Connecting Within After Trauma

A long-lasting effect of trauma can be disconnection from ourselves, from our essence. We can't change what happened in our past. We can reconnect in the present moment.

This practice begins with a short clip from Dr Gabor Maté then goes into a guided inquiry and practice of inviting connection with all "parts" of ourselves, including what we may have disconnected from as a result of trauma.

Transcript

This is an excerpt from an interview by Lynn Fraser with Dr.

Gabor Matei for the Radical Recovery Summit 2017.

The real problem wasn't that your mother or father couldn't support you or maybe even they hurt you.

The problem was as a result of that you lost the connection to yourself.

That's the good,

That's the greatest catastrophe.

That's the greatest calamity.

It doesn't use catastrophe,

Calamity he says.

No,

That's the good news because if the problem was what happened to you and I however many decades ago.

If that's the problem we're basically lost aren't we?

Because ain't never,

Ain't never gonna not happen right?

Yeah,

Yeah.

But if the problem is that a result of that we lost the connection to essence,

Well that can be regained at any moment.

Right.

And that's the positive news.

Yeah.

So the,

What he's saying is that whatever happened to us is the,

Is what happened to us and we can't change that.

And that the real calamity was that we lost our connection with ourselves and that we can get that back at any moment.

Nothing has to happen in the exterior world for that to happen.

We'll keep dipping back into that through the practice.

Even as you're getting yourself settled and moving your body,

Notice what you feel,

What you feel right now.

What kind of a connection you feel with yourself right now.

And this is a perfect setting to do this in because we come here regularly.

Some people come every day.

Some people come when they can and it's not quite as regular.

But whatever practices we do,

Whatever ways that we have of tuning into ourselves,

We do practice to reconnect and to go within and to,

To experience our own inner world and our connection within.

One of the first ways that we do that is by noticing our own body.

In our lifetime,

Especially when we've had trauma,

Our own body has not been a safe place always.

One of the ways that that shows up is an unwillingness or inability to stay present within our own body.

When things are happening to us that are harmful or scary or terrifying,

We very understandably don't want to be in our bodies.

So we have developed a habit perhaps of disappearing.

Our bodies will often be tight and contracted and not,

Not really a pleasant place to be either.

And over time we experience a healing of that as we come in and pay attention.

It is safe now.

We are safe in our bodies now.

And we have memories of not being safe.

Those are both true.

And right now as we relax and soften,

We're able to reside in our body in a way perhaps that we weren't before.

And that's available to us now.

And not in some perfect way,

Just in the way that it shows up for us right now.

And we can notice our breathing and allow our breath to settle and soften and become deeper.

We can enjoy our breath.

Enjoy what it feels like to come in and be present and breathe deeply.

It's so relaxing.

We talk about connecting with our body and our breath.

These are mindfulness practices that help us to have that unity.

Our body and breath and thoughts and higher level of the mind and the witness and the space in which it arises are all one.

It's not disconnected,

We're not connected.

We're not connected.

We're not connected.

The awareness that arises are all one.

It's not disconnected,

We're not divided into these layers that have no connection.

It's all one.

As we breathe and relax,

Often our mind settles.

We can restore the connection with ourselves,

That connection within.

We can restore the connection with ourselves,

That connection within.

We can restore the connection within.

So many of us feel unseen.

And no matter how much of our lives we've been unseen,

We can see ourselves now.

We can bring our attention in.

We can bring our attention in.

Witness and observe our own experience right now.

And as we do these practices over and over and over and over again,

We become familiar with all of the layers and experiences that we've had.

We learn to be kind,

Even if at first that feels ridiculous or not safe.

We learn so deeply how our systems work that we stop blaming ourselves.

Or we become open to stopping the blame,

The self-shaming.

It becomes at least a possibility.

Notice right now your body and your breath,

Your mind,

Your thoughts,

Energy.

And as you attune to yourself and attend to yourself,

Look to see if there's anything internally that is not allowed to be here.

There might be a preference for calm and peace and all of that.

But look to see what really is here.

Is there anything in you that is absolutely beyond the pale,

That you just can't have that there?

Let's take a moment to see what comes up.

If it words or pictures,

We can work with them the way we do.

Put them in a frame,

Tapping or look at the space around the outside.

In your own direct experience,

Right now in this moment,

Is there anything that you have to not have here that has to be pushed out,

That has to be gone?

Something that's so bad that you would have to disconnect from yourself.

Continue to notice your breath,

Notice your whole body.

Notice that you are looking,

You're doing an inquiry and seeing what comes up.

Stay connected with yourself as you look.

Sometimes a behavior will come up,

Some shaming words or stigma.

If that's the case,

See if you can look at that with kindness,

With understanding we have all behaved in ways that weren't ideal.

Why did that happen?

Look underneath the behavior.

See if you could invite all of you to be in your awareness.

Stay connected with your breath and your body.

With that willingness to restore lost connection.

Notice where your mind is going.

Allow yourself to observe.

It's possible that there is evidence coming up about things that are maybe the reasons for disconnection.

Might be painful to see.

Notice if you could allow everything to be.

We do not have to be perfect to allow ourselves to be connected within.

We're all human.

We all react in certain ways to trauma,

We react to protect ourselves.

We're wounded perhaps,

But we're not bad.

Sometimes evidence might come up of things we've been told or beliefs we formed from experiences in our earlier life.

We could look at all of the evidence of a belief.

Evidence comes in words and pictures,

Memories.

And evidence of an experience is something that we can look at and observe.

It's not who we are.

It's something that happened to us.

It might be our response to something that happened to us.

It might be words that we've heard about us.

I see myself.

I welcome all of myself.

I'm connected with myself.

Or perhaps it's I'm willing to become more connected within.

Notice your whole body from head to toes.

If you're guarding yourself in some way through tightness in your body.

Just notice that allow it to release so you can rest.

Deep,

Deep breaths.

Let yourself really nourish on the inhale and relax on the exhale.

I know myself.

I'm kind to myself.

I connect with myself.

Invite in any parts of yourself that you've carved off,

Pushed away.

Restore connection.

Allow your own presence,

Love,

Compassion to heal.

Know that you're already healed.

Connection is already intact and restored.

From presence.

Allow yourself to notice what needs to be brought in closer.

From knowing your whole.

Allow the healing.

Do this as a practice.

Bring your attention back over and over and over again.

Restore any lost connection.

Allow yourself to rest in that.

Notice your body,

Your breath,

The energy in your body,

Your thoughts,

Your whole experience.

See yourself.

And then when you're ready,

Come out of the practice.

And then when you're ready,

Come out of the practice.

Reviews

This was so deeply moving and productive. Thank you, asl always. 🙏

That really helped me, I loved the visualisation and your voice and also the flute at the end. I am starting to reconnect with my body after realising that I have been so disconnected & have masked for so long. Thank you, your work is invaluable 💚

Self acceptance. The events of the past are part of my history, but they are not who I am as a person. Welcoming all of me back with a warm hug. Healing from CPTSD and PTSD is a process, but well worth every moment spent. Thank you for this compassionate meditation. It is joyful finding my way back to who I really am without trauma hijacked brain.

Very much Love this. I was totally disconnected from myself but learning how to reconnect and starting the healing process. Thank you.

I was able to connect to the part who did not want to understand... thank you! 💝🙏

Compassionate & objective inquiry let’s us truly know ourselves. I love this process as I can observe all my parts without getting triggered.

Thank you!! 🙏 amazing insight for your shadow parts and to regonize them. Very powefull meditation. I feel more complete and whole after this meditation. 💚

Very helpful thank you

Helped me connect to some of my alters' fear from the trauma

Thank you. Slowly reconnecting to myself again - this was very helpful! X

Such a proudly healing practice. Beautiful guidance to restore disconnection. Thank you.

Thank you for this very powerful practice. At times, I wanted to turn away from the pain and hurt that came up but I resisted the urge to push it back down and run. The emotional and gut pain was extraordinary! But I am so glad that I held on and stayed with the practice. I found some peace in the end and I felt the comfort of God’s presence. I will return to this practice as often as I need to but I already know that I am finally reclaiming the disconnected part of me. I am finally forgiving myself for being human. You have helped me tremendously! 🙏🏽

Wonderful. The quote from Dr Gabor Mate at the beginning was also very powerful.

Most helpful inquiry; thank-you!

I love Gabor Mate's work on compassion4addiction.com and your acknowledgement and synopsis and guided meditation around awareness within safe place and then having compassion and acceptance for those parts of ourselves someone else taught us to or modeled for us to disown, or even, in my case, projected their own (vomit) disowning they experienced or believe onto me... As a child I picked it up and made it my own, whereas this and my work in ACA will help me identify and drop it, stop the cycle of self abuse... Self shaming and minimizing with the opposite coming out in perfectionism and grandiosity. Right size as a child of God who lives me and wants me to feel great joy from being of service to His other children and keeping my Vow to my Father to carry the message when He showed me the way to ReStore my health. No one who has verbally abused me, and continues to, can override my Huge God. This reminded me it is a Faith issue - and that He is showing me how"the sins of the father are passed down four generations" and I can refuse to play. Amen!

Excellent. A lot of information and guidance here. I see why it is listed as a talk, but it is both a talk and a meditation. Very useful. Thanks so much

Just what I needed after getting two phone calls related to sudden losses this morning. I feel so lucky to have found this Meditation to help me get back into my body.

This exercise really surprised me- or rather, I surprised myself when it struck such a chord. LFS uses an excerpt from a talk very effectively as a platform for a soothing meditation. Usually I go for the longer practices, but LFS distills a lot down in her works, and I like it. Thanks.

This inquiry was very helpful and these approaches which finally merge meditation and trauma work have been invaluable in my journey of healing. Grateful to be living in an age where you can find so many of these resources online. This is a great one with two great experts.

A brief explanation on how trauma causes disconnection at so many levels followed by a gentle meditation on loving kindness and reconnecting to oneself. I will return to this for continued healing. Thank you 🙏