05. Mapping healing: [step two] uncovering the truth

Light and Shadow: the podcast

In this episode, we dive straight into step two of the healing journey - uncovering the truth. After a brief overview of what we covered in step one, figuring out what’s broken, we explore how learning and gaining greater insight can better help us troubleshoot the core issues of our lives. By becoming curious about attachment theory, emotional attitudes, past traumas, family dynamics, the cycle of addiction, cognitive distortions, etc., we can gain information to help us make practical and lasting changes in our lives. We are essentially educating ourselves on the different facets and moving parts of ourselves and our lives - present and future - in order to guide us to the direction we want to go, and interrupt any cycles in an opposing direction. If sailing is the objective, uncovering the truth is the manual, while step three - interrupting the cycle - is actually learning to sail. In this case, everything we learn and glean from this uncovering the truth stage will effectively inform how we approach the next step of healing - interrupting the cycle. The goal of this step is not just to gain information, but to gain insight to inform the practical actions we need to take in our life to bring us back to balance, regulation, and, thus, recovery. While we focus mostly on step two, uncovering the truth, we are all setting up for step three to happen naturally and most effectively.