When learning how to recover childhood memories, it is essential to keep in mind that there is a part of ourselves that has chosen to block out this part of our existence. It’s as if there is something within us that said, “This is too much for you to deal with. So I’m going to lock all of these memories away until you’re able to process all the energy and emotions that this brings up.”
In other words, there is a part of ourselves that specifically keeps us from recovering memories; in order to keep us safe emotionally. The intent of this block is to allow us to move forward, without the weight or burden of this period of our life debilitating us emotionally.
It’s the perception of the child that’s important here. It’s this child’s perception that’s determining what is safe or not safe to remember. And when it comes to healing the Inner Child in our lives, perception is everything!
Why Recover Childhood Memories?
The reason that it’s useful to learn how to recover childhood memories is that it grants us freedom. The type of freedom that I’m talking about here is the freedom to move towards the goals and desires that you have in your present life.
Too often it’s these hidden energies from our childhood that keeps us locked in place due to fears from our past. Locked-in fear can prevent us from taking action and moving towards our desires. It can block us from allowing ourselves to receive love, success, or rising above the circumstances of our life. The intent of this locked-in fear is often just the need to feel safe.
How to Recover Childhood Memories
When I’m asked to help someone to learn how to recover childhood memories, I’m not focused on the memories themselves, but rather, I’m focused on making it safe for the person to remember.
To help illustrate this point, let’s listen to an actual session recording of me working with someone on this issue. This was someone who had very few childhood memories available to her. But one memory that she was able to access was a recurring memory of playing in the forest area behind her home as a child.
But before we start this recording let me first offer a trigger warning here. This process of working with people is designed specifically to help them bring up past hurts and deep-rooted fears. If you have any concerns about listening to this, please turn off the recording now. I’ll also invite you to contact me to schedule a time when we can work through these triggers.
And yes, this session was recorded with the permission of the woman having the session and is being replayed with her permission.
Now let’s listen and find out how to recover childhood memories.
Case Study of Recovering Childhood Memories
Patrick: Let’s see if we’re able to go back to the pond. Now, you may be seeing it as a movie at first. And let’s see if we can connect to the little girl. It might be a little bit scary at first.
Yeah, I’m getting a little bit scary feeling. Tell me if that resonates for you?
Client: No, I sit with her often.
Patrick: Okay, there is sitting with her and then there is connecting and being her.
Client: hmmm I don’t think that I’ve ever done that.
Patrick: Yeah that’s the part I am getting that it’s a little scary. Tell me if that resonates?
Client: It does, I see it as a movie.
Patrick: Yeah, yeah. And that’s okay. That’s okay.
So what we’re going to do is, I want you to know is that, she is you. She is you. Yeah, I’m getting a little bit of fear energy coming up.
Client: Yup.
Patrick: What I want you to do right now is give you permission to feel scared. I want you to give you permission to feel scared.
Because you’re not allowed to feel scared. You get it? This is something you are not allowed to feel. Oh! Man, I feel so much male energy coming out of me.
You are not allowed to be scared. Let’s sit with that for a second, “I am not allowed to feel fear.”
Just give your male energy permission to just bubble up. “I am not allowed to feel fear.”
Client: Oh yes, you’re singing my song.
Patrick: That’s good, that’s good. Give yourself permission to feel it. Feel it, feel it, feel it. It’s safe to feel, “I am not allowed to feel fear.”
It’s safe to feel, “I am not allowed to feel fear.” One more time it’s safe to feel, “I am not allowed to feel fear.”
Do you feel that starting to dissipate?
Client: Oh yeah
Patrick: Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. Just allow it to happen. Good, you are doing so good.
Understanding Your Inner Child’s Perception
In this session the woman realized that what she believed was her happy memory was really a memory of her trying to escape all of the painful drama that was happening at home. As a little girl she would escape to this pond.
The relevance to her current life is that she came to realize that she was still using the memory of the pond to mentally and emotionally escape from her present life.
As we gave her permission to feel afraid as a little girl, the fear began to dissipate from the adult woman. In other words, by embracing the little girl she began to make it safe for herself to stay in the moment as an adult.
To put it in another way, as the Inner Child begins to feel safe the adult woman no longer has to experience a knee-jerk reaction to situations. And here we’re talking about the fears from childhood that are triggered by an event or circumstance in her present day.
Unlocking Your Potential
By letting go of the fear energy from the past we find that we can respond to present circumstances without feeling the need to react.
This was a highly significant revelation to this woman. And it served her far beyond just being able to recover past memories, although in coming days she found that many childhood memories began coming back to her as well.
Now let’s go back to the recording so we can hear in her own words how she felt about how to recover childhood memories in this way.
Client: It’s making a lot of sense. Now that you given me something really important to understand.
Patrick: That’s so cool. I’m so happy.
Client: Yeah, thank you. I thought that that was my play time but that was my escape time. Oh shit. Huh, and I’m doing it again. I just been doing it for several years. Hmmm Wow! Cool. Big. Huge. Thank you.
Patrick: You’re welcome.
I love that ending.
We can hear how, even as the session is coming to a close, that she’s still having new understandings coming up for her present life.
And this brings us to a full circle. At the start of this recording I asked the question, why would we want to learn how to recover childhood memories. And this woman makes it clear, so that we can have freedom.
We start with the feelings that arise as we try to access any early memories from our childhood.
We then bring in the energy of compassion and empathy to the Inner Child that is still struggling with the fear or memory blocks.
We then help the Inner Child feel safe to allow memories to surface.
And finally, as we allow the feelings from the memories to surface, this in turn frees us from the locked-in energy of fear that may have existed in our past.
And it is that freedom that makes it possible to have more energy, more focus and greater awareness in our present life.
Reaching Out for Help
So now let me turn this around and ask you,
Are you someone that has trouble remembering events from your childhood?
Are you ready to experience the freedom from your past fears from childhood?
I believe that learning how to recover childhood memories in a safe and compassionate way can lead to real and lasting changes in life.
And if you’d like to work one-on-one with me, I’m here to help. You can reach out to me through my Contact page and set up a time for us to work together or sign up for my newsletter so you’ll know when new podcasts are released.