Mindfulness Journey: Loving Your Inner Child Replace a Negative Mindset with Healing That Comes from Love

By Patrice M Foster

Do you feel lost, empty, neglected, or not understood, and when you reflect on all the pain you experience every day, does it stem from your childhood experience and you wish to dig deeper and find a lasting solution so as to turn your life around?

And are you looking for a blueprint that will help you in your journey by helping you identify the childhood issues that could be the reason for your woes as well as helping you overcome these issues from the inside out?

If you've answered YES,

This book will teach you how to mindfully replace your negative inner child mindset and experiences with the self-love and happiness you've been craving!

It takes time to heal the feelings of emptiness, hopelessness, and helplessness, but being here means that you have realized that you need to do something and are ready to face your fears; hence, it might not take that long after all.

Probably, you are thinking…

What is mindfulness, and how does it help?

What does my inner child have to do with my overall happiness and fulfillment in life?

What steps do you need to take to reparent yourself?

What if the wounded inner child reoccurs after healing? How do I deal with him/her?

Will this make me happier, more peaceful, and less worried?

If these are some of the questions worrying you, keep reading to learn how you can finally enjoy your life!

More precisely, you will discover:

Who you really are

What mindfulness is, what you should be mindful of, and the benefits you'll get from it

How mindfulness brings out your inner child

What your inner child is, and how the inner child affects everything and every aspect of your life

How to deal with your inner child and the consequences you will get from it

If you are a wounded child or not

How to bring happiness, peace, and love into your life

How to live a worry-free life

Tips to follow to heal from inside out

What is acceptance and how to gain it

How to regain the inner child you are meant to have

Motivation tips to help you through this journey

Stress management stages and tips

How to build confidence

Tips to help you through the healing process

How to find happiness in life

Some positive creativity things that will help you

And much more!

Even if you cannot remember how and why you got to where you are right now, this book has all you need to get rid of the unhealthy, wounded inner child you are and replace him/her with the best you could ever wish for!

Scroll up and click Buy Now With 1-Click or Buy Now to get started!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Patrice M Foster
• Release date: Dec 2, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223359043

Patrice M Foster

About The Author Patrice M Foster is a Registered Nurse in Childhood and Adolescence Psychiatry, with more than 30 plus years of clinical experience. She blogs and writes about issues that affect kids' mental health

Book preview

Introduction

All we want is to enjoy life. Be happy and peaceful, and have hope and faith in ourselves. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Ever since you were a child, things have been happening to you or around you, and they all, one way or the other, have contributed to the person you are today.

For example, if your parents weren't around as much as when you were growing up, do you crave full attention from your partner and feel neglected whenever he/she is not around, even for a good reason? Or if your parents were always fighting, do you find yourself fighting with other people and can't seem to control yourself? Maybe you were abused or violated as a child, or possibly your siblings or childhood friends didn't include you, and as a result, you've never been happy in your life.

First, you need to understand that you didn't deserve any of that, and I am sorry for having to experience it. All a child wants is to feel loved, safe, and wanted, and even though you didn't get that experience then, it is not too late to give it to yourself. Yes, you have the power, will, and ability to change everything and make your life much easier.

All you need is a blueprint to guide you, and luckily, this book will help you begin your mindfulness journey and show you how to take charge, heal your inner child and replace him/her with a happier, more peaceful, less toxic, and stress-free one.

More precisely, this book will help you understand what mindfulness is, why you need to start being mindful, and the benefits you will get from it regarding reparenting your inner child. You will get to meet and face your inner child, learn how to let him/her go, then replace him/her with the child you've always wished to be. Also, you will learn how to build your confidence, motivate yourself, manage stress, and boost positive creativity, which will all help make you love yourself more than ever.

When you have self-love, everything else will start falling into place. You will be able to love other people more, and you will find it in yourself to understand and forgive yourself and others, and that alone is enough to make your life the best you have and will ever have. You will even find yourself succeeding in things you've always had a hard time because you will finally get to overcome the blocks that are limiting and sabotaging you from reaching your full potential.

If you find yourself reacting to situations impulsively with anger, fear, jealousy, pain, and frustration, or if all you have is negative self-talk, pour a cup of your favorite and keep scrolling to learn how to heal your wounded inner child.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to those whose life has not always been a bed of roses, whose past has been marred with tragedy, physical pain, abuse, abandonment, trauma, and neglect. If you ever feel lost or empty because of what you experienced as a child, then this book is for you.

Chapter 1: Valuing the Practice of Mindfulness

Who Are You, Really?

You are a miscellaneous mixture of your past experiences, including the lessons you learned, the experiences you had, and how other people in your life treated you. Your past hasn’t always been perfect. Everyone has gone through pain, disappointment, tragedy, abuse, conflict, and all sorts of negativity. When you grow up to be an adult, these negative feelings don’t go away, really. They’re actually all still buried until we release them. 

This is a journey of mindfulness, allowing you to travel into the past – to face your inner child.  For it’s only when you face your inner child that you will be able to acknowledge your deep internal wounds and finally start your path to healing.

What is Mindfulness?

Mindfulness is not a trait or a value. It’s an active state of mind. It’s constant and deliberate. Mindfulness traces its roots to the meditative practices of Buddhism. If you’re mindful, your mind, heart, and soul are attentive to what’s happening in the present moment. However, these thoughts and feelings should be viewed objectively. Mindfulness means that you shouldn’t judge this information coming from your mind, heart, and soul as either moral or immoral. There is no right or wrong. If you’re mindful, you live in the moment and your senses are awake to experience these moments.

So, there are essentially two main elements of mindfulness, without which you don’t have true mindfulness. These elements are awareness and non-judgmental acceptance of your moment-to-moment experiences.

What Should You be Mindful Of?

Should we accept all stimuli or filter what we should be mindful of? When we’re mindful, we’re aware of our surrounding environment, our thoughts, feelings, and the sensations that our body makes. When we’re mindful, we’re only aware of the moment-by-moment, the present time. This is not a time to look back into the past or imagine what your future looks like.

As an adult, I’ve often struggled with daydreaming about my future. I had always been imaginative as a child, but due to the abusive and poverty-stricken childhood that I had, I was forced to quash my imagination and live in constant fear, hunger, and danger. Thus, when I grew up, my inner child took over and I had flights of fancy. I enjoy daydreaming, and there is really nothing wrong with it. However, daydreaming about the future can have its dangers, because it makes you want things you don’t have, which can then make you feel hopeless at the same time. I don’t know about you, but that’s what I felt, at least. I just had a feeling that those daydreams of the wonderful future that I wanted wouldn’t come to pass. That’s what made me more depressed and hopeless. 

It’s important to balance future aspirations and dreams with mindfulness exercises. Having an awareness of the present helps you anchor yourself in reality, so that the dreams you have for the future are anchored in present-day circumstances. Hence, you’ll find them easier to achieve. You now develop the hope in your heart and the possibility of your dreams being fulfilled.

What Are the Benefits of Being Mindful?

Research into the effectiveness of mindfulness has shown it impacts all parts of your life – physical, social, emotional, and psychological.

In a 2003 study by the US National Library of Medicine, findings showed that a four-month program in mindfulness meditation produced demonstrable effects in brain and immune function. This means that a short mindfulness program can boost your immune system.

Aside from boosting your physical wellbeing, mindfulness is also good for your mind,  increasing positive emotions and decreasing negative emotions and stress. This is backed up by several studies, including the Duke University study entitled Effects of Mindfulness on psychological health. Mindfulness restores the mind to wholeness.

Mindfulness is also regarded as an effective antidote to psychological distress, such as anxiety, worry, fear, and anger. Numerous studies have shown that mindfulness is associated with high levels of life satisfaction, agreeableness, conscientiousness, self-esteem, empathy, sense of autonomy, competence, and optimism. Conversely, non-practice of mindfulness is associated with such negative traits as disassociation, depression, and difficulties in emotional regulation. One study even suggests that mindfulness meditation should replace anti-depressant medication.

In separate research in 1999, 2002, and 2006, mindfulness was thought to also increase metacognitive awareness, which is the ability to perceive thoughts and feelings and view them as passing events rather than believing them to be accurate representations of reality.

Mindfulness changes the physical density of the regions of the brain linked to learning, memory, emotion, and empathy. It also helps us tune out distractions and focus better, improving our memory and ability to pay close attention.

Mindfulness and Stories

The former CFO of Pixar, Lawrence Levy, talks about his journey into mindfulness meditation in this way: If everything is about function ... bureaucracy, performance, that’s all we care about, we might one day kind of wake up and wonder if we ever truly lived because we’ve been so focused on just getting it right, getting it done, or whatever it is. He says that we cannot function this way. What he’s found out during the years of working for Pixar and also studying Buddhist meditation is that we function in a story. Pixar is a company that deals with stories, and these stories have to be simple yet profound. If you notice, most Pixar movies, which are essentially for children, also resonate with adults. Because these are our stories, and our inner child is telling us that these stories, although they’re meant for children’s entertainment, have greater meaning because we can relate to them.

Toy Story, Finding Nemo, Monsters, Inc., The Incredibles. These are all great Pixar movies that resonated with adults. But perhaps the most profound Pixar movie is Inside Out. Just watching this movie is a great study into both mindfulness and bringing out your inner child. We shall delve into this in the next chapter.

Each of us has a story to tell, and our present beings reflect that. If we’re mindful of our present, then we don’t have to dig up our past to see that the inner child we’re struggling to keep under wraps is still there – trying to get out and succeeding. This inner child sometimes gets in the way of our lives because we’ve never truly dealt with it. The power of getting these childhood stories out through meditation is that now they’re in the present, we can find ways to deal with the hurts and pain they’re causing.

If our negative thoughts and feelings remain inside, our inner child is still hurting. The practice of even five minutes of mindful meditation per day will release the inner child and finally give us an opportunity to deal with it in a positive way. To quote the study from Duke University: Mindfulness is the miracle by which we master and restore ourselves.

Making Mindfulness Simple

To make mindfulness as simple as possible, it’s helpful to think of it as it’s described in the illustrated children’s storybook Zen Shorts, by Jon J. Muth. Zen is the Japanese word for meditation. In his introduction, Jon J. Muth talks about Zen using the simple language of children. He says that the meditative mind is like still water at night. We can see the reflection of the moon in still water. However, when our minds are agitated, just like the water, the reflection becomes blurry. This is the reason we need to clear our minds of intrusive thoughts.

In Zen Shorts, Muth writes short meditations. There