Healing Through Community

Tragedies around the world can put us down, even when we’re hundreds of miles away. Turn on the news and we find out about the catastrophes in Ecuador and Texas. Families and communities were lost in minutes. We feel their pain, their sorrow, and their loss. Who are they going to for help?

Maybe you reach out and try to help through Red Cross. Or maybe you continue on your way, move through your day and place the tragedy at the back of your mind, not knowing how to help. Sometimes, we have too much of our own baggage that we simply must carry on. That’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with that. How can we help someone else when we’re still figuring out our own lives? We are accustomed to dealing with our own battles and the problems we already have on our own plate. What we don’t see is that there are hands around us in our community to help lessen that weight.

For some of us, our plate is heavy. Too heavy. Some of that weight is invisible to the rest of the world. Many people don’t know that you went through some serious stuff and you’re still learning how to talk about it to those around you. You want to connect with people and not allow the memory, the trauma, to completely take over your life.

Turning off the memory takes therapeutic recovery. Memory is a powerful weapon that we often use against ourselves. Sometimes, it’s the main reason why we find it difficult to function. We’re hit with our memories, like one bullet after another, but we fail to realize that we’re the one pulling the trigger.

That is the effect of trauma. Many know that it resides in the mind, but some don’t know that it also rests deep in the body. In my internship with LA YOGA Magazine, I interviewed a survivor of human trafficking who confirmed that the assaults left a scar not just in her subconscious, but in her tissues and in her bones. The body is extremely sensitive. It doesn’t forget. It’s the one holding all of the stress and anxiety.

It hurts to revisit the sight of pain and band-aid it over and over again. We just want it to be healed, already, and not have to deal with it anymore. But the band-aid falls off. It’s not strong enough to hold you together.

The metaphors are tiresome, I know, but stick with me.

Perhaps you begin to truly heal by taking a little extra time to talk about it with your husband, sister, or someone close to you. You start to maybe even realize that your problems are manageable once you face them with another person by your side. For some, speaking to a counselor or a psychologist isn’t therapeutic at all; it might even bring on more anxiety. On the other hand, it may be the best thing for you to talk to someone outside of your family. Whoever that person is, they are stronger than that band-aid you used to cover up and forget the scars.

It’s not a cliche to say that ‘you are not alone’, because it’s the truth. You have an abundance of love, care and support around you. You are not weak or selfish by asking for help.

When you feel more than strong and ready, maybe you can volunteer to help lift someone else up. Slowly but surely, you will be able to see just how weightless that plate is and how unified your community is.

Watch the love for yourself and others grow. When that happens, you’re the hero in your own story.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sacrificial

 

Allow me to shatter the glass slippers and throw on a dirty pair of used boots.

Let me walk in their glorious filth across blood-spattered lands of mist.

You gently squeeze my sweaty, shaky palms.

I hear you take a breath and say, “Here we go.”

I go barefoot and blossom with calluses.

Grunting and groaning the whole way down,

you kiss my toes one by one

between walking over flaming charcoals of childhood

and ravenous tarantulas lurking behind every chewed-off finger nail.

We face the first circle of memory,

waiting for the next circle of healing.

Trauma – Change – Resilience

Dr. Megan McElheran talks about the sort of healing that is most important in the lives of those who have experienced trauma. Re-engaging with themselves and connecting on an interpersonal level. Empathy is the bridge that must be built between two humans in this process of surviving as well as thriving. If you have undergone a traumatic event in your life, I highly recommend watching this video.

Joan of Arc Armor

Journal No. 12

Today, I internalized the stories of trauma I heard about at UpRising Yoga teacher training without emotional or psychological armor. Their raw and honest stories of incarceration and human trafficking flooded the forefront of my mind. I was speaking to my mom about the event and suddenly began crying. I couldn’t figure out how to turn off the waterworks and get to work without looking like a total wreck. She lovingly guided me towards personal detachment, despite my habit of constantly reflecting on what I had heard as I went about my shift at the restaurant.

Yesterday, I listened to the story of a 19-year old girl who said she was one of the youth instructed to do yoga while in jail. “Doing yoga,” she said, “was one of the only things I had done right in my life.” Both parents in jail. I don’t know the rest of her story. But being close to her age, I reflected on my own parents and my own childhood. Her story literally hit home.

I saw the redevelopment of an impoverished community in Wilmington, California. The people had torn out a vacant parking lot where trash was thrown into, and they built a garden of fruits, vegetables and flowers. Volunteers tend to the garden beds and keep the soil fresh. Every Saturday, a farmer’s market is held here. Whatever produce is leftover is donated back to the community. The value of this project kept Wilmington nourished and unified. I saw my own neighborhood in conjunction with Wilmington, remembering my neighbors who provide our family with fresh oranges from their backyard trees. Another story that reminded me of home, a place that shaped who I am.

Jill Ippolito, Founder of UpRising Yoga, and I standing in front of the community garden.

A beautiful bed of lettuce planted by the community members.

A yoga instructor opened the teacher training with a 15-minute meditation, and through this meditation, I visualized the image of a brown box with a travel tag. This is the “gift” she told us to see. It’s the gift that we possess as well as give back to people. As a journalist, I envision giving the gift of story-telling and news.

Back to this morning and my unanticipated meltdown, my mother helped remind me to build a shield around my heart. She said to me that as a journalist, I need to create some distance between myself and the stories I cover, especially since I’m emotionally invested in issues of gender. My mother made a point that journalists who take on serious projects like these can potentially end up with PTSD from their job. I’m seeking to build an emotional and subconscious armor, some protection against my repressed memories, my most secret thoughts, my dreams.

I don’t believe this guard can be manufactured in a day, in a month or in a year. Maybe I call it my Joan of Arc armor. Whenever I pick up a pen or sit at my laptop with emotional and mental investment, I put on this armor. And if I need to strip off the armor in order to go there — go to that place of truly connecting with another person through journalism, fighting my own demons — I choose to have that option.

It’s risky opening up myself completely and I might not be as functional for awhile afterwards. But I care. I’m human. I am a person who also has a story. Being a journalist doesn’t make me a hero or someone with more authority or power. It doesn’t make me better than anybody else. I am who I choose to be. I am what I give back. Above all, I choose to fight being a victim of my own mind.