Lately I’ve been doing a lot of trauma work with clients who didn’t realize they even had any trauma. Most people come to me struggling with anxiety, a relationship, or questioning their career, but pretty soon, we start talking about deeper things. The old pains and past hurts that were never fully healed. Those wounds which seem to elude words are blocked, trapped in the subconscious.
“I don’t know why I feel so upset,” while you cry over something seemingly trivial.
“This isn’t really a big deal, I know that, but I don’t know why I can’t get over it…”
“I have no idea why I get so angry and upset every time he says that to me, it shouldn’t matter,” but it clearly does, a lot. And there’s no logic to it other than… it’s reminding you of a past trauma.
Trauma gets stored in the body like a DVD stuck on pause, ready to be “played” again whenever something in the present moment, our current life, reminds us in some way of the pain of the past. Why? Because trauma is not stored in the brain like other memory. It doesn’t get filed away into our filing cabinet of autobiographical facts of our life. Instead, it is stored in the body, as emotion, tension, or pain because of our “emotional brain,” or Autonomic Nervous System.
Animals shake when they experience trauma or anxiety. Think of a dog who’s been in a fight with another dog: Once the fight is over, both dogs will shake to calm their nervous systems and quiet the fight, flight, or freeze response. This enables them to move on without the physical memory of the situation.
Humans, however, don’t naturally do this. Instead we carry our stress, anxiety, and trauma around with us every day and use food and other addictive behaviors to soothe ourselves and quiet the emotional discomfort.
There’s nothing wrong with turning to food or other means to soothe yourself, but typically habitual behaviors provide a short-term solution, and you’ll continue to feel the discomfort until you release the memory from your body.
We have a tendency to look for the quick fix, but there’s no six-hour healing elixir that can magically erase the pain and discomfort from old wounds. Healing takes time.
Give yourself time to fill your emotional tool-kit and understand that healing is a journey—one that lasts a lifetime.
Of course, practice makes the journey easier, but there is no perfection. There will be times when you fall back on old patterns and behaviours, when that happens reach into your emotional tool-kit and take what you need. You are equipped. You can do this.
Now, let’s hear all about it from the very expert Phil Lee who takes us through the journey of unblocking trauma. Listen to the entire episode here - https://open.spotify.com/episode/4hthb4gsGHBcIIapfjdae4?si=Wf4uyKb-SiGv8CSsRu_xcg&dl_branch=1
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