we are kids in adult bodies

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When we recognize that many people are emotionally wounded kids in adult bodies, it’s a huge relief—because we can stop taking things so personally. But there’s another layer: we’re carrying our own emotional wounds, too. And that complicates everything.

Our reactions are shaped not just by what others say or do, but by our own unresolved hurts. That impatient coworker? They’re triggering something in us. That friend who pulls away? They’re scratching at an old wound. When we see others’ behavior as rooted in their own pain, it allows us to approach the situation with more understanding and less defensiveness.

But it doesn’t mean we’re free from our own stuff.

Knowing we have our own emotional baggage helps us approach situations with humility and curiosity instead of judgment. We don’t just get to say, “Oh, they’re wounded.”

We have to turn that lens inward, too: What’s mine here?

What past hurt is making me feel this way right now? It’s a two-way street—cultivating compassion for others and ourselves in equal measure.

When we bring awareness to our own wounds, it helps us show up with more honesty and less need to control or “fix” others.

We realize that we’re all just trying to do the best we can, each of us navigating our own messy, imperfect, neverending healing.

And that’s where real connection happens: not in expecting each other to be whole, but in understanding and supporting each other while we do human stuff together.

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