Heidi Bruce was walking through Target one day, when one of her favorite songs came on.
The 27-year-old recalls how she felt an immediate urge to start dancing − something that initially terrified her. What would people think if they saw an adult woman dancing in Target? Would something bad happen to her if she did?
These fears, Bruce says, made clear what she had to do: Face those anxieties head on, let loose and dance, right there in Target. After all, it wasn't really her dancing − at least not her adult self, anyway. It was her inner child, she says − the childlike version of us that still lives in each of our psyches.
"The part of you that lived through childhood is still within you today," Bruce says. "Whether you had a horrible childhood or a great childhood, now it's our role to be able to take care of ourselves now."
Bruce is part of a community online of people striving to "reparent" themselves. As Bruce explains it, reparenting involves talking directly to that childlike part of yourself, listening to your needs and then becoming the loving parent that you may or may not have had growing up. Bruce herself has been documenting her reparenting journey, sharing videos online that have gone viral. In one of them, she jumps in the air, celebrating her inner child's accomplishments. In another, she has a heart-to-heart with her inner child in the car.
