Healing Without Forgiving: A Hero’s Journey for Dissociative Survivors will be published on January 13, 2026 and pre-orders are now open! To give you a sneak preview, I’m printing occasional excerpts from the workbook. Today’s excerpts come from Chapter 6: The Quest under the subheading The Healing Wheel. The Healing Wheel is a roadmap that leads down the path of recovery.
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The healing journey requires the hero to plunge into work that’s daunting and difficult. Luckily, the drive to heal is greater than the drive to avoid the pain at all costs, so you’re probably already knee-deep in the thickets of recovery. With your healing intention in your pocket to chart your destination, the Healing Wheel (see graphic 1) is the map that will help you get there.
Using the Healing Wheel as a graphic organizer, you can anticipate what your unique healing path might look like. From the top of the wheel, and moving clockwise, (1) you’ll discover who you are by working with your parts, your memory, and identity, (2) you’ll work on shame, trust, and relationship issues, (3) you’ll learn how to manage your triggers and feel all your feelings, (4) you’ll grieve the loss of your fantasy childhood, (5) you’ll learn how trauma impacts survivors in general, and how it has impacted you specifically, (6) you’ll explore ways to claim surrogate justice, and (7) you’ll build a new future and eventually find peace.
Each spoke of the Healing Wheel represents a facet of the healing process outlined above, not in a linear or orderly fashion, but in a ubiquitous, spontaneous, and ongoing manner that’s specific just to you. These different work areas are represented graphically as equivalent in size and revolving around the hub, which is a whole life.
In reality, you may spend more time on one work area than another, but in the end, you’ll work on every one. In the case of coexisting conditions, you may have issues not represented in the Healing Wheel to add to the mix. You may be working on one, two, or even seven areas at a time, as each area impacts and relates to the other work areas.
It’s helpful if you can space out your work so it’s manageable; if you’re like many of us, you’ll go through some periods that feel like a marathon or a clown juggling too many balls. Like a rider on a cross-country bike trip, you’ll pedal through all of these spokes and more.
The Healing Wheel is not intended to replace the work of healing. Reading about the work of healing is not the same as doing the work of healing. Rather, the Healing Wheel will provide you with a map, so you know what’s up ahead. In truth, this journey will take years, maybe even decades, to travel, so take your time, prepare well, and create soft landings for the hard times ahead.
It’s helpful to note that the Healing Wheel aligns well with Judith Herman’s stages of recovery we encountered in chapter 5. The specificity of the spokes of the Healing Wheel and, in some cases, the intensity of the work, surpasses that of Herman’s stages due to the developmental impact of chronic trauma on children.
The vast expanse of your journey is the quest for a whole life.
Let’s take a deep dive.
📫 As we head into the holidays, what part of the Healing Wheel resonates with you most? Can you choose one spoke and share what it’s been like to navigate that? I’ll share your thoughts in our next newsletter.
🎉 2026 LAUNCH EVENTS FOR HEALING WITHOUT FORGIVING! 🎉
Join me as we celebrate the launch of Healing Without Forgiving: A Hero’s Journey for Dissociative Survivors!
Wednesday, January 7, 1:00 pm Eastern, “Narrative Collapse & Restoration,” Wesley Theological Seminary, Washington DC
Thursday, January 8, 6:00 pm Eastern, Dissociative Writers Launch Party! Zoom, click here for link
Sunday, January 11, 3:00 pm Eastern, “A Hero’s Journey for Dissociative Survivors,” AIM Speakers Series, click to register
Tuesday, January 13, Healing Without Forgiving PUB DATE!!!
Sunday, January 18, 2:00 pm Mountain, “Let’s Talk About Dissociation,” Peace Lutheran Church, Las Cruces, NM
Sundays (every other) from March 1-May 3, 3:00 pm Eastern, Healing Without Forgiving Book Study with Kim as Facilitator, Dissociative Writers Zoom Calendar
PREORDER NOW FROM AMAZON OR BARNES & NOBLE!
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Healing is the return of the memory of wholeness.
~ Deepak Chopra
Lyn