🌿 Healing Through Story & Self: The Power of Naming

There's a quiet kind of power in naming.

Not labeling. Not diagnosing. But gently placing language on an experience that has long lived in the shadows.

Many of us carry pain we don't have words for. Memories that live in the body but not in a narrative. Sensations that rise in the chest or sit heavy in the gut, and we don't always know why. Trauma does that. It disconnects the story from the feeling. It pulls apart meaning from memory.

But when we begin to name our truth, what happened, what it felt like, what it means to us now, we start the slow weaving of story and self. We begin to reclaim our voice.

🖋 Why Naming Matters

Language gives us agency. It helps us move from "something is wrong with me" to "something happened to me." And that shift? It changes everything.

Naming doesn't mean having it all figured out. It means starting somewhere. Saying:

• "I felt unsafe."
• "I didn't have a choice."
• "I shut down because it was too much."
• "That moment shaped me."

This kind of truth-telling is healing. Not because it rewrites the past, but because it lets you become the author of your present.

💬 The Body Knows Before the Mind Does

Often, our bodies speak the story before our mouths ever do. A flinch. A freeze. A racing heart. A sudden sense of shame or dread.

Before we can speak of the pain, we feel it.

This is why body-based practices like breathwork, movement, and somatic reflection are powerful companions in healing. They help us connect the dots between sensation and story. They help us remember what was forgotten or buried, not to relive it, but to finally live with clarity and care.

🔍 Naming is Not the Final Step—It's the First

It's okay if the words feel messy.

It's okay if your voice shakes.

It's okay if it takes time.

This isn't about having a polished story to tell others. It's about starting an honest conversation with yourself. One that begins not with answers, but with curiosity:

• "What part of me is asking to be seen?"
• "What's the story my body holds?"
• "If I could say one true thing today, what would it be?"

💛 Gentle Invitation

Take some time this week to journal, speak aloud, or reflect on a moment in your life that still feels unsettled.

Please don't rush to make sense of it. Just offer your presence and your words.

You might write:

"I don't fully understand this yet, but I know it mattered."

That's enough. That's more than enough.

🌀 Healing is not the erasure of your story, it's the reclaiming of it.

You are not too much. You are not broken. You are learning the language of your own becoming.

And that… is the work of coming home to yourself.

—

Love and Light,

Anique

Founder/Sanctum & Soil

© 2025 Anique Herbst LLC | Sanctum & Soil

Trauma-informed, body-based care rooted in psychology, faith, and presence.