On Deep Healing And The Nature Of Trauma

(Journal entry 13 Aug 2022) : I feel like the self that appears in my dreams is changing. I'm witnessing the transition of my subconscious mind's version of me with each dream.

The way I appear in my dreams now is more connected to the way I appear to be in the waking/conscious state. So perhaps what is happening is that all the trauma at the subconscious level seems to be changing—seems to be healing.

Realization at that level is so beneficial and important. It is evidence of the fact that the process of healing is penetrating the unconscious manifestations of trauma. Through the opening created by the penetration, the traumas inside are rising from a state of affective dormancy into a more visible form in the subconscious, where they can be acknowledged in the realm of dreams.

And then, as the trauma gains a form, an image, a symbol, or an animation appears that can be recognized, interpreted and if desired, manipulated at the level of dreaming through lucid dreaming, if so one wishes.

And this process is not singular or uni- or bi-directional, it is repetitive and continuous. It is almost like establishing a re-producing system in which this pathway gets built, where trauma needn’t hide or get lost in the unconscious but it can be kept moving in between the unconscious and the subconscious realms until the friction of this movement, dissolves the trauma.

Now trauma keeps getting generated and will constantly circulate in our inner lives. But what the opening of this pathway does is it prevents the settling and hardening of the traumas inside our bodies/minds.

Instead, it allows the trauma to circulate. This (in-to-out) circulation has an impacting presence in the outer or physical manifestations of our inner lives. Consequently, the inner movement implicates the movement or constant changing character of the outer self.

As I keep healing on the inside, there are more tangible transitions in my outer life.

How does the trauma circulate? What puts it into motion? It is put into motion through the currents of awareness. Simply by the act of acknowledging the past wounds of trauma, one can shift its location in the mind.

It is awareness that enables better perception, vision, and sensibility of traumas when they arise/are born and it is this awareness that gives the trauma the will to take forms that we can recognize.

Through awareness, we can track these shifts and regain a sense of control. Instead of being unaware of the trauma as well as its effects on ourselves (body/mind), we get to control how deeply we want to descend into the unconscious and at what pace.

So, now, where is the conscious self in all of this? And what is it doing in all of this? The conscious self in fact is the resting place of awareness. It is where things (here, our traumas) acquire actionable physical and physiological forms.

And if the conscious is the resting place of awareness, it is also the control panel where the happenings of this pathway are contemplated, interpreted, and then can be acted upon.

It is the plane of awareness where the happenings of the unconscious-subconscious pathways are studied and the information gathered is used to make conscious changes in physically manifesting behaviors, feelings, tendencies, and sensitivities. All of which may have been previously concretized in the past, due to the lack of movement and awareness in the unconscious and subconscious realms.

Not only is the conscious mind affected by the two realms (unconscious/subconscious), but it also impacts what happens within them. The levels of the mind are more interconnected than we realize.

When the body is not in the state of healing, when it stays stuck in either survival or defensiveness, none of these shifts can take place. But we disrupt this stagnation through our awareness.

When one makes up their mind to heal, there is a will produced that acts as a fire. It first begins to melt the hardened parts. It provides warmth to a seemingly endless winter that may have developed inside the body at some point in time.

Then, when the body enters the state of healing, it initiates movement. As a result, slowly the pathways between the unconscious and subconscious open out; all with the help of the conscious self.

This motion also affects the pathway between the two realms. The way the trauma moves between the two realms shapes the pathway. Moreover, everybody develops their own unique pathway.

The pathway is shaped according to how the individual navigates their process of healing and in turn how they develop the relationship between the conscious, unconscious, and subconscious realms. How they develop their vision of the self.

The more repetitive and consistent efforts we put into shifting the shape of and interaction between these three levels of the mind, the better we can change our current outer selves.

With time and consistency, the distance between the subconscious/conscious self decreases, and the transparency between the realms increases. If this transparency is maintained and the pathways for movement are kept open, magical transformations happen.

All those seemingly small, temporary, shifts and changes, that feel uncomfortable and unusual, that you make to the way you usually may do something or think something, actually get solidified in the conscious realm in more concrete ways.

Only that qualifies as deep healing of the wound. It's no longer the band-aid approach we are so familiar with when dealing with our trauma.

Depth in trauma is not unidirectional or bidirectional i.e. diving is not a useful metaphor to describe healing work. I think it describes only part of the healing work. Deep healing is more like a continuous amphibious life.

Where you need and are consistently in and out of depths that both increase your familiarity with the ocean as well as affect your life on land when you are out of the ocean.

It describes better the innate nature of trauma that is let loose in order for healing to take place. It describes the necessity for this kind of habitation, of building an amphibious habitat of consciousness to enable our traumas to actually heal, where movement is given precedence over location/destination.

Where trauma healing isn’t goal-oriented or given a singular recognizable residence in our lives, but where trauma healing is located in motion, in sync with the movement of our lives.

When trauma is moving, it can be healed at the deepest levels perhaps beyond even that which you can imagine. I feel that is the possible depth at which any kind of trauma can be healed, can be set into motion, to enable its dissolution into yourself.

I love this metaphor of dissolving the trauma into you. It is more tender, not aggressive as in curing, eradicating, removing, taking out, or wrenching away trauma out of the body.

It isn’t ridden with the binary. Instead of basing our understanding of trauma on a dualistic foundation, a dissolving of trauma instead founds itself on a non-dual foundation.

Dissolving would mean acknowledging its presence, helping it move and circulate inside you, it would mean offering your inner environment, your whole body, and your entire consciousness to the most pained and painful resident of your body- your trauma.

It is founded on the premise of compassion and self-acceptance. By allowing it to roam, move, and express itself; by allowing your trauma to take shape and change forms; by allowing it space and movement, you allow it to dissolve like sugar in water, slowly, as and when its expression meets its own fulfillment, it is allowed its lifetime, then, trauma, like a soul, having its lifetime, passes on, it doesn’t die.

It dissolves inside your body-world. It becomes part of you, yet it doesn’t hold you. You, hold it. You, contain it, and it becomes an invisible part of you. Neither friend nor foe. Neither a cause nor an effect. It exists within you and within itself.

Finally, upon reaching an eternally formless existence, it dissolves into you. In this way, you are able to honor your trauma. Trauma, you know, once it is planted in your body, it becomes itself.

It is only distantly connected by and to the event that caused it. So, I think, we help ourselves when we think of trauma as something that resides in us now, and is something of its own, and that can be mortalized instead of the immortal status that we so often tend to give trauma.

And by mortalizing it, we even humanize it. We are able to think of trauma as human and this allows the inculcation of compassion and kindness and for it to flow profusely. When that happens, it brings so much peace to our lives and the way we live.

It helps create the right kind of environment inside ourselves, as we navigate this world of suffering, and ease the movement of our trauma from its birth to its passing.

For me, a more nurturing and inevitably feminine (and I would extend it to feminist) approach to trauma healing through dissolution, which is built on the foundation of powerful love and courage, debases more masculine approaches to trauma healing through destruction or elimination, that is built on a more egotistic foundation of unhealed pride and innate fear.

This is to say, our traumas most often, do not deserve the hatred that we very often tend to award it with. It is most likely, an ocean of love that it is yearning for, to absolve itself, and to dissolve into. Our work, is just very simply, to initiate and enable that to happen.