Live The “Good Life” Despite Trauma or PTSD
Sometimes trauma survivors turn to professionals who view their suffering from a clinical, possibly emotionally distant, perspective– with limited success in healing. I share powerful, realistic tools for trauma resolution in my books and in my seminars and live speeches. I know they work because I am a trauma survivor and this is what I did to heal. I have spent over 30 years immersed in personal development and studies.
Let me give an example of one of my dangerous encounters that I had.
I’m Phoenix Alexander. In 1988 I was at a mall near Seattle. I had enjoyed some shopping and was in my car leaving the parking lot. I came to a 4 way stop and noticed that the truck facing me had 3 young men in the front seat. The driver was slouched with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand out the window with a gun– which he pointed at my head!
Suddenly my life was being threatened and I had to respond! Instantly, my previous experiences of having my life threatened kicked in. Instead of screaming, crying or begging, I yelled, “What is your problem?” The driver looked at me like I was crazy, then he looked at his buddies in disbelief, and he drove on.
I was unarmed, and used my voice to show my fighting spirit. I would rather live– or die, on my own terms than grovel in fear! I am a warrior! It’s the only reason I survived my life experiences.
That was not the first or last time my life was threatened, and it made me angry! I just felt like, you have no idea what I have been through and I will not be intimidated. Kill me or put the gun down!
This was a minor incident compared to the surreal violence that I have had to overcome.
Over the past three decades as an Author and Personal Empowerment Guide, (Life Coaching) I have worked with hundreds of brave trauma survivors who eventually confided their deepest pain, fear, shame, and victimization. I estimate that over 80% of my clients have shared a personal trauma story with me. They express a common feeling—the trauma feels like it’s never really over and feels a lot like a “death sentence.”
We live in unprecedented times with too many people suffering from a silent epidemic causing suffering, isolation, and sometimes death from suicide-it’s Post Traumatic Stress and trauma.
I have shown hundreds of survivors powerful techniques to resolve their trauma and begin truly living– instead of dying a little every day.
It is my deepest desire is to help many thousands more trauma survivors gain hope, and begin truly healing & living the “good life”. Overcoming trauma is a “Tall Order”, and may be the journey of a lifetime.
Some people feel it is “Too Tall an Order” and choose to end their journey. We lose around 17-20 veterans each day to suicide. This is a tragedy that I feel compelled to change!
According to the 2021 National Veteran Suicide Prevention Annual Report-
The average number of suicides per day among U.S. adults rose 55.0%, from 81.0 in 2001 to 125.6 in 2019.
Across the same 18-year period, the average number of Veteran suicides per day rose 4.5%, from 16.4 in 2001 to 17.2 in 2019.
https://www.mentalhealth.va.gov
My goal is lofty–I want to save lives! If I can teach even one of you effective techniques and change your perspectives, you have a chance to live well, not just survive! I know, I am an insider! I have fought my way through extreme violence, a life threatening illness, and much more. I have spent part of every day, from the time I have conscious memory, overcoming the choices of my perpetrators.
I had to reach deep inside of me and empower the parts of me screaming for safety, love, and a shot at happiness. If I had not exercised this kind of mental toughness, and learned to release the suffering and trauma, I would have died–from Adrenal Insufficiency- which nearly killed me in my thirties, or from someone trying to kill me.
Instead of living in misery, I developed unshakeable determination to limit the power of my traumatic experiences, and not just survive, but go from victim into victor! My mental toughness was born of pain, injury, suffering, and a determination to heal.
The beauty of my life now is that I no longer feel traumatized– I feel empowered! I want to empower YOU!
Right here, right now, I want you to shift your perspective. Instead of thinking of yourself as hopelessly flawed by trauma, I want you to acknowledge that you are amazing! You’re adaptable, and resilient-because you are still here.
Now I want to give you tools to thrive and be truly happy and satisfied with your life.
I have vast, real-life experience in healing trauma with powerful practices that help me thrive and I will share a few here today.
What can you do when without warning, your life is turned inside out by trauma leaving you with PTS?
–Reclaim Your Life!
- Embrace your inner warrior! Your fighting spirit, needs to be your best friend and ally as you reclaim your life, and heal the damaged parts of you that were claimed by your perpetrators or experiences.
- Defy the misconceptions about PTS that say, “You can never heal because you are irreparably damaged!”—Wrong!
- Use your voice, and take actions that re-connect you with your own body–some have called it a “Temple”.
- Changing your perspective to find any conceivable benefit from the trauma, makes you feel less hopeless.
Instead of fighting against the people, and circumstances that wounded you, use your strength to defy suffering– and heal.
I know there are many survivors who have had little success in freeing yourself from the terror and shame that trauma creates.
I took a workshop to help trauma survivors get the trauma locked in their body– out. I wanted some personal resolution to my own trauma, and also to help others.
What I learned was extremely compelling. I went home from the workshop the first night, and vomited the entire night! I was shaking and dizzy. The next morning, I was totally unable to drive myself, so I got a ride to class.
When I got there, I took the instructor aside and explained what had been happening. He asked, “Have you had a lot of trauma in your life?” I said, Yes! My life has been threatened multiple times by people I loved and trusted.
He asked if he could work with me in class so that the other students could see how to help someone who had been seriously traumatized.
I felt anxiety rise up in my chest just thinking about a disclosure– to total strangers, about some of the most horrifying, private, details of my life. I didn’t want to be the one that everyone was focused on because it made me feel like I was strange and different.
He told me something that resonated profoundly in me. He said, “Shame is the emotion that fills the void created by trauma.” As much as I could intellectualize that the shame was not mine, but belonged to the perpetrators, it was always there– like a film over my eyes, my mind, and my very cells. I felt “shame” in all its bitterness and betrayal. I longed with everything in me to be free from its grasp.
The instructor explained that my severe reaction to the information covered in our class was, “Terror leaving my body through vomiting and dizziness.”
Then he asked me questions about where I was currently feeling the trauma in my body. I felt it in my heart, in my head, in my stomach, and I definitely felt it in my legs, because I wanted to run away from the whole experience.
He asked me, “Is there anything that you wanted to do when your life was being threatened but you couldn’t? I said, Yes! I wanted to run away–but I was trapped and couldn’t leave.
He sat beside me and put his hand over my heart and he told me “Close your eyes and run!” I craved for a different outcome than the actual one that had held me in suspended terror for too long. So I closed my eyes, and in my mind, I ran. In my visualization, I was in nature–not where the actual events occurred. Mentally, I ran until I was exhausted, then I sat on a rock, by a stream of water cascading powerfully down a mountain, and I rested there. Soon, my state completely shifted into calmness, because of this powerful imagery.
Finally– my mind and body were freed to relinquish the terror, and I was no longer captive to the trauma, because I visualized the outcome the way I wanted and needed it to be-– not exactly how it was.
This profound technique of visualizing a different outcome, while grounding my body, powerfully connected to the terror locked in me, and gave me a resolution that “talk therapy” with a counselor had never accomplished! It was totally empowering.
The key to healing is TO ENGAGE THE MIND AND BODY TOGETHER because they have spent too much time dissociated by the original trauma.
Visualizing this way is extremely effective to re-write trauma experiences– creating a different memory, because it is now a better experience, in a new environment.
- This differs from other methods of visualization because instead of visualizing something you would like to have or do (which usually doesn’t have a lot of traumatic emotional energy attached to it) when you‘re re-framing trauma, it will have the emotions of the original experience. But you can release those emotions!
- Using touch as an anchor somewhere on your body can ground you to the present time, so you won’t get lost in a flashback, and feel like you are re-living the past.
Multiple studies have shown that the mind does not distinguish between a real event and one imagined with detail and emotion. Studies show vivid visualization can change brain structure.
Be careful what you dwell on with your mind. Use it to de-sensitize you from your triggers and heal your trauma. If you revisit your trauma without visualizing a different outcome, the brain may interpret it as being re-traumatized over and over– not as a single traumatic event.
Acupressure Points for resolving trauma have been used safely and successfully for thousands of years.
- One is 4 fingers up from the bottom of the sternum, called the “Sea of Tranquility” CV17. This point will help you get out of a disempowering emotional state and ground you to the present with tranquility. It’s good for: PTS, suicidal thoughts, anxiety attacks, fear, depression, and helps heal the heart emotionally. As you hold it take slow, deep, breaths. It feels good!
- Another point is on the forehead just above the eyebrows in the hollow. GB 14. It’s good for: Increasing mental health, getting out of a flashback or panic attack, fear, or helping you re-frame a traumatic memory. Hold this point while you mentally rehearse an unpleasant memory until the emotions dissipate. Do this with a counselor or trusted support person.
When you’re triggered by a situation that puts you in “fight or flight” you MUST do something with those responses and emotions immediately!
- Do Deep Breathing
- Use a punching bag,
- Go for a run or brisk walk.
Next you must get into the present time and out of the past. Elicit the “rest and restore state” by activities that connect your mind and body.
- Mobilize your body’s healing responses with Qigong or power breathing exercises.
- Spend more time in nature taking in serenity and peace. Try Forest Bathing.
Use Trauma Healing Strategies:
- I work at re-wiring my brain using neuro-plasticity- the brain’s ability to heal.
- I purposefully create happy, pleasant, experiences that are soothing to my mind and body.
- I truly “embody joy”, which strengthens my resilience, and creates new neural pathways:
- I also create new emotional states by assuming the posture of the emotions I want to experience.