I found myself dealing with traumatic pain from my past around the end of last year. The type of pain that forced me to seek professional help. And I didn’t realize until then that, sometimes, we tend to carry some very heavy memories. Some very intense energies. My body stored all that pain for decades, and seemingly out of the blue started releasing it. Dwelling in those intense energies, I was ready to fuck shit up until I got to the heart of the matter: trauma.

This very intimate piece discusses the famous “Hero Journey” that I have often taken pride in, but that was made possible by the victim in me that had to become a hero at a very young age. How does one release traumatic pain for once and for all? And how does forgiveness look like for a victim? Read on to find out what worked for me…

For the sake of clarity, let’s use a dictionary definition of victim: one that is acted on and usually adversely affected by a force or agent (Merriam-Webster). If that’s a bit too broad, we can subdivide it into two categories: a) one that is injured, destroyed, or sacrificed under any of various conditions, and, b) one that is subjected to oppression, hardship, or mistreatment.

Whenever I write a piece, I do my best to keep it to my lived experiences. So speaking for myself, I’ve been a victim of parental neglect, physical and verbal abuse, systemic injustice, racism, homophobia, and assault.

I never liked the word ‘victim’ because I never wanted to feel victimized. But we need to be clear about concepts, topics, and definitions to have any form of conversation about these themes. Because there is a difference between forgiving a friend for infringing on a boundary or someone for yelling at you in the heat of the moment versus forgiving oppression, hardship, mistreatment, or injury inflicted on you.

Discussing something as delicate and personal as trauma and forgiveness asks for context so you can have a sense of where I’m coming from. So, let me take you to the inspiration for this Offering. Let’s go back to the end of 2025 and the first month or so of this year, 2026. I met pain that was deeply buried, waiting for its moment for release.

Meeting the pain behind
an Unmatched Rage

I had never before experienced so much violence and anger from within my being as I did last winter. This lasted for several weeks. It was very, very scary to witness myself like that. This is because I’ve always known myself as someone kind, nice, with decorum. I can also be very assertive and direct, and I say what I feel when I need to… But this was not assertive or outspoken; I wash harsh, rude, snappy. I had lost ‘it’—the personality I have known myself to have. I couldn’t recognize myself anymore. And a part of me didn’t care about my loss of identity either. That loud rage was the tip of a deep iceberg.

Underneath all of that anger and rage, there was traumatic pain. I didn’t know this initially. That’s the thing about pain that lives in the body: even when the mind tries to intellectually process or suppress it, the body always remembers—and it has its own form of processing.

The dangerous Hero’s story:
dismissing the Victim’s reality

I’ve always narrated my life from The Hero’s perspective. I’ve always been in control of my narrative: a strong, independent, resilient, loving man. Wearing struggle like a badge of honor, I took pride in my resilience.

When I was younger, I would share how I started working when I was 15 years old, and how, by the time I was 18, my life experiences were vastly different than those of my peers. I always narrated from a triumphant perspective–looking at the glass half full kind of point of view. But the ugly truth was that me working from such a young age came out of necessity. And having more cashflow than my peers came with responsibilities.

Before I became The Hero of my own story at age 15, there was an indefensible boy who needed more safety, stability, and efforts from the people closest to him. There was that version of me that was vulnerable, in need of protection, of direction, of guidance, emotional and financial support—and these were not granted to him. Not in the ways that he deserved. Not in the ways that any child deserves, actually, in my opinion. So I had to grow up very fast and take responsibility for my life at a young age.

There are defining moments where some of us we have to be strong, resilient, survivors. It’s either that, or sink.

Some heroes had to become heroes, otherwise they would have stayed as victims. But there was a victim there before there was a hero. In such instances, there was a price to pay. In my case, that was the loss of innocence at a very young age.

Can we acknowledge the Victim in us, too?

Almost two months into delving in hell, I had reached a very, very delicate point: I touched the wound that’s been beneath all of that anger and rage. Beneath wanting to burn it all down, what my pain was asking from me was acknowledgment.

And so, I broke down, and I cried, and I sobbed on a Tuesday morning after almost two months of not recognizing myself. After asking that same Tuesday morning in my journal, “How do I release this pain for good?” Little did I know that I’d be crying like that, and finally feeling the pain of the loss of innocence. I was crying unconsolably in the arms of my partner. It was the most vulnerable I have felt in a very long time.

Alchemizing pain:
feeling and accepting
before healing and forgiving

The Victim in me never had a chance to actually feel what it was like to be a victim until it was safe enough to feel. I needed to feel sorry for myself, and I did. I needed to feel sorry for that child that had to grow up way too soon, and so I did. I had to feel his anger, I had to feel his pain. I had to ask him: “what did you need my boy?”, and once I reached that point and did that, and I realized that what was, is not anymore, and what is, suffices for all the needs of that little boy, I was able to start making peace with what was. But not before feeling all the rage of that young boy and teenager inside of me.

My theory is that I was finally safe enough to rest after being in survival mode for a very long time; my body felt safe and rested enough to release all the pent-up stuff it carried because it had no other option but to carry. All the baggage it had no space to release, finally had space for release. It sneaked up on me when I was safe enough to feel.

When you have a more mature understanding of the scope and breadth of everything, but you were a victim, when you accepted that some things happened beyond your control that heavily affected you and your journey, how do you experience forgiveness? What is forgiveness when you feel and realize how much harm was done to you by the people (who claim to love you) and systems (not designed to protect you)?

Redefining Forgiveness

My partner and I were listening to Celia Cruz the other day. A fantastic, legendary singer. This was shortly after we had a conversation on forgiveness and letting go, and whether there is a difference between the two.

We were listening to this song in Spanish titled “Rie Y Llora” which means “Laugh and Cry.” In that song, Celia sings: “It’s not that I remember; I don’t forget. This is forgiveness: remembering without pain.” That’s a very interesting take.

“Remembering without pain,” isn’t that the same as releasing someone or something? Somatically, how can the body remember without your chest shrinking? You’ll need to let go of what makes your chest shrink and your heart pound faster. A big part of that is acknowledgment and acceptance of what happened, I believe. Another big part is release. And another one is awareness. Let’s discuss them.

Acknowledgment and acceptance is important because something impactful did happen. This is the beginning of healing: telling yourself that what happened was truly fucked up and impactful.

Once that which happened is acknowledged, should we want to move on, we must release it. Cry it out, scream it out, get it out.

And once that release has run its course, we must reign in awareness that we will not experience that pain again. That experience will not happen again. We can let it go safely. We can then talk about remembering without pain. But also remembering with awareness that it won’t repeat.

Letting things rest without repeating…

I think forgiveness can be something that we tend to romanticize. I think that forgiveness is something that we make it look like this big ass virtue, but it’s something as simple as letting go of the grip that suffering has over us–and that can be self-inflicted or it can be inflicted by others. Simple is not always easy.

If you ask me today about forgiveness, this is what I believe: Forgiveness is not reconciliation. It’s not reconnection. It’s not even access. Forgiveness is not going to the perpetrator and telling them, “I forgive you.” It’s not even you telling yourself in your heart that you forgive people. It is letting go, fully, so you can move on, wholeheartedly.

You can let go of all the people, and the places, and the circumstances that were the source of so much of your pain. You can let go with complete trust and awareness in your current self. The one who can promise you that it was handled, and it was resolved, and it won’t happen again.

Forgiveness, to me, is being in a space where what was does not affect what is negatively anymore, even as it may have informed you and changed your life at some point. Where you can look at what was and say, “This was something that happened, but this is not something that will define me or something that I will hold on to for the rest of my life. I deserve more than the stories that ask for release. I deserve to live free.”

no more villains,
no more victims,
no more heroes,
I AM.

If you don’t want to bitter yourself or corrode your inner being, I highly recommend letting go. At the same time, give yourself time to feel, to heal, to release. Just remember this: even after your most painful and traumatic experiences, you can still return to you. I will leave you with this piece from my book, The Return: