Healing the Father Wound with Shadow Work
This blog is from my weekly series ‘Shadow Confessions’ of anonymous disclosures revealing others' deepest secrets & hidden feelings.
Within this offering, you will see yourself in others, learn how to acknowledge your shadow & receive practical tips so your shadow no longer handicaps your potential.
“How do you release the block of feeling unsafe in being supported by your partner when you weren’t able to rely on your father?”
Triggered Feeling:
Emotional safety
Acknowledge Your Shadow:
The father wound is the absence of love from your birth father. The wound can be caused by: neglect, absence, control, abuse, or withholding love/blessings/affirmations.
For women, specifically, the father wound has a way of manifesting in several ways, like:
Picking partners who repeat the same negative patterns as your father
Seeking approval/acceptance from men & unable to say no
Feeling emotionally unsafe to be vulnerable in relationships
Trying to regain a sense of control by being rigid with boundaries
Scroll down to begin the first steps of breaking this cycle.
Steps to Integrate:
In your journal please answer the following questions.
When you think of your father-daughter/son relationship as a child, what do you wish you had more of? (affection, time together, honesty, emotional support, etc.)
How has the lack of emotional safety (or what you listed above in question #1) from your father growing up affected your inner world?
Releasing this block involves understanding your father on a deeper level.
How was his childhood? What type of family dynamic did he grow up in? In what ways was he wounded?
From here, consider his teenage years & adulthood. Did he feel like a failure at all? How? Might that unhealed wound be part of his interactions with you?
Do you think that over his entire life to this point, your father has any regrets down deep inside? Shame or guilt? Feelings of inadequacy?
Can you see that your father is more than his specific behaviors of insensitivity toward you? Can you see someone who never got the chance to heal those wounds?
This practice is not about forgiveness (unless that's what you're seeking), but more about gaining perspective on how our wounds can be generational.
In order to break this cycle you must disengage from the beliefs/ behaviors you adopted due to your father. Understanding what those are, then viewing their limitations from another perspective grants you the freedom to choose differently.
Lean into the vulnerability and know that you are worthy of healing.
Until next week,
Jordan
