“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.” 2 Timothy 1:7
Fear permeates a childhood trauma survivor’s being. We had reasons to feel afraid as children, particularly those of us who suffered through abuse. The trouble is that we are safe now. However, the danger detector of the brain, the amygdala, thinks that we are in danger when we experience triggers.
I am learning to investigate the fear when it pops up. “As we ask ourselves questions about our experience, our attention gets engaged,” says Tara Brach. Lately, the fear that I will not recover from trauma has come over me. Instead of figuring out where the fear comes from, I have been leaning into it. I do a few minutes of deep breathing, and while I do, I investigate how the fear feels in my body. After, I turn the sound of a running stream on in the Insight Timer app. Then, I picture leaves falling into the stream. The leaves represent my thoughts. Five minutes later, the fear is gone.
There is a reason why, in addition to getting curious, deep breathing and meditation stopped the fear. Deep breathing and mindfulness meditation rewires our brains. Researchers studied the effects of a mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) course on participants. What they found is that MBSR participation increased emotional regulation in the brain. The University of Toledo said this about the effect of deep breathing on the brain:
“Deep breathing and relaxation activate the other part of your nervous system, the parasympathetic nervous system, which sends a signal to your brain to tell the anxious part that you’re safe and don’t need to use the fight, flight, or freeze response. Deep breathing gets more oxygen to the thinking brain.”
The sacred pause
As a trauma survivor, I became used to living in a constant state of fight-or-flight. Then the covid pandemic came and I realized I could not continue living that way. I sought ways to rewire my brain. What I do when I practice deep breathing and meditation while feeling fear is take a sacred pause, as Brach called it. Using my tools changes my life. I leave behind the fear that has permeated my life for as long as I can remember.
“We learn radical acceptance by practicing pausing again and again. At the very moment when we’re about to lash out in verbal outrage, we don’t. When we feel anxious, instead of turning on the TV or making a phone call or mentally obsessing, we sit still and feel our discomfort or restlessness. In this pause we let go of thinking and doing, and we become intimate with what is happening in our body, heart, and mind.” Tara Brach
Recovery from childhood trauma depends on the sacred pause. Each time we use tools to rewire our brain, we heal. The healing happens little by little every day. Daily breath work and meditation practice takes us further down the healing path. We want instant healing, but that is not possible. We want the fear we have lived with since childhood to go away instantly. Once we realize that will not happen and embrace the slow grind of healing, we make peace with the recovery process.
Image by Renata Hille from Pixabay
Resources
Radical Acceptance by Tara Brach
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Thank you for this. I can really relate. Fear has been a constant "companion" for a long time. It has been a roadblock to success.
Thank you for sharing dear Gina. Fear has controlled us trauma survivors for decades. I am so thankful for the Lord Jesus and for tools to help us in our healing journey. I ordered "it's not your fault" and look forward to continuing on in my healing journey. Love you, dear Gina. <3