The Zen of Trauma

sun was there every morning for a billion mornings, it will be there tomorrow. In order to deal with this, we psychologically suspend the question and believe the sun will be there. We take it on faith.

   Now, a trauma survivor's ability to suspend awareness of the possibility of catastrophe is weakened, if not destroyed, by the traumatic experience. The survivor often quite literally enters each day open to the reality of danger. The survivor has experience that challenges his or her faith in the predictability of events. Like a koan, this can paradoxically open the survivor to the sacred.

   The main characteristics of traumatic experience then are t hat it is sudden and unpredictable, dangerous, and defies our concepts of fairness and justice.
     
     
    Try this:
    I would like you to imagine, for a moment, that something completely unexpected just happened that threatened your life. There is little or no warning. You felt terrified, not just scared. You could not get away from it, it was a situation that was out of your control. You did not do anything to deserve this to happen: it was not your fault. It was unjust. It was not fair. Now, on top of all this, you went to someone that was supposed to help, such as the police or a doctor or the courts. There you are told that somehow it must be your fault, that you should not have been at that place at that time, or that you must have done something to provoke the event. You have asked yourself the same questions, of course, but could not really come up with any answers. In your "gut,” you know this was not your fault. Then you are told that you just need to put it behind you and "get on with your life." This is reasonable, you think, you should be able to put it behind you. However, you just cannot . Something about the event s tays with you: Either it was not fair or it did not make any sense or your mind will not let you forget.
    Now, how would this change your life?  Your ability to exist in relationship?  Work?  Make some notes here and study them.

   A trauma survivor will feel many things: alienation, isolation, anger, broken trust, fear, sadness, irrationality. All of these are part of the survivor's immediate and enduring experience. Once the trauma happens, we cannot go back to the way things were before. We are in the middle of a different life, often with a different language...a language built on intensity of experience. Those around you will not really understand what you have been through. They will want you to come back to them as if nothing of cons equence had happened. T hey may right in wanting that , but is it reasonable? We all want our loved ones to recover from injury. We would like to continue our lives as if nothing had happened. What is as unreasonable as that?
     

    THE MANJUSHRI EXPERIENCE

   A traumatic experience is, by definition, life altering. Because of such an experience, we separate ourselves from all that we love in a very deep way. What do we do now? Most of us find ourselves perpetually trying to find answers. We want to make sense of what has happened: all in an effort to get on with our lives. Yet, as we try, nothing seems to fit. The world has become a dangerous place, not to be trusted, not to have a back turned to it. It is too unpredictable for that. Often our resources fail us and blame us for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. We are confused with the event. We are the war, not just the warrior. As life moves on, we feel ourselves locked in a circle of dreams and nightmares; things that really mattered no longer do. Things that we were once too busy for now matter greatly: a cold glass of milk, a locked door, a warm bed, and the smile we see in our dog's eyes as we come in to the house.

   Manjushri is the Zen Buddhist B odhisattva of Wisdom.  He brandishes a sword and resides in Zendos.  Manjushri represents that aspect of us that is wise and sees the world clearly as it is. For our purposes, t he sword of Manjushri cuts three domains: Safety, Predictability, and Fairness. Our world is the world of the awake. Delusions constantly arise, but meet our blade. The world is a dangerous place, it is unpredictable, and it is not fair. A survivor, however, rarely has the tools to deal with this. We do not come to traumatic experience prepared to live ever after in impermanence. We therefore rely on old strategies involving coping or denial.

   We are cracked wide open just as open as with