Too often trauma survivors, regardless of the source of trauma, are expected to somehow magically be "ok", as if there were a clock, ticking and saying "hurry up; aren't you done yet?"
And if they aren't, they are somehow "disordered"; their very normal response to trauma is seen as something being "wrong" with them. The natural emotional healing process is too often seen as a character defect, we are conditioned to simply see ourselves through the lens of "illness" and in need of someone or something that will somehow make our pain go away.
In reality, we are often experiencing a very justified anger at the loss of control and the physical, emotional and mental injury of the trauma experience and grieving the losses around it.
It is in the validation of our experiences and the emotional and mental fallout from these experiences that we begin to heal.Compassion, a kind ear, a hug often do more than any elixir that could be prescribed.
Anger and Acceptance is a big deal in the healing journey.
At some point I was able to piece together that my initial anger or irritation at others and circumstances - past or present - was connected to that sense of powerlessness that had ruled my life for such a long time.
This served a couple of purposes....
In focusing on what others "should" do or "should" have done I had a sense of power over the behaviors of others as I judged them and their actions and often got lost in "story"and being that perpetual victim as my focus was on the power others seemed to have over my life. This kind of rumination was like pouring salt in a wound and reliving the injury or offense over and over.
And - focusing on what I thought others should or should not have done or be doing....successfully kept my feelings at bay and allowed me to avoid shifting from that "fight or flight" response of stress or conflict to the more vulnerable state of feeling the feelings behind my personal boundaries being violated and the "Story" that would enable me to find healing.
It took some practice but eventually I was able to recognize that my anger was not a bad thing thing, needing to be managed. But that this feeling was the starting place for recognizing the difference between accepting what I truly had no power over - what others do, think or say - as well as the things that I DID have power over - my own thoughts, feelings and choices today.
And slowly I made that shift from rumination to resolution of past injuries and learned to no longer tolerate the intolerable and embrace the power within that would allow me to create the change that would change my life.
And it was when I learned how to tell the difference between "story" (little s) and "Story" (big S) that I began to understand the power of
Story.
"story" I came to view from a writers perspective as "backstory".
"story" lays the groundwork, tells who the players are, give atmosphere and lays a foundation for the ending, like in a novel.
Its the framework for a creative ending.
But - if the entire novel is written only about the "backstory" that lays the framework the last chapter never gets written.
We are stuck in WRITERS HELL....
That file on our hard drive that is never quite finished
and causing us all kinds of irritation
or distress.
It is when we move from laying the groundwork, setting the stage and telling the backstory to telling about the emotion, the experiences and the drama behind our feelings about the 'story", like when we
that we begin to see how the story might evolve and in time come to a conclusion worthy of a pulitzer...
so to speak:)
Throughout my journey, when I was stuck on "story" that focussed on what others had done or things that had happened TO me - I was stuck in anger, resentment, hatred and rumination...
not resolution.
I was stuck in the pain of the past.
In time, I learned to recognize this was where I was at by who and what my focus was on.
If the focus of my story was on the things that had happened; the people, the places, the things going on that I'd had no choice in - well, those were things that I could not change.
(God, grant me serenity....)
These were those things I was truly powerless over - people and past circumstances.
That was backstory; the details, the players...the who, what, when and where of my bigger "Story" and the framework for the final chapter.
It was in shifting my Story to be about me, my anger at being violated, my power and my choice taken from me, to feel both the anger and the grief, to tell why this was important to me that I was able to move myself into, through and out of the healing process and
give meaning to the backstory by telling MY story.
Getting entangled in "story" made it impossible to tell my "Story" and write that new ending where I am
no longer
a victim
and much more
than a survivor
where I am
creating and living my best life
each day....
in spite of the past I'd had.
See the post: It is Unwritten....(today is where your book begins:))
Finding myself in a "stuck" place where all I could do was talk about a life event or those involved in it became a signpost telling me where I was in my journey.
I've learned that I could get myself "un-stuck" if I could shift to talking and thinking in terms of how the event affected me instead of what others have done, didn't do or should have done...
Very often the first emotion I would feel around a particular life event that came up in my healing journey was anger, especially if my initial perceptions and feelings around this event had been denied by others in some way.
It was through learning to validate my own experiences and the emotional pain around it that I was able to make the mind shift from anger and rumination to acceptance and resolution.
This is where I discovered what it meant to "go through" to "get out of" the pain of the past as I allowed the initial anger to be the door to grief and grief the key to my freedom.
In the past....the "past" was my nemesis. It often became so torturous that every thought, every sense was on high alert as I consciously and unconsciously avoided the triggers that were guaranteed to send me into a tailspin….yet another “meltdown”.
For a long time I engaged in a variety of coping skills that either put myself in danger or had me lashing out at and hating everyone and everything around me. I was “acting out” and “acting in”. Eventually I just shut down when I could no longer live in that pain and those behaviors no longer brought relief; I lived in a chronic state of dissociation and isolation for many years thereafter.
Then one day I had a very clear realization. I had a moment of insight – one of those “aha” moments where I suddenly became aware that by "avoiding" the past this way - either that of my recent past or that of the far gone past - that I was slowly losing my now AND my future because I was so obsessed with avoiding the pain of facing that which I felt so helpless to affect or change.
Part of that realization was understanding that the rumination of the life I’d had, the resentments, the anger at what I had survived and what I had lost in my lifetime because of other peoples actions or lack of action was holding me in this state of chronic pain.
Another part of this moment of enlightenment was that in order to get beyond this pain, to reclaim my life and begin to create the future I so wanted for myself that it was time to let go and begin to feel the pain instead of avoiding it.
It was time to begin to “go through” the anger not by attacking or lashing out at those around me or those who had hurt me – but by allowing myself to own that I first had the right to feel this rage that consumed me…as well as the responsibility to learn to express it safely and respectfully.
And this act led me to the grief that would wash me free of the pain of the past and free me from the prison I had lived in for so many years.
I was finally able to integrate the pain of surviving what I call “childhood horrors” and embrace who I am today.
And thus my journey to wellness shifted from being “mad at the world” to creating my best life where I became a part of the world around me, learning to live my life to it’s fullest instead of living in the isolation and shame that had held me prisoner for so long.
If you’ve found this note helpful – I’d like to suggest that you take a look at a couple of other notes in my archives…Fighting Forgivenessand Onions Make Me Cry.
Namaste.
“I see the light in you”
Susan
**
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What I discovered though is that if I am approaching "tilt" or "overload" where I have an instinct to either pick a "fight" or take "flight"....I very well may be expecting to find my solutions in things outside of my control.
If I'm viewing people places and things outside of myself as my problem....then I am also very likely looking to those same or similar external sources as my solution.
This position of dependence on things outside of myself for my solutions was fuel for that feeling of hopelessness because I saw my well being at the mercy of things that I had no control over....those people places and things that I could not influence or change.
This also fueled that feeling of helplessness and anger when people and circumstances did not meet my needs or my expectations that they would, or "should" meet my needs.
It was when I learned to recognize this dependence on things outside of myself and shift my focus to being self empowered to find and access my solutions that the issue of chronic anger and irritability was no longer an issue for me.
We can use our anger to identify where we are expecting others to do for us those things that we can truly do for ourselves.
This in turn frees us up to search for other resources and solutions instead of being dependent to stick with a resource that is not meeting our needs.
We can use our anger to fuel our quest for solutions through seeking the knowledge that will open the doors for us to live that self empowered life and escape the pain of living in chronic anger and dependence on others to meet our needs.
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Q: How could you use your anger to find and fuel your own power?
