/edit / Robert Grant / and the Spiritual Journey

TRAUMA AND THE SPIRITUAL JOURNEY/EDIT 

Robert Grant Ph.D.@ copyright 2012

http://in-sighttherapy.blogspot.com/2013/06/trauma-and-spiritual-journey.html

REINTEGRATION CHALLENGES 

/the hope of having these traumatic experiences;

🤞understood,
🤞normalized
👍folded back into a social fabric

 "post" victim's trauma most

 ppl (even health care team/law enforcment)don't have the emotional depth/experience/are

unable/re-

luctant to extend com-passion/dis-turb their

status quo/ acknowledge reality/of

exposure to other’s report of trauma. 

typically trauma victims testimonies get

/denied

/minimised, 

/distorted 

/attacked

/mismanaged 

by other people/professionals 

VICTIMS END  UP  FEELING FURTHER TRAUMATISED/MISUNDERSTOOD

Victims of trauma often begin to 

doubt the reality of their own experience.  

In very rare cases, some become agents of change,
social heros/
prophets

Various manoeuvres are
 used to medicate or 
silence remainders 
of experiences that 
are disturbing.

Personalities/
spiritualities

built around the effects of 
~addiction 
~blocked intellectual attitude ~blocked spiritual attitude 

LIFE/ATTEMPTING TO VANQUISH AN EVER PRESENT TYPE OF ANXIETY 

Mystery and ambiguity

FEARS AVOIDED AT ALL COSTS/

~SOLUTIONS
to complex/uncertain/existential / ontological issues

~PROCESSES
of purgation or purification involving intense and prolonged periods of overwhelming pain and isolation.

Spiritual direction :

🌿recognises the spiritual,
🌿offers hope 
🌿rarely advocates the excavation of past traumatic material. 

Resistance/ failure to understand the 

function of suffering have symptoms

Resistance/humankind ontological lack of foundation. 

(ontological;

dealing with 

the nature 

of being.)

symptoms of intrusion;

🌱reliving experiences
🌱panic attacks
🌱nightmares
🌱flashbacks

denial  symptoms;

🍃depression, 

🍃numbing, 

🍃avoidance 

🍃magical thinking

Necessary to 

health / Recovery 

in view of information 

that has been revealed 

in /through experiences of

 trauma/expanding images of; 

☘️self, 

☘️other, 

☘️world 

☘️God 

/DECONSTRUCTION 

OF TRAUMA HAS VERTICAL/HORIZONTAL IMPACT.

Horizontally;

trauma crushes links to essence/mythic structures used to  organize Reality.

💜external reality, 

💜belief systems

💜self-imageslf,

💜humanity, 

💜God  

all can be challenged/destroyed by a single traumatic event.

version of reality;

in the wake of trauma reality is under assault and/or is rapidly coming apart at the seams.  

Trauma can initiate a similar

 process in the vertical direction.

Accumulation of social/parental

conditioning isn't the true self even though it is usually taken to be so. This conditioning

 

undergoes a process of disintegration.

Traumatized victims face 
challenges relying on ;



💜racial privileges 

💜 intelligence,

💜religion
💜degrees 
💜looks,
💜money,

grounding/
genetics/good 

fortune/which make up most ppl’s

sense of identity have been unable to protect one fr

traumas effects

     victim's 

myscellanious 

confrontational

   challenges;

❤️lack of substance that exists at the core of their being.

❤️inherent vulnerability,
❤️personal limitations,

❤️lack of (agency)
❤️powerlessness 
❤️dependency 
   on others
♥️mortality

victims status;

One has b/c a thing/ statistic

One has experiences being objectified by other 

human beings/

/deprived of

 subjectivity

/deprived of

basic humanity

/exposed to loss

lack/internal

 substance

/dissociation

depersonalisation

VICTIM'S EXPERIENCE;

🌱loss of consistency that exists beneath what their egos have taken for granted. 

🌱Are confronted w/ the lack of foundational connection to god  and reality that underlies every facet of self and world.

EXPOSURE TO PERSONAL INSECURITY:

ANOTHER EFFECT OF VERTICAL DECONSTRUCTION.

Personal integrity;

depends upon whether 

an individual has been recognized as a separate self at critical junctures in his/her psychosocial development 

Has PTSD insights/ the nature of human identity, 

🌷Has interpersonal relationships, 

🌷Has social institutions

🌷Has had spiritual reality validated or not.

Horizontal impact of trauma

When an individual’s felt sense of self/well being relies upon an outside communities validation/

how s/he has been and 

continues to be 

       ~perceived, 

~recognized /af-firmed by others

~is in consistent\

caring interactions

w\other human

beings

When connection with others/ community has not occurred certain experiences of abuse/ trauma have the capacity to undermine part or all of the progress one has made regarding creating a healthy sense of self.

abuse has the power to 

reverse (especially at 

vulnerable times in personal development) the process of identity consolidation.

Experiential state re;

🌿fragmentation

🌿nothingness.

🌿collapse,

The insubstantiality existing at the core of individual’s being is

the place every 

mystic seeks.  

~ego has been re-positioned/stripped
re:the deeper Self

ARRIVAL/THE.                        GROUND OF EXISTENCE

some have never been allowed

 to develop an authentic or true sense of self with which they could stand in relation to the profound/groundless nature of individual consciousness/Reality

~The descent of a victim into this terrain is often sudden and brutal.

~most stumble and many collapse.  ~Most find that they are lost and don’t know who or where they are. 
~many in the above predicament have great difficulty finding a healer who is familiar with the territory of the Self and are able to provide guidance and direction.

Conundrum;

Rather than create a safe space s/he is encouraged to return to the functional demands

of the ego and social world. Opportunities for depth conversion and rebirth are often lost, in these instances forever.

many wander from healer to healer trying to articulate and give form to a profound movement that is taking place in the depth of their being that will not let them rest until it is have been obeyed and

embraced. Such ppl  won't discover peace til constant contact w/the transpersonal dimensions of their being has been  made.

attempts to get  back to

 social worldview/ 

pretraumatized world/

leads to an increase in psychological and physical symptoms/spiritual

distress/

Suffering:

~continual reminders/trauma

~experiential loss 

~More trauma occurs when partial renditions of self and life collide with reality.

Transitional state of grief /loss/

done in the service of trying to dis-identify with the social persona/ego;

🎉wearing simple clothing,
🎉shaving one’s head and
🎉meditating for a long period at a time.

calming the restless

mind to make 

contact with the 

transcendental

dimensions 

of self and

Consciousness.

victims have to negotiate the territories exposed by their

experiences of trauma or be

overcome by them.  

W/out guidance their chances of surviving such encounters is severely limited.

TRAUMATIC EXP/

SPIRITUAL PATH/

a result of be-

ing traumatized

~one is stripped of egocentricity
~allowed to make
contact w/ Self/Spirit. 
~aware/naive approaches to life

/the life of Jesus Christ;

🧡a price on his 

head as a child,

❤️ was a refugee 

for the first 

few years 

of his life,

❤️ repeatedly 

betrayed/ 

friends,

❤️ continually 

fled from ppl

trying

 to kill him

❤️was publicly

 humiliated,

❤️scourged and 

❤️crucified.

  All these experiences qualified him as a trauma victim of major proportion/an example of how to take up the way of the wound that every human is required to walk.

TRAUMA AS A CONTEMPORARY FORM OF SPIRITUAL INITIATION 

victims are/ can be deprived of;

~whatever they

consider to be

 sacred 

~whatever they

 used to build a 

semblance/self/ 

order/world. 

Traumatic events forces

individuals to let go

/everything they've tried to used to

insulate/protect

themselves from 

the realization 

that nothing is 

stable or secure 

~That they are

nothing unto 

themselves, ie., 

unless connected

 to the deeper

 Self, Spirit/ 

other forms/ life.

~This path of 

conversion 

has been lost 

to/contemporary

 healer/as a 

many contemporary healers(religions/12-step programs)unwittingly encourage return

to styles of living which the ego’s need for

 centrality control continues to dominate.

The challenge;

😋learn the lessons 
of one’s wounds

😋not to harden
one’s heart as
one negotiates
a gauntlet of social cruelty
/ignorance/
isolation.

One experiences a tormenting sense of anxiety/confusion;

having been cracked opened by Life/exposed to the nothingness of Self and World/being unable to find any kind of help that could tell one how to proceed.

Conclusion/The path of healing;

😙 dangerous 

😙 uncertain 

😙will be long  

something profound has shifted in the 

foundation of a

 traumatized 

consciousness.

Victims need / lack

💜 Understanding of depth/(v.)
breadth(h.)/what happened to them
💜multidimensional map of trauma

TRAUMA MAP;

/ immediate trauma exp. 

/ post-traumatic syndrome

/ treatment-

  therapy

/ recovery

/ life after.

Experientially/ a typical reaction for victims of trauma:

wandering 
from one form of treatment/
spiritual direction/addiction 
to another in an attempt to silence a call/
spiritual/Enlightenment

Healing from trauma demands divesting oneself of anything that separates him/her from the Self and Spirit.

http://in-sighttherapy.blogspot.com/2013/06/trauma-and-spiritual-journey.html