Healing Your Inner Teenager with Magic

On Healing the Inner Child

“Of pain…and beautiful times we had”

When we address wounds of our past, we often talk about healing the inner child. We think of our smallest, most vulnerable selves and the earliest harms we experienced. This is important work, and I think we may neglect another young self—our inner teenager.

Not as innocent and “sweet” as the inner child, the inner teenager was a swirling inferno of hormones, liminal experimentation, and rising responsibility and expectation. Some of our most potent patterns of harm, both to ourselves and to others, started in adolescence. This was when we discovered aspects of who we are, not just as a being to be nurtured, but as an individual existence. This time is often an explosion of independence or an intense smothering of that exploration. It’s a stinky, sticky time when self-awareness rises, and so does body hair.

We are talking about this time through only one of my divination tools—my Sapphomanteion. It’s Sappho of Lesbos’ poetry broken down into numbered lines. You roll a die three times, and the three numbers correspond to that line of poetry. When I asked what she wanted to talk about, she said, 1-6-2  “of pain” and 1-6-2 “virgin deershooter wild one the gods call her as her name.”

That second line of poetry speaks to the Greek goddess of the hunt, Artemis. This line of poetry emphasizes her ferocity, independence, and chastity. Not only that, but her family calls her by her name and addresses her as who she wants to be. There is a declaration of boundaries and power.

Of course, chastity is not necessarily a marker of inexperience, as many experienced people are asexual or, for one reason or another, choose not to have sex. At the core of this message, I felt intuitively that this poetry points to a time in all our lives when the burning desire to be wild and free clashes with our inexperience, sexual or otherwise. Whether you experimented with substances as a teenager or not, your brain was a mess of chemical warfare; thereby, there was a lot of potential for even little mistakes to feel like harrowing harm. And those imprints of psychological vulnerability can haunt us.

What should we address first to heal the wounds of our inner teenager?

5-5-1 “and beautiful times we had”

First, we must trace the threads of beauty in our youth, specifically the beauty that we experienced. This could, of course, be concentrated moments of celebration like school dances or awards, but I want to encourage you to reflect on small or mundane moments of your teens that held beauty you might have taken for granted.

Did you read more? What were your favorite snacks? How often were you pulled into daydreams? What were the first times you discovered things that became your passions or hobbies? How did you know you were attracted to someone? Did you question why?

Even if that time was painful for you, there were moments of beauty hidden in the chaos. Find them and spend time with them. Find them and thank them. Healing processes should always start and end with gratitude.

What about our inner teenager is asking to be healed right now?

3-1-4 “in sacrifices”

What about your teenage self did you sacrifice so that you could become an adult?

What about your teenage self did someone else sacrifice for their own gain?

We are not who we were in our teenage years, and some of that is through neurological shifting; some of it is cultural, and of course much is personal. But did all that was sacrificed actually need to be sacrificed? There may be a part of you that was cut away that is asking to be reattached, to come home.

How do we find out what part of young selves wants to return to us?

2-4-1 “barefoot”

It’s time to make yourself vulnerable and primal.

It’s time to be Artemis and find your wild space, whatever and wherever that means to you. Claim your name. Go out there and just be. Just listen. Find a way, small or big, to capture the sensation of freedom. In that intentional liberation, you will find what is asking to come home.

Then how should we deepen, expand, and integrate the healing?

6-6-6 “full appeared the moon and when they around the altar took their places”

You are not meant to do this work alone. Teenage years are often defined, especially in media, as a time when “like-groups” and “cliques” form. This is an often-commodified echo of our evolutionary adaptation for social safety. Whether you were rejected or accepted into a social group as a teenager, your inner teen is asking right now not to be alone and not to do this alone.

Together, form a circle of trust, even if it’s just a place to talk. If everyone feels aligned, turn this act of reintegration into a ritual. Create an altar together, and connect your ritual to the moon, an ever-changing, liminal being, much like your teenage years. This healing calls for camaraderie and intention.

Just the other day I realized that I had never told one of my partners, who I have been with for many years, one of my most painful memories of my teen years. I thought I was an open book, without secrets, but there, in me, an aspect of my teenage self was festering in anger. This simple act of sharing brought some relief. That can be your start too.

Projecting and healing your inner teenager can feel scarier, more volatile, or more challenging than healing your inner child, but it is necessary. As that being is you, living in your actions and your thoughts.

Together, may you set boundaries. Claim your identity. Find your friends. And embrace your wild heart. Claim your name. Be free.

Malachi Lily, also known as The Magick Artist, is Inglenook’s Transformation Features Writer, with over a decade of experience in the art of divination.