The Courage to Face

​It feels like almost anything can trigger it – a familiar sound, an image flash, seeing a car that reminds you of THE person that reminds you of what happened, of IT.

Anyone who has experienced trauma likely knows this familiar, dreaded experience.

Flashbacks can freeze you in place, terrified, unable to move.

Your brain immediately goes into overdrive – a flood of painful emotions, “what ifs”, and self-critical bludgeoning.

​“Will this ever stop?”

Unfortunately, your body and mind work against you getting unstuck from this whirlpool of agony.
Trauma takes a normal brain/body process designed to help you avoid pain and hijacks it, causing a
seemingly unending cycle of avoidance and psychic pain.

Our human brains are adaptive – we are able to identify images, feelings, sounds, sights that have gone
together with pain and make a story of them. We are more advanced than the animal, who goes to a
pool of water and drinks, and after narrowly avoiding being eaten by an alligator, can recover from
terror to find calm quickly, and resumes drinking at the very same pool.

No, we advanced creatures have the ability to tell a story – “when I last drank I almost died” – and so we
avoid the pool. This brain process helps us survive longer and live more enriching lives. However, when
trauma occurs, the story can change in our minds from “that pool” to “any pool”, resulting in avoidance
of any body of water, anywhere. Even the thought of a pool of water can trigger that same fear
response, resulting in safety, but also misery, because life gets smaller and smaller, more insulated and
isolated. The pain from the trauma boxes us in, adding suffering and agony to our pain.

Is there a way out?

Yes. To begin, let me first tell you a story. Imagine I’m terrified of jumping off a diving board into
a pool. I truly fear I will die. Even touching the ladder makes me quake in fear, rooting my feet to the
ground. But if I know how to swim, and there is water in the pool, and I want my fear to change, I must
face it and go through it. I can transform my fear into something else, if I face it. It helps if I have a
patient, trusted guide, encouraging me, believing in me, helping me contain my fear and overtake it.
And then I jump, and jump, and jump, until my terror transforms.

Similarly, the path through trauma requires the courage to take a risk – going through the pain instead of avoiding it.

We often find ways to adapt to our current pain and resign to living in it. We often choose
to blunt our pain with alcohol, self-injury, or other forms of self-destruction. We would rather face the
known pain instead of walking into unknown suffering that awaits us on a different path.

Our minds can create a catastrophic story of what that pain would be like – and when we approach it
our fears feel confirmed. Facing the pain and going through feels terrifying. If my feared pain is worse
than my current pain, I know I won’t survive.

This way of thinking forgets two vital elements.

First, when traversing the path through trauma, there is HOPE. Sure, risk taking means things could get worse. But surely if you keep things as they are, you also risk remaining stuck in your current pain and suffering for the rest of your life. You take a risk either way. Facing and going through the pain runs the risk of feeling overwhelmingly intense, but also carries the hope of potentially transforming the pain into something new and manageable, something meaningful, even something good.

Second, you can maximize this hope by facing your pain with someone.​

Going through with a trusted guide provides a borrowed sense of courage, a sense of grounding and
safety, and a hope for change. Further, the therapy experience itself is transformational – by going
through pain with another person, you can learn that you are not alone and that you can engage in
meaningful and healthy relationships. This type of change not only helps you, but can ripple out to the
world around you. Just as the pain of trauma propagates internally and externally – so too does the
healing of trauma. When two people have the courage to face the pain, the beauty from transformed
trauma can bring life to you and the world around you.