Tag: recovery

Trauma recovery demands that we be very intentional. 

Intentional about our time. About our focus. About our mental “diet.”

We are not going to realistically recover from trauma on autopilot. 

Remember: our autopilot was programmed by trauma. By abusive and neglectful people and institutions. 

If we could live a functional and meaningful life on autopilot, we would have by now. 

But if we’re serous about trauma recovery, we have to take it off autopilot— which is easier said than done. 

When we take our life off of autopilot, we’re forced to be way more intentional. We’re forced to choose our focus. We’re forced to manage our time. 

We’re forced to manage what I call our mental “diet”— what goes in to our head via what we watch and what we read and who we follow on social media. 

Mental “junk food” leads to feeling and functioning about as good emotionally as actual junk food leads to feeling and functioning physically. 

Having to be this intentional about life can be exhausting. 

When survivors struggle with trauma recovery, it’s almost never because we don’t “want” to recover— it’s almost always because we are so. Goddamn. Tired. All. The goddamn. Time. 

I’ll spoil the suspense: there are absolutely going to be times when you and I are just not up to living as intentionally as recovery demands. 

There are absolutely going to be times when we don’t feel like it— and there are going to be times when we are not physically or mentally or spiritually up to it. 

There are going to be times when we resent the hell out of all this super intentional living, and we go back on autopilot out of exhaustion— and maybe even a little spite. 

Then, our trauma-programmed autopilot does its thing— and we wind up where we wind up. 

No shame. It happens to all of us. Most definitely including me. 

What we need to remember is, there’s no shame in being tired. 

There’s no shame in being exhausted, even. 

Trauma recovery is one of the hardest things you and I will ever, ever do. It’s one of the hardest things humans ever do. 

It’s okay to be exhausted. It’s okay to not feel like working your recovery today. It’s not evidence of “cowardice” or “weakness” or anything else Trauma Brain is accusing you of when you have a day when you’re just not feeling this “recovery” thing. 

What we’re shooting for, in trauma recovery, is building up our capacity to live intentionally. 

What we’re shooting for is living intentionally more days than not. Making decisions intentionally more often than not. Day by day, upping the percentage of intentionality with which we live. 

It’s not going to be perfect. And that’s okay. 

Let me repeat that. It’s not going to be perfect— and that’s okay. That’s normal. That’s all part of recovery. 

It’s not going to be perfect— but it’s going to get better. We get better at it. 

We get incrementally more used to it. 

Day by day, we develop the habit of living more and more intentionally— and when I tell you living intentionally is the absolute bedrock of realistic, sustainable recovery, I’m telling you something I believe more than anything else about trauma recovery. 

People often ask me what practical, on the ground trauma recovery looks like— and it’s not an easy question to answer, insofar as the details of everyone’s recovery tend to look a little, or a lot, different.

But one thing I can tell you is that nobody recovers without getting good and intentional about their focus, their time, and their mental “diet.” 

Living intentionally doesn’t solve all our problems. But it’s necessary to solving any of our problems. 

I would not have chosen trauma. Or addiction, for that matter. 

I would not have chosen it for you, and I would not have chosen it for me. 

Your mileage may vary, but I don’t believe “things happen for a reason.” 

(It’s perfectly okay if you do— I just don’t happen to believe that.) 

I don’t believe God, or anyone else, “gives” us challenges to “test” us. 

(Again, your mileage may vary— it’s perfect okay if you believe this; I jus don’t happen to.)

I think certain things happen to us just because we got enormously, extraordinarily unlucky. 

We were in the wrong place, at the wrong time, around the wrong people. We don’t ask for any of it, we don’t “choose” it, and most of the time we could not realistically opt out of it. 

I don’t believe we “chose” our parents, or what happened to us in this lifetime via “karma.” 

Here’s the thing, though: I understand why many people do believe all of those things. 

I completely understand the urge to try to give our trauma meaning. To try to convince ourselves that we somehow “caused” or “deserved” what happened to us. 

The alternative is truly awful: that terrible things can happen to innocent people, and we can’t control our vulnerability to certain kinds of trauma. 

Many people, including me, HATE that idea. We would rather feel guilty than helpless— so we bend over backwards trying to devise ways we somehow “caused” or “deserved” our trauma. 

I get it. But  don’t believe it. Not anymore, anyway. 

I don’t think God “tests” us with pain or challenges. And I definitely don’t believe we “have” to create or find meaning in our pain. 

We don’t “have” to do anything, necessarily, in response to our pain— including work a recovery. No one reading this “has” to work a recovery.  I would never suggest they do. 

All that said: I choose to work a recovery. 

And I choose to find— or, rather, create— meaning from my pain. 

This is not toxic positivity bullsh*t. This is what I choose to do with my pain, my trauma, my history. Your mileage may vary. 

I decided, at a certain point, that I was not going to waste my pain. 

The pain I endured may have been as random and meaningless as any pain that is inflicted on anyone, anywhere— but I decided that I am going to use it. 

How? By working my recovery. 

Working our recovery demands we get serious about things like values and goals and accountability in ways that people who aren’t working a recovery program will never, ever understand. 

Working a recovery means we wake up every day and choose recovery. It means no more going on autopilot. 

No more passively accepting what somebody else wants or expects from me. 

No more letting my mood, as opposed to my goals and values, determine my behavior. 

Recovery is how I decided to manufacture meaning from my pain. 

No one forced it on me. 

I could have kept on keeping on. Though at the rate I was going, I probably wouldn’t be alive to write these words if I’d done that. 

No one “has” to create meaning from their trauma by working a recovery. 

But it’s a choice we can make. 

No matter how exhausted we are, no matter how alone we feel, no matter how wounded we are. It’s not a matter of “character” or “intelligence” or any bullsh*t like that. 

Our trauma may not have had any rhyme or reason or meaning. 

But our recovery can. 

A lot of trauma recovery is starting over, and a lot of trauma recovery is reinventing ourselves. 

How many times? As many times as it takes. 

Trauma has this way of trying to convince us that we are limited in the number of times we can try again. 

That might be true in some specific contexts— but, in the grand scheme? We never actually run out of chances to work our recovery. 

That thing, where our trauma conditioning tries to convince us we’re “done” because we’ve “failed” a certain number of times? That’s just our trauma conditioning fishing for a way to discourage us and get us to quit. 

These “failures?” Aren’t even usually failures. Though, I must confess, I’m not an authority on the subject of “failure,” because I don’t actually believe in it. 

To me, there, are no “failures.” There are only results. 

They may not be the results we prefer, or the results we expect, or the results that are consistent with our larger goals— but we always “succeed” in producing a result. 

Trauma Brain, however, very much wants you and me to believe in “failure.” 

It wants us to believe that a bad day is way more than a bad day— it wants us to believe that a bad day is “clearly” indicative of the fact that we’re doing recovery “wrong.” 

Believe me, there are lots of ways to “fail” in trauma recovery— if you believe in that kind of thing. 

We’re gonna have days when our mood sucks. 

We’re gonna have days when our motivation is zero. 

We’re gonna have days when we cry in situations where we’d very much prefer not to cry. 

And, sure, we could process all of those as “failures.” But to me it’s just not that straightforward. 

There are lots of reasons why our mood might suck, or our motivation is zero, or the water works happened to be turned on in inopportune times or places today— and chances are we don’t actually have perfect control over all those reasons. 

But even if we do have some control over some of those reasons, and even if we could have made adjustments to how we managed our feelings or responses, I still don’t consider those “failures.” They’re results. They’re data. 

No more; no less. 

Your milage may vary about all of this. Maybe you really do believe in the concept of “failure.” The question to ask, always, is: “does the belief or way of thinking about this support or chip away at my recovery?” 

Most of the “failures” we think are devastating in trauma recovery are setbacks due to moments of exhaustion or confusion. Many of those setbacks are the result of a specific skill deficit in a specific moment. 

They do not represent a generalized “failure” in recovering from trauma. 

If you’re reading this right now, even if you’re coming off of an experience of “failure”— or, as I would call it, unexpected or unwanted results— you’re still in the game. 

I know this, because you have eyes to read this and a brain to decode it and another day to work your recovery. 

How we explain what happens to us, matters. The language we use matters. The metaphors we use matter. The labels we affix to unexpected or unwanted results, matter. 

If you’re still breathing, there is no “failure” catastrophic enough to disqualify you from starting over and working your recovery today. You don’t even have to wait until tomorrow. You can work your recovery for the rest of today. 

Oh, and one more thing: Trauma Brain is very likely absolutely howling at you as you read this. 

That should be an indication that we’re on to something recovery supporting here. 

Breathe; blink; focus; and do the next right thing. 

You can think about all this in terms of, “I have to work my trauma recovery every single f*cking day for the rest of my life”— but I wouldn’t recommend it. 

Rather, I would recommend you think in terms of, “every day, for the rest of my life, the tools, skills, and philosophies I’ve developed in my recovery are there for me. I’m not alone in this.” 

Trauma Brain is going to try to get you to think of recovery as something you “have” to do— but which would you would’t choose to do if you didn’t “have” to. 

Here’s the thing: no one “has” to work a trauma recovery. 

We do “have” to somehow deal with what’s happened to us in our life, and we do “have” to somehow manage the feelings, memories, and reactions we’re experiencing. We don’t get a choice about any of that. 

But we do get a choice about whether or not to work a recovery. No one can “make” us. 

The only difference will be whether we’re trying to handle the overwhelming symptoms and struggles of trauma on our own, with no plan or coherent approach— or whether we’re meeting our symptoms with a blueprint, a realistic game plan, and tools for the task that we’re constantly upgrading. 

I know which alternative I prefer. Because for a long time I tried to wing it, and that got me exactly where it got me. 

As long as we think of recovery as a burden, instead of an opportunity, we are going to resent it. 

The truth is, trauma recovery is not a burden. Trauma is a burden. 

Flashbacks are a burden. 

Body memories are a burden. 

Dissociative splitting that interferes with our ability to function and relate is a burden. 

Recovery is nothing or less than a commitment to meeting our symptoms and needs with radical presence, radical compassion, and a realistic acknowledgement that we are, and probably always will be, vulnerable in certain ways. 

You don’t want to go into a fight not having trained, not having scouted out your opponent, and not having devised a game plan for when sh*t goes sideways. 

That’s what trauma recovery is: your training program for the fight that is your life. 

I would not wish traumatic experiences on anyone. If I had my druthers, my job as a trauma specialist wouldn’t exist. I’d be making a living helping people quit smoking or something. 

But: none of us, not you reading this nor me writing this, had the option of trauma not existing, did we? 

None of us asked for this. The very fact that any of us have to think about the words “trauma” or “recovery” is utterly unfair. 

We can’t change that. 

We can’t deny or disown the utter f*cking unfairness of all of this— nor can we deny or disown the reality of it. 

Trauma recovery is about embracing reality, because we have things to do with our life that have nothing to do with trauma. 

We have relationships that we want to deepen. 

We have have careers we want to advance. 

Some of us even have a world to change. 

If we’re going to realistically do any of that, we need a coherent, effective set of tools, skills, and philosophies that guide how we respond to our trauma symptoms. 

That s to say: we need to work a recovery. 

How long will we need to work our trauma recovery? I honestly don’t know. I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to live my life without learning into a recovery paradigm for my own safety and stability. 

Your mileage may vary. But I’m not sure “how long will have I have to do this” is a particularly useful question. 

Instead, maybe try, “do I need to work my recovery today?”

In my experience, if you need to ask, the answer is very often, “yes.” 

And that’s okay. 

Recovery is not your burden. Recovery is your lifeline. 

Don’t get it twisted. 

Something that holds many survivors back in trauma recovery is, we can’t imagine a recovery that is consistent with the life we’re living now. 

I know, we’re working a trauma recovery to create a new life, that doesn’t particularly resemble the life we’re living now. 

But in the short term, if we can only envision trauma recovery as something that entails a drastic departure from our current reality, it’s likely going to affect our levels of motivation and belief. 

We’ve been around long enough to know that dramatic leaps rarely happen. They do happen, sometimes— but they tend to be the exception, not the norm. 

We’ve been around long enough to know that tomorrow is probably going to look a lot like today. Much like today looked a lot like yesterday. 

In trauma recovery, we are always swimming upstream against hopelessness and our vulnerability to becoming overwhelmed. Trying to envision our recovery as a whole new life, entirely incompatible with or removed from what we’re living now, makes us especially vulnerable to both. 

This is is why I sound like a broken record when it comes to taking baby steps. 

This is why I sound like a broken record when it comes to focusing on .01% shifts. 

This is why I sound like a broken record when it comes to setting recovery goals so small they feel stupid— goals so small it’d almost be harder NOT to achieve them. 

The truth is, I very much want a dramatically different life for you. That’s the only reason I do this work— because I love watching people completely remake themselves and their lives. 

But I want that transformation to be realistic. I want it to actually happen. I don’t want it to remain a fantasy that sounds awesome and is temporarily motivating— but which evaporates when it’s exposed to the pressures and obligations of our current life. 

Something we know very well in the behavioral sciences is that change that takes us dramatically out of our comfort zone is usually unsustainable without a massive level of support. 

I don’t know about you, but I don’t know many trauma survivors working our recovery who have a “massive level of support” handy. 

So: when I say start small, I’m not just talking about making changes you already have the strength and skill to make, although that’s obviously part of the equation. 

I say start small to avoid freaking out your nervous system. 

(If you’re a survivor working your recovery, chances are your nervous system exists at a baseline level of “freaked out”— we don’t particularly need to add to that with unrealistic expectations of recovery, you know?)

What I want for you in your recovery is to make consistent, manageable changes over time. I want, in six months, you to be able to look back on changes that you’ve made in how you think, feel, and behave, and realize, huh, it’s been six months— I didn’t think I could keep any of that up for six DAYS. 

What we think, feel, and do has a lot to do with neural pathways that have been shaped and conditioned over time. If we try to rip out every neural network we have all at once, our nervous system is going to respond to that feeling of chaos and unfamiliarity by reverting back to and doubling down on its old programming. 

That is to say, trying to make too many changes, too fast, not only won’t serve our trauma recovery— it’ll likely set us back.

Again, I don’t know about you, but I don’t have time to be set back in my trauma recovery. 

So: if you want to make radical changes in how you think, feel, and behave in the long term, I’m gonna ask you to make teeny, tiny, barely noticeable— but very consistent and very purposeful— changes in how you talk to yourself, direct your mental focus, breathe, and use your body day by day. 

This is how we realistically rebuild ourselves and our lives. 

This is how we sustainably recover. 

This is how we actually make it happen.