Imagine this scenario: a daughter is hit by a car and suffers a mild injury. When she goes home, she seeks comfort from her mother. To her shock, not only does her mother fail to comfort her, she scolds her instead: “How useless you are! You’re always creating trouble for me!” The daughter is injured twice—first by the accident, and then by her mother’s words. Imagine how she would feel.
Feelings such as fear, being wronged, not being recognized or abandoned leave deep imprints in the mind. Later in life, these imprints are easily reactivated. After marriage, she may have the same emotional reactions when she argues with her husband, and she may even repeat the same scolding patterns with her own children.
Most of the time, we no longer remember the details of our original emotional injuries, but the feelings remain. They stay dormant, waiting to be triggered. When a situation even slightly resembles the past, those old emotions rush back to the surface.
For example, when she argues with her husband and he says, “Why did you spend two hundred Taiwanese dollars on soy sauce when one hundred would have been enough?” she may immediately feel wronged, misunderstood, and not recognized. Is this really about soy sauce? Please pause and notice this carefully.
When we seek counseling for conflicts with our spouse, we often believe the problem is about such surface issues. But how can we clearly sense the original injury beneath them? Most of the time, we cannot. Even though we may have forgotten the events, the emotional wounds—fear, abandonment, not being understood or recognized—are still there. They continue to be triggered whenever similar situations arise.
So what should we do with these feelings? How can we face them? Our first instinct is usually to escape when these emotions surface. We may distract ourselves, slack off, or seek pleasure to avoid the pain. As a result, the pattern remains unresolved. Instead, we can choose to return and stay with the pain. When we sense feelings such as being misunderstood, we can pause and remain present with this painful energy. When the pain receives our full attention, it begins to heal itself.
During the healing process, you may cry, scream, or feel anger. These are surface expressions of energy. Please continue to remain with the deeper pain beneath them. When this energy passes, it begins to transform.
What does it transform into? When you stay present with the feeling of not being understood, you may begin to sense deeper layers—fear and loneliness. At that moment, the emotions of being abandoned or misunderstood naturally begin to collapse. This transformation happens on its own, beyond the mind’s predictions.
If we go even deeper, we may see that the original injury was rooted in loneliness and fear. If there was no fear, the daughter might have been able to say to her mother, “I was hit by a car, and you scolded me?” But because of fear, she did not dare to express herself. She was afraid of being abandoned or unloved. That fear silenced her.
When we can remain fully present with the feelings of not being understood and abandoned, and allow our awareness to go deeper, we come into direct contact with fear itself. At that moment, we can clearly see the repetitive patterns in our relationships. This is pure attention.
Let’s return to the original scenario. Why did the mother scold her daughter? Because she had expectations, and her daughter did not meet them. Disappointment turned into anger. These expectations were formed from the mother’s own past wounds—experiences she did not want to relive. At the root of her reaction was fear.
If we do not understand our own fear, we will repeat the same reactions when life presents challenges. In fact, the mother is trapped in her own pattern of suffering. If she cannot observe and bring awareness to it, the pattern will not end. Instead, it will be passed on to the next generation through her daughter.
By Suzhen Liu
If you enjoy Suzhen Liu’s writings, please check out her new book, “Discover Love Within—Release Your Suffering” available on Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/Discover-Love-Within-Release-Suffering/dp/0999251732
