The death grip of control is often fueled by the fear of being separate and the fear that our needs will not be met.

Unmet needs in early development can literally signal the end of the world and be a matter of life or death.

This is far too much for the developing brain to make sense of. This overwhelm persists and lives inside of us manifesting as pain until we are able to reconcile the unfulfilled wish within our unmet needs.

As we revisit unmet needs, we will make contact with, and begin to make sense of, what has historically been too much to handle.

In doing so we can build a relationship with the parts of ourselves that have felt split, separate, splintered, isolated, alone, unsupported and/or in hiding. This helps these aspects of self come back online and integrate into wholeness.

And the more whole we become the less pain we carry

To grieve the loss of what never was is to meet the parts of ourselves that were never met, that were never held, that were never supported, that were never attuned to.

This helps us to finally feel and process the emotional impact of not having these needs met.

Then we no longer need to carry the burden of this emotional impact in the form of chronic pain, anxiety, depression or chronic illness.

As we meet these parts of self, we build a relationship to ourselves, from ourselves. And this is where repair happens. The splinter heals. The divide mends. And we can synthesize and make sense of life experience that previously was beyond comprehension.

And when we can make sense of our pain we shift our relationship to it.

This relationship we derive with ourselves then becomes the bedrock of the relationships we form with others. When we reconcile the unfulfilled wish, we are no longer beggars trying to drink from an empty well. We are no longer trying to get our unmet needs from early development fulfilled by others. This way we can show up in relationship established more deeply in our wholeness.

And this breaks cycles of codependence, helps us establish healthy boundaries and brings clarity in identifying what we feel and what we need in any given moment. It helps us accept that part of being human is to have needs and it frees us up to get our needs met with more and more skill and ease.