Meditation teaches us to observe the various narratives running through our minds on a moment to moment basis. For me, when I observe these narratives, I realise that most of them do not serve me. They’re rarely peaceful and calm. My own streams of thought mostly centre around defensiveness, a sense of impatience, or worry. These are nagging and tend to stifle focus and creativity but they are not hugely destructive. On the other hand, every once in a while an exceptionally destructive narrative comes along. These narratives are different. Not only are they more dangerous to my well-being, they are often also routed in trauma.
Trauma voice is the term that I give to these narratives that stem from childhood wounding. Trauma voice is more than a mere low-level worry. It’s the one that makes you become the worst version of yourself. Buying into trauma voice can lead to really destructive behaviour.
Childhood trauma can leave us with certain ideas like, I am not loved, I am not enough, I can’t get what I need, or maybe, I am not allowed to be here. These ideas, although true from the wounded child’s perspective, can be exceptionally destructive when we act from them. And integrating deep trauma can take years. So, from my experience, just having awareness of the destructive narrative (although it is a first step in diffusing the charge) is sometimes not enough to make us not buy into it. So what, then, can we do? What can we do if we wholeheartedly believe something that makes us become the worst version of ourselves? What can we do if awareness isn’t enough to interrupt the pattern?
I think there are at least some choices. One is to just make a decision to not act from that space. It doesn’t matter what the voice says, just don’t act from it. A realisation that acting from this space is usually an act of self-sabotage is also beneficial. The second option is to seek out counter examples to these trauma-rooted stories. To ask ourselves: Is this really true? Or Is this true in every instance? Just one counter example can sometimes dilute some of the poison. The third option is just to recognise that this version of ourselves are not who we want to be in the moment. So, tend to the wound, not the person or situation that caused it. That can be the difference between a downward spiral and dealing with the hurt gracefully.
The turbulence of the pain settles after a while. It is at this point that it becomes possible to connect more fully to your inner voice. Inner voice is not emotionally charged. Nor is it fearful or angry. And it doesn’t encourage us to make bad decisions in the moment. That said, recognising inner voice can also be challenging. Inner voice isn’t just rational. Nor is it just action-orientated. Or just wise. Indeed it is hard to precisely define inner voice, because what it says depends on circumstance. One thing I can say about inner voice is that it always fills me with peace.
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