What Generational Healing Really Asks of Us

On being human, forgiving your parents, and still choosing to grow.

Photo by Troy wade on Unsplash

Healing has a way of making you see people differently… especially the people who raised you.

There’s a moment in the self-awareness journey when you realize that if you're going to accept yourself as a flawed human being, you also have to accept that your parents are flawed too.

Not just in theory.
But in the real, lived, complicated way, even if the ways they show it may have been hurtful to you or your progress.

That’s where I’ve been sitting lately in the space between compassion and frustration. In the truth that only being focused on survival shaped so much of how I was raised… and still shapes me.

Whether your family comes from the aftermath of forced migration, systemic injustice, poverty, or simply generations of survival-first living, those patterns linger. In my case, I come from people who carried generational fear in their bones… and that fear, even when unspoken, still shaped how dreams were received.

Survival energy isn’t tender. It certainly isn’t full of compassion.
It can be urgently working toward getting enough for the next paycheck without leaving yourself breathing room to rest into who you are.

It’s heavy because the weight of needing to push past your emotions to get by ends up paralyzing your immune system. It drains you slowly. It doesn’t always leave room for dreaming, gentleness, or emotional awareness.

And when you're raised in that kind of energy, it shapes the way you see the world.
You might start expecting things to go wrong before they go right.
You can find it hard to imagine ease or overflow, because you’ve only known the tension of making things stretch.
Or maybe, like me, you internalize a quiet comparison, always wondering why others seem to have more loving support, more belief in their dreams, more financial backing than you ever did.

That doesn’t mean our parents didn’t love us.
But sometimes, love came through fear. Or control. Or intense protection that hurts more than it helps.

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It’s easy, especially as you grow and surround yourself with people on their own healing paths, to start comparing.
You see other families where support seems to come easily.
Parents who celebrate softness.
People whose lineage seems to uplift and wish for the best-case scenarios instead of warning against possible negative outcomes.

And if you’re not careful, grief creeps in disguised as resentment.
Resentment toward your parents for what they couldn’t give.

Why didn’t you become successful in the way other parents did … in a tangible way, that allows me to start from a place of thriving, not barely surviving?

In a way where I don’t second-guess my next move… because I believe good things are always on the way?

Or maybe envy rises toward the people around you… the ones with parents who help pay down payments, cover rent when needed, or believe in their dreams loudly, proudly, and without conditions.

You start measuring your parents against ideals they were never set up to meet.
And sometimes, that grief is valid.

But sometimes staying focused on that grief keeps you locked in a story that says:
“If they had just done this better, I’d be more whole.”

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When I was living abroad as part of a teaching program, I witnessed others in the group have their parents visit them, send them money to travel, and encourage their decision to do something different. Something outside the box.

I felt envious. Resentful.

Because when I told my family I was going abroad, some of their responses were lukewarm at best. One family member even told me, “Things don’t always turn out how you want them to.”

That was so off-putting. I remember thinking:
Why can’t you just say congratulations and keep it moving?

It can be heartbreaking when the people you love are unable to support your dreams, especially when those dreams are too big for their belief systems.
It feels like they’re not just rejecting the dream…
They’re rejecting you.

And me feeling envy and resentment? I had to work through that.
Because the truth is, this was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I needed to hold space for my emotions, but also soak up gratitude for the journey I was embarking on.

And though I was dealing with instability and challenges (because living abroad is not as easy as social media makes it seem unless you're financially secure, remote-working, or lucky enough to have generous sponsors), it was still mine.

And I’ll share more about that journey another time.

However, one way I released that resentment was by reframing how I internalized seeing others’ families being so supportive.

I had to learn that holding my parents to that kind of standard, expecting them to have emotional tools they were never taught, or to see the world through my lens instead of their lived experience, wasn’t just unrealistic.
It was unfair.

Because none of us is perfect. We don’t meet the mark every time.
And no one, not even the people who raised us, can carry the weight of everything we need.

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At some point, we have to pick up the mantle from where they dropped it.
We decide what makes us happy.
We learn how to design a fulfilling life.
We validate our dreams for ourselves… not because others approve of them, but because we believe in them.

That’s what I mean by being flawed but responsible.

It means being honest about what shaped you…
without using it as a lifelong permission slip.

It means naming your flaws, sitting with your tendencies, seeing your patterns…
and then deciding what to do with that information.

That’s the shift point.
That’s where personal growth actually lives.

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In my reflection journal, From Envy to Aligned Action, there’s a prompt I love:
“Name it and reclaim it.”

It was written in the context of comparison, but honestly, it applies to everything.

(P.S. If you’re the kind of person who processes through writing, I turned that prompt into a full journal guide you can explore anytime. More on that at the end.)

Because once you name a flaw?
You and the universe both know what’s up.

You don’t get to pretend it’s not there anymore.
But you do get to choose your next move.

Sometimes that move is taking aligned action.
Sometimes it’s just holding the awareness gently until you have the capacity to shift.

Both are valid.
But either way… the power’s back in your hands now.

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So yeah, I’m still evolving.
There are parts of me shaped by environments I didn’t choose.
There are things I needed that I didn’t get.
Conversations I still wish my parents and family members had the emotional bandwidth to have.

But I’m also here… alive, reflective, open to possibilities.
And in the end, maybe that means something my parents and family did went right.

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📖 Want to explore these themes more deeply?

Check out my reflection journal:

From Envy to Aligned Action — made for the moments when the comparison of others’ wins, the grief of what you could’ve had, and aligned growth actually meet.

🫖 If this stirred something in you, or helped name something unspoken… consider fueling the next cup.