Survival – PLC Blog

How do you respond when the elephant is crushing the mouse?

“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Put another way, there is a wonderful analogy that staying “neutral” is like watching the elephant crush the mouse and not interfering because you are “not taking sides”. To the mouse, you look like you are siding with the elephant.

THE DAMAGE OF NEUTRALITY

This is something that is very prevalent in our society. It ranges from the children and teenagers who stand by while a friend is being bullied to adults who look the other way when another adult is being physically or verbally abused, even when they know the adult.

Being the victim and feeling totally unsupported is a frightening thing. Wired deep into our brains is the need to be supported by the group in order to survive. If you are ignored then you are not valued by the group and not protected. This means you are in serious danger.

Often victims of abuse will report that the lack of support of others was more terrifying than the abuse itself.

NEUTRALITY IS BETRAYAL AND INVALIDATION

Victims will also say they felt betrayed by the person who remained neutral.

People think they have to stay neutral, but as the analogy says, to the mouse being crushed by the elephant you do not appear neutral. To the elephant crushing the mouse you appear to be on their side.

Think about it.

Neutrality is deeply invalidating to the mouse.

Neutrality is betrayal.

Neutrality is a form of trauma.

NEUTRALITY IS TRAUMATISING

It is trauma that challenges a person’s sense of safety in the world and the trust that they are not alone and will be defended when they need it.

Neutrality harms the brain of the victim. It damages connection bonds and destroys trust in those who practice neutrality.

NEUTRALITY DESTROYS RELATIONSHIPS

I see so many couples where trust and commitment have been destroyed by one partner remaining “neutral”.

Trust and commitment are the foundation of sound relationships. Without trust or commitment relationships are destroyed.

NEUTRALITY INCLUDES SUPPORT AFTER THE EVENT

Neutrality is not just practiced when in a situation of conflict. It can also occur when you go to another person for support and validation of your hurt, and they try to rationalise the other person’s behaviour.

This can happen when a child reports bullying at school. It can happen when a friend reports being subjected to nasty comments from people at work. It can happen when your partner’s mother is rude to you and your partner takes her side.

In those situations and many more you feel scared, unsafe and in pain.

NEUTRALITY LEADS TO YOU BEING BLAMED FOR WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU

What if the response to this is “you brought this on yourself?”.

Or you are asked “what did you do to trigger them to behave that way?” In other words, it is your fault.

How many times have you tried to tell another person about a scary situation to be told to stop complaining and get over it. Or to have the other person ignore what you said and change the subject?

The end result of all this neutrality is that you can often feel shamed.

All these are examples of neutrality and its destructive impacts.

INVALIDATION STARTS AS A BABY

Many people were raised under a style of parenting where parents were taught to leave their baby to cry. But babies cry because they have a need. Failure to meet that need invalidates their right to comfort, to be nurtured and cared for. Failure to meet that need changes the baby’s brain.

Then there are the invalidating experiences in childhood. As a child growing up, invalidation occurs every time your needs are not met by a caring parent who is attuned to you.
Parents can’t always meet your needs, but they can communicate their understanding of your situation and their concern and care for you.

So many children spend time in daycare. Culture in daycare centres often treats bullying as the fault of the victim and seeks to teach the child how to avoid being bullied. Becoming neutral is something taught very early in life.

This patterns is repeated in school. Teachers are human being and they can be caught up in the toxic “neutrality” behaviour as well. Many children experience the invalidation of neutrality when faced with bullying in school.

NEUTRALITY CAN BE ABOUT SURVIVAL FROM ABUSE

For some people, being neutral is a survival mechanism. As children they learned to side with their abuser to survive. In later life, when they are in a situation with another person who needs support, they can feel very unsafe if they don’t take the abuser’s side. They think they are being neutral when in fact they are trapped in a childhood survival mechanism.

Other people grew up frightened of the bullies and survived by not intervening. For them intervening was a very dangerous thing. In adulthood they haven’t unlearned that behaviour so keep it up.

So many people think not intervening is the right thing to do because that is what they were taught by neutrality obsessive parents, teachers, peers and society in general.

YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR BEHAVIOUR

But that can be changed. All it needs is to learn to push through that fear and intervene anyway.

Pushing through that fear can be hard if you learned it as a survival mechanism in an abusive childhood. In those situations you may need counselling to learn to overcome that fear.

CAN I HELP?

If you would like to talk to me about how I can help you stand up to those who frighten you, or you have been invalidated by neutrality and need help healing, please contact me on 0409396608 or nan@plentifullifecounselling.com.au

If you would like to learn more, I write a regular newsletter with interesting information, tips, information on courses, and the occasional freebie. At the moment I have a free mindfulness meditation for anyone who signs up to my newsletter. This meditation offers a way to safely explore your feelings and learn to be okay with them. If you would like to subscribe please click on the link here: http://eepurl.com/g8Jpiz

Jung and the Gold you Hide Inside

You may have heard of the term “shadow self”.

It refers to the parts of yourself that you don’t like and don’t show the world. The part you believe is bad.

Or that is what you have been taught to believe about your shadow self.

WHAT IS THE TRUE SHADOW SELF THEN?

When you are a small child, you learn how to live in the world of your family and wider society.

You are told what you should and shouldn’t do by your parents.

If your parents both work, you will be cared for by other people and you will be told what you should and shouldn’t do by those carers.

The web of people who influence your perception of self in your early years can be quite extensive … and destructive to self.

You will be praised when you do what others perceive as good and punished for what they perceive as being bad. But what you are doing is not necessarily good or bad. It is just what the person caring for you thinks is good or bad.

THE LITTLE GIRL AND THE HARRIED TEACHER

An example is a little girl I once saw who came to school bursting with excitement because she had learned to count to 20 over the weekend. This little 5 year old had just started school and was learning basic numbers. She was excited at that achievement. So she told her teacher.

The teacher was doing something else at the time, which the little girl did not have the developmental maturity to realise. To the little girl’s horror, the teacher reacted by slapping her leg and telling her to be quiet (I might add this occurred a few decades ago). What she had perceived as being something exciting to tell others about had become something shameful.

She never told anyone about her accomplishments again. She consigned that beautiful curiosity and zest for learning to her shadow as unacceptable and kept quiet about what she knew.

CHILDREN HIDE WHAT THEY BELIEVE IS UNACCEPTABLE.

Children will hide away what they believe is unacceptable.

But what they are doing is not necessarily bad, it is just not what the adult in their life wants.

It may be an inconvenient time, as with the teacher.

It may be the child is exhibiting strengths the adult is jealous of, so the adult shuts them down. Yes, it does happen … a lot.

It may be the adult was shamed about similar behaviour when a child and shuts the child down out of fear they will be shamed.

As an adult you may be able to recognise the motives of others, or put their behaviour down to them being wrong. But a child doesn’t have the knowledge of life to be able to do that. The child hides the parts because they believe they are unacceptable. Then they forget about them.

WHAT YOU HIDE TRIES TO UNHIDE

These hidden parts often reveal themselves later in life when you find yourself admiring things others do. You admire what you have in yourself that you have forgotten. Your admiration is longing for the part you hid. It is the call by your subconscious of that part to come out of hiding.

THE GOLDEN SIDE OF YOUR SHADOW

Other strengths develop due to early traumas. A lot of people don’t realise that they survived because of strengths they possessed or developed.

It is worth noting that hiding your strengths because you are told they are bad causes you to doubt yourself. This causes you to question everything you do. Often, uncovering your golden shadow and reclaiming those strengths you hid is an important empowering step to take.

It is important to be proud of your shadow side. It is said that your shadow is where your healing and pain meet the gifts you have to offer others. Pretty powerful stuff. Embrace it and be proud.

WHAT HAPPENS IF YOU CONTINUE TO SUPPRESS YOUR GOLDEN SHADOW?

When you suppress your golden shadow, either deliberately or subconsciously, you will find your life full of problems, anxiety, depression, addictions, illnesses and perceived failures. You may not realise it, but your subconscious knows you are not living life true to yourself and it doesn’t like it.

4 WAYS TO DISCOVER YOUR GOLDEN SHADOW

Notice where you feel envious of the abilities and qualities other people possess. You envy most the things you see in others that you yourself possess but have repressed.
What do you admire and idolise most in others? You admire most in others what you yourself possess. There is great creative potential here for you to be guided by that understanding to uncover your own abilities. When you admire others you are admiring the disowned aspects of your own unique potential.
Insecurities and feelings of unworthiness are another guide to your abilities. Did you know that not knowing your power creates insecurity. The parts where you feel the most wounded or where you feel something is wrong with you are indicators of your greatest abilities. When you have hidden a strength because you felt it was wrong you feel insecure. Insecurity creates a sense of unworthiness and emptiness. If you know your strengths you will have the space of gratitude for your own talents and to live in that strength. Then you will be able to reduce your self-doubt.
Flip the script on your perceived faults. If you re-examine your beliefs about what is good and bad you may reveal strengths that have been disguising themselves as burdens. Look at your dark side and seek the treasures there instead of seeing that side as being negative and bad. Examples are to see introversion as a positive instead of a negative thing that holds you back. Another is to see what others tell you is laziness as the wonderful ability to relax. If you look at the opposites you will realise there is always more than one side to everything. Explore this and seek the positive.

HOW CAN I RELEASE MY GOLDEN SHADOW?

Your subconscious may hide your golden shadow, but it also tries to alert you to its presence. Work on healing the wounds of your past. Decide to choose strength over weakness, love over fear and inspiration over depression. Embrace your golden shadow. You will find a lot of your problems no longer exist.

Instead you will find you develop confidence, self-love, inner beauty, creativity and gratitude. All these contribute to you making positive choices in your life.

THERE WILL ALWAYS BE PEOPLE WHO WILL BE JEALOUS BUT KEEP GOING – YOU HAVE THE POWER

As you embark on your own healing journey, be aware that there are always people in life who will feel threatened by your aliveness and try to damp it down or destroy it. It happened when you were a small child and it can happen now in adulthood. Just be aware of this and don’t fall for the destructive attempts of others. Hold your power and stand firm in it.

You may find being your true self is unfamiliar and frightening. After all, you have lived a different way so far in life. You learned early that fitting in was the safest thing to do. But fitting in is what brought you safety as a child when you needed to be looked after. You are an adult now. You can look after yourself.

Step out in your own true self and your own power. This may make your vulnerable to the reactions of others who feel threatened by your abilities. Do not expect approval for your glorious traits from such people. Look instead to other golden people who will appreciate your golden gifts. In other words, find your tribe.

BE YOUR OWN CHEER SQUAD

Choose to recognise, reclaim and express your great gifts and be delighted in yourself. Hang in there. There are people out there who will appreciate what you have to give.

Enlist the creativity and support of your own imagination. It is a great healer, so make the most of yours.

No matter what you have been told in life, you do have an imagination. Use it.

ALLOW YOUR IMAGINATION TO RESTRUCTURE PAST HURTFUL EVENTS

In your imagination go back to those past incidents when things did not go well and you suppressed those positive traits and were made to feel weak, small, unworthy and afraid. Imagine you making a different choice and run with it.

The magical thing about your mind is that the subconscious mind will not know if your imagining is reality or imagination.

Live those past traumatic events in the new power you are imagining you have. Say your piece, fight back, even call in allies (real or spiritual) to assist you.

Imaging bringing that spiritual strength you possess into those past traumatic times. Write them down, draw them, paint them, create them if that helps.

Believe you have redeemed those moments, because in your imagination you have. Allow the power you display in your imagination to shine and let your body be run by that power. Now let your golden shadow shine bright.

THE PATH IS ROCKY BUT WORTH IT

Note that entering your shadow side can be difficult. You first need to go down into those dark things you think you should hide. But exploring those and choosing to see them from a different perspective will reveal your golden shadow. Once you unleash that, you will discover so much more that you hid. This is an ongoing process, not a once only thing. Keep searching. Discover your true golden strengths.

NEED HELP? I CAN HELP YOU

If you would like to talk to me about how I can help you with discovering your Golden Side and healing, please contact me on 0409396608 or nan@plentifullifecounselling.com.au

My trauma symptoms helped me survive

The effects of trauma can last for weeks, months or years. This is particularly true if the trauma occurred in childhood when major growth in the brain was occurring. This is because trauma affects the way the brain develops.

The impact of trauma can be experienced throughout life, until it is able to be processed. Even then the memory will not necessarily fade, but the impact may.

TRAUMA IS AN UNWANTED FAMILY HEIRLOOM

It is useful to liken trauma to a family heirloom. Family heirlooms tend to be old and may be passed down through the generations. By the time you get them they are often very old, even considered antiques. These items are usually greatly loved sentimentally and valued for their memories.

Trauma can be passed down through the generations too. It may be passed down in the way you were treated growing up, in the way your family related to each other, in the way you were taught to see the world, even in the keeping of secrets within the family.

Unlike family heirlooms, trauma is not something that is valued or loved sentimentally. It is often not acknowledged. But it leaves one massive elephant in the room that is very hard to hide. Although people will try.

TRAUMA’S GREATEST WEAPON IS SHAME

Shame leads people to hide the trauma in the family. This makes it very hard to heal the trauma.

TRAUMA IS FELT THROUGH PHYSICAL SENSATIONS AS WELL AS EMOTIONS AND PERCEPTION

Trauma as it has been experienced by you leaves you with intense physical, perceptual and emotions reactions to things others may feel are nothing important or frightening. These things trigger memories of past experiences. Experiences that are related to the trauma you feel.

The intense physical, perceptual and emotional responses are hard to control because they are stored in part of your memory known as “implicit memory”. These are memories deeply embedded in your memory. Memories of things you are often not aware you have experienced. Memories you have no control over.

They are not stored in conscious and manageable memory. They are stored in subconscious and therefore unmanageable memory.

The constant reactivation of these memories ensure they remain at the top of your memories on a daily, even multiple times daily, basis.

SYMPTOMS OF TRAUMA REACTIVATION

When these memories are reactivated by reminders, referred to as triggers, you are thrown into a fight/flight defence mode.

• You may feel hyperalert and hypervigilant.

• You may be aware of tension in your body.

• Your breath may feel shallow and you may be aware of your heart pounding.

• You may even have horrifying images come to mind, or thoughts warning you of danger.

• You may find yourself inexplicably afraid or angry.

• You may feel pain in parts of your body.

• You may feel isolated and alone.

• You may be aware of being anxious or feel others are against you and unsupportive.

• You may find yourself judging what is happening around you negatively.

• You may have a strong desire to isolate from others.

• You may feel frozen.

• You may find it difficult to say no to people.

• You may feel you have to please people.

• And many more experiences. The list of reactions is endless

TRAUMA SYMPTOMS ARE POORLY UNDERSTOOD

There is not much awareness of what constitutes a trauma symptom.

Many of the symptoms of trauma are not recognised as being trauma related.

Trauma survivors share many symptoms and it is possible for a trauma informed therapist to spot those symptoms.

When I work with people I often see the symptoms that that person may not be aware of.

People may come to see me because of

• difficulties in life

• anxiety

• unmanageable stress

• difficulties in relationships

• depression

• work stress

• feeling numb

• inexplicable pain

• difficulty concentrating

• difficulty making decisions

• difficulty setting boundaries

• and many more symptoms

I AM IMPACTED BY TRAUMA. DOES THAT MAKE ME DEFECTIVE?

When you realise your current difficulties are due to trauma it can lead to your feeling deficient as a person.

Maybe you feel you are weak and not as able to cope with life as others.

But the reality is you survived difficult experiences you could not deal with at the time. So you learned ways to cope, to survive.

TRAUMA SYMPTOMS ARE SURVIVAL ADAPTATIONS

You learned to adapt to the threats and danger. You learned how to cope with being too young to be able to defend yourself, or too powerless to overcome someone stronger or just being trapped.

The behaviours you exhibit now. The way you see the world now. The way you relate to people. The way you perceive the world. All these are ways you adapted to survive.

And survive you have. You learned how to behave, how to keep yourself safe in a situation over which you had no control.

The things you did were wonderful adaptations to help you survive.

I AM SAFE NOW. I WANT THE BEHAVIOURS TO STOP.

Now that you are away from that situation the adaptations are causing difficulties.

This is because you need to learn new behaviours.

It is time to heal from the past and let go of the once helpful but now constricting behaviours. It is time to learn new behaviours.

HOW DO YOU HEAL FROM THE PAST?

The Blue Knot Foundation is a peak body in trauma treatment in Australia. They have produced trauma treatment guidelines that trauma therapists follow in trauma treatment.

These guidelines are world renowned and highly respected.

They involve long term therapy conducted safely by properly qualified trauma therapists.

I have trained extensively with the Blue Knot Foundation and follow their guidelines in my work with trauma survivors.

DO YOU WANT TO TAKE THIS FURTHER?

If you would like to talk to me about how I can help you heal from your trauma, please contact me on 0409396608 or nan@plentifullifecounselling.com.au