Contents
In today’s world, traumatic events are becoming more and more widespread and often affect not an individual, but entire groups of people. How can we help ourselves or loved ones if they find themselves in a traumatic situation? Let’s look at five exercises that will help you get back to yourself.
Trauma specialist Peter Levin has been researching post-traumatic stress disorder for over 30 years. He is convinced that psychological trauma is the result of an incomplete instinctive reaction of the body to a traumatic event. The completion of this reaction will lead the affected person to complete healing. Therefore, the main emphasis in the therapy of psychological trauma, Peter Levin makes what happens to the body.
1. Pulsating shower
Every day, take a light ten-minute pulsating shower: run cool or slightly warm water and put your whole body under its jets. Concentrate your mind completely on the part of the body where the water is falling rhythmically at the moment. Turn around, prompting your consciousness to move from one part of your body to another. Press the back of your hands against the shower head; then the palms and wrists; then – the face on both sides, shoulders, armpits and so on. Try to include all parts of the body in this process.
Pay attention to the sensations in each area, even if you do not feel anything or numbness or pain begins. At the same time, say: “This is my head, neck”, “I am glad that you are back.” A quick and light slap on various parts of the body will evoke a similar feeling of awakening. This simple exercise will help restore the connection between the body, mind and spirit, which is often broken after psychological trauma.
2. Feeling through touch
Wherever you are, while reading these lines, make yourself as comfortable as possible. Feel how your body is in contact with the surface that supports you. Feel your skin, note the sensations in contact with clothing. Feel what is under the skin – what reactions of the body do you notice?
Remember them and calmly think: how exactly do you determine that you feel comfortable? What physical sensations make up the feeling of comfort that is born in your mind? What thoughts help you become more aware of the physical sensation – are you more comfortable or vice versa? Do they change over time? Sit down for a moment and enjoy the comfort that bodily sensations give you.
3. Feel the dissociation
The traumatized person is usually dissociated. Dissociation is a kind of psychological defense. In a moment of strong negative experience, we begin to perceive what is happening to us from the outside, as if we are leaving our own body. This mechanism protects against unbearable, too heavy emotions. A dissociative episode after a trauma is usually referred to as, “Like it wasn’t me.”
To understand what dissociation is and how it feels, sit back in your chair and imagine yourself lying on a raft that floats on a lake. Feel yourself floating and then allow yourself to gently float out of your body. Rise up to the sky, slowly, like a balloon taking off, and look at yourself sitting below.
What is this experience like? What happens when you try to feel your body? Go from your own body to this feeling of flying a few more times to get a better feel for the dissociation.
4. Test for dissociation
Sit comfortably in a chair that supports your body. Think of a place where you would really like to go on vacation – a long, leisurely and carefree vacation. Go through the memory of wonderful places and try to choose the best. Now mentally go there and do whatever your heart desires.
Right before you’re ready to go home, answer the question: where are you?
Most likely you will name your favorite vacation spot. It is unlikely that you will answer that you are now in your own body. When you are not in your body, you are dissociated.
5. Working with photos
Open your family photo album and select 2-3 photos from your travels or your childhood. They should be well-known to you people or familiar places.
Look at the first photo. What emotions does it awaken in you? Whatever your reaction is, just note it. Is she strong or moderate? How do you know what she is? If you can answer this question based on your bodily sensations, then you are already learning to use the hidden physiological basis of your emotions.
Now ask yourself: “How do I understand that my emotional reaction to this image is exactly this?” Do you feel tense or energized? If so, how strong are they and where are they located? Pay attention to your breathing, your heartbeat, and how tension is distributed throughout your body. How does your skin feel? Body as a whole? Does your feeling get stronger? Where exactly does it start growing? Be as precise as possible. How do you know that this is your reaction?
Constantly remind yourself to come from the body, not from the mind – perceive everything as sensations of the body, and not as thoughts or emotions. You just need to describe your feelings. Take the next photo and repeat the exercise.
About the Author: Peter Levine is an American psychotherapist and author of Waking the Tiger. Healing trauma.”