With regard to Mental Health, I have learned so much and more each and every day I learn. It was no different in our workshop today. So many different unique perspectives on one subject. I have suffered from a complex trauma issue for a few years now and I have been human all my life.
There are times when I over-react simply because my brain is telling me about the dangerous situation I am in, even when it is not a dangerous situation.
If a trigger I have never realised was there suddenly decides to rock my boat, it takes time to recognise what it is and what I can do to re-train my brain not to consider that particular trigger a problem.
There are some long, quite scary words used in Complex Trauma training, “systemic abuse,” being one of them. Now that one can open up a whole can of worms, anything from watching too much news, to being hounded in respect of benefits, creating all the anxiety and stress that does bring-up.
You know, I am sure that every single individual interprets communication completely differently from the next person. If you look at the process:
You see something, you think a thought – through the chemical processes of the brain, that thought becomes communication and in the case of verbal communication, you then have a verbal, communication.
The person, receiving the information, hears and sees the verbal communication, which is then decoded by the brain.
A complicated process.
Added to which we all have our own developed individual realities, issues, background, that get in the way of us completely understanding, or interpreting what is being communicated in the way the person creating the communication meant it to be heard, seen etc.
We also have something else that can interfere in the whole process and that is an ability emotionally to feel what a communication is about. We pick up emotion at an unconscious level and can get the communication wrong if what we see and what we feel do not match-up. We can be honest about statements, and truly believe that the act was carried out, even when it didn’t happen that way at all, simply because we feel the intention, even when we do not see the act, itself.
Empathy, when we connect with others at an emotional level is an amazing human ability. It allows us to sympathise, and, although we cannot walk in anyone else’s shoes, relate to others with similiar life experiences or issues. In this way, we can share, learn, teach, support each other. Mutuality, as it is called, can bring a more complete, in-depth mutual support experience (Peer Support), than other forms of support. Some people are so sensitive to the emotions of others that they can end up travelling the road with the person suffering emotional disturbance. It can prove impossible to pull away or draw back easily from situations, causing trauma to the previously unaffected person in addition to the person suffering disturbance.
Did you know? The brain is really like the branches at the top of the tree, it is where the chemical/electrical thought, memory, etc. processes occur. We do, however have other systems in the body that are part of the whole brain system. These areas are located in the heart and the gut, the liver as Muslim people would say.
It is only when these three brain functions work in harmony, ie. we do not have a gut instinct or a heart suspicion that is different from the thoughts going through our brain. On the contrary, everything is working together, that we can be in the best place we can possibly get too.
So that was my day’s learning. I would love to hear from folks on what they think, etc.
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