Kicking Trauma in the Butt

Traumatic experiences can affect relationships with friends, family, and coworkers as well as cause mental health problems like depression, anxiety, and alcohol and drug usage. Don't dismiss emotions or actions that may be signs of past trauma. Start dealing with them! Relationship trouble, depression, and listlessness may be signs of past trauma.

There are 3 categories of trauma: Complex, Chronic, and Acute. The effect of a single event is acute trauma. Trauma that is chronic is recurring and lasts a long time, like domestic abuse or violence. Exposure to several and numerous traumatic situations, frequently of an intrusive, interpersonal kind, is known as complex trauma.

Searching for a path to recovery?

We must focus on the positive side of rehabilitation when considering the question, " How can I get past this? Be patient with yourself, don't be too hard on yourself, and remember that you didn't do anything to deserve the suffering or the events connected to the scenario that injured you. Give yourself permission to experience good and bad days. Try body and dance movements or workout routines; movement can assist your nervous system heal after the trauma has disrupted it. Incorporate more innovative ways to feel good and get the blood circulating. The body stores a lot of memory, tension, and unwanted emotion, when you don't move or release those emotions, it will build up within your body, which could make you ill.

Burton (1925) proposed that dance therapy can develop spirituality and physicality. This correlates to the mind, body, and soul ideology; where all three are seemingly connected. Unlike the soul, the mind and the body cannot be separated because they work together as one. Many emotions, memories, sensations, desires, etc. come from the mind but are often experienced throughout out the body (McGonigal, 2012). Scholars believed that dance emerged after the European Renaissance, which created a variety of dance within time (Payne, 2006). On the grounds of a society that is always developing, dance has and will continue to change with time. Researchers have shown how emotion regulation occurs through movements, as it reflects, neurons activation during motor observation.

Different types of motor behavior modifications contribute to emotion regulation based on changes in motor behavior changes in autonomic nervous system activation and in metabolic processes that generate elevated moods, reduce stress-anxiety, depression. (Calvo et al., 2015). Dancing can improve the brain functioning of individual's that suffer from dizziness and memory loss, by guiding the brain to prevent these issues from surfacing. When the brain is healthy functioning, the following occurs, positive behavioral changes, steady breathing, and proper circulations in blood vessels and veins (Philadelphia Integrated Medicine, 2018).

How to help?

If you know someone struggling with past trauma, lend them your ear, hear them out, listen…

• Give them time.

• Accept their feelings.

• Use the same words they use to avoid triggering them.

• Don't dismiss their experiences.

• Only give advice if you're asked to.

• Ask for help, find out what resources is accessible in your neighborhood.

• Connect with positive people.

• Give yourself credit when its due...and stop looking at what didn't work out.

Happy Monday and be well!

Dancing Mindfulness

When a person is mindful, they are being nonjudgmental and attentive to their self and what's happening around them. Developing mindfulness can promote a healthy state of well-being, sustain growth, and reconnects a person's mind, body, and soul. It allows us to identify and accept our thoughts and emotions for what they are without further proof or explanations. Understanding that thoughts and emotions just are, we can alter the relationships we have with them, by not chasing after them, taking a step back, and relaxing "in a space of awareness" (Powietrzynska, 2014, pg.98).

Some of our thoughts and emotions come from previously lived experiences, which have exasperated or soothed our emotional reactions to different situations. Being mindful can impact the way a person labels his or her emotions, experiences of emotions, level of positive and negative emotions experienced (Heppner, Spears, Vidrine, &Wetter, 2015). The connection between emotions and conduct makes up a big part of mindfulness, as it can support a person with recognizing emotions as they are, naming them, and letting them go (Powietrzynska, 2014). Since emotions are changeable, it is important that we identify, accept, and separate them from the body. Mindfulness can improve the way we manage, discouraging affective states and improves “the way we respond (emotionally) to external stimuli” (Heppner, Spears, Vidrine, & Wetter, 2015, pg.109).

Dance is considered a mindful practice, which has the potential to offer affect regulation (Tobin, 2015), by increasing positive emotions and improving the way we control the negative ones. As a dancer, I've become aware of my body and the moves that I make with it. Before dancing, I normally chose the songs at random. I started using this method to break myself out of a bad habit that I once had. If I was in a bad mood, going through a breakup or frustrated with my workday, I would choose songs that related to those topics. Eventually, I realized that it wasn't helping me, in fact, it exacerbated the situation. I was unconsciously increasing my negative emotional reactions by listening to music that brought me back to those painful times, rather than letting them go.

From there are on, I choose the songs randomly, to dance and express myself naturally. Ordinarily, I don' think about the moves I make as I dance unless I am creating a routine for class. Instead, I move instantaneously as it reflects the way my body is feeling at that moment. When I am in a negative or stressful emotional state, my dance moves are tight, dark, and closer to the floor. After dancing and releasing all the tension, my body is left refreshed and ready to dance to another song. Following that, I would choose songs that are upbeat and has more cheerful lyrics. In turn, I would dance freely, bigger, and involve more upper body movements.

Dancing It is a creative approach to mindfulness meditation that uses dance as the vehicle for interacting. Mindfulness is a holistic wellness practice. Breath, music, body, story, mind, spirit, and fusion are the seven main elements of mindfulness that are in motion when dancing.

Dance for Your Health

By dancing, we can increase positive effects to our physical and mental health, which can promote a healthier state of well-being. Aktos and Ogce coined dance as "the most fundamental human behavior and art forms, involving direct expression through the body" (2005, pg.408) because it enhances self-expressiveness. Some therapists believed that emotional and mental problems are often held in our bodies, as forms of muscle tension and self-conscious movements (Aktos & Ogce, 2005). As a way of testing this, some therapists incorporated dance therapy in their stress management practices. They noticed significant outcomes such as stress management, a reduction in stress levels, and a better quality of life (QOL), deeming dance, a treatment modality (Brauninger, 2014).

Dancing was considered a useful way to get in touch with the "conscious and unconscious components of their psyche by using movement" (Aktos & Ogce, 2005, pg. 409). A person can’t develop self-awareness without first, being mindful. Jon Kabat-Zinn stated that “Mindfulness is the key to self-awareness,” in his mission statement, during the launch of his Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program (Kabat-Zinn, 2017, pg.1).

Dance movement is often praised for the benefits that it provides through body conditioning. Many people use dance to increase their flexibility, muscle strength, balance, and coordination, and stabilize their breathing. The physical movements that are used during a dance routine can often enhance the functioning of bodily systems, which generate a healthier circulation for the body. Considering dance as an exercise, individuals develop a positive body image, self-esteem, reduces chronic pain, stress, body tension, and depression (Aktos & Ogce, 2005).

Dancing can improve the brain functioning of individual's that suffer from dizziness and memory loss, by guiding the brain to prevent these issues from surfacing. When the brain is healthy functioning, the following occurs, positive behavioral changes, steady breathing, and proper circulations in blood vessels and veins (Philadelphia Integrated Medicine, 2018). To establish balance and coordination during a dance routine, Dart-Harris (2015) provides the beneficial functions of the mentioned bodily systems: which I recorded in the table below: