Tag: Childhood Trauma

by Nathan Chua

Anxiety is probably one of the most common complaints that people come to therapy for, which makes me wonder why this has not been a subject that I discuss more often.  I think a lot of my own anger issues stem from a deeply held anxiety about an assortment of issues in life.  I grew up in a home full of unpredictability and the sight of anger and acts of intimidation familiar.  It is therefore quite easy for me to feel anxious about any kind of turn of events that don’t go my way.  I became very strict with rules that I felt were needed to keep things in check even if much of these were out of my control.  

I recently came up with a metaphor that I hope people who suffer from anxiety due to a past traumatic experience, can benefit from.  This provides a simple imagery of what goes on in us when we become overly controlled by our anxiety in situations that could mean a lot to us if only we could “overcome” our difficult feelings.  Unfortunately, that is most of what we have learned from mainstream psychology for many decades now.  We should be able to bring anxiety down to certain levels in order to function and live meaningful and purposeful lives.  I will have to leave this discussion for another time.

The subject I wish to talk about is how we can understand what we do when we allow our anxiety to dictate our lives.  Sort of a step backwards to see the unworkability of the things we do when we experience anxiety.  Let’s say one day a person gets involved in an accident caused by a yellow car.  As we have minds that are capable of remembering much more than other animals do, that person’s mind will remind him of the terrors caused by yellow cars in his life.  In fact, even the word yellow can bring back all the sordid details of the accident.

Now let’s imagine that this person went for a pleasure trip someday where he enjoyed sightseeing so much that he forgot that there will be no options to get back to his hotel anymore other than riding a yellow cab.  Unfortunately, he or she or they would have to walk to the hotel in the middle of the night where there is less certainty that it will be safe.  Would the person summon the courage to take a yellow cab then?  If safety and enjoying the vacation is important enough, one can be forced to ride the cab and by forced I mean, by the person’s own free will, and how much more workable taking a yellow cab would be. 

Now here’s how this story can relate to our own histories of past traumas.  In Acceptance and Commitment Therapy or ACT, not being able to realize the different contexts in which real danger should be avoided is at the heart of what is called psychological rigidity or what I prefer to call behavioral rigidity or inflexibility.  

One thing that happens if we start following rules that our minds offer us to protect us in situations where there is an actual danger or threat, we begin to lose sight of other options available.  We hold on to limited patterns of behaving in dealing with the myriad of situations that happen as we go through different life stages or even daily challenges.  

If you are like many of us who have lived with imperfect parents or caretakers, there will be situations that will cause us to feel anxious.  But some of these situations can call for our willingness to open up to these difficult feelings in order to enrich our lives.  Noticing how our minds overgeneralize with rules is the key to breaking out of the limits our minds make.  Opening up to our past histories and noticing them as they are is key to what is possible.  

If we stay and see behind our difficult memories, there may be something that we can learn which is important to us.  In my case, I hated my own anger because I cared about being kind in the presence of that anger.  If you have been bullied or rejected, that hurts because you care about not being bullied or about being accepted.  There’s much to learn from what is painful.  Don’t run away.  Stay and watch how much your pain says about you and the beauty of all that you hold dear and care about.  In other words, don’t run away from your own humanity.  As it is often said in ACT, open up to your painful thoughts and feelings, and see what gifts lay behind.

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