When presence is elusive

Anywhere but here as a trauma response

“The trauma is not the story of what happened long ago; the long-term trauma is that you are robbed of feeling fully alive and in charge of your self.”

- Bessel van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps the Score

We were born as present-moment beings. For better and worse, thanks to evolved brains that can weave complex meaning from our experiences, we tend to become adults primarily dissociated from the here and now.

I can vividly recall comparing myself to other students in my second grade class and coming away with a clear determination of my inferiority, and an equally plain understanding that this was critically important to resolve.

This is partly a side effect of something awesome. We survived as a species by forging communities where we could rely on one another. This necessitated empathy, social norms, and shared morality. We could steal all the food for ourselves, but we’d have been cast out to die on our own. However, this also tied social acceptance to survival.

I think it’s safe to argue that Western culture and a capitalistic economy takes advantage of our need for belonging, aggravating insecurities and divisions in order to drive profits for quick dopamine rewards (shopping, food, alcohol, entertainment, sex) and status signaling products (luxury homes, cars, clothes, jewelry, vacations, etc).

Given our neurobiology combined with a hypercompetitive, individualistic environment, it’s predictable that many, if not most, of us primarily exist in either the past or the future. We are striving to feel connected to meaningful relationships and pursuits, but our desire has been hijacked by the false premise that connection and meaning require striving.

We are already inclined to be anywhere but here, and that normalized state of being can mask the effect of trauma on our ability to be present, especially chronic trauma.

I am defining trauma in the broad sense of perceiving danger that feels so overwhelming (we feel helpless) that there are lingering reaction patterns to associated stimuli. After a bad car accident, it would be predictable to experience a racing heart and sweaty palms when you begin driving again, for a period of time.

The experience of trauma does not necessitate post-traumatic stress symptoms or the disorder, and there are many factors that play into whether a traumatic experience leaves a distressing imprint long-term.

The usual experience of PTSD involves hyperarousal (hypervigilance) and/or hypoarousal (feeling numb), re-experiencing (invasive thoughts, panic attacks, or nightmares), negative or disempowering thinking patterns, and avoidance of situations that lead to dysregulation.

Complex post-traumatic stress disorder, or C-PTSD, is differentiated from PTSD in that it results from prolonged traumatic overwhelm typically within interpersonal relationships such as from child abuse, neglect, or domestic violence.

“...there is a mistaken notion that trauma is primarily about memory—the story of what has happened; and that is probably often true for the first few days after the traumatic event, but then a cascade of defenses precipitate a variety of reactions in mind and brain that are attempts to blunt the impact of the ongoing sense of threat.” - Bessel van der Kolk

Following trauma, especially prolonged trauma, our unconscious survival system is disturbed. We become hyperaroused or numbed out, frozen in the past or stuck in high gear in an attempt to escape it.

We can sometimes identify a major trauma as a source of ongoing difficult patterns in our lives and relationships. And other times we wish we could point to something because the shame associated with a lack of a socially accepted trauma to explain our behaviors is itself overwhelming.

Either way, we can find ourselves stuck in a chronic maladaptive state of fight, flee or freeze at a subclinical intensity. We’re getting by, but something is off. We’re disconnected, living at a distance from the present moment.

If your response to your own helplessness in the midst of trauma was a hyperfunctioning sprint to safety, the seemingly positive reinforcement of your over-productivity or self-sacrificing can be hard to set down, until the burn is more painful than the fear of everything falling apart.

How do we find our way back to presence as our baseline? We must reestablish safety within our own bodies.

Neuroscience research has demonstrated that trauma changes the insula, an essential part of the brain for integrating bodily sensations with emotions and cognitive functions, making it difficult to feel engaged in our lives because it is difficult to remain in our bodies.

Often, a client will report a debilitating episode of anxiety or depression and when I ask what they are experiencing in their bodies they are surprised to discover a tightness in their throat, tension in their face, nausea, or an ache that wraps around their head. We are far more aware of our thoughts than sensations, especially if a past experience led to fleeing our bodies to survive, tolerate the pain, or escape perceived danger.

As Bessel van der Kolk would phrase it, our mission is to practice noticing and befriending the sensations in our bodies.

This might begin with a daily ritual of scanning the body for sensations and noting them down as a compassionate observer, flexing the underused muscle of sensation awareness as we build confidence in our capacity to remain safe during the distressing situations that tend to reflexively produce unhelpful reactions.

“Once you start approaching your body with curiosity rather than with fear, everything shifts.”

Bessel van der Kolk

Authoring Beauty Practices:

Paid subscribers can join me on a deeper journey to embody each week’s lessons through poetry, writing prompts, and intentional practices.

Are you a mental health professional? Reach out for full access at no cost. It’s a small way I can support our shared community.

Find this week’s Authoring Beauty Practices here.