I’ve been sitting with a question recently — one that feels important enough to slow down with, rather than rush to answer.

Is it the responsibility of someone in authority to trigger me — especially if that trigger touches my deepest wound — because working with it might help me grow?

The short answer is no.

But the longer answer is more interesting.

When authority wakes something old

When someone sits in a position of authority — a tutor, a teacher, a guide — something old often stirs inside me.

Not because they are doing something wrong.
But because my nervous system learned very early on that love, safety, and approval came from someone with power over me.

And that power could be withdrawn.

That is the shape of my mother wound.

So when I feel small, unseen, uncertain, or desperate for clarity in those dynamics, it isn’t really about the present moment. It’s about an old pattern being activated — one I now have enough awareness to notice.

That awareness matters.

It tells me that it is not someone else’s responsibility to deliberately trigger me so I can heal. That kind of work belongs in therapy — in spaces that are safe, consented, and held with care.

Not in education.
Not in authority-based relationships.

At the same time, authority will naturally activate these wounds.

That doesn’t mean I am failing.
It means I am alive to my inner world.

Healing versus integration

There’s another truth I’m slowly learning to accept.

Some wounds don’t heal in the sense of disappearing.

They integrate.

The mother wound may never vanish, but it no longer has to run my life from the shadows. I can notice when it’s activated. I can feel the ache without confusing the present with the past. And I can stay with myself instead of abandoning myself.

That, to me, is real healing.

Not erasure.
Not transcendence.
But relationship.

Owning desire, gently

This reflection has also taken me somewhere unexpected: desire.

For the first time, I’m allowing myself to say — quietly, without justification — that I want a partner.

Not someone to rescue.
Not someone to fix.
Not someone to fill a hole.

But someone I can love.

That distinction matters.

For a long time, love was entangled with caretaking and survival. Wanting felt dangerous, because wanting often led to disappointment or shame. So I learned not to want too much.

Saying “I want a partner who loves me” still feels vulnerable.
Even saying “I want to love a partner” feels new.

But it feels honest.

And honesty, I’m learning, is gentler than suppression.

Money, wealth, and inherited pain

Desire also shows up in another place I’ve avoided owning: money.

I think I want to be wealthy.

Not out of greed — but out of a desire for safety, freedom, and ease.

And yet every time I get close to owning that, something in me pulls away.

I don’t think this is really about money.

In my life, money became symbolically linked to emotional absence. To a parent who didn’t love me in a way that felt nourishing or safe. Somewhere deep inside, choosing abundance began to feel like choosing abandonment — or becoming like the one who couldn’t meet me emotionally.

So veering away makes sense.

It’s protective.

The work, then, isn’t to force myself to want wealth harder. It’s to learn — slowly — that I’m allowed to have security and connection at the same time.

Choosing myself without losing love

All of these threads seem to meet in one place.

I am learning how to choose myself without believing that love will disappear as a result.

To own desire without shame.
To notice old wounds without letting them decide my future.
To allow authority figures to be human, not parental stand-ins.
To stay present with the part of me that still aches — without letting it steer the wheel.

This isn’t a dramatic breakthrough.

It’s quieter than that.

But it feels real.

And for now, that’s enough.