The Gift to Inner Child

As a child, before going to sleep, when the world around you begins to sink into darkness, but you don't feel sleepy at all yet, you lie in bed and your gaze wanders around the room. It's a fragile time of half-awake, half-sleep, when everything is reshaping. Shadows thicken, cracks in the ceiling become gorges and endless sandy roads. But the most interesting stories unfold on the carpet. Half-flowers-half-beasts weave in frivolous dances. The thickets part and beautiful valleys open to view, with rivers and lakes, and a castle on a hill.

For a very long time I was looking for a way to translate my childhood memories into artistic form, and one day, by some miracle, I found that very rug from my childhood. The ornaments of the rug inspired me to create a video, which became a gift for my inner child. That's when I felt that I had an artistic and psychological tool in my hands that allowed me to rediscover joy and meaning in life, to look at the world around me with curiosity and wonder.

Then it was February 2022 and I moved to Sri Lanka, immersed in anxiety and fear of the unknown. Visiting Buddhist temples and looking at the stone vaults of ancient caves, I noticed drawings so similar to the carpet designs from my childhood.

The darkness of the temple was quiet and warm, like a mother's womb. Sitting on a rock and hugging my knees, I heard a melody inside me. It was a lullaby, and I began to hum it, too.

I felt keenly that a lullaby, one of the oldest songs on Earth, is a way of supporting the inner child from our inner parent. The child only creates and rejoices when it is safe, when it is held by the hand and comforted - tomorrow will be a new day, and everything will be okay, because I am with you. 

We miss that so much in adulthood.

The lullaby tune was the missing element in my work. Now the puzzle is complete, and the inner child and the inner parent finally meet.