Psychology teaches us that the conditions of our early life, and incidents or situations have shaped us into who we are today. At minimum, we learn lessons from mistakes or mistreatments that we commit or that happen to us or others, just as we learn lessons from successes of our own or of other people.
Of those formative life conditions, traumas in particular clearly result in coping mechanisms, fears, and avoidance, as well as commitments to positive behavior, depending on the person and the severity of the events in question.
Sometimes we refer to someone as being "scarred for life" by certain traumas that they endured or perceived. In this case, we usually use emotional scarring as a metaphor for having such a deep injury that it leaves an indelible mark, and often, a trigger that may cause additional injury.
All of this is true, but not for everyone at all times. When we speak of someone being scarred for life, we think of a scar as an ugly, inflexible mass that gets in the way. And yet, physical wounds, even deep ones, do heal, sometimes completely. When there is a scar, it may heal in any number of ways, depending on how it was treated after the injury. It may end up nearly invisible or as pliable as the surrounding tissue.
It may be interesting to discriminate between emotional injuries that heal completely and those that don't. Sometimes we do distinguish between "scarring" in conjunction with an emotional wound, and "festering," as in an unhealed injury which can be easily reinjured.
But aren't there many emotional injuries that do heal? Don't some develop a healthy scar like a physical wound? A repair that's stronger and less vulnerable than what was there before?
This is not at all to question the impact of emotional injuries. It's just to consider adding nuance in how we think of such incidents, how we speak of being "scarred," and how we tell our stories.
One time, I got to thinking what stories I would tell a therapist if they wanted to understand my life. I thought of loads of stories I could tell, and some that could be presented as having felt traumatic.
But after thinking about these stories, I noticed that some contradicted each other, and some were incidents I really don't care about any more. I realized that many were stale stories. Maybe they had a part in shaping me in the past, but so have countless incidents since then. And if those stale stories caused injuries at the time, they seem to have healed long ago.
I attended a family reunion recently, one where I knew everyone, though it wasn't my family. I knew lots of their stories, including many about the lingering resentments dating to mistreatment from childhood or since. I noticed people, perhaps out of habit, protecting others from what they thought were sensitivities to certain topics or turns of phrase.
But everyone at that reunion actually enjoyed each other, and those old stories of minor trauma and resentment suddenly seemed stale. Sometimes people's fears and coping mechanisms seem to soften with age, or perhaps we could say we grow up, or grow past those obstacles, even if it takes us a long time to get there.
Sometimes emotional scars fade in a healthy and natural way, just as physical scars do, leaving a less vulnerable person. Many of the injurious stories may simply grow stale, outmaneuvered by life. The dark clouds may lift, and we may suddenly notice that, contrary to all the weather reports, the sun has come out.
The last two entries you sent to my email were both comforting and embracing of my own aspirations and feelings. The previous entry underscoring and embracing musicality has been my mantra for the last several months and continues to give me pause.