The Zen of Trauma

practice without the aid of meditation.  In Zen we practice Zazen , seated meditation practice. This practice involves a willingness to sit down, face a wall, and just sit.  During the practice thoughts and feelings arise.  We notice these, but do not engage them.  We simply sit.
    Exercise: Pick a time. Find a section of a wall that is blank.  Take a seat cross-legged on a cushion or on the forward edge of a chair. Place your hands together left hand cradled in right with your thumbs lightly touching.  Straighten your back, open your shoulders, and place your attention on your breath.  Sit this way without moving for a period of time.  This is the practice of Zazen.
    Make some notes afterwards about the experience.  You will likely have squirmed, had an irresistible itch, thoughts running amok , As you continue to do this practice, try to just return to the present moment and watch your body and mind without engaging either.  We will build on this exercise as we move through this booklet.
     
     
    CONCEPTS OF ORDINARY LIFE
 
    To understand trauma we must first get an understanding of ordinary everyday life.  What is it?  What are our assumptions about normal everyday living? In my study and practice as a psychotherapist, I found that p redictability, safety, and fairness are concepts that undergird social systems and allow for civilized human activity. Without these basic concepts, civilized life would be difficult, if not psychologically impossible.
    In addition to these, a sense of belongingness, connectedness, and obligations to self and society are part of our fundamental worldview, our cosmology and can lead to a necessary balance and well-being. While these concepts may be commonly held across cultures, there are strong differences in order and intensity between and within each culture. We will discuss these differences shortly. However, first it is important to mention one other concept that plays a role in understanding trauma, its impact, and meaning. This is the concept of time.
     
    Time is a synthetic thing that has no "objective" reality. Our mind creates time as it perceives, stores, and recalls data. Thus, the “passing of time” is a delusion, which, if we were to not have “memory” would not exist at all.  What would be is what actually is: now . So, time does not exist in itself without us marking it.
 
    There are at least two different ways of understanding time, linearly and circularly. Thus, it becomes possible to conceive of different ways of understanding causation. People can be "reactive" and "mechanistic," but they can also be "proactive" and "intentional."
       In Western (dualistic) societies, time is viewed as linear, having a beginning and an end. Events are understood within a series of sequential steps. The purpose of Western science and medicine, including psychotherapy, is to discover the correct sequence in order to affect a cure. This is a mechanistic (often medical) "cause and effect" model of understanding the way the world works.
 
    In Eastern (non-dualistic) societies, including Native American societies, time is not understood as linear at all. Rather, time is a cyclical or circular phenomenon, having no particular beginning or end (and if referenced, only for the sake of story), but more importantly, it is a view of time where all time is in one time: no past, no future, not even a now.
 
    Between Western dualistic and Eastern non-dualistic cultures there are also differences in how human beings relate to the natural world. In Native American cultures, for example, the entire world is alive and possesses spirit. Human beings are considered only a part of a vast interactivity and interconnectivity of life. Non-dualistic cultures aim to respect everything in the natural world. This cannot be overstated. The entire world is understood as a living, interrelated and interactive system. Thus, if a tree outside of the zendo is damaged, I am also damaged. Just so, if I am damaged, so to o , the Universe.
 
    With this in mind, we can see how obligations to care for each other and the entire world may become a core belief system of Native peoples in specific, and non-dualistic cultures in general. We can also see how a dualistic religion makes very little sense to traditional Native Americans. In Native culture, everything and every act possesses some "religious" connotation.
 
     

    The Spirit in Ordinary Experience.
 
    Typically, we do not consider