I look at it a little differently, maybe because my past has caused me to already have super-agency in my life. When I started therapy 2 years ago I suffered from PTSD. EMDR really helped that, and I have kept going with it. I also read a lot about the trauma response because of an abusive childhood I don't remember (probably because I was dissociated). This work was very important to me because I'd recovered from aggressive cancer and it seems clear that repressed anger and other such things increase recurrence. I did learn through therapy that instead of blaming other people for bad things they did, I always blamed myself for not being able to prevent them from doing it. I learned to take that anger that I was directing toward myself and put it back on the person who deserved it. That was an insight that a lifetime of self-analysis didn't come up with.
But in parallel, I took my decades long meditation practice to another level with a daily Tao practice. And I found a dichotomy. Whereas therapy is about naming emotions and feelings, and about telling a story which integrates your experience, Tao teaches that all that matters is the present moment, and that words and stories get in the way of experiencing the present moment. I found myself caring less and less how to name or describe a feeling, or what story explained what was going on and helped me feel better about things. Instead for the first time in my life I was able to be be present.
I still have some very stressful things in my life that I am trying to change. So I still go to therapy. But I'm no longer obsessed with trying to "figure things out", and I'm increasingly just happy to simply be alive.
And yes, despite a lifetime of trauma I am not "traumatized" because I've never liked labels, especially medical labels which lock you into a model which often barely approximates truth.
In a social worker who reluctantly became involved in mental health treatment. An excellent experience, but I’m careful to identify in my private practice of 40 years that I’m a social worker, and as such, I believe that environment and relationships and opportunities need to be dealt with logically and with some hard choices. Not some hard choices, always hard choices. I also believe that unless seriously damaged in brain or psyche, and by that I mean, soul, people have the wisdom within them to see the right direction. I’m not the kind of therapist that doesn’t give advice, lets people consider really horrible choices that will lead them to danger or regret beyond coping. And I also believe that it’s really easy to become a therapist who enables the weakest part of somebody which disable their strength. So thank you for this lovely article and your book looks intriguing. I intend to read it.
I look at it a little differently, maybe because my past has caused me to already have super-agency in my life. When I started therapy 2 years ago I suffered from PTSD. EMDR really helped that, and I have kept going with it. I also read a lot about the trauma response because of an abusive childhood I don't remember (probably because I was dissociated). This work was very important to me because I'd recovered from aggressive cancer and it seems clear that repressed anger and other such things increase recurrence. I did learn through therapy that instead of blaming other people for bad things they did, I always blamed myself for not being able to prevent them from doing it. I learned to take that anger that I was directing toward myself and put it back on the person who deserved it. That was an insight that a lifetime of self-analysis didn't come up with.
But in parallel, I took my decades long meditation practice to another level with a daily Tao practice. And I found a dichotomy. Whereas therapy is about naming emotions and feelings, and about telling a story which integrates your experience, Tao teaches that all that matters is the present moment, and that words and stories get in the way of experiencing the present moment. I found myself caring less and less how to name or describe a feeling, or what story explained what was going on and helped me feel better about things. Instead for the first time in my life I was able to be be present.
I still have some very stressful things in my life that I am trying to change. So I still go to therapy. But I'm no longer obsessed with trying to "figure things out", and I'm increasingly just happy to simply be alive.
And yes, despite a lifetime of trauma I am not "traumatized" because I've never liked labels, especially medical labels which lock you into a model which often barely approximates truth.
In a social worker who reluctantly became involved in mental health treatment. An excellent experience, but I’m careful to identify in my private practice of 40 years that I’m a social worker, and as such, I believe that environment and relationships and opportunities need to be dealt with logically and with some hard choices. Not some hard choices, always hard choices. I also believe that unless seriously damaged in brain or psyche, and by that I mean, soul, people have the wisdom within them to see the right direction. I’m not the kind of therapist that doesn’t give advice, lets people consider really horrible choices that will lead them to danger or regret beyond coping. And I also believe that it’s really easy to become a therapist who enables the weakest part of somebody which disable their strength. So thank you for this lovely article and your book looks intriguing. I intend to read it.
https://substack.com/@americanapostasy/note/c-167348003?r=2b0uzh&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action