now feel fraudulent. Struggling to stay away from the ‘bad’ side and identify with the good side, they have a felt sense of ‘faking it’, ‘pretending’, or of being what others want them to be. For some, this conviction of fraudulence engenders resentment; for some, shame and self-doubt. For both groups, the legacy of the trauma remains alive rather than resolved."
📖 Janina Fisher. Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors: Overcoming Internal Self-Alienation
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2 years ago