A reminder that reflection doesn’t have to be about solving or correcting yourself, but about witnessing your experience with compassion and creating emotional safety.
Most of us reflect like we're trying to solve a problem. But healing does not come from fixing yourself. Reflection, when it is most restorative, is observational. It's about witnessing what happened and just acknowledging that was how it was.
Most of us reflect like we're trying to solve a problem. But healing does not come from fixing yourself. Hi, my name is Rachel Havocost, and this month on Cadre, we're talking about reflection. So I want you to think about how a lot of times when we reflect, we have an agenda. We are thinking, what's wrong with me and how do I stop it? But that mindset keeps you in a loop where every feeling becomes evidence that you're not healed enough. Reflection, when it is most restorative, is observational.
It sounds like, this is what I felt, this is what I thought, this is what happened, this is what didn't happen. It's more about observing things from a non judgmental stance without any conclusions required. So when you witness yourself without rushing to change, your nervous system learns something new. It learns I'm allowed to exist as I am. So you do not need to have clarity every time you reflect. Sometimes the insight is simply, wow, that was hard. And this is something that's hard for me to learn as someone who likes to analyze every little thing.
Especially when I'm in therapy, I like to reflect on all of these things that happened in my past and try to figure out why, what went wrong and how to make it better. But sometimes reflection is just about learning how to sit beside yourself instead of standing over yourself. It's about witnessing what happened and just acknowledging that was how it was and allowing yourself to move forward.
