After I had my 2024 breakdown, I decided to be very diligent in what I got involved with. Avoid what I could. Keep my schedule scant. Try to say no to all the things I could.
However, this group of ten women that I am now apart of was something that the Lord thrust upon me.
When I first heard about Adam Young's 12x12 Conference my brain went something like this:
1. I'd love to do that.
2. I don't need to do anything extra.
3. Wouldn't it be grand to get a group of women together to do this conference?
4. I don't need to do anything extra.
5. That's expensive.
6. No one can afford $1,500 for this conference.
And then, on the same day, I happened to have a one-hour coffee outing with two separate women who ended up being in the group with me. They both shared their need for community and a group of women to help them traverse their healing stories.
And so, I texted Adam Young. Was there, by chance, a discount for a group?
There was.
$495!
And so, I decided to start the group.
I reached out to anyone I thought of in the Greeneville area who had expressed need of this type of help. And I didn't nag them. I sent ONE message. And I let God work on them to see if they should join.
And eight other ladies did.
A few weeks later, we added one friend who does not live local.
And what has occurred is nothing short of God-breathed, miraculous, life-giving.
When I try to share with JB about the magic ("God") of this group, I can't even put into words. It's like God is sitting with us, guiding our conversation, opening our hearts, revealing our wounds, and allowing for the vulnerability we all require to heal.
These
confessional communities are helpful to people because of our
vulnerability -- not because of our wit and wisdom. Most of us do not
recognize that in the act of being vulnerable, we create space for
helping other people to be vulnerable as well. "When you were vulnerable
with me, it spoke to a part of me that I had never thought about
before."
The
act of vulnerability has power for neuroplastic change within
myself and others that would be otherwise nearly impossible to recognize if I was not in a
community that is all being vulnerable with each other. We can out-flank
our therapist, but it is hard to out-flank seven or eight people at the
same time.
My brain is affected the other brains in the room!
If we have one relationship that is attuned to us, it creates the neural mass for us that we have never had before. It is someone else coming for us.
We are able to move into a river of integration because we have the
impact of someone who is joining us. If there is more than one person,
the pace and depth occurs even faster.
Honestly, I wouldn't believe it unless I saw it for myself. Who cares if I have someone help me or if I am doing this myself? But I am witnessing this in person. In the flesh. Up close.
We need people! It is a mandatory part of the healing journey.
We
first sense it in the room amongst non-verbal cues -- the comfort that
we feel having someone with us. So much of what trauma does both
shatters our story and shatters our story-telling mechanism. We can't
imagine a different future. We are walled off neurally. We lose
possibilities of hope and joy because we are primarily trying to do all
of this by ourselves. We need the mass affect of someone else's brain to
invite us to consider (even if for only a small moment) a new
experience that turns on a new set of neural networks that we then WANT
to practice by remembering.
Even if your encounter is virtual, it is valuable.
In Deuteronomy 8, Moses tells the people to remember four separate times. As we practice remembering, we are enhancing our neural plastic change. And to the degree that we are doing this in the context of community, we are building a bigger train.
Trauma and its primary vehicle of shame is like a locomotive.
Let's
say you encounter a tiny little wagon flying toward you at 3mph. You
could stop that with your foot. If you have a train approaching you at
the exact same speed, you couldn't stop it. But not from its velocity.
It's because of its mass affect!
What we are doing in this healing work is building a bigger train.
Our
trauma and the shame that it wields is like a locomotive. We can't just
speak to the trauma and have it go away. We, collectively, join forces
(bringing my mind to the table which has had a co-regulatory experience
with someone else) and have a community, collectively, that together
begins to shape our remembered past that then shapes our anticipated
future because of the affect of multiple people in the presence of our
mind.
It's not surprising then that when we hear Jesus say:
Where two are more of you are gathered, I will be there also.
He is speaking to the relational mass affect!
We need people!
I chose the name "Story Warriors" for our group. At first, I thought this was corny and that I would probably change the name when something more "reasonable" came up.
But that is what we are. We are warriors. We are looking some hard things in the faceHe is speaking to the relational mass affect!
