Are you aware of the place in you where you say it is uncomfortable to allow anyone else to be? Are you aware of the guards and protectors that kick in if someone or you get close to this place? Are you open to the help, support, comfort, and strength you could experience if you had a safe enough person you could allow to come close and be good with this part of you?

This is where the important and good stuff of therapy happens. In fact, therapy is a bunch of moments of you bringing and opening up parts of yourself with another. If the protective ways of being that keep you emotionally regulated know that the person you are with is going to be safe and good in the way they are with you, they will relax, step back, and allow co-regulation between you and the safe person to occur. This ability to allow others to be there to help, support, understand, and empathize with us is vitally important for taking in resources when we encounter something in life that we don’t have the resources within ourselves to deal with. That which was previously used to keep you away from tender, vulnerable, and uncomfortable parts, now know that what you’ve been looking for, sometimes for decades, in this place and for this part is now available.

What parts of you are hungry for a new way of being with them?