I have come to recognize in myself and in others, how much of our stasis or growth emotionally and spiritually lies a great deal within our teenage self. This self that still lives in the house of our emotional and spiritual bodies. Actually, they may even be in two separate houses due to a divorce between the two. A Spirit-Human Spilt if you will.

I knew that this was true 10 years ago when I started my healing journey. How much of a well this was and is still being discovered, met, and reconciled. This teenage time in each of our lives holds so much information about who we are now and how we relate to the world, to intimacy, and to Spirituality. Whatever our wounding was that stemmed from early childhood was like an exposed nerve ending that was cauterized through our teenage experiences.

We actually stopped growing in our emotional maturation. I personally put on the 3D ‘adult’ pants and tried to fit into that traditional mold of ‘get-a-career’. Next came a marriage, then a baby. All the while the teenager lived-on on the inside. He did the best he could playing mature adult but would leak out many times in immature actions. Then a battle would ensue with my own punishing voice to get my ‘shit’ together.

Others may have taken on the spiritual route earlier and stayed away from more 3D type jobs and found a less ‘stable’ environment from which to live yet be free of the Matrix while still being a part of its clutches. A teenage relationship to Spirituality grew that was disconnected from its human pain and a shell of a true integrated spirituality was born.

Maybe it was a blend of the two.

Either way, our unfelt and integrated teenager has been at the helm of our growth trajectory deciding what is and isn’t acceptable. He or she has decided that they own the keys to the car now and it is up to them what happens next. This unhealed teenager is probably found most noticeably in our intimacy and sexuality. They were hurt deeply in these relationships and damned if they will be hurt again. Sexuality either becomes underexpressed or overexpressed and that can show up in their relationship to spirituality as well in the seducer and the seductress.

We were most susceptible to influence and hijacking at this time of our life. We were also susceptible to hiding and fighting. Our relationship to all of Life on all levels was deeply embedded during this time. While our Inner Child may forgive more easily, our Inner Teenager has been less likely to, as it needed to be like this in order to survive and maybe even thrive. To say that we are still emotional teenagers on some level is not a judgment. It is a reality that exists until we are open to come into the same space with him or her and really be honest with where they still have the proverbial keys to the car. This is also not meant to shame ourselves or them for it. It is to heal, to mature, and to integrate the power that we had at that age yet has been distorted.

If you take a look at the world through this lens, you may see it all acting out from this place of teenage wounding and lack of true initiation. Of course, that is not ALL that is going on but it is one big facet. If you were to visit and feel this part of you, you may be surprised by what may still be operating in the background of your emotional and even spiritual consciousness. The goal is to help free this part of you from the position of trying to be the adult when all he or she wants is to be felt as the magical, beautiful, and powerful being it is and was. They have a role in our lives that is not about being in control but about being initiated into our sacred mature humanity. The more we feel them and even challenge them, the more we can start to feel the real spiritual man and woman we truly are.