What Are the Five Core Wounds? A Complete Guide

Pain is inevitable in life’s journey, but it’s not created equal. While we all face daily stressors and challenges, many of us carry deeper, more foundational hurts without even realizing it. These hurts are known as the five core wounds.

These core wounds are the fundamental, archetypal ways in which a human being hurts. When left unaddressed, they don’t simply fade away — they linger in our subconscious, eventually manifesting in our lives as addiction, anxiety, depression or ongoing struggles to maintain healthy relationships.

At The Sanctuary at Sedona, we provide a safe space for your healing. We understand that the symptoms you’re experiencing — whether it’s substance abuse or a co-occurring disorder like depression or anxiety — are your soul’s way of asking for help.

Table of Contents

• What Are the Five Core Wounds?
• The Abandonment Core Wound
• The Abuse Core Wound
• The Betrayal Core Wound
• The Defectiveness Core Wound
• The Separation Core Wound
• Heal Your Core Wound at The Sanctuary
• Your Path to a Renewed Life Starts Here

What Are the Five Core Wounds?

You can hurt in many different ways. While your story is unique, the emotional imprint of these experiences often falls into one of the five core wounds because they strike at the very center of who you are.

These wounds often originate in childhood or during times of extreme vulnerability in adulthood. Because you lacked the tools to process them when they occurred, you internalized them and built your personality around them. You developed coping mechanisms to protect yourself from feeling that specific pain again.

While these mechanisms keep you safe, they can hold you back, manifesting as soul wounds, a state where you’re disconnected from your true self.

The Abandonment Core Wound

The core fear is: “I don’t matter, and I’ll be left alone.”

Of all the archetypal issues, abandonment is perhaps the most primal. While it may seem subtle compared to physical violence, abandonment cuts deep into our biological wiring.

One of the reasons this wound has such a significant effect is that human beings are wired for connection. You’re created to belong. Instinctively, you know that being separated from your community and loved ones is destabilizing to your well-being. This innate need for connection is why, when this wound is triggered, your body often reacts with a severe stress response.

Causes of Abandonment Issues

While abandonment is often associated with a parent physically leaving, emotional abandonment is far more common and can be just as painful. This form of neglect occurs when a parent, caretaker or partner is physically present but emotionally absent, dismissing or delegitimizing your feelings.

The different causes include:

• Narcissistic parenting: This is a common cause of abandonment wounds. Narcissistic parents may be overly critical, holding their children to unrealistic standards while disallowing emotional expression.
• The invisible crisis: Warmth, affection and understanding are vital to a child’s development. When a child feels invisible, it can create an internal crisis of existence.
• Modern Isolation: In our fast-paced, digital world, genuine connection is becoming rarer. Many people experience deep isolation and disconnection, triggering old abandonment pain that was previously dormant.

The Impacts on Adult Life

When you’re abandoned as a child, you can’t understand the experience. Instead, you internalize it and take on the role of the “inner child” who feels helpless and vulnerable.

This response often leads to insecure attachments in adulthood. You might find yourself afraid, oscillating between two extremes:

• Clinging: Holding on too tightly to loved ones for fear of them leaving.
• Avoidance: Pushing people away or avoiding closeness to preempt the pain of rejection.

Healing From Emotional Neglect

Healing begins when you realize that you can comfort your inner child. While you may have faced painful circumstances in the past, you can change the narrative. At The Sanctuary, we help you discover that the love, stability and safety you seek are within yourself.

The Abuse Core Wound

The main fear is: “I am unsafe, and I have no power.”

Abuse involves a violation of boundaries. While this wound includes physical and sexual abuse, it also encompasses emotional and psychological violations where your sense of safety and autonomy was taken away.

When a person experiences abuse, especially at a young age, the world ceases to be a safe place. The people or environments that should have been safe became the source of your fear. This experience creates a physiological state of constant alert.

The Physiology of Abuse

Abuse is more than a memory — it lives in the body. Trauma dysregulates the nervous system, trapping you in a state of fight, flight or freeze. You may feel that you have lost ownership of your own body or your own story.

Abuse manifests as:

• Hypervigilance: You may constantly scan your environment for threats, unable to relax even in safe situations.
• Revictimization: Without healing, the subconscious mind may gravitate toward abusive dynamics because they feel familiar to the nervous system.
• Powerlessness: You might struggle to assert your needs, feeling that you don’t have the right to say no.

Reclaiming Your Power

Healing from abuse is about re-establishing safety. It’s about learning that you’re no longer powerless in that situation. At The Sanctuary, we help you reset the nervous system, reclaim your voice and move you from a place of victimization to a place of empowerment, where you have control over your own boundaries.

The Betrayal Core Wound

The primary fear is: “I cannot trust anyone, and I am a fool for trying.”

Betrayal occurs when someone violates your trust or confidence. Whether it’s a parent breaking promises, a partner cheating or a friend revealing secrets, betrayal involves disloyalty and deceit.

What makes this wound so excruciating is that it’s often intentional. It involves someone making a conscious choice to hurt or disregard you. This realization is unsettling, causing you to question your reality and disrupting your energetic balance.

The Cycle of Blame

It’s natural to feel anger toward the betrayer, but if you get stuck in this stage, you’ll remain tethered to the person who hurt you. Eventually, this blame often turns inward, leading you to blame yourself — perhaps feeling foolish for trusting them or believing you somehow caused the betrayal. This continuous loop of resentment toward others and shame toward yourself is what keeps the wound active.

Beliefs Based in Betrayal

When the betrayal wound is active, it can shatter your belief in the goodness of people. You may develop a trust-no-one philosophy to survive, often leading to protective patterns such as:

• Control: You may try to control every outcome to ensure you’re never blindsided again.
• Emotional numbing: You may disconnect from your emotions to avoid the sting of disappointment.
• Performance: You may feel you need to earn loyalty through perfectionism or high achievement.

The Healing Field of Loyalty

True healing moves beyond the mind and into a healing field of loyalty to yourself. It requires facing your pain with honesty and reclaiming trust in your own intuition. At The Sanctuary, we guide you to release the bitterness that weighs heavily on your spirit, helping you find forgiveness — not to absolve your betrayer, but to free you.

The Defectiveness Core Wound

The fundamental fear is: “I am not enough.”

The defectiveness wound is the mistaken belief that you aren’t good enough exactly as you are. It’s known as a Defectiveness Schema, a rigid, deep-seated pattern in which you feel internally flawed and think people will leave if they get close and see who you truly are.

Where Does Defectiveness Come From?

Internalized feelings of defectiveness usually form in early childhood. If you were constantly criticized, compared to others or made to feel that your needs were a burden, you may have developed the belief that you’re:

• Broken.
• Unstable.
• Inferior.
• Unlovable.
• Wrong.

The Myth of Being “Broken”

Conventional treatment often reinforces the defectiveness wound. Many clients come to The Sanctuary after years of therapy where they were told they have a disorder or a chemical imbalance that they’ll have for life.

We fundamentally disagree because we don’t see you as broken. We see you as a whole person with the natural ability to restore your balance.

Avoidance Coping and Masks

To hide your perceived “defectiveness,” you may wear masks of perfectionism, caretaking or high achievement. You might also develop addictions to numb the pain of feeling inadequate.

For many people, the turning point comes when these coping mechanisms simply stop working. You may find yourself at a moment of crisis where the old ways of managing your pain no longer provide relief. You might feel angry, sad or in denial, which makes it easy to place blame. But often, that anger is a secondary emotion, a shield you use to protect a heart that’s deeply hurt.

Restoring a Sense of Wholeness

Healing the defectiveness wound requires a radical shift in perspective. It involves realizing that you don’t need to be fixed but need to be accepted. Through our holistic program, you can learn to shed these limiting beliefs. The goal is to reach a place where you no longer define yourself by your past or your struggles. 

We help you remember who you are and realize that your value isn’t something you have to earn — it’s something you have always possessed.

The Separation Core Wound

The central fear is: “I don’t belong.”

The separation wound is the feeling that you’re isolated from others and life. For some, this wound is obvious when it originates from a lifelong feeling of being different or misunderstood. For others, it’s hidden beneath social success. But deep down, you continually feel that what’s attainable for other people is not attainable for you.

The Ego in Survival Mode

When you feel separated from love, your ego can go into overdrive, causing you to build a version of yourself that you think the world wants to see. This survival instinct may manifest as:

• People pleasing: Performing socially to “buy” a sense of belonging.
• Codependency: Seeking external validation to prove you exist.
• Control: Manipulating your environment to avoid the overwhelming pain of aloneness.

The Cost of Denial

Living in separation hinders your creativity, sexuality and authenticity. It can make you emotionally numb, unable to truly touch the depth of your own life. When numbness eventually stops working, the suppressed emotions flood in, giving way to fear, anxiety, stress and depression.

You may suddenly feel a terrifying lack of control and a deep sense of vulnerability, afraid that because your defenses are down, you’re unsafe and destined to be hurt again.

Returning to Oneness

Healing the separation wound is about reintegration. It’s about shedding the false self and daring to reveal to the world who you truly are. It’s also about realizing that you’re connected to the earth and the community around you.

At The Sanctuary, we foster a nonjudgmental, family-style community where you can practice being your true self. Here, you do more than talk about connection — you experience it. You learn what it feels like to be truly seen, accepted and valued for the person you are.

Heal Your Core Wound at The Sanctuary

If you recognize yourself in these descriptions, know that you’re not alone. The caring team at The Sanctuary is ready to help you navigate and heal these complex wounds. Through a holistic, integrated approach, we heal the mind, body and soul, going beyond the symptoms to heal the root of your pain. Our process of identifying and working through these wounds is an immersive experience designed to break the hold of long-standing patterns.

We provide:

• Integrated care: We combine science-based treatments with nutrition and complementary therapies like music, sound and yoga in a serene, 22-acre campus. Our multidisciplinary team develops individualized treatment plans and comprehensive care with a 3-to-1 staff-to-client ratio.
• Privacy and confidentiality: Surrounded by the healing energy of nature, The Sanctuary is a private setting designed for healing. We maintain confidentiality, small client numbers and private, luxury accommodations to promote your peace of mind.
• A proven track record: Over the years, we have walked alongside many clients and helped them reclaim the quality of their lives. Our commitment to you continues after you leave, as we support your healing through our aftercare program.

Your Path to a Renewed Life Starts Here

With expert guidance, time and dedication, you can heal your core wound and emerge stronger. Call (866) 773-9133 or contact us online to begin your journey. Let us help you start your journey toward happiness, peace and a better quality of life.