The Psychological Impact of Traumatic Life Experiences.
By Bessel van der Kolk M.D.
Studying the psychological impacts of traumatic life experiences helps to clarify many issues of human suffering. The legacy of traumatic life experience, particularly in childhood, is expressed in bodily reactions such as chronic physical discomfort and illness; unmodulated emotions; and failure to fully, physically and mentally, engage in the present.
In order to gain a sense of control over one’s physical reactions, it is necessary to mobilize the body. Unless we physically come to terms with the remnants of fear and defensiveness lodged in our physical reality, the imprints of the past may permanently alter whether we feel at home in our bodies or are paralyzed in our capacity to be open to and learn from new experiences.
Bessel van derolk, MD
Bessel van der Kolk, MD, Clinical Consultant for The Meadows and Mellody House, is one of the world’s foremost authorities in the area of post-traumatic stress and related phenomena. His research work has ranged from the psychobiology of trauma to traumatic memory, and from the effectiveness of EMDR to the effects of trauma on traumatic memory. He is a professor of psychiatry at Boston University School of medicine and medical director of the Trauma Centre in Boston, a Community Practice site of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network. The Trauma Center is one of the pre-eminent training sites in the country for psychologists and psychiatrists specializing in the treatment of traumatized children and adults.
Mainstream therapy helps people by providing insight into the origins of our misery, often in the context of an understanding and supportive relationship. When done correctly, such understanding and support can give people the courage to face previously intolerable realities and help give voice to what was felt to be unspeakable.
Working with bodily states is relatively recent in western psychology. In contrast, most cultures around the world have ancient traditions, such as yoga and tai ch’i, that emphasize working with bodily states to affect the mind. These body-oriented methods hold in common the notion that in order to change, people need to have physical experiences that directly contradict past feelings of helplessness, frustration and terror.
Neuroscience research shows that there is little connection between the various brain centers involved in understanding, planning and emotion - we simply are not capable of understanding our way out of our feelings. In fact, our logical selves tend to run behind our emotional urges and may function primarily to rationalize our loves and hates. Psychological conflicts, while often having origins in the past, become rooted in our internal sensations, which have become blunted, exaggerated or “stuck.”
Hence, the process of psychological change fundamentally concerns regaining a healthy relationship with all our internal feeling states. In contrast to understanding, paying close attention to one’s internal life and the flow of physical sensations, feelings, internal images and patterns of thought can make an enormous difference in the ways we feel and act.
The pathway in the brain from the conscious self to the emotions (i.e., the only way that people can effectively influence how they feel) links areas in the conscious mind that convey the sense of being in touch with oneself and one’s bodily states (the medial prefrontal cortex and insula), to the emotional centers of the brain (centering on the amygdala), to the arousal centers and, finally, to the hormonal and muscular output centers.
In this way, working with deep sensations and feelings has the potential to attain a sense of internal equilibrium and balance. Only after being able to quiet down and master one’s inner physical experiences do people regain the capacity to use speech and language to convey to others, in detail what they feel and remember.