🌿The Roles We Outgrew -Living the Healing
- Upan Lifton
- Jun 17
- 3 min read
Updated: Jun 25
Heart of Healing Series: Living the Healing
“We are not who we think we are. We are who we needed to become to survive.”
Letting Go of Who We Had to Be
Who would you be if you didn’t have to hold it all together anymore?
What would you say, feel, or allow… if you weren’t still playing a role that no longer fits?
We all carry silent scripts... written in childhood, shaped by circumstance, and rehearsed for years. Some made us the strong one, the fixer, the responsible one.
Others cast us as the peacekeeper, the performer, the invisible one.
These roles weren’t bad.
They were brilliant strategies.
They kept us safe.
They got us through.
They helped us belong - or at least avoid rejection.
But here’s the bold truth: Healing begins when we stop confusing our coping with our identity.
🔍 These Are Some of the Roles We Outgrow:
The one who never needs help
The one who always forgives
The one who makes it look easy
The one who keeps the peace at any cost
The one who overachieves to earn love
The one who never speaks up
The one who is always okay
You might not have chosen the role, but you learned it.And over time, it became a mask that felt like skin.
🌱 Why Letting Go Feels So Hard
Letting go of a survival role can feel like betrayal.
Who are we without it?
What if we lose love, safety, or purpose?
The mind resists.
The body remembers.
Even as your soul whispers: This isn't who you really are anymore.
And that’s okay.
Because outgrowing a role doesn’t mean rejecting your past - it means honoring how far you’ve come.
💔 A Gentle Practice: Honoring the Role
Take a quiet moment.
Place your hand on your heart.
Ask yourself:
What role did I have to play to survive?
Who did I become in order to feel loved, accepted, or safe?
What did that role cost me? What did it protect me from?
Now thank it.
Write a letter if you need to...
“Thank you for keeping me safe.
Thank you for helping me survive.
But I don’t need to be that version of myself anymore.
I choose truth now.
I choose rest.
I choose me."
🔄 How to Begin Letting Go
Name the Role: Bring it into the light. Healing can’t work with what we pretend isn’t there.
Notice When It Shows Up: Observe - without judgment - when you feel yourself slipping into the pattern. Awareness is a doorway.
Try One Small Act of Reversal: Say “no” when you’d normally say “yes.”
Pause instead of fixing.
Speak when you'd usually stay silent.
Reclaim What Was Hidden: Often, what the role covered up is something sacred - your need for support, your voice, your tenderness, your joy.
🌟 The Truth Beneath the Role
You are not the strong one.
You are strength embodied.
You are not the peacemaker.
You are peace, learning to live untangled.
You are not the one who makes it look easy.
You are a soul who deserves softness, too.
The role helped you survive.
Now it’s time to live.
🕊 Final Words
Letting go of who you had to be is not abandonment, it’s arrival.
This is how we heal in real time: By stepping out of performance and into presence.
You don’t have to hold up the whole sky anymore.
It was never yours to carry.
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