3 Profound Ways Our Emotional Wounds Actually Strengthen Us
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it.” — Helen Keller
1. We learn to embrace and come to terms with pain.
Despite our intense emotional wounds, the hurt will pass and scars eventually heal. We learn, over time, that it is healthy to process our emotions rather than to cling to them.
As time moves on, so does the emotional strain, yet we needn’t clutch to our pain story. We can suffer or let go of what no longer serves us.
We must love and acknowledge our darker aspects like our pain and grief. If you appreciate the sun and wish away the darkness how would you see the stars at night?
Our emotional wounds lead us to the wholeness of ourselves. It is remiss to emphasize our darkness while identifying with our light since we encompass both parts.
Pain is a powerful teacher that connects us with our inner wisdom.
Without pain, how can we recognize the enduring self that lies beneath the rubble of suffering?
Without pain, we are powerless to embrace the entirety of who we are.
Our emotional wounds do not imply we are flawed, yet show our true character. They are our battle scars that show we have danced with life and lived to tell the tale. We communicate to others of the struggles that lie ahead, having traversed the path ourselves.
Our wounds lie fragmented deep within our psyche. If we have not reconciled them, they grow stronger until we address them. They are the imposing shadow, lurking in the darkness waiting to grab hold if we grow weary.
2. We learn the strength in returning back to love.
We can become our own healer in loving and nurturing declarations to ourselves. This reinforces how it is now safe to face these emotions with openness to heal.
Our emotional wounds call us to connect with our inner child instead of escaping when the pain intensifies. To run away from pain is the opposite of loving kindness because we neglect to honor our emotional well-being. We must love ourselves foremost as you would a friend or loved one who is hurt.
To demonstrate this commitment, consider the vows recited when two people marry: to honor one another through the good times and bad. So we ought to make the same commitment to ourselves. Irrespective of the emotions that arise, we will honor them.
Our emotional wounds strengthen us because they show we have lived a purposeful life.
There is a broader lesson contained within each emotional wound. If we penetrate through the pain, we realize it is a return to love.
“When I stand before thee at the day’s end, thou shalt see my scars and know that I had my wounds and also my healing.”
— Rabindranath Tagore
This simple act of self-renewal permeates into our conscious, so regardless of the external conditions, our deepest wisdom leads us to connect with our heart.
To heal, we must de-clutter our lives and nurture the child within, while creating a secure environment for healing to occur.
3. We become transformed from the inside-out.
“The transformation process evolves your consciousness from fear to love. That means you have to dissolve the fears and heal the emotional wounds that are in the way—by understanding them. And that means you have to face them, feel them, and decode them, which most of us dread,”
— Penney Peirce
The saying, time heals all wounds does not hold significance if we don’t make the time to face them. We may store away the emotional fragments of the past, only to have them reappear at a later stage.
To confront our emotional wounds means to honor ourselves foremost. No matter what emerges, we trust we will cope.
Everyone is bound to experience hurt and pain in their lives. Unless you’ve lived under a rock, we all carry emotional pain. It’s how we transform the pain to develop a deeper relationship with ourselves that leads to inner freedom.
Our wounds strengthen us because they invite us to be sensitive to our emotional life. We become inquisitive about our emotions and examine them with openness and equanimity.
To be curious fosters a balanced relationship with the wholeness of who we are, rather than dismiss the emotions as untoward. As we associate with our fractured parts, we strengthen our commitment to ourselves.
To accept and heal our emotional wounds, we release them to invite the power of love to occupy its space. We allow the experience to transform us into empowered beings.
“Remember, forgiveness doesn’t necessarily mean forgetting. We may always have memories attached to some of our emotional wounds in much the same way we have scar tissue from a physical wound that happened long ago. That doesn’t mean you have to relive the pain that caused the scar.”
— Dennis Merritt Jones
Our childhood wounds are exposed through adult relationships and if we do little to confront them, they can ruin our lives. Therefore, they are a gift guiding us to heal within.
Through mindfulness, we learn to be grounded in the present moment and experience any emotions that emerge. This simple act cultivates true intimacy with ourselves.
So avoid holding on to your pain. There is no power gained from being a victim, other than to deflect your wounds onto others to appease your suffering.
“If our heart has been closed and then begins to open, we often discover why our native sensitivity originally shut down. Old emotional wounds will surface and ask for our attention. Difficult feelings such as grief, shame, self-loathing, personal deficiency, despair, and fear can arise.”
— John Prendergast Ph.D.
This statement reaffirms the need to love ourselves completely, no matter the emotions.
Our responsibility is not to judge ourselves, but to reconcile the pain and integrate it into our experience toward oneness. 
