Maybe you’ve met your inner child. Have you met your inner teenager?
Inner child work is relatively well known. Spending time with our inner child helps us go back and give ourselves anything that we didn’t receive (or didn’t receive in a way that worked for us) when we were children - filling in the gaps. We can increase our awareness of patterns of behaviour and coping mechanisms that have followed us to adulthood (and with more awareness we have more choice). It’s also a good way to increase a sense of self compassion, and to increase our ability to effectively be with and process emotions, and increase our ability to show up as our best adult selves in our relationships and other areas of our lives.
Inner child work isn’t just good for healing our inner children - it’s also good for reconnecting with our wonder filled, childlike selves and inviting more silliness, lightness and play into our adult lives.
But what about our inner teenagers? They tend to get less airtime than inner children, but getting to know them and finding ways to give them what they needed but didn’t receive has a whole host of benefits.
When we’re teenagers, we’re establishing who we are in the world. We’re relating more with people outside of our immediate families, perhaps navigating romance and sex for the first time, finding belonging (or not) in a social group. We’re learning about boundaries, feeling our way towards independence and taking on the responsibilities of adulthood. We also might be invincible.
Here’s some food for thought for you for the next little while.
Where the inner child needs to be seen, heard, mirrored, and protected, our inner teenager’s needs are different. And given that each of our journeys through adolescence were unique, what each of our inner teenagers might need from our adult selves is likely to be unique, too. That said, giving them a place where they feel respected and valued is a good place to start.
As a suggestion, perhaps you’d like to take your inner teenager out somewhere they’d enjoy, and get to know them a bit. What do they like? What do they long for? What do they want you to know? Do they carry any wounds that need healing? Do they have things to say?
Our teenage selves have many strengths that can enrich our adult lives - what might integrating some of these strengths mean for you?
If you’d like a friendly space to get to know your inner teenager a bit, in our next online art group we’re doing some collage with our inner teens. You’re very welcome to join us if this sounds interesting to you!