Truth, Trauma and Kindness

JanineGreaves.com-Beyond Trauma-Truth, Trauma & Kindness-Man holding a child-Canva Stock Photo.png

What does this photo evoke in you? I’m curious …

When we become aware of conflicts arising inside of us and that are expressed outside of us it can appear as if two worlds are colliding … or are they actually moving apart? The conflict that I’m referring to is where we know that living in a different way is a possible reality yet the reality that we have been living is the one that is so much more familiar. The cognitive dissonance that arises in the face of this torsion can be immense.

As we look out at the world around us through the filters of, among others, definition and judgement to which we have been entrained, what do we see? Do we see a world of beauty, brutality, inclusivity … something else? Those filters become the methods of deciding what we allow into our own private world or exclude from our own private world, and they become also the control mechanisms of our responses or reactions.

When a person has been tortured or abused repeatedly it can result in a de-sensitisation of that person towards the action that was repeated. It can also result in an intense aversion to the action that was repeated. It can result in actions that are incongruent with how the person expresses themselves in other situations. It can result in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). It can result in the entire nervous system, particularly the Vagus nerve, of the person becoming ‘locked’ into hyper-vigilance to anticipate any potential threat and react accordingly. It can result in something called Stockholm Syndrome, defined as “the psychological tendency of a hostage to bond with, identify with, or sympathise with his or her captor”. It can also result in an inward reach to strength and presence that allows a transmutation of the trauma into something positive and generative rather than limiting. This list is not exhaustive by any means. The effects of trauma filter through to every aspect of our lives, many of them remain unacknowledged indefinitely.

Not everyone who has experienced traumatic events can recognise the impact

In such situations, it can be very challenging, in some instances impossible, for the one affected to disengage from the event and view it objectively. Therapeutic intervention has been used to assist in such circumstances. However, not everyone who as experienced traumatic events can recognise the impact and ask for assistance in recovery, nor can they always manage the financial aspect of seeking such therapy. Does that mean that the person has to live the remainder of their life in a state of trauma and fear? That may be the case in some instances especially if they cannot ask for help. However, from another perspective, it does not have to be that way.

The increased acknowledgement of PTSD has led to greater awareness of the effects of violence on the nervous system and psyche of the individual and groups. I suspect that, based on events in very recent history, there may be a vast number of cases amongst the population that are waiting to be counted. From a personal perspective, the constant barrage of threat that has been broadcast had a wearying effect on me to the point where I barely noticed the words any longer, numbed and immune to the rhetoric and repetition, which is apparently a result well-known by those who deliver what’s called psychological torture.

How many people lose connection to or sight of the truth of a situation as a result of being subjected to that type of bombardment?

You could say that my attention became a bit fuzzy around the effects of the bombardment from the media until I pulled away and re-set my truth barometer. How many others are either willing to do that or even consider it to be a possibility? In the depths of serious trauma the concept of living in any other way can be a real impossibility, and I would also ask the question ‘how many people lose connection to or sight of the truth of a situation as a result of being subjected to that type of bombardment?’

What is it that we are truly implementing when we abuse, control, diminish, ridicule, reject, punish, torture or de-humanise another? Are we acting out our individual or ancestral trauma? Is it learned behaviour? Is it a program that fundamentally turns us against each other to maintain control through division and isolation? I find myself wondering if any other species on this planet deliberately brutalises large numbers of their kind just because …

There have been studies conducted into the effects of isolation of an individual person and we know what they are without being told. We have been living them in recent months. One of the effects of isolation that I noticed was an increasing challenge to be able to reference who I was in the world. Conversely, I also became more aware of who I am, who I am not, and the ways in which I enjoy expressing that. We humans need to be around others of our kind, which can include family or friends, who reflect back to us our value as an individual, who express enjoyment in being in our company, who offer kindness and consolation in the instance of distress.

Those who impose solitary confinement as punishment and those who have been subject to it know all about the effects of that kind of torturous deprivation. What I’m pointing to is how easy it is to lose sight of the truth of a situation in the face of trauma. I found, in recent months, that the lack of touch can trigger a ‘threat level’ in my nervous system that requires of me a great deal of kindness to and presence with my own body. It is necessary to regularly monitor the central nervous system and adjust my sensory perception of the world around me. I have the skills and awareness to be able to do that for myself and there are also times when I need assistance from another. Additionally, if I direct my attention towards them, I can register, through my body’s systems, the distress of many other bodies near-by and around the world.

One of the questions that I must ask, therefore, is “how much of what my body is ‘experiencing’ is actually directly associated with my unique location or life, or is my body showing me information being broadcast by other bodies?” Usually it is the latter. How does that work?

We are all connected. My sensing is that the organs, vibrations, electrical systems of our bodies resonate with each other. It can be challenging to recognise the state of another’s body or being, and not become entrained and therefore slip into resonance with them so that we also act out the same behavioural state. It requires constant monitoring and adjustment.

Is that all? No.

Choice is required - the choice to choose how we live.

It is something that we have to claim for ourselves. It is active, not passive. It requires the choice to keep on choosing how we live as well as the regular assessment of whether earlier choices are still an expression of individual truth and integrity and then make a different choice. For people who have sunk into the mire of fear, isolation and intimidation by others it may require a gargantuan effort to pull themselves out of it. This is where companionship is so vital: we can throw the life belt to each other and pull together.

Often, a traumatised person is unable to ask for help. Some say that a person has to ask for something before they can receive it. Well, yes, much of the time that is true. However, in my point of view, when someone is locked into shock or trauma asking for help is often something that they cannot do or find it very difficult to do for themselves. In some severe cases they lose the ability to speak and in other instances, shock can interrupt normally efficient cognitive processes.

There are, certainly, ways in which we can approach the person to ask if we can offer assistance and let them know that they have a choice. They can make the choice to accept our help or not but withholding help because they haven’t asked for it may end up prolonging the trauma instead.

What is kindness?

I looked up ‘kindness’ in several dictionaries. The etymology in the Merriam Webster dictionary offered this: “Kind: Middle English kinde, from Old English cynd; akin to Old English cynn kin”.

There is ‘kind’ as a noun and ‘kind’ as an adjective. ‘Kind’ as a noun indicates category, essence, a family or lineage, and number of or many of. ‘Kind’ as an adjective indicates motive, quality such as gentle, affectionate, loving and a context of catalyst towards something different.

What is kindness? What does kind mean to you? Do you live with kindness to yourself? Do you live with kindness towards others? Is it a choice that you have ever considered?

What kind of world do we choose to live with? Is the cruelty and brutality to which many of us have become accustomed, and numbed to, a way of living that we wish to perpetuate? Do we know that something else is possible?

I do know that another way is possible. It includes many others and is really only achievable when others are included. It is that kind of kindness - kind-ness as in ‘with my kin’; kind-ness as in the type of living conditions that we choose; kind-ness as in the extension of gentleness, generosity and affection that is so very needed in our world right now. I can live with kindness towards myself and others, certainly, and the reflection of that choice is also a gift in the receiving.

Such a choice may actually mean the difference between living or dying

There is something about kindness that soothes the nervous system, and allows the high alert state to begin to soften. There is something about the kindness of touch, or even sometimes in the not-touching, that lets the body know ‘you are honoured, you are welcomed, you are loved’ and the tissue softens to allow more receptivity. When we spend our lives bracing for impact we become rigid, hardened, alone, cold. Kindness - true kindness that is devoid of agenda but which is simply a state of being in honour of all - has the capacity to melt those cold, hard places and infuse them with a different possibility. Such a choice may actually mean the difference between living or dying, life or death.

What do we choose? Are we willing to re-calibrate to a truth that has been denied for so long? Are we willing to choose to let go of some of our most fundamental beliefs if or when we may recognise that they are no longer serving us? Are we capable of recognising truth from un-truth still? If not, are we willing to ask for help to restore our truth barometer and claim our kind-ness? Are we?

It may require that choice to be activated within each of us individually: that choice to live with kindness, inclusion, generosity, creativity becomes a resonant field that begins to harmonise with others who live from the same choices. We resonate with each other, and still more begin to join in. Do we choose a resonant field of kindness or cruelty?

Kindness is a cornerstone in the foundations of the world

In these days of immense change around the world as we have known it, it seems to me that kindness is a cornerstone in the foundations of the world as it is becoming. We must choose to live with kindness if we are to survive as a species. We must choose to live with kindness if we are not to destroy the human-inhabitable regions of this planet and become extinct. We must choose kindness if only as a different possibility to the violence and perpetual trauma from which we, and many previous generations, have lived. Have we, finally, reached the end of our acceptance of life as we have known it?

This photo that I found in the Canva graphics program library of images expresses some of what I would like to convey here. My body melts when I look at the embrace: the tenderness, the kindness and simple presence offered by the adult to the little one has tears welling up. You could say that I’m projecting: perhaps I am. I do know that I would not be able to recognise those qualities in another if they were not also in me.

Have so many of us forsaken our kind? Is it possible to create an infusion of kindness for all life forms of this planet?

Yes. It is possible. Many people know it. Let’s turn up the frequencies of kindness. Let’s make the choice to live from kindness and inclusivity. Let’s recall the truth of who we are as individuals and our inimitable kind-ness and the intrinsic kindness of our bodies. Let us choose that and live it.

What if it is entirely possible that the choice to live from kindness could restore truth and diffuse trauma?

Kindness allows a very different future than the past that we have lived, so far. What future do we now choose?

RESOURCES

“Stockholm syndrome.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Stockholm%20syndrome
“Kindness.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/kindness
“Kind.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/kind
“Kind” Online Etymology Dictionary: https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=kind&ref=searchbar_searchhint
Subscribe to Janine’s Newsletter for the latest tips, tools and blog updates