Overcoming Trauma and Learning to Thrive
Trauma can feel like an insurmountable mountain. Maybe you recognize you have some unhealed trauma, or maybe you don’t, but it’s casting a shadow over every aspect of your life either way, seeping into your thoughts, emotions, and even your physical body.
While trauma is a powerful force, our capacity for healing, surmounting the pinnacle, and learning to thrive, is even more formidable. If there is one singular driving force behind where I am today, why I went on a healing journey in the first place, and why I’ve created Full Circle Wellness to help guide you on your own journey… it’s my own trauma. Full Circle Wellness is a platform birthed out of my healing journey, that I’ve curated to help you move beyond survival mode, so that you can truly thrive!
And if you’re like me… it starts with healing your trauma.
Let’s Start with Understanding Trauma
Trauma is a deeply distressing or disturbing experience that overwhelms our ability to cope with everyday life situations. It can result from a single event, a series of events, or chronic experiences. It can come from something that happened, AND/OR something that didn’t happen. Common sources of trauma can look like:
Physical, Emotional, or Sexual Abuse
Neglect
Accidents or Illnesses
Chronic/Repeating Events
Toxic Relationships
Betrayal
Bullying
Natural Disasters
Wars
Pandemics (i.e. Covid 19, the Quarantine, etc.)
The impact of trauma is not just emotional but it can, and usually does, manifest physically, affecting every facet of our lives, because as I’ve talked about before, trauma is often stored somewhere in the physical BODY until it is felt, processed and healed.
The Healing Journey
Healing trauma is an extremely nonlinear process. If you’re going on a healing journey, get ready for the ride! You will have good days, bad days, stagnant days, days with major breakthroughs, days with intense breakdowns… the list goes on. Healing involves both progress and setbacks. But if you’re on the path, here are a few moments you can expect to encounter:
Acknowledging the Trauma: The first step to healing is recognizing and accepting that you have experienced trauma. You cannot heal what you don’t reveal. Denial only traps you in a cycle of pain, while acknowledgment opens the door to recovery. You have to feel it to heal it!
Seeking Professional Help: Therapy, fam. It will be the soapbox that I die on! Therapists and counselors trained in trauma can provide essential support. Techniques such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy, and other trauma-focused modalities have been proven effective. I go into great detail about my own journey with IFS Therapy in this episode of my Let’s Talk About It podcast.
Building a Support System: Y’all, get a team. Surround yourself with supportive friends and family who understand that you’re on a journey, and they’re willing to support you through it. You can also find support groups and communities, online, that can provide a sense of shared understanding. This can really help you feel heard and seen!
Self-Care: Healing requires taking care of your physical, emotional, spiritual, and mental well-being (Mind, Body, Spirit!). This is going to look like regular exercise, eating nutritious food, getting adequate sleep, and engaging in activities and hobbies that bring you joy.
Meditation: Another rock that I plan to die on LOL… Meditation! Mindfulness practices like meditation will help ground you and heal you. Meditation reduces anxiety and stress, calms the mind, allows you to go inward and really root down in your healing journey. Techniques such as deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation, and guided imagery are what you can look forward to practicing. IFS is also a form of meditation that results in a much deeper understanding of yourself and your behavior.
Expressing Yourself: Creative outlets like writing, art, music, or dance are powerful tools for processing emotions and experiences related to trauma. You have to learn to give your pain somewhere else to live outside of your body, and creating is one of the best ways to do that! Journaling, in particular, allows for reflection and expression of feelings that might be hard to vocalize. I also find painting to be an incredible source of peace, and processing for me. I got into detail on this episode of the podcast!
Setting Boundaries: Protecting your energy and well-being become crucial when you start a healing journey. Learning to set clear boundaries with people and situations that may trigger your trauma is key. This is an essential part of your self-care and recovery.
Educating Yourself: More than anything you’re going to want to understand more about trauma and its effects so as to demystify your experiences and reduce feelings of isolation, confusion and fear. Books, articles, and workshops on trauma can provide invaluable insights and strategies for coping! I’ve created a resources section of this website to help get you started.
Eventually, You WILL Start to Thrive
Once you have begun to heal, it's possible to move beyond survival mode and start thriving! That’s where I’m here to help you.
I could not be more dedicated to sharing what I’ve learned on my own journey so that you can have the resources and tools that I didn’t have at first, all in one place, and a community of support to help you!
At the end of the day, creating balance within the Three Core Areas of Wellness (Mind, Body, Spirit), is KEY! If you know you’ve got some trauma to heal, or you’re just feeling burned out, or like you’ve hit your own version of rock bottom, or like that crash is right on the horizon… Here’s how how you can starting healing:
ASSESS: I’ve created a completely FREE Full Circle Wellness workbook to help you assess the different areas of your life, so that you can get a good look and where you want to focus your healing efforts. You will notice that I don’t include things here like “family” and “friends”, or even your marriage or relationship, because Full Circle Wellness is about YOU.
SMALL RIGHT ACTIONS: Start thinking about the babiest steps that you can take to feel better… Does that look like getting a therapist? Maybe you start taking short walks, or journaling every day, or start a meditation practice. While some of this can seem daunting, these are super small steps! You can write for 5 minutes, take a few deep breaths, get a ten minute walk around your neighborhood… focus on what you CAN do, small right actions stack over time.
WORK ON YOUR MINDSET: There are a few things that are crucial to the healing journey, and mindset it one of them. You have to recognize that one, you’re capable of growing beyond where you are now; two, you have to believe that healing is possible for you; three, you’ve gotta strap in for the long haul because healing is a PROCESS, and that process is never over… healing is for life; and four, you’ve gotta be ready and willing to make the change. If you’re struggling in this area, I’ve put together a complete guide to help you Master Your Mindset, so that you can get started strong.
THERAPY: Here it is again. I could not recommend it enough. Get in touch with a therapist and start doing the deep work required to become new. I’m a big big fan of the BetterHelp platform! This is the platform I use to get online therapy, even EMDR, even IFS… I’ve experienced incredible healing working with a BetterHelp therapist at my own convenience, straight from my phone. Check it out here for a free week: GET STARTED HERE
Whatever way you slice it, overcoming trauma is a PROFOUND journey to freedom and inner peace that requires courage, patience, and persistence. The journey is what is meant to be achieved!
By acknowledging your trauma, seeking support, and taking proactive steps towards healing, you can get out of survival mode, get unstuck, and rise up from rock bottom and begin to thrive, fully well.
Remember, you are not alone on this journey. There is a community of survivors and professionals ready to support you. Embrace the journey. Take the first step. You are worth it.
Be well,
L
