Knowing your family story helps to heal transgenerational traumas.
Storytelling is an essential component of the healing process after trauma. Understanding every detail of our story is important. Remember that my story is also about my family and ancestors. We have an inextricable connection to our ancestors, thus our story is a continuation of theirs.To fully understand their story, we must first understand our own.However, telling stories evokes many memories. Some are painful, startling, humorous, strange and life-giving. Some of these memories can be found in our DNA. For this reason, I usually invite my clients to tell their stories slowly, while being present, noticing what’s happening with the bodily sensations or/and emotions
that may be arising. When I notice changes in the storytelling rhythm, I invite them to pause to make space for healing process to happen.
Healing trauma using Somatic experiencing®, a natural modality that Dr Peter Levine founded, encourages us to be present, here, and now, as well as to slow down while breaking down an overwhelming event into a manageable small piece. For instance, while telling a story about an awful event from WWII, we encourage clients to create space and resources for their bodies to connect with their deep resilience.
Since the story might be coming from a descendant of a great grandfather, a survivor of the war, then we are sure that the existence of resilience that was passed on from the ancestors is evidence. Through the knowledge of Family Constellation system therapy, a method that was founded by Berth Hellinger, we can explore these resources that can help our clients handle the deep emotions that will emerge from the response and the imagination of the magnitude of the event. Then we invite our client to bring awareness to one’s own emotions that are different from those of their ancestors. This is a very crucial point for healing transgenerational traumas. In this process, we uncouple the dynamics of the trauma response of the ancestors, from the trauma response of the client. The ancestors who went through the actual trauma process suffered but survived and this is why we are here today. Through a DNA transmission and the stories that were narrated many times, our clients will bring mixed feelings and emotions about the trauma that they are about to liberate.
The emotions, feelings, and sensations that belong to the ancestors are given back to them with honor. When this processis done consciously, there is a feeling of lightness and relief, which eventually results in well-being. When our physiology experiences well-being, there is evidence of resiliency with more space to handle discomfort and difficult emotions. At this point, we encourage the person doing a healing process to take care of the part that belongs to them by noticing the bodily sensations and becoming aware of the emotions that show up repeatedly. With the new awareness and resilience, the person is ready to give all that they feel an adequate space, allowing the discharge to happen.
This is to say that when a person is present in their own felt sense here and now, one can take responsibility of one’s own pain, discomfort, pleasure, emotions (anger, fear, shame, guilt, sadness, etc.). With the help of the therapist and with many other resources including the ancestors, we can witness pain, tensions, and discomfort moving out of the body while experiencing a feeling of relief and resilience.
In my 20 years of experience working with trauma healing, I have witnessed many people going from extremely painful emotions to a relieved, relaxed body that is no longer needing to neither revenge nor do harm to self or to others. Often time we move away from the healing process by blaming and/or holding intentions to harm our ancestors or those who were the enemies of our ancestors. By doing so, we keep repeating similar traumatic events unconsciously. Here are a few examples of what is happening in our world right now that are the results of repetitive traumatic events.
- Socially and collectively – war situations, political crises, and conflicts in different organizations, even those with well-intended intentions like NGOs.
- Personal level – individual health (physical, emotional, spiritual, and mental), unbalanced financial situations, conflictual relationships, and lack of focus/objectives in life.
These repetitive patterns will keep happening until individually and collectively there are the awareness of the patterns of repetition. Somatic Experiencing ® Invites us to be present in the here and now, while paying attention to the physiology where we find; well-being and goodness, the ability to engage with others from a place of playfulness and collaboration, the ability to develop compassion, and the ability to hold space for others to do their healing process.
