A different way of looking at your past, present, and future.
By Leslie K. Hughes
Over the last few years, I’ve been diving deeep into myself. I’ve explored some crevices of me that maybe weren’t ones to be proud of; things I was doing, ways I was thinking, who I was being.
And so I began the work of changing that – of trying to give past Leslie what she needed but didn’t have so that I can have the present and future life that I want and deserve.
I’m not alone in this journey. Call it a journey of self-discovery, if you’d like. It’s something many of us experience to varying degrees in our lifetime.
But one thing that kept rubbing me the wrong way in books I was reading and therapy I was receiving was the use of the word “healing.”
I even used the word myself, but it always kind of gave me the ick.
“You’re on your healing journey.”
“You’re in the process of healing.”
“Healing from your past.”
“Do this to heal.”
I finally realized that I hate the word “healing.”
Why?
Because it assumes that you were broken; that you were something that required “fixing.”
But you’re not broken, and you never were.
Maybe you were young. Naive. Unaware.
Maybe you weren’t given the right tools. Opportunities. Circumstances.
But you are not something that needs to be “healed” or “fixed.”
You are someone that needs to grow. Learn. Forgive. (We all are.)
Past Leslie had many faults and struggles. And present Leslie has some, too.
But I’m not someone who needs “healing.” And neither are you.
Rather than look at life like a “healing journey,” I like to look at it like a video game (because honestly, it kinda is).
Each day or week or month or year is like a level. It presents challenges that you have to figure out how to overcome so you can get to the next level that’s full of new experiences, lessons, and knowledge.
If you’re learning from past mistakes and growing, you keep leveling up.
Much like my favorite Italian plumber, Mario.
When Mario goes through the first level of Super Mario World, he makes mistakes. He tries to eat the wrong mushrooms. He gets trampled by turtles. He falls off the edge.
But he (technically you, as the controller of Mario) learns from his experiences. The next time around, he remembers which mushrooms to eat. To jump over the turtles. To steer clear of cliffs.
Does that mean that the Mario who made those initial mistakes was broken? That he needed to be “healed?”
Absolutely not. He needed to learn from his mistakes and level up (in human terms: evolve).
The same goes for you.
I know your life is far more nuanced; far more deep and complex than a Super Mario game. But honestly, the same rules apply.
