Chap. 20 - The Logic of Survival
We don't heal in isolation. We heal in collaboration.
The fear was born in aloneness.
The meaning is emerging in companionship.
The healing is happening in the space between.
I spoke about this with a friend because something in me needed companionship as I stood this close to the fear. As I described the belief that lives in me â the one that insists I am doing something wrong and will be punished beyond repair â she reflected something I hadnât seen before.
She said, âWhat youâre describing isnât pathological. Itâs organized. It has a logic. This belief didnât arise randomly; it once helped you survive.â
Hearing that, I felt a small shift. I had always thought of this fear as a personal flaw, something to be fixed. But she helped me see it differently. This wasnât about moral error at all. It was about disappearance â about being removed from the world of relationship altogether.
She gently named the pattern for me. "Itâs not 'I did something wrong,'" she said. "Itâs closer to, 'If I am wrong, I cease to belong to the human world.'"
I could feel how exact that was. It wasnât just about death. It wasnât just about being abandoned. It was about being discarded while still knowing I existed. Endless, conscious exile. Irrevocable wrongness. No pathway back.
She helped me trace it further. Beliefs like this often arise in early environments where safety depends on being âgoodâ in invisible, unspoken ways; where caregivers are unpredictable or frightening; where expectations are implicit and unforgiving; where mistakes escalate rather than repair; and where a child learns that once something goes wrong, there may be no path back to connection.
A child in that environment doesnât think, "My parent is overwhelmed."
They conclude something more precise and more terrifying:
"I canât seem to do the right thing. The rules keep shifting. And if I get it wrong, the cost is separation."
Hearing this, I began to notice my own internal patterns more clearly â the compulsion to confess, the terror around omission, even my reaction to the raffle. It all made sense in a way I hadnât realized: this belief wasnât moral; it was existential.
She also pointed out why these old patterns keep showing up in small, ordinary moments: uncertainty, ambiguity, choice, visibility, authority, time delays, silence, not knowing what the right thing is.
My nervous system reacts before my mind can even catch up.
I realized something important: I am no longer alone in these moments. I am reflecting. Naming. Differentiating. Tracking patterns across time. Holding curiosity instead of panic.
This belief â I'm doing something wrong â born in isolation, can begin to heal in relationship; first internally, as I witness it in myself, and then externally, through connection. It doesnât need to be erased; it needs to be completed. Acknowledged. Held.
I heard something essential that day:
I was not created to live without error. I was created to live in connection, through imperfection.
And the fact that this belief is surfacing now tells me something hopeful: there is enough safety to let it be seen. Not regression. Readiness.
âŹ
ď¸ Chap. 19
âĄď¸ [Chap. 21] (In process)
âŹď¸ Return to Hub List
đA Living Memoir
Thank you for reading. If youâd like to share something, reach out > here.