Big T Vs Small T Trauma And How To Build Resilience

Calling every painful moment “trauma” can feel validating, but it can also train your mind to interpret normal stress like an emergency. We unpack that tension head-on by defining trauma in a clear clinical sense, exploring where “small t trauma” fits, and explaining why the language we choose can shape identity, relationships, and resilience over time.

We also zoom in on the most consistent finding in resilience research: strong social support changes outcomes. I walk through how to identify one to three safe people, what it looks like to actually receive their care, and the three markers that build a sense of safety in real life: consistency, effectiveness, and timeliness. If your story includes childhood pain, rejection, or chronic criticism, we talk about how repeated experiences can create lasting meaning, and how new repeated experiences can rewrite that meaning.

From an attachment perspective, we connect the dots between anxious, avoidant, and disorganized patterns and the way everyday relational bumps can feel catastrophic. We also make space for what Christians often miss: your body’s response matters, not just your thoughts. Along the way, we offer a grounded Christian counseling framework for reframing hardship, strengthening secure bases relationally and spiritually, and practicing small acts of resilient living.

If this helped you, subscribe, share it with a friend who’s sorting through the word “trauma,” and leave a rating and review so more people can find the show. What part of your story do you want to describe more clearly starting today?

Transcript

Welcome And Why This Topic

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Well, all right everyone, welcome back to the God Attachment Healing Podcast. I'm your host, Sam Lantha, and I'm glad that you're here. Uh as you have noticed, I've been having a lot of conversations, a lot of interviews for the podcast, and it's been really a great experience, as always, having these very important conversations with a lot of counselors, people involved in ministry. Overall, it's just been a really great experience. And like I said, I wanted to bring you more value in not just having these conversations with other uh counselors or people involved in ministry, but also just the content and how much more in depth I can go uh on these topics. And today I'm gonna be talking about a difficult topic in the sense that there's still debate around things such as trauma and small tea trauma, and you know, is it actually beneficial and what can we do about it? So today really is about clarifying uh on that topic. And I know that in some ways it can feel very validating to have all issues in your life considered trauma, maybe specifically from your childhood. But, you know, one of the things that I find in the research is that ultimately you can't really build resilience if you have that type of mentality or approach to viewing uh traumatic events. So there's there's a couple of different things that we're gonna explore today, but specifically what we'll do is we'll define what trauma is and what it's not, and then we'll look at how attachment patterns are involved and can pull us towards being more resilient as we analyze those early attachments. And lastly, we'll go through some steps to build resilience by reframing negative experiences. And obviously, I do this through a Christian perspective, Christian worldview. Um, so if you've been wondering, am I traumatized? Did I experience a lot of trauma growing up, or am I just going through something difficult? This is going to be the episode for you to tune into. Again, there's there's a lot of debate on this topic. I have my view, and you'll hear some of that uh today. And I actually had a really good conversation with Maggie McCain. She's a licensed clinical social worker. She actually opened up my eyes a little bit to viewing small tea trauma as an actual uh issue that we should address and be mindful of. So I will touch on that today. But for the most part, my perspective or my approach today is not just for you specifically, but for people in general not to label things or everything as trauma. And also for you, as you hear stories on social media or from friends, is not to take it at face value when people say that I've experienced trauma. This doesn't mean don't pay attention to them. This doesn't mean don't uh hear them out, it doesn't mean minimize their pain. It just means think critically as people are sharing these things because you don't want to establish or provide for them this victim mentality. And that can happen very easily. Obviously, my job as a counselor is to sit with people, to have compassion, to be empathetic towards their situation, and also to move them towards healing in the best way that I can possible. And a big part of that is being able to sit with people throughout their suffering and help them make sense and gain meaning from their life experiences. So we do that together. And honestly, because I've worked with a lot of trauma, I've seen the benefits. Ultimately, everything comes down to one specific thing. It's the quality of relationships when you were growing up and also the ones that you develop as an adult. Um, that ties in very well to the attachment perspective that I use, and you'll see again some of that today.

Quick Request For Ratings And Reviews

SPEAKER_00 3:50

So, uh before we start, for those of you guys who have been tuning in, one thing that I want to emphasize a lot is getting reviews. So if you can go right now to the Apple Podcast on your phone, or you can go to Spotify as well. And if you can just look up God Attachment Healing and provide a review there, you can leave a rating and then provide a review. I'd greatly appreciate both. Um, and basically what that does is that it gives me feedback, it allows for the podcast to continue to grow. And honestly, the last couple of weeks, it's continued to slowly go up, which has been good to see. That means more people are getting access to or are tuning into the episodes and are interested in this topic. Well, again, this has taken a long time to build up. And by you providing a rating, by you giving some comments and some feedback uh through your uh reviews, uh, that really helps people who are now tuning in to like, oh, here's what they're saying about this this podcast. So if you could do that, that'd be great. And I'd really appreciate that. So thank you.

What Trauma Clinically Means

SPEAKER_00 4:52

All right, well, let's get into the topic today of what trauma is and why is it bad for us to label everything as trauma and learning just how to build resilience. So, what is it and what is it not, right? So the core diagnostic manual is define trauma as exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence. This can happen directly or indirectly by witnessing it with your own eyes growing up. Okay, so that's the big T trauma that we'd be referring to: sexual assault, severe accidents, combat, natural disasters, life-threaten, life-threatening medical events, and some forms of chronic abuse and neglect. Okay, so there's also something known as post-traumatic events, meaning situations that can be traumatic but do not affect everyone in the same way. And we see this all the time, right? Two people who live through the same events and one develops post-traumatic stress and the other person does not. Why does this happen? Is it a personality thing? Did it what makes the difference in how they perceived that situation, right? So some people are able to experience the same thing and learn something differently or cope with it in much better ways, and others cannot. And again, we'll talk a little bit about that, but not every experience that you have is gonna have a traumatic event. I remember very clearly um this time where I was driving my sister to college. I think we were driving home actually, and on our way home, there's this long street, and it was a, I want to say it was a 45 mile per hour street. And um there was a car ahead of us, and it was it just parked off to the side. And it was there for you know the what five, ten seconds waiting on the side. So I'm like, okay, is this car just gonna stay there? Is it gonna turn? What's gonna happen here? So I just kept driving and I didn't see it move. So I kept on passing by. I was about to pass by, and all of a sudden, it just makes this little U-turn right in front of us, and we hit it, and obviously it was a little accident, nothing really happened to the car. I had a small dent. Their car got, I think I nicked them like right in the tail end of their car. And uh yeah, I mean, it was pretty shocking, and I immediately just was upset and was like, why did they do that? I got out of the car and said, Hey, what are you guys doing? And you know, it was young college kids, and you know, I was a college kid as well. But um, but it was pretty shocking. And my sister was in the car with me. She looked a little shocked, you know. She I think she hit her shin on the dashboard. Um, overall, we were both fine, and you know, we just kind of went our separate ways. Nothing really happened from that. I didn't want to wait for the cops or anything, so we just ended up leaving, and I said everything was fine. We didn't have any scratches on the car. But, anyways, that was pretty shocking, you know. It was it was um traumatic in the sense that I wasn't expecting it. I mean, the the hit was a little hard. I mean, I felt a little whiplash, it wasn't anything big. Um, but I I only think about that when I think about those those car crashes. I haven't been in an accident since then, I don't think. And um yeah, so you think you think to yourself, well, would that be small tea trauma or is that big tea trauma? Definitely not big T trauma because it doesn't fall into the category that I mentioned

Small T Trauma And Identity

SPEAKER_00 8:08

here. Small T trauma, though, takes takes kind of two forms. One of the forms is that it is chronic, so that it happens consistently, so you can have one negative thing happen to you on a consistent basis that could eventually turn into small tea trauma. So small tea traumas are traumas or are events that create a sense of meaning that we attribute to ourselves based off that repeated negative experience. For example, if you have a parent who is consistently calling you names, is consistently calling you lazy or good for nothing or ugly, whatever the case is, if they do that on a consistent basis, it starts to take on a meaning to your identity, to you as a person, right? So you start to feel worthless, you feel ashamed, you feel not good enough, all of these different things. So if you've had multiple chronic experiences of those negative events and negative situations, you start to develop a certain way of looking at yourself. So we would call that small T trauma because it's repeated chronic events that shape how you view yourself. Every once in a while, you can have one big event or multiple events or repeated events throughout time that also start to shape your identity, right? And these could be tied to these major events like sexual abuse or um we talked about natural disasters and so on. But most of those things um can be coped with because it's not another person doing an offense towards you. Like it's traumatic, your body feels it, it may be in a state of shock, right? And it takes some time to recover from that. But the reason why it's not as damaging, again, I'm not minimizing the effects of that. I'm saying it's more damaging when it's a person who does the hurt towards you. Okay, again, going back to those major events of um threatened, threatened death or serious injury by someone else. Uh, maybe someone robbed you or pulled out a gun on you, something like that, right? It's very traumatic situations. It's a person, and we don't often think of ourselves or think of other people as wanting to do harm to us. But when they do, it does shock the system in a different way. And it makes us rethink how we view ourselves as people and how we view others, right? Trauma shapes not only the way that you view yourself, but also the way that you view others. So, that being said, those are the ways in which small-te trauma can manifest itself.

Social Support As The Main Buffer

SPEAKER_00 10:42

Now, one thing that's extremely important here as we start to talk about um trauma is the biggest buffer that we have to coping with trauma is to have strong supportive systems, people in place, right? A strong support system is the number one buffer against dealing with trauma. And what I mean by that doesn't mean that you're not gonna be affected with by it, by the traumatic event or events, but you having a social support system is gonna alleviate a lot of the pain that is attached to that traumatic event or the traumatic events. So if you have support before, that prepares you well for those traumatic events because when you experience them, you have people to go to. Let's say you don't have anyone before. If you have them during, meaning you're desperate and you're like, who do I turn to? I don't really have anyone. And because some people that care about you know what your experience, what experience you're going through, they start to support you in that process. That can help a lot with how you're coping with the situation. And there's also even after the effect, so maybe not before, maybe not during, but after you've experienced the trauma, there's other people who start to get involved, or you let people know, right? You may have stayed quiet about something that happened to you. And then um afterwards you say, you know what, I can't deal with this anymore, I have to share this with someone. It alleviates a lot of that pressure, and now you have someone to walk with you as you're trying to make sense of that experience, right? So having a strong support system is going to help you cope with those negative situations. Um, this is one of the factors that can help towards building resilience, okay, and we'll talk about that in a little bit here. But not every difficult experience, know this, reaches that level of threat. Okay. Um, heartbreak, frustrations, disappointment, work issues, conflict with a roommate, being misunderstood at church, or getting critical feedback can hurt, but it does not automatically qualify as trauma in a clinical sense. Okay, so again, I want to make sure that I communicate and emphasize that I am not minimizing your pain if you've experienced these things. Again, I'm a counselor, I'm a teacher, and one of the things that I want to help people understand is that they're actually that God has actually built us in a way we're able to withstand certain amounts of pain and struggle in our lives. That doesn't mean that your pain doesn't matter, it doesn't mean that um uh that you should be strong, it doesn't mean any of those things. Okay. I just want to give you this sense of autonomy and belief that God has equipped you for these things. Now, we call this, you know, some people may call this spiritual bypassing, or they might call it a spiritual band-aid in a sense. It's not that because it's not just you having a different perspective that's going to alleviate how you manage stress or how you manage trauma. It's that it's having a good support system, it's your faith in God, it's family and friends, it's meaning in life. All of these things contribute to you being able to manage these things in a much healthier way. And especially in Christian circles, we should have this. I think we have more than we think we do, but we've become a society where we want to, in some ways, be the victim. It's the only way that we've been able to get attention. This is very common for people who have experienced some levels of trauma, is that when you have people sympathizing with your pain, it feels good to finally get some levels of attention with that. So in the initial stages, when you're sharing what you've experienced, that's okay. We need that, right? That's part of the healing process that you need people to witness what it is that you're experiencing, what you're sharing about your emotions. We need that. That's how God made us, right? Made us for a community. But as time goes on, that witnessing is um useful to help us see ourselves also in a different way. Like if we think of ourselves, I'm no good because my parents constantly told me that I'm not good enough or that I need to do more. And you have friends or a good support system that is encouraging you and saying, No, you've you've done so much. Look at everything that you've overcome. Like that's it, that's going to provide you with a sense of support that you need to overcome those things. And also, I don't want to just frame or paint your parents as the main contributors to this pain either, right? There's friends, you know, some of you guys were bullied in school, um, some of you guys did the bullying, um, some of you guys had uh hard breakups and you're still recovering from that, or you had uh an abusive relationship and you're trying to recover from that. You had a neglectful relationship and you're recovering from that. So we take meaning and we create meaning from all of these different events that happen in our lives. And the meaning that you create is what's going to either establish a road for you moving forward in resilience or for you moving backwards or stagnant, which is essentially going backwards. But I want you to know that you have resources available to you. Um, I'm trying to think back through uh a number of my clients who have experienced um some very deep traumatic events. And one of the things that I realized is that each one of them, or most of them, I would say 80 to 80 to 90 percent. And again, I work with college students for the most part. Um, I would say 80 to 90 percent of them had at least one other strong support system, right? And that's very telling because all you need is one strong supportive friend, parent, mentor, whatever the case, to help you cope with these things from from your past. Now, they're not gonna explore everything with you, so obviously going to counseling is a good way to deal with much of that healing. But if you have that one supportive friend, parent, um, mentor, whoever it is, that is enough for you to be able to cope moving forward, along with some other tools, which we'll get to in a little bit. But if you have at least one person, that's a starting point. And what I found is that for the most part, even though these um clients had uh someone to go to, they weren't able to clearly or easily identify them as we were doing the work. And a big part of that is that in some instances, they weren't aware or didn't see that person as especially supportive, right? They wanted to be supported by someone that they wanted. For example, uh, someone went through a breakup, it was a really tough breakup, and they established a lot of their identity within that relationship and they felt like, you know, this person was my world. We made all these plans together, we were gonna get married, this, this, and that, right? And then they out of nowhere decided to break up with me. And you feel that you're like, Oh, you know, I'm sorry that you went through that and so on, right? And then they'll stay on that track, you know, for a number of weeks, and you say, Well, who's been supporting you throughout this process? And they would turn and they're like, you know, I don't, I don't know. I I I guess my friend has been has been there, but not really, you know, and they'll make these these comments of they have been there, but not really. And what I found was that it wasn't that they weren't being supported, it was that they weren't being supported in a way that they wanted. And that's different, okay, because you need to be able to acknowledge when people are there supporting you and wanting to see the best for you, right? And they're wanting to help you. But we get so caught up in the situation that happens that we're blinded to seeing the efforts of other people trying to meet our needs, and we can't communicate them because we don't know how, or we need to learn how, right? And the way to learn how is by being present in those friendships, relationships that you have with other people. Again, you just have to, and so I would encourage this right now, as you're listening, is think about one, two, maybe three people. If you have three, great. I mean, that's that's a great, great start, but at least one that you can turn to if you were to face the most difficult thing in your life. So just think about what that would be. You know, for each of us is different. It could be, you know, if I were to lose my job, it would be like a big deal for me. Or if I were to lose my family, that would be a big deal for me. If I were to lose my health, gosh, that would be so hard on me, right? If I were to fall away from the Lord, uh that would be very difficult for me because where would I go, right? So think about all of these different things. And who would be there for you if any of those things were to happen? Who would you want to turn to? Who's been there? Who's shown consistent effort and has been there for you as much as possible? Think about that. You should be able to come up with one, two, or three. Um, but once you figure that out, then you'll start paying more attention to that specific relationship because you'll realize, wow, you know, I've gone through so much. And every time that I went through something big, even though this person wasn't present all the time, whenever I needed something and they were aware, they either asked how I was doing or I just felt very comfortable sharing with them, right? You'll find that person. And again, going back to that uh principle I mentioned at the at the beginning, is that social support is the biggest buffer to be able to cope with traumatic events. So most people, if you're going through a traumatic event and it's a difficult time, having the social support during that time is super helpful. Now, this gets a little bit tricky for those of you who have experienced trauma from childhood, right? Let's say you're still thinking about something from your childhood. Um, you're trying to explore why it is that you view yourself in a negative way, or why you don't trust other people, or why you don't even trust yourself, right? All of these different things. Um, that's that's when it gets a little bit more complicated because your friend is not going to be able to process all that with you. Now, sharing with those friends helps alleviate some of it, right? It's very cathartic. It feels good to finally share a part of your upbringing with someone else and the hard things that have happened. So that's one good way to cope with that, having just someone hear you out,

Body Awareness And Counseling Support

SPEAKER_00 21:30

right? But if you consistently stay on that storyline, eventually you start to believe it even more, even though you're not in it anymore, right? So this is why going to counselor is often helpful because they can help you process and analyze everything that you're experiencing, but more so, also helping you get in tune with how your body is feeling. And this is an aspect of counseling that I think Christians often neglect. We usually think in terms of I need to challenge these negative thoughts. Thoughts or challenge these negative beliefs and replace them with scripture, and then eventually, or then I'm supposed to feel better. Though that is helpful, I do believe in replacing lies with truth and biblical truth. There's also this other part of well, what how does your body feel when you're challenging these different negative beliefs about yourself? How does your body feel when someone doesn't invite you to something? Right? Oh, it's that feeling of rejection. Oh, that's where it comes from. When I was young, I didn't have a lot of friends. And when I did have a friend, they invited her or him to this party and they didn't invite me. And I felt super rejected from that. And it kept on happening, right? So eventually I come to believe that no one really wants me. Right. And how does that show up in your adult life? Well, you know, same thing. I mean, I'm now um an adult and I just graduated and I'm starting a family and I see my friends kind of move away, and no one calls me, no one texts me. So it must have meant that it was never nothing meaningful or nothing true for them, right? Or I have friends, but we don't really hang out as much. So it's probably because they don't like me. When it could just be a bunch of other things, right? But those experiences from your childhood have shaped the way that you view yourself and the way that you view others in your adult life. Okay. So so there's a lot, and there's a lot, a lot to explore when we're talking about these different um, you know, these different types of experiences that we label trauma or not trauma. So why is it important then not to label everything as trauma? Because then your mind starts to narrate every negative experience through that lens. Okay. So a couple of things here. If you're if you did experience something traumatic, so I mentioned the big T traumas, right? So obviously, from those, you've if you've experienced that, you know, I would say go to a counselor and try to explore what's the deeper root of all those things that you've experienced. If it's small tea trauma, I would say first focus on your social support system. Find that. And if you can find that, and if you have that, focus there, not on processing your trauma, but just appreciating those moments that you have with those people, knowing and seeing them as social support and saying, Man, I really have people in my life right now that care and love me, that don't make me feel the way that I felt when I was younger, right? The rejection, the shame, the not good enough, and so on. Right. Now you might say, Well, Sam, I do have friends and I do have um people that care about me. My parents check in on me and my parents like ask how I'm doing. And I have someone, you know, a boyfriend, girlfriend who loves and cares about me, a spouse who loves and cares about me, but I still feel this way. I still feel rejected oftentimes, right? And, you know, one of the things that we like to do in counseling is looking for evidences that confirm those feelings, right? So if you felt rejected and you feel it from someone who's very close to you, you would say, Well, you know, my um boyfriend, girlfriend often makes me feel I feel rejected by them. Oh, okay, tell me about that. What do they do that makes you feel rejected? And you would say, Well, you know, they ignore my text or they don't call me back when they said they're gonna call me back. Okay, so let's look at that and say, okay, have you communicated this with them? No, you know, I don't want to make, I don't like make it a burden, or I don't want to make this thing kind of like a big deal. It's probably nothing. Well, share it with them. At least they know where you're coming from, right? And that's kind of that's kind of like the first step of okay, get these things out, right? These things are locked inside. And when you have someone that is a safe person, you want to start to share these things. And usually people have experienced small tea trauma have a hard time trusting people because they don't know how they're gonna respond, right? So they feel fearful of sharing these um these offenses out of fear of ultimately being rejected again, right? But when you find someone who is safe, again, that's why I said that list is so important. That one, two, or three people that you have, start to share these things with them. And what you'll start to experience is repeated instances of safety, repeated instances of attentiveness, repeated instances of empathy and compassion and love and care for you as you share those things, right? Oftentimes we just keep these things to ourselves and we don't give people the opportunity to be able to minister to us in that pain, right? Which again reinforces the belief that you're not important or that you're gonna be a burden for other people, right? So everyone had, like I said, 80 to 90 percent of my clients that I've had have had at least one or two people in their life that they can turn to when they go through a um difficult situation. But even when you're processing old traumatic events and those beliefs are coming up for you, again, small T trauma has to do with how you view yourself, how you view others based off of those negative repeated instances in your childhood. So what you need is repeated, consistent, helpful um uh instances or experiences with safe people for you to start believing a new narrative. And that starts to help regulate your nervous system. Okay. Um, I've often talked about this, the big three when it comes to healing and safety is you want consistency, uh, you want effectiveness, and you want timeliness. So consistency is exactly what it is. You want repeated events, right? Consistent markers of someone being there for you throughout your life experiences. Okay. Effectiveness is that what they do, whether it's listening to you or giving you feedback, maybe that's what you're asking for, or if it's just a hug, if it's just, hey, I'm here for you, if it's tell me more, what whatever the case is, whatever it is that they're doing that it's working at helping you regulate, that you feel good or better after sharing with them, right? Initially there's a little discomfort, but again, the more repeated instances you have of people being there for you, the better you're going to be able to see how effective that um uh their presence is for you, right? And timeliness has to do with how quickly do they tend to your need. So let's say that you need to talk to them immediately and they pick up the phone, like, hey, what do you need? I'm here for you. What do you how can I help? Right? Or they at least give you a timeline of when they can be there for you. So let's say they're at work and you know something happened, you need to let them know. You call them and they say, Hey, I can't raid now. How about we talk tonight? Or how about we talk this weekend? Right. But they give you a timeline. That's part of timeliness, is letting you know what time they can be there for you, but also how quickly they tend to one of your needs. Okay. And like I said, as you share more and more with this safe person, you got to identify that safe person. That's important. Once you identify that person, you start testing these out with that person over an extended period of time. I would say at least a month, right? So let's say you have a friend you haven't shared with them much, but you're wanting to learn how to do this, you share little by little, right? And just see how they respond. Is it consistent? Do they start to respond consistently? Are they effective in what they do? And you're able to ask for those things, what you need, and then timely, how quickly do they tend to that need? And the more repeated instances you have as you're processing this old traumatic event, it starts to reshape the way that you view your story. No, you know, you know what? I am important. This person shows how much they care about me. The Lord is using this person in my life as someone who's able to minister to me during this difficult time. I don't know why I think the way that I think. I wish I thought differently, but now that I'm seeing this person be here for me, like it's starting to shape my mind differently and how I view myself and how I view her or how I view him, right? You want repeated experiences of positive experiences uh in a relationship, and that starts to shape the way that you view these things.

Attachment Styles Change How We Appraise

SPEAKER_00 30:21

You know, when it comes to uh attachments, you know, one of the things that or question that could come up is not just what happened, but how did you experience what happened and who was with you in it, right? When I'm distressed, someone comes, I matter, I am not alone. That's essentially what you're going to experience as you find this um healthy, key, secure attachment figure, right? That secure base and safe haven makes it easier both later in life to navigate stress and in the present, to navigate stress, conflict, and disappointment without collapsing. Insecure attachment, whether anxious, avoidant, or disorganized, can make everyday stressors feel like emergencies. Okay, again, this would go back to small, small T trauma. Um, anxiously attached people may interpret a delayed text as abandonment. Now, is it abandonment? No, but it will be interpreted or may be interpreted that way by someone who is anxiously attached. Avoidingly attached people may experience normal closeness as suffocating and respond with withdrawal. Okay, so here you have the avoidant. Again, it's part of an insecure attachment. They will experience someone being too close as uh, you're getting in my space. I don't really need that. I need to pull away because this is too much for me, right? It's not always going to be I'm worthless or anything, but you know, leave me alone. I don't want any of this right now. So those patterns are not trauma in and of themselves, but they shape how we appraise events. Ordinary relational bumps can feel catastrophic because they touch on attachment fears. So, again, this is how your attachment style plays a role in how you cope with traumatic events. Um, very important. The story that we need to create in our minds of how we view ourselves and how we view others is looking for these repeated positive experiences that you can create. You could create these positive experiences by sharing with those people that are a secure base. Okay. Um, now let's say this is just gonna, I'm just throwing this out there. Let's say you feel like you don't have anyone, okay? Then that would be time for you to go to counseling. Again, I'm talking about small tea trauma specifically, because we start, we need that consistency of meeting with a counselor where it provides a sense of security. Um, we need the effectiveness of the tools that they give us, that they teach us, um, of them just being present with us, right? And we need the timeliness, right? Most of us wait until we go and see your counselor to start sharing all of these things that we experienced throughout the week. And it can be very freeing and very healing, right? So that uh counselor becomes your um corrective attachment figure. They're the person who now can help you. Hey, maybe we can find someone. Who could that person be? And you know, you can explore that um together. Okay. So that's how attachment plays a role in this. Now, to kind of finish this last step of okay, what are some ways in which I can develop resilience? I I'm a huge believer in resilience. Um, most of the things that I do for myself um are sports-related, um, uh military-related, what else can I say? A Christian, faith-related, very important to me. So all of these things, they they teach me something about how I want to view myself, how I want to view others, and how I can move forward. Um, and obviously, we, you know, if we look at scripture, we had plenty, plenty of Bible uh people in scripture who experienced traumatic events, big T traumas, right? And we could assume that because there was a big T trauma, there were likely small T traumas, right? Um, so just kind of taking that approach, I can already connect with a lot of figures in the scriptures because of the pain that they experience. And I would say that a lot of what I experienced wasn't even to the level that some of them experience or many of them experience, right? I mean, Paul suffered persecution, the disciples were some of the disciples were crucified upside down. Um, they just experienced so much tribulation, some were stoned to death. So Stephen, the the martyr Stephen. So there's a lot that has happened in scripture that I would label as that was heavily traumatic, right? But

Drop The Label And Describe Facts

SPEAKER_00 34:40

one of the things that this isn't gonna work for everyone, but this is one of the ways that I look at life in general is how can I differentiate trauma from hardship, right? So, first of all, it's just describing what it is that happened. I don't need to label it trauma for it to be real, right? And I see that a lot of people, there's a sense of ease or um maybe they feel a little bit alleviated by calling something trauma. And I have found that that is not actually beneficial, right? Because saying the word trauma puts you already in the victim mindset. It doesn't mean that didn't happen. Okay, so I hope you hear me clearly on this. It doesn't mean that didn't happen. It just puts in your mind this mentality of I'm a victim, right? Because most people who are sharing about these traumas um kind of see themselves in that way. So what I like to recommend is okay, let's if the client uses trauma, they use trauma, right? But for myself, the way that I view things and how I approach things in regards to this is okay, what happened? Just describe what happened. Okay. So it could be something as simple as, you know, for for many years, um, my this isn't a real real story about myself, it's just an example. Um, for many years, my dad would put me down because I wanted I wasn't a great athlete. So he made me work super hard and kept on pushing me and pushing me and saying, it's not good enough, it's not good enough. And um yeah, so that was that was hard to live up to. And you know, today I feel like I live with that mentality of I need to live up to other people's standards. And, you know, so that's kind of where where where my head is at. But that was hard for me to do the best that I can and still not placate or satisfy my father's expectations, right? Now, notice what I did there. I shared what happened, but I didn't label it trauma. And say it was very traumatic for me to see this from my dad. Like it's just the word itself. The word itself puts your mind in a certain space of this kind of victim mentality. Okay. So what I'm saying is if you just describe what happened, it's just a fact of what happened without the label, right? Here's what happened, and here's what was hard about it, and here's what was and you can walk through that, through each of those feelings, the beliefs that you that were developed from that. So for me, like I said, you know, again, just as an example, um, I feel like I have to make people happy with me. And um it always feels like I'm working to gain their approval, right? So see, we can work with that, but as soon as we label, you know, it's very traumatic for my dad to say that about me and still I experience some of that trauma when I when I um when people are expecting things of me, right? That doesn't that doesn't help at all, really. So clients do this all the time because I think it provides them a sense of relief, but in the long term, when we talk about building resilience, you need to change the narrative around that word because we're assigning a lot of meaning to that word. Not only that, other people also assign meaning. Like I remember someone one time said, I went through something really traumatic, um, you know, with with my dad or with my mom, and it was just the the hardest thing. And you know, all my family knew about it. So there was like she was making it this big thing. Like I was expecting, oh man, this was something abusive or dangerous or violent, something like that. At least that's how it was being painted. So in my mind, if I didn't explore more about what that actually was, um I don't know if we would have made any any progress. So, anyways, I started exploring what it was that was so traumatic, and she was being left out of things that her older sister um uh was was benefiting, right? Mainly her parents basically favored her older sister because of all her accomplishments, and she was kind of being forgotten. So could fall into small tea trauma, right? Because the meaning taken was I'm not good enough for my parents, or um, they like my sister better or they hate me, whatever the case is. So it could fall into small tea trauma. But again, that traumatic um language or the trauma language painted in my head a picture of something completely different, right? It's not until we started digging into the details that we said, okay, and again, this didn't say, oh, that's not trauma, that's not what I thought, or that's not what I experienced, but it's I had to reshape my approach because I'm not gonna deal with something that hits big T trauma the way that I'm gonna deal with something that's small T trauma. Okay, hope that makes sense. So basically, as they start to explore that, we say, okay, what are the other experiences in your life right now that repeat the same message? And obviously, we went through some of those, we challenge some of it, but we also help body regulate. Okay, how does your body feel? That's a big part of this as well of trauma healing, is that you work through how their body's feeling, how they interpret the messages, um, and explore certain memories and so on. Um, you know, some questions can be um, was my life, bodily integrity, sexual safety actually threatened, or was this a serious stressor that did not hurt or threaten my survival? Am I re-experiencing this event with symptoms like nightmares, flashbacks, intrusive memories, or intense physiological arousal? Is my functioning significantly impaired over time, socially, occupationally, spiritually, as a result of this event? Or am I distressed but still able to engage with life? Right? So just answering yes to any of those questions doesn't give you an automatic diagnosis, but it does signal that you may be in the territory of trauma and could benefit from trauma-informed counseling. Answering no may mean that what you're experiencing is real pain, real disappointment or real conflict, but also an opportunity to practice resilience rather than collapse, right? So with this um client, it was exploring that and saying, okay, what are the what are the strengths or coping skills that we need to recover from this type of thinking? And part of that again is removing the trauma language, like using trauma, just describe the facts. Describe the facts, describe the memory. We go to the memory, deal with the what's going on within the body, and then try to work to changing some of the meaning attached to the person based off of those life experiences. Okay. Um, research on resilience shows that many people exposed to potentially traumatic events actually maintain or regain stable functioning over time. And I found that to be very true, right? It's the fact that they believe that they don't have the skills to cope and they're doing well, right? That they're succeeding in life, they're they're performing well, they're doing good at their job, but it's usually in relationships where these things start to come up. So, again, you can start to work through these as you go to counseling or have your social support system. Others experience what is called post-traumatic growth, positive psychological change that can include deeper appreciation of life, stronger relationships, a sense of personal strength, and sometimes spiritual growth, right? And again, I mentioned various factors that contribute to healing and growth and resilience over time. It's not just social support, although that's a huge factor, but also the um the meaning that you create from these experiences, the meaning that you create now from these past experiences. That's important. Also, one's faith, it's a huge factor in how you view things. Um I would say there's some Christians who minimize pain by just trying to get to the meaning first or trying to challenge certain negative beliefs. But a big part of healing is being able to be present with people. I strongly believe that. So the way that I approach counseling, again, it's not starting to get to the meaning first, or it's not negating what they experience or trying to change the way that they see it early on. It's really about being a safe presence for them along the way, right? Developing strong, developing a strong therapeutic alliance with the client as we move towards making these other changes, right? And one of the factors they look at is well, how strong is your faith? Like, what do you want to believe about this experience that you went through? Um, what meaning can you create from your faith in Christ to use this experience? Again, it doesn't have to be your testimony. I know that's often described like I went through this, this is my testimony, and and it can be, but what meaning does the person themselves want to attribute to these experiences that they've encountered in life? Okay.

Practical Steps To Build Resilience

SPEAKER_00 43:26

Um, one of the things that they can also do is to develop resilience is reframe your appraisal to not that I'm damaged, but I'm growing. And I don't hear that language a lot where I'm damaged, I hear more of, oh, this was very traumatic and it's really um I'm traumatized or something like that. Like that's more of the language that I can that I hear people use. Um, you want to strengthen number three, you want to strengthen relational and spiritual secure bases. Okay, so again, spiritual mentors, family, uh friends, anyone who's able to speak into your life. In a um and share God's word with you, right? Um, it's a variety of factors that contribute to your overall growth. This is just one of the factors, right? I've already mentioned some of some of the previous ones, but the other thing too is practicing small repeated acts of resilient living. So when someone misunderstands you, instead of labeling as, oh, they're ignoring me or this is traumatic, just slow down and you regulate your body and practice clarifying and repairing the relationship. Like, what did they actually mean? If it's someone that cares about you and that you care about as well, it's most likely likely that they didn't mean to um ignore you or to make you feel like they don't care about you, right? So you got to reframe that, right? Again, this is after I'm talking about after all of these evidences of repeated instances where they've been a secure, helpful, listening base for you. Okay. When a plan falls through, instead of saying nothing ever works out, I'm, you know, everything's always my fault. You name your disappointment, then intentionally look for another alternative way to respond or one small good that is still present. Again, look for the good, right? If usually people have experienced small teeth trauma will always have like a tendency to look at the negative only. Try to reorient your mind towards looking to a good thing that's happened. Again, this is just a small reframe. This doesn't happen at the beginning, so don't feel the pressure there. It's with time that these things start to develop, okay? Because you see people modeling for you what healthy behavior can look like, and um, especially those secure bases, and that's how you start to learn how to implement some of these things. Lastly, when you feel rejected instead of immediately assuming I'm unlovable, you talk with a wise friend or therapist about other possible interpretations and you bring that wound honestly to God in prayer. Again, um, oftentimes we feel that because people are not able to um be there for us, we feel like, oh, I'm not as important or I'm unlovable to this person. But you can name that disappointment and say, you know what? When I invited so-and-so to my house, it was to, you know, to have them come over and you know, so we could enjoy each other's company, but they weren't able to make it, right? So it must mean that they don't that they don't love me or don't care about me. Well, we want to look at that and we want to say, okay, what other possibilities can it be? Could it be that they're also busy? Could it be that something came up for them? Could it be that um they want to maybe they were just tired tonight, right? Could it be anything else? Is this a person who is usually spending time with you? Yeah, yeah, they are. Okay, so it could be something else, right? But again, this only happens, you only get to this point after repeated instances of secure attachment, of secure people modeling for you what it looks like to be present in your life.

Closing Takeaways And Review Reminder

SPEAKER_00 47:10

So this is what trauma is and isn't, or we talked about what trauma is and isn't. What are some ways to look at trauma differently, and how you can build resilience along the way, specifically near the end. And um, yeah, guys, I mean I hope that this was helpful for you. You know, I I do feel like I have maybe a different perspective on this, but I want to make sure that the takeaway from today was that you know what trauma is and what it isn't, and that I'm not negating or denying your lived experiences, or um that I'm not denying your experiences, or that your pain, you know, is minimal. You shouldn't be exaggerating. Like I hope that I didn't communicate that throughout this this episode. I don't think I did, but just so you know, it is important that you see these things for what they are and you find people in your life who can be a strong support system for you and know that your faith plays a huge factor in the meaning that you create from these various experiences, both in the present and the past. So uh thank you guys as always for tuning in. Uh hopefully you guys can take a lot from this episode and um remember to leave a rating and review for the episode for the podcast, and I really appreciate that. I'll talk to you guys next time.