These posts were written beginning in December of 2024. However, I am posting them years back so that they are not at the top of my Blog, and if you want to read them, you need to go "find them!" :)
On Saturday, January 4, I began an amazing conference series. Throughout all of 2025, on the first Saturday of every month, I will meet with eight other women here in Greeneville for an online conference.
It is honestly hard to put into words what these sessions will be about and what all this actually means. If you have not deal with "healing work" in your life after suffering "trauma," it may not make sense to you. (Honestly, those words I put in quotes are quite cringy to me. It really isn't nearly as cringy as that makes it sound). "Trigger" is another word that feels cringy. I think this is because society has warped what these really mean.
Here's how I would summarize what this conference is about. Through my counselor and through the PODCAST: The Place We Find Ourselves, I have gotten involved in something called "Story Work."
What ... is .... story work?
Well in short, it surrounds this overarching theme:
We believe true healing and restoration occurs when we courageously step into our stories of pain and harm.
The idea is that you don't have to just live/accept/deal with with your past. And, in truth, saying to yourself "What's the point? It's in the past?" may work for some people, but for the majority, it does not.
Adam Young's work dovetails off of the work of Dr. Dan Allender. You can visit his website here.
Dr. Dan Allender is a pioneer of a unique and innovative approach to trauma and abuse therapy. For over 30 years, the Allender Theory has brought healing and transformation to hundreds of thousands of lives by bridging the story of the gospel and the stories of trauma and abuse that mark so many.
In other words:
The Allender Center trains people to listen and work through narratives of harm–both their own stories and the stories of others–to foster truth, goodness, and beauty in all of their relationships.
If you are dealing with depression, anxiety, or obsessive thoughts, worry, relationship-breakdown, anger, etc., I want to tell you what I wish someone had told me the first time I saw depression when I was 17:
THERE
IS
A
REASON!!!!
If you ignore what is happening to you: decreasing patience as you age, vices that you can't get away from, frustrations that seem to be getting worse, etc., you will NOT GET BETTER.
I truly hate to say it that bluntly, but it's true. These behaviors are seeping out of you. Do you want to live this way your whole life?
The point of engaging your past is so that you can live in the present!
Here are the common objections to engage your story:
1.LOOKING AT YOUR STORY IS SELFISH: The truth is that research has shown that people that engage their story, have increased levels of compassion and empathy. People with a high capacity for and practice of self-reflection (how they are in the world and how they have come to be in the world), have an increased ability to empathize with others. In other words, practicing reflecting on your story will give you increased compassion.
2. I DON'T WANT TO BLAME MY PARENTS: (or whoever harmed you): There is a difference between BLAMING someone (posture of contempt) and NAMING (saying what happened.) Most people, as they go into therapy, work very hard to DEFEND their parents. Blame is about a posture of contempt toward another person. It's a posture of accusation. You know what it is like when someone is blaming you for something. Compare that to someone who is naming something (that may be hard to hear) but it is TRUE about you. If you want to LOVE YOUR PARENTS well, you must NAME what has been and is true of the nature of how you relate to your parents and how your parents relate to you. And that endeavor is in no way synonymous with blaming them.
3. MY PARENTS DID THE BEST THEY COULD: Adam hears this most from Christian parents. From non-Christians it would make more sense. But, according to the Bible, NO ONE does the best they can. Everyone is a sinner. In other words, your parents have harmed you. That harm has been intentional. And it doesn't make them an awful person. It just makes them a sinner. We don't want to look at how deeply they hurt us. But if it is the truth that sets us free, then we gain nothing by closing our eyes to what has been true of our relationship to them. Have you put language to the primary ways that people who harmed you, harmed you? YOU NEED TO DO THIS IN ORDER TO HEAL!!!
WENDI WILL/HAS HARMED HER OWN CHILDREN, AND I WILL BE HERE WHEN THEY WORK THROUGH THE WOUNDS THAT HAVE COME ABOUT FROM THE ERRORS I COMMITTED.
The people we will sin against the most are our spouse and our children. We will harm them and we will intentionally do so. Naming, HOW you have been harmed is about 70% of the battle. When and where are you excusing your parents? We will ALL DO THIS!
4. WHAT IS THE POINT OF DWELLING ON THE PAST? "The past isn't dead. It isn't even past." William Faulkner. If you think your past is in the past, you don't understand how the brain is built and how the brain functions. Whenever you have an experience in the present, the very first thing your brain does, is it filters that experience through all of your past experiences. No one experiences reality as it truly is in the present. That notion is a fiction based on a misunderstanding of how the brain really works. YOU SEE MORE OF WHAT YOU'VE ALREADY SEEN!
GOD HEALS INCURABLE WOUNDS!
From Adam's Podcast website, I read the following:
It turns out that the practice of reflecting on the story of your life actually promotes healing in your brain. There are two reasons for this:
- Brain health is a function of the degree to which all parts of your brain are connected with one another.
- The process of reflecting on your story, sharing your story with another, and hearing another’s reaction to your story connects neural networks that were previously separated.
In other words, the key to healing is connecting. Engaging the core stories of your life heals your brain by connecting regions that were previously not well connected.
When you experience harm, your thoughts about the experience become disconnected from the overwhelming emotions you had. Literally. The neurons holding your thoughts (stored in your left brain) become disconnected from the neurons holding your feelings (stored in the right brain).
Telling the story of the experience requires that your brain link your
thoughts about the story (left brain) with your feelings about the story (right brain).
If you are able to tell your story while remaining connected to your emotions, then the neural networks in the left part of your brain will link up with the neural networks in the right part of your brain.
This is very healing.
It leads to what neuroscientists call integration, and what the Bible calls SHALOM.
Telling your story not only leads to left-right integration, but it can lead to “top-down” integration. “Top” refers to the portion of your brain that is behind your forehead—your cortical brain. “Bottom” refers to the portion of your brain that is lower and deeper—your limbic brain. The limbic brain triggers your fight-flight response and your shutting down response.
When you begin to reflect on harmful parts of your story—stories that hold shame, fear, or rage—your limbic brain reacts and you enter a state of fight-flight or a state of shutting down.
Do I Really Have to Tell It To Another Person?
The short answer is Yes! Yes! Yes! If you are able to stay with the story in the presence of another person, two things happen (which are both very good for your brain).
- First, the other person’s limbic brain regulates yours—which is to say, their limbic brain soothes and calms yours.
- Second, as a result of their attunement and soothing, your cortical brain (top) forms connections and linkages with your limbic brain (bottom).
In other words, the presence of an attuned listener leads to changes in your brain.
Your brain develops neural pathways that connect your cortical brain to your limbic brain. This is very healing because these pathways enable you to self-regulate when you become overwhelmed by fear, shame, or rage.
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