Aug

5

PTSD + JOY = PEACE… May be

Filed Under Treating PTSD 

2405388040062930279vmvhfv_thSome of you may have read the title to this blog and thought, “Oh right. You must be kidding!” Actually, I’m pretty serious about the components of the title: PTSD + Joy = Peace… May be. 

Putting these three words together – PTSD, Joy, and Peace – may be the only real solution to living life after trauma. It is what all of the therapists and therapies strive to achieve. Yet, I’m not sure that we think of them optimistically in the same sentence. However, the three are intricately linked by both the challenging and hallowed events of the trauma. 

Despite the incredible agony and horror of the trauma, there is something that is definitely available to us if we quiet our minds and bodies enough to recognize some of the gifts the event may have brought us. Yep, I did say gifts. Gifts such as acknowledging the immense courage survival required. Gifts such as being deeply aware of the importance of each new day, each new experience, and life in its entirety.  Gifts, that, in spite of the fear of recurring nightmares and panic attacks, you understand something about life and living that many do not.

You understand that it can be more fragile than you believed before the ordeal. You appreciate the fact that somehow, someway you survived. You recognize, after enduring profound sorrow, perhaps you made it through the fire because your mission on this earth was not done, and, you, in someway, were meant to carry on. It is not yours to question or know immediately what that mission is or may become. Only living each day fully can answer the question at the very end of our time.

So what does this have to do with Joy? In our society many think of joy and happiness as the same emotion. However, they are really quite different. Happiness may entail some outside, material component to subsist.  Joy, on the other hand, can exist even during our darkest moments. This is possible because joy is connected to gratitude. Gratitude for what went before the trauma, what may come through it, and what can be after. You see, we now know what we know about the preciousness of life. We know the importance of the love of family and friends. The value of new life. The reminder of a rainbow after a storm.

As the joy/gratitude list grows, something amazing takes place in our hearts, minds, and bodies.  We become peaceful. Maybe not all the time, or even, at first, much of the time, but some of the time. And that, my friend, is better than nothing. For if I can touch that peaceful place even once, I know it can be done. That gives me hope. Hope that I can touch it again, and again, and again.

Yes, PTSD + Joy = Peace… May be.

Comments

Comments are closed.