To reiterate what was said previously regarding the limbic system is that its main purpose is to avoid pain by means of memory registration.
We’ll look at two types of experiences which may inflict trauma and how they both can impact you.
1) Accidental Experiences
Let’s say for instances…
You shovel your hand into a bag to pull out some stuffs, but it turns out that there was a pointy or sharp object inside it which pokes you right in your finger.
While you are in the kitchen, you touch something thinking that it wasn’t hot, then you get burned.
While cutting something, the knife slides off and cut you.
How would you respond to any of these experiences?
You would quickly pull back your hand in pain, isn’t it?
This instinctive reaction is carried out by this part of the brain.
It’s this very part that compels you to shrink back in fear or panic from something you perceive is going to hit you. Your reflex is deeply embedded in that part.
Then it registers pain derived from these accidental types of experiences as a memory that will serve you as a warning to keep you from doing that again.
Its intended purpose in this case is to keep you from doing something painful that can potentially be detrimental to you.
How does your conscious mind deal with accidental experiences?
Your conscious mind is much better in dealing with accidental type of experiences of this nature, particularly painful accidental experiences which leave no impact on your self-image and self-worth.
Therefore, it’s easier to get over them and move on. Mainly because there wasn’t really somebody with ill-intent who acted out against you. So there’s no grudge that you can hold unto that would inflame the .
Make no mistake that there are some extreme accidental type of experiences that may leave you with serious trauma, such as getting involved into an accident in which you lose a part of your body.
But things usually start taking a sharp turn when dealing with other types of traumatic experiences which involve someone else.
Pain Inflicted On You by Others
When it comes to verbal, emotional, physical, and sexual abuses, that part of the brain uses the exact same mechanism to register these horrible experiences as memory just to keep you from ever having to experience that again due to their degrading and destructive nature.
But the problem is that since these horrible experiences were inflicted intentionally by another individual, thus they were meant to hurt you, the conscious mind in which your ability to think and respond is located has come to have a hard time trying to process them.
That literally sends you into an unending questioning mode in which you are asking yourself these following questions.
Why is it me?
Why did this happen to me?
What did I do to deserve such terrible treatments?
Why did God allow something like that to happen to me, and so on?
You can’t quite wrap your mind around that.
This unleashes a relentless yearning toward some form of vindication that can validate the pain of heart.
So, I get that.
The inability of the conscious mind to fully process that will ultimately lead to unresolved trauma, which will leave the brain and body in a frozen state.
This also will leave behind a huge internal wound leading to what can be labeled as soul infection that needs to be taken care of.
This is where the problem all starts.
You feel violated, victimized, exploited, humiliated, rejected, or abused, which will incite a spirit of bitterness, hatred, vengeance, and hostility toward your aggressor.
That person has either ruined or captured a vital part of your humanity by leaving you with terrible memories that will haunt you for years to come.
This growing hostility raging within will trickle down on you and even those around you through burst of anger, irritation, self-hatred, low self-esteem, and so on.
You may find yourself lashing out on others for no obvious reason due to the pain of your heart.
Remember that the limbic system is irrational in the sense that it doesn’t have conscious or intelligible understanding regarding the implications that will ensue later based on how you respond to what you went through.
It’s also unconscious in the sense that it doesn’t have conscious, moral, intellectual, or spiritual knowledge of how it’s behaving itself.
It feels the pain being endured through its instinctive, emotional, and sensational mechanism.
It will always try to bring to your awareness the experiences being templated into it as a form of defense when there’s a trigger.
It will behave based on how it was built: instinctively, unconsciously, and irrationally.
It registers accidental experiences mentioned above in the form of memory that will ensure you to be cautious next time.
You exercise caution through the means of your conscious mind.
But when it comes to pain and suffering inflicted on you by others, it still registers the experiences in light of the horrors you had to experience.
The conscious mind through which your ability to think and respond is located is the part that has to deal with it.
The choice that you and I make in that regard will decide whether we’ll ever be able to get over trauma or not.
Certain things in life are much easier to deal with than others. If you are dealing with self-induced trauma, it’s much easier to get over it.
But your worst nightmare lies with the fact that somebody did that to you.
In many cases, they hurt you to boost their own ego.
A lot of people take great pleasure from doing so to force their will and dominance on others in the sense of giving the victim a clear warning of what will eventually happens if this or that were to transpire again.
Most likely, someone who should have known better than that, someone you trusted, loved, and who should have protected you at any cost.
The consequence of unresolved trauma is that it will overrun your mind with waves of out-of-control thoughts gushing in.
As a result, the impact will start wearing down your body due to stress along with the terrible feelings associated with such issue.
The very part of yourself trauma memories are registered constantly finds itself on the defensive mode just as though the danger is still there.
Your brain has developed a tendency to constantly be on high alert, which gives rise to what’s so called “fight or flight” response.
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