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Human Response to Trauma
In order to understand how CLEAR
works, it is helpful to first examine how trauma impacts humans.
Trauma results from any experience that we want to push away from
ourselves or from which we want to retreat. Trauma may result from a
physical experience such as a car accident, or from an emotional
incident such as being humiliated or the untimely loss of a loved
one. Trauma may occur to children who are required to grow up before
their time. It may occur because of repetitive negative events such
as being yelled at by an unhappy, emotionally unstable or angry
parent. Or it may be the result of something hurtful someone once
said such as declaring that you are ugly, stupid or ridiculous.
Humans respond to negative
situations with a hard-wired "fight-or-flight" response, and if we
can’t fight or flee, we go into the “immobility response.” All of
these responses are survival mechanisms that protect us—it is
obvious how fight or flight keeps us safe—we are primed to run from
or fight the danger. The immobility response protects us because it
dulls our senses so that we don’t feel much during the ordeal. So if
we see someone killed or we are tortured, our senses are numbed and
we don’t feel the pain so intensely.
To provide an example of fight,
flight and immobility, it is helpful to picture an animal, like an
elk, being hunted by a cougar. The cat moves in for the kill and
fells the elk, which can no longer run and it can’t fight—it goes
into immobility so pain is dulled. Now imagine a person comes along
and scares away the cougar. The elk is not fatally wounded. It lies
on the ground and its body twitches and its eyes roll for a while.
Eventually, it stands up and walks away. This natural “processing”
of the trauma prevents it from getting stuck in the animal’s body.
This is the normal way a body (be it human or mammal) deals with
trauma. Imagine after a traumatic incident, laying there and
allowing your body to twitch. The desire to get away from the danger
stops us from being present in our bodies and allowing processing of
the trauma to occur. We want to get as far away as possible as fast
as possible, so it is highly unlikely we will lay there allowing our
system to deal with the ordeal by staying prone and twitching.
Because we humans block the
complete processing of the response, the “trauma” gets stuck in our
body. We block the full processing of the response because we don’t
want to feel vulnerable, we don’t like how we feel, and we don’t
want to feel what we feel—in other words because we think. So we do
something to remove ourselves from the situation as quickly as
possible.
When trauma is stuck in a human,
and later we witness a situation that reminds us of this past
trauma, we react as though we are actually experiencing the trauma
again—with the powerful response of flight-or-fight, or with the
immobility response. Once we are "triggered" by a new event that
resembles an old trauma, we have very little control over our
behavior because we react from the old, reptilian, survival part of
the brain. Fight, flight and immobility responses bypass the
cognitive mind and we react to the potential danger before we even
have time to think. We have little access to our neo cortex, so both
emotional intelligence and logical thought are limited and we don’t
even realize how strong our reactions are.
A good indication that the past
is impacting current behavior is when relationships aren’t working;
when we are depressed, anxious, or reactive to others. If you find
yourself strongly hurt, angered, saddened by, and reacting to
another’s behavior, chances are that incidents from the past are
influencing the situation. This is not to say that others don’t do
things that negatively impact us and create negative emotional
response from us. They do. But we don’t have to personalize the
behavior. And if we do, our past is impacting our feelings.
Our reactive behavior is usually
a predictable response, such as withdrawing, being passive,
attacking aggressively, spacing out, acting unconsciously, or
disassociating. Our response, in the original traumatizing incident,
helped to keep us safe. But it is a response that is not effective
in the present because we are reacting from the old trauma and not
to the current situation. Our relationships suffer because we are
not responding in the moment to those with whom we are interacting.
How CLEAR Works
Let’s review how energy
psychology works so you understand how CLEAR could help you. CLEAR
involves having the client touch particular acupressure points on
the face, body, and/or hands while thinking of the incident he or
she experienced. Acupressure points, when stimulated by touching,
rubbing or tapping, transmit signals directly to the specific areas
of the brain that are associated with those emotions. It is assumed
that the stimulation of the point inhibits the “alarm response”
(fight/flight or immobility) by sending appropriate signals directly
to the amygdala.
Feinstein states that the energy
therapies actually help change the chemistry in the amygdala (the
control center for emotions in the brain). Ronald Ruden, M.D., Ph.D.
states that tapping on the acupressure points increases serotonin in
the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala thus extinguishing fear.
Studies involving brain scans indicate significant decrease in
intensity and frequency of Generalized Anxiety Disorder after
acupressure treatment. My own observations of clients indicate that
the change results in a “rewiring” that removes the automatic
response to trauma so they are free to respond differently. And this
change is permanent as long as we are not re-traumatized.
It is not necessary to
re-live a trauma in order to clear it. The client holds the
acupressure points while remaining aware of physical and emotional
sensations in her body. She finishes processing the trauma and can
thus release it from her body. This frees her from the alarm
response of fight, flight or immobility so that she may be fully
present to the situation at hand and respond from her full
awareness.
Clients who utilize CLEAR show a steady evolution of their goals as they
eliminate issues from the past. With CLEAR, we have the power to remove
the past from our systems so we can move forward productively and creatively
in our lives, becoming less stressed and more peaceful and aligned.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Feinstein, David, Eden, Donna,
and Craig, Gary, The Promise of Energy Psychology, New York,
Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2005
Ruden,
Ronald A., M.D., Ph.D., WHY TAPPING WORKS: Speculations from the
Observable Brain,
http://energypsych.org/article-ruden2.php
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