REWIRING: The 5 Reminders We Need
The Past and The Present: Childhood trauma then, brain development and emotional wiring now.
I have a beautiful Instagram community of just over 550 people.
Now, for some that may not be a lot.
For me, imagining myself speaking in front of 550 people seems like a lot.
In this community, 24 hours ago, I posted this:
Repeat after me:
I am no longer a child in a dysfunctional home.
I am an adult with the ability to make healthy choices,
create boundaries and live the life I create.
200 people “liked” it so far.
200 people identified with a dysfunctional home.
Why did a dysfunctional home resonate with so many people?
1. We all have hurt children inside of us.
I have told you this before but your brain is a computer, and childhood trauma is a damn virus.
Whether it is verbal, mental or/and physical abuse, neglect, or even less obvious emotional neglect, these traumas mess with your ability to regulate emotions and develop emotional maturity.
Trauma in early years really screws up our emotional wiring and if, God forbid, we don’t do the work and find an anti-virus program, we can end up being a 50-year-old with the emotional regulation of a toddler.
Simplified, this is what early trauma does to you:
What you are looking at is literal brain damage.
The hippocampus (part of your brain responsible for function, learning, memory, emotion and control) shrinks with abuse.
If you experience abuse as a child, it simply stunts development,
and other parts of the brain take the lead instead.
As a result, we are programmed to survive.
Notice that I used “we” - think of this in a collective setting as much as in an individual.
People older than you have a child inside of them, too.
Sometimes, most times, the behaviour of person X is a response to their own ‘brain damage’, not to you.
2. Overcoming Survival Programming starts when you speak to yourself with the kindness you offer others.
Childhood trauma often programmes us to be our worst critics.
You might have been told you weren’t good enough, and now you believe it.
Change the script.
Talk to yourself like you’d talk to a friend.
When my friends, the beautiful, honest (with themselves, as well!) people that they are, share something painful with me, I ask them:
What would you have told me, roles reversed?
I believe in the profundity of this question because I know that they would have offered me the kindness and unfiltered honesty they are afraid to offer to themselves.
Self-compassion isn’t just another popular word (although it is, thankfully, becoming more and more used)—
it’s rewiring your brain to see your worth.
Next time the negative self-talk pops up, imagine a friend in front of you instead.
3. The task-oriented healing approach is not healing.
The truth is that being here means you also want to heal.
When I began healing, I took it in the old survival programming of ticking tasks off the list, putting pressure on myself to implement every little word I read, to try every practice I find, to read the most prominent books in the field of trauma recovery.
Why did I do that?
“To heal” ended up being yet another to-do list task, instead of a compassionate journey towards reconnection.
“To truthfully understand my mind’s mechanisms, my body’s cues and my soul’s purpose" did not make it to the list because I did not embrace the depth of what I was doing.
I was afraid to let go of my “old ways”, a.k.a the mechanisms that helped me survive so far because they felt safe, they were the only way I knew.
I was doing instead of listening.
I was conditioned to believe that we need to fix ourselves immediately because we are broken.
Healing does not mean you are broken, it means you are becoming whole.
The process of healing is not about fixing the parts you consider “broken”,
but about nurturing and reclaiming all parts of yourself - the “good”, the “bad” and the “ugly”.
4. Our bodies are messengers.
In the earlier image, you can see how trauma switches the brain’s hierarchy from cognition last to survival first.
Discomfort and dis-ease are your body’s natural ways of calling your for attention and care.
Next week, we will talk about the power of the body more, but I can’t help myself from sharing this beautiful reminder:
I was struck by the uncanny ability of nature to teach
through adult dis-ease
lessons that,
in a better world,
should be learnt in childhood and in health.
Body consciousness helps us reclaim the connection to signals we have silenced in our early years.
5. Our brains can be unreliable.
When your mind is wired to survival, you see threats everywhere.
(It is called hypervigilance, and I am guilty of it!)
What your brain does has good intentions - to protect you.
What your brain doesn’t do brings bad results - to focus on “worse case scenarios” over conscious awareness and judgement of each situation.
What you do, as a result, is reach to past scenarios and/or future anxieties instead of to extend a reaction the present.
When I am stressed, I ask myself:
Am I reacting to the present?
I consciously condition myself to ask and reflect before I react.
I consciously condition my brain to be calmer and more precise.
I consciously condition my body to be relaxed instead of hyper-reactive.
To be here not there.
Recognize your survival programming and gently guide your mind towards more balance.
From my conscious choices to yours today,
Katrin