Do we actually grow from adversity?

a ost by Eranda Jayawickreme and Frank J. Infurna for the Big Think blog

"That which does not kill us, makes us stronger"?


How much people believe they’ve changed often isn’t associated with how much they’ve actually changed. frankie's/Shutterstock.com

In our culture, there's this idea that enduring a tragedy can be good for your personal growth. You'll have a newfound appreciation for life.

You'll be grateful for your friends and family. You'll learn from the experience. You'll become more resilient.

This theme appears in media coverage, time and again, in the wake of natural disasters and terrorist attacks.

But what does the science say?

Is there actually value in pain and suffering? Was philosopher Frederich Nietzsche onto something when he said, “That which does not kill us, makes us stronger"?

A powerful narrative

As psychologists, we've been studying this question for the better part of the last decade.

We're not the first to grapple with these questions. Psychologists Richard Tedeschi and Lawrence Calhoun have written about how, after experiencing loss or trauma, people reported feeling a greater appreciation for life, closer to their friends and family, stronger, more spiritual and more inspired. They dubbed this phenomenon “post-traumatic growth."

The appeal of this finding is obvious. It shows there's a silver lining to tragedy. It's also consistent with the biblical theme of redemption, which says that all pain and suffering will ultimately lead to freedom.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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3 Practices That Help Ease the Pain of Being Highly Empathetic

a post by Tia Cantrell for the Tiny Buddha blog



“I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person.” ~Walt Whitman

Empathy is the ability to put yourself in another’s experience and understand with depth the gravity of their situation. In general, I believe the world needs more empathy.

But I’ve learned over the course of my twenty-nine years that sometimes being a highly empathetic person is incredibly painful. And sometimes too much of a good thing is a bad thing.

Hearing stories of the pain that people experience can be extra painful when your mind tries to carry their pain around with you. Empathy is healthy when it’s useful and helps a wounded person feel understood, validated, or release their pain. But it’s unhealthy when you carry it with you as if it is your own.

Feeling sorrow for someone who is suffering is part of our humanity and connection to each other. Carrying the sorrow as if it belongs to you ends up feeling traumatizing and can cause us to disconnect from others.

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Trauma Informed Care: How CBT & Mindful Awareness Are Key Factors in Repairing the Brain

a post by Maria Bogdanos for the World of Psychology blog



We’ve come a long way since therapists prescribed to their clients to punch their pillows when angry as a cathartic way to release negative emotions. While it helped bring up the emotion, they left out a critical piece in recovery: connecting that emotion to the logical side of our brains. What the person felt was not relief but disassociation.

What we know today in neuroscience and psychotherapy research is that when a traumatic event occurs, the brain goes into dysregulation. That is, the body and the mind become disconnected. Our survival or emotional part of our brain kicks in and calls the shots while our logical or thinking part goes silent. It’s an acute physical reality just like when someone might get their shoulder disconnected in a sports accident.

The person who experienced trauma is said to be stuck in “trauma time” and may also be emotionally reactionary when something triggers them, which is called a “trauma response.” When a person continues to feel trauma, the brain stays in a disassociated state until they are able to re-integrate the two parts of the brain again. Sometimes this can take years… as with chronic stress or continually being in unsafe situations including financial insecurity, and domestic abuse or neglect.

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Chronic urban trauma: The slow violence of housing dispossession

an article by Rachel Pain (Newcastle University, UK) published Urban Studies Volume 56 Issue 2 (February 2019)

Abstract

This paper sets the idea of slow violence into dialogue with trauma, to understand the practice and legitimisation of the repeated damage done to certain places through state violence.

Slow violence (Nixon R (2011) Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press) describes the ‘attritional lethality’ of many contemporary effects of globalisation. While originating in environmental humanities, it has clear relevance for urban studies.

After assessing accounts of the post-traumatic city, the paper draws insights from feminist psychiatry and postcolonial analysis to develop the concept of chronic urban trauma, as a psychological effect of violence involving an ongoing relational dynamic. Reporting from a three-year participatory action research project on the managed decline and disposal of social housing in a former coalmining village in north-east England, the paper discusses the temporal and place-based effects of slow violence.

It argues that chronic urban trauma becomes hard-wired in place, enabling retraumatisation while also remaining open to efforts to heal and rebuild.

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How I Learned to Trust Others by Learning to Trust Myself

a post by Kerry Campbell for the Tiny Buddha blog


“You may be deceived if you trust too much, but you will live in torment if you don’t trust enough.” ~Frank Crane

I’ve had trust issues for as long as I can remember, but didn’t realize it until after my divorce.

Divorce can be a traumatic experience, and in this case, it made me begin to take stock of my life. I began to reflect on my failed romantic relationships and why this was a repeat pattern for me.

I realized then that I never let people in for fear they will let me down, belittle or make me feel small, or otherwise diminish me in some way. I keep people at a distance, and this impacts my ability to have close, connected relationships.

I used to think I had trust issues because I grew up in a family where things were not “psychologically safe.” But I’ve come to realize there’s more to it than that.

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Why It’s Never Too Late to Heal Your Mind

a post by Hilary Jacobs Hendel for the World of Psychology blog



Brian had suffered for years from an intractable depression for which he had been hospitalized.

He had been through cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), psychoanalytic psychotherapy, supportive therapy and dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT).

He received varied diagnoses from major depression to bipolar disorder to dependent personality disorder. He had tried many medications that had proven ineffective. The psychiatrist who referred him told me he was hopeless.

I am a trauma therapist well versed in the science of emotions and attachment. Although change takes work, my conviction that the brain and mind heal is unwavering. No one disputes that the body heals itself. You fall and scrape your knee. Then, if you take care of the wound, your body heals. Just like your body heals with proper care, so do your brain and mind.

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Job loss and its aftermath among managers and professionals: wounded, fragmented and flexible

an article by Yiannis Gabriel (University of Bath, UK) and David E Gray and Harshita Goregaokar (University of Surrey, UK) published in Work Employment Society Volume 27 Number 1 (February 2013)

Abstract

Based on longitudinal fieldwork with unemployed managers and professionals in their 50s, the article examines the meaning of job loss to these people and charts their subsequent efforts to restore their lives.

The article identifies core similarities in their experiences and discerns different narrative strategies through which they have tried to make sense of their dismissal and sustain their selfhood.

For all, job loss was a considerable trauma leading to a fragmentation of identity; this was compounded by subsequent rejection and perceived discrimination. Few were able to resume their earlier careers; the majority had to adjust their expectations downwards and opt for either virtual deskilling in less well paid and less demanding jobs or for an assortment of part-time, casual and voluntary work.

Best ‘adapted’ (and least fragmented) were those who were prepared to forsake hopes of a return to high-powered jobs and display flexibility, resourcefulness and opportunism in adapting to their reduced circumstances.

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Fear, panic and prosperity consciousness:

developing resilience as the paradigm shifts

an article by Angela Courtney in Development and Learning in Organizations Volume 23 Issue 3 (2009)

Abstract

Purpose
The article shares insights from a program that was developed to address burnout, compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma. The program works from the premise that people and organisations thrive when they have shared values and common understandings.
Design/methodology/approach
The approach draws together reflection at the organisational and person levels. Connecting business ethics and organisational analysis, improving understanding of the body's energy as well as inter-cultural understanding are all achievable while adopting the resilience development methods.
Findings
The article concludes that reflective practice through the tools used on the program enhances understanding of the challenges faced by organisations and the individuals involved. It provides creative routes to resilience and enables problem solving. The indications are that this might have relevance to teams and work-groups in a variety of settings.
Originality/Value
In confronting current realities, it is timely that we promote a holistic view of human and organisational energy. The tools for our organisations are to hand. Individuals in the groups that I am involved with, whether for team building, strategic planning or supervisory management, have made considerable shifts in perspective and their ability to handle problems while employing them. The shared values which lie within each person can meet the highest values at the heart of any organisation.

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