{"id":52898,"date":"2021-10-31T13:34:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-31T17:34:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=52898"},"modified":"2021-11-08T11:43:48","modified_gmt":"2021-11-08T15:43:48","slug":"heal-emotional-trauma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/heal-emotional-trauma\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Heal Emotional Trauma: Forgive and Forget"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

How do people form emotional scars? Why do some people move on from emotional hurt relatively quickly while others form emotional scars that last a lifetime?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Emotional scars\u2014otherwise known as psychological trauma\u2014result from situations that threaten your sense of emotional or physical safety. Psychologists argue that your subjective emotional experience of a situation defines whether you find it traumatic\u2014the more powerless you feel, the more likely you are to feel traumatized and form an emotional scar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this article, we’ll explore what determines your ability to heal from emotional trauma and how to speed up your recovery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Forgive and Forget<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

According to Maxwell Maltz, the author of Psycho-Cybernetics<\/em>, the way people handle emotional trauma is strongly dependent on their self-image. Someone with a positive self-image<\/a> responds to traumatic experiences rationally. In contrast, someone with a negative self-image responds to the same experiences irrationally, is more likely to feel threatened, and form emotional scars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maltz argues that an unwillingness or failure to forgive past mistakes and traumas holds people back from experiencing success in their lives\u2014they form \u201cemotional scars\u201d to protect themselves from future hurts and humiliations. These scars don\u2019t protect them, but rather prevent them from experiencing new things and keep them trapped in a state of resentment and misery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n