What is psychological trauma?
One who has been mauled by a particular kind of large dog may fear large dogs after the event. The chances are, the greater my trauma, the more my unconscious mind will generalize to include all the canine species as potential biters of my flesh. Perceiving similarities where there are none existing might help to ward off repetition of a trauma: on the other hand, one can also create self-fulfilling prophesies which retraumatize, especially if one reads a hostile intent, when there is originally none.
There are also those who are proactive in the attempts to cure themselves. According to Judith Lewis-Herman, they tend to try to repeat the circumstances which led up to their trauma, as this is an unconscious attempt to create a situation which would allow them to repeat what led up to the particular traumatic event with the hope of producing a different outcome, the next time. Indeed, what the victims of trauma seem to be looking for is to enter a situation which is similar enough to the traumatising situation to allow them to "re-write fate" , seemingly by achieving a positive memory this time, which overwrites the negative one -- the one which had done them so much harm as if it had been a perpetual thorn in the flesh.
Thus it would seem that people do often inadvertently recreate the psychological dynamics which harmed them, and it seems that often this reproduction of harmful events is caused by an unconscious seeking to replicate the situation in which they were first harmed -- a search which usually only produces more harm and retraumatization.
The question that remains about Herman's views concerns this tendency to retraumatize to find healing. Why does this happen? In my view, it is almost a feature of logic that one should attempt an overall psychological healing, by means of regressing into the past to heal what had been broken back then. We feel healthy only when we are whole, but trauma chips away at our capacity to close the circle with others. It prevents us from being able to relate both outwardly (by understanding others) and inwardly (by understanding one's self).
Shamanistic regression and restoration enables one to recover, by going back to the roots of Being, itself. One destroys the previous fabric of the self that had been traumatized and then starts a psychological rebuilding process. This rebuilding takes its time In my case, two years, during which time I needed more sleep than usual. A sense of emotional detachment from the original source trauma was my result.
One who has been mauled by a particular kind of large dog may fear large dogs after the event. The chances are, the greater my trauma, the more my unconscious mind will generalize to include all the canine species as potential biters of my flesh. Perceiving similarities where there are none existing might help to ward off repetition of a trauma: on the other hand, one can also create self-fulfilling prophesies which retraumatize, especially if one reads a hostile intent, when there is originally none.
There are also those who are proactive in the attempts to cure themselves. According to Judith Lewis-Herman, they tend to try to repeat the circumstances which led up to their trauma, as this is an unconscious attempt to create a situation which would allow them to repeat what led up to the particular traumatic event with the hope of producing a different outcome, the next time. Indeed, what the victims of trauma seem to be looking for is to enter a situation which is similar enough to the traumatising situation to allow them to "re-write fate" , seemingly by achieving a positive memory this time, which overwrites the negative one -- the one which had done them so much harm as if it had been a perpetual thorn in the flesh.
Thus it would seem that people do often inadvertently recreate the psychological dynamics which harmed them, and it seems that often this reproduction of harmful events is caused by an unconscious seeking to replicate the situation in which they were first harmed -- a search which usually only produces more harm and retraumatization.
The question that remains about Herman's views concerns this tendency to retraumatize to find healing. Why does this happen? In my view, it is almost a feature of logic that one should attempt an overall psychological healing, by means of regressing into the past to heal what had been broken back then. We feel healthy only when we are whole, but trauma chips away at our capacity to close the circle with others. It prevents us from being able to relate both outwardly (by understanding others) and inwardly (by understanding one's self).
Shamanistic regression and restoration enables one to recover, by going back to the roots of Being, itself. One destroys the previous fabric of the self that had been traumatized and then starts a psychological rebuilding process. This rebuilding takes its time In my case, two years, during which time I needed more sleep than usual. A sense of emotional detachment from the original source trauma was my result.
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