An alternative definition of trauma.

Over the years, coming from my own understanding and own trauma, I have formulated an alternative definition of trauma.  A definition that works for me and hopefully encompasses all the different aspect of it. Trauma runs up and down a continuum, from low grade to intense, but the mechanism is the same. Trauma happens whenever we have an understanding or an idea of how a situation should/could unfold and we are emotionally invested in the outcome. This could be anything from the nature of the traffic to the office in the morning, to the lifespan of a loved one. With one million iterations of expectations in between.  Trauma happens when I think I know how the day will unfold and suddenly it doesn't go the way I thought. Trauma can be measured from disappointment through to devastation, from irritation all the way to absolute hopelessness and powerlessness. It is when something happened that should not have happened.

Someone will have to tell the story

Someone will have to tell the story. It has been carried for so long in the hearts and minds of so many people. It is the story of a lost tribe. A tribe that has been scattered all over the world. They have been wondering in the cities of the world, they have been living in sky rises and suburbia, in squatter camps and the projects. They are stuck on high ways, on trains, in airport terminals and in aeroplanes. They are in hospitals, in institutions, the work in corporate or on the mines. They sweep the street and lay the cables, They drive the busses and they remove the garbage.  They take their kids to school, they work to get an education. They work to get an increase or a promotion. They work for a salary, they worry about the next payment into the account. They work to pay the mortgage, to pay the pension to pay the medical aid. They worry about their children, their health, and the state of the nation. They worry about the weather, the crime, war and natural disasters. They run away from dying. They live in constant fear of losing a loved one.  They live in constant fear. They run away to holidays in foreign countries, to go to the seaside, they walk in the mountains, they swim in the sea, in frozen rivers, they do extreme things always for the next adrenalin rush. They go to church, they don’t go to church. They read extensively every book they can find, they do research on the internet. They talk to friends, to their partners to the pastor and to their therapist. They are looking for a guru, they are looking for a saviour. They gamble, they drink too much, they use drugs illegally and over the counter, they eat their pain away. They fall in love, they fall out of love, they get married and divorce. They find love on the internet and they find love on the street. They abuse their partners, their children their parents. They run away from their abusers. They steel, they murder and they commit unspeakable crimes. They get involved in corruption and they play to win the lotto. They abuse themselves, they abuse the world. They neglect themselves, they neglect each other, they neglect the world. They send their children overseas to find a better life, they hate being here because they missed a better life. This tribe has been lost for so long, they can’t remember that they have ever belonged.
And every day they search for something better, something more, something else, to understand, to find meaning, to love, to forget. For someone to come and save them, for something to happen to change them.

I want to talk to you about being at peace.

I want to talk to you about being at peace. But in order to do that, I will have to tell you about my journey back to me. The opposite of inner peace is turmoil. For as long as I can remember I have been in turmoil, in flux. Always striving, working hard relentlessly, without reprieve. But never quite enough. I think I was driving, one foot on the petrol and the other on the break, or that's how it felt. I had this memory though, a memory of a very pleasant feeling. I called it my holiday feeling. Now you must all know what I am talking about. Remember the last day of school when the bell finally rang for the start of the December holiday and you get on your bike and you ride home feeling free. Feeling the work is over, feeling that for a while I could be myself and I don’t have to answer to so many rules. Remember this is my story. Your best feeling ever might look very different. But I think these feelings that we often long back to, has many aspects in common and it is those aspects that we long for. My “holiday” feeling had all the makings of a good feeling. I had energy. I was creative. I had a purpose and it felt as if everything in me was in alignment, I could do and be whatever I wanted. I think I lost the holiday feeling by the time I left primary school. Years later in my late forties, I often thought that if I can just find the holiday feeling then I will be able to slog through another day, to face another day of crazy madness in my head. 

I just want to remind you. Remember this is my story and my journey looking for a solution. At some point, I was overcome by fear. What if I never feel the holiday feeling again? And is this it, slog and slog and madness in my head. I was also not well physically, but that is almost an entirely different story. And then I started remembering those holidays and dreaming about those holidays. But all the obsessing over a juvenile holiday feeling just contributed to the madness in my head. It was about that time when I discovered the idea of the original dream. And when I suddenly remembered my original dream. The original dream is not a dream, it is a knowing. The original dream is ancient knowledge about who we are. The knowledge of the original dream says; I am enough, I have everything I need. I am not better, I am not worse, I am. No harm can come to me, I am made of the same stuff as the universe. I am a part of the universe. I am the universe. I have no beginning and no end.

“Wearing the face that she keeps in a jar by the door”

I am not sure what the Beatles meant with this famous lyric, but for me, it has very specific and significantly meaningful. I used to have several faces in the jar by the door. I still have a few, some dusty and some very well used. Over the last several years I have been working very hard to lay them to rest, too not need them as must as I used to.

I think there might be a few of you who would be able to relate, almost painfully familiar.

I used to use these different faces of myself so often and intensely that at some point I almost completely forgot what I looked like.

Why did I do it? Because the me, I thought I was, was definitely not good enough to sent out into the big bad world. I invented different personas, I don't think I did it consciously or deliberately but definitely out of necessity. And these personas evolved and got a life of their own, with stories and expectations and all the rest. I don't think I could have been diagnosed with multiple personalities, but I had the next best thing that was still vaguely acceptable in "normal" company. But it boiled down to the same thing. I was giving the people out there what I thought they wanted to see from me. I was showing the world the face I thought would be acceptable.

It is very hard work but I played the game very well. Until one day when I couldn’t do it anymore.

In our modern day civilization, there are so many rules, regulations and preconceived ideas about who and what we need to do and be. And there is nothing wrong or right with it. The madness starts when we buy into it and start to construct our lives accordingly.
The Original Dream Teachings

In the Organisation

In organisations, when brands and logos, business plans, financial forecast and growth patterns, equity, and stock, are stripped away, it is always just people remaining.
The Original Dream Teaching values people and are instrumental in restoring the long-forgotten connection with the self. The Original Dream Teaching is a guided process using memory, narrative, metaphor, mindfulness and the exploration of belief systems to restore the personal and unique connection with the self. Individuals will show up with joy, creativity, and aliveness when they are able to freely and mindfully connect with the self.  Productivity will be able to flower in an atmosphere of co-operation and sharing. With the Original Dream Teachings, individuals are assisted to access a forgotten entry into personal power and authenticity. The organisation can only benefit.
The Original Dream Teachings in the organisational setting consist of a one day workshop and a personal and private Quantum Energy Coaching session for each participant. During the Quantum Energy Coaching session, the belief systems that are identified during the workshop are used in the coaching process.


For more information about the Original Dream, Teachings contact susanna.wessels@theback2basicsgroup.co.za
website: http://www.theback2basicsgroup.co.za/
For more information about Quantum Energy Coaching
website: qecliving.com/

Living lives of quiet desperation.

1. Living lives of quiet desperation.

2. Who is driving your car today?

3. "Stille waters diepe grond, onder draai die duiwel rond."

What do these 3 sentences have in common?

Imagine that you are planet earth. Quietly floating in space, slowly turning around and around. At any given time there is a side of planet earth in the dark, but also a side in the light. Somewhere it will be summer, or winter, or autumn or spring. In some places, stormy winds will gust through the valleys or there will be no wind at all. There will be devastating floods and drought all at the same time. Where the people are quietly sleeping or going about their day, tectonic plates are slowly moving beneath, drops of lava are trickling down setting dry leaves alight. And while holiday makes are lolling in the salty warm waves, a faraway rumble has awakened a Tsunami. 

All of this happening all at once.

This is who you are. This is what is happening in and around you at any given time. The question is, who will be in the headlines tonight at news time? 

You have thoughts and feelings. You get hungry and sick.  You live within a paradigm.  You have memories and expectations. You have fear and resistance. You have plans and dreams. While all this is happening all at once, you have co-workers, family and loved ones, you have friends and neighbours each in some way depending on you, even if it is just to say good morning when you take the bin out. And I have not yet mentioned other constant responsibilities.

Read it, don't read it.

Read it, don’t read it, it doesn’t matter to me. I just need to say this to an invisible community out there, who might not even read it or need it. I have been not good enough since 1977 and even before. But the day in 1977 when I was in standard 2, haunts me like a nightmare. It could have been September, the classroom door was open and the sun was bright and warm outside.

I walk through the mall and I look at the people, and I wonder if we all carry the anxiety deep within us. Like a homing device, deep inside, constantly saying “not today, definitely not today, maybe tomorrow”, while time moves forward relentlessly.

Today I am experiencing this sense of urgency so clearly, I would like to cry. While lying in the bath this morning, I ran through a list of my closest friends and family in my head, and I know for sure, one after the other after the other is experiencing that unwelcome, too familiar gnawing “dear God just get me through this day”. And for them today and maybe for you, if you are still reading, it might not even be a bad day.

In this day and age, we say “I am so over myself”, meaning I am sick and tired of myself in conversational language, but what it really means in the language of the heart is “I am sick and tired of locking me away from myself”. And suddenly little bits of concrete are crumbling down from the ceiling as if the walls are starting to fall down.