In the new audio learning course Transforming Trauma: A Seven-Step Process for Spiritual Healing, acclaimed author and medical intuitive Caroline Myss and psychologist James Finley discusses the futility of conventional psychotherapy approaches to healing trauma. Myss describes how the intellectual mind becomes an obstacle to healing and must be transcended in order to access a higher perspective that allows for healing. This course teaches a mystical approach, offering guidance in going beyond the egoic mind and the programmed beliefs that dominate human thinking.

Trauma threatens one's physical survival in a real or imagined way, and when the survival compass and survival defenses are overwhelmed the mind develops dysfunctional programs in its desparate efforts to gain a sense of safety. In order to heal these patterns it is seen as necessary to connect with a spiritual compass, an awareness of oneself as the eternal essence that transcends the physical life experience. Thus, in this view, trauma presents an opportunity, a catalyst for the individual to reach for a greater understanding of onself and an awareness of a transcendant reality.

This is an important contribution to this subject area, as common therapies provided for those with difficulties related to trauma seem to be ineffective. People suffering from the aftermath of abuse, traumatic stress, heart-break, job loss, death of a loved one, and other life stresses often continue in a dysfunctional manner for the remainder of their lives even when receiving counseling or psychiatric treatment. These approaches (talk therapy, medications, etc.) fail to address the level of consciousness where the disturbance or disharmony exists. Working solely with the conscious, logical mind to address issues that are present in the subconscious is not likely to yield much benefit.


Therapies that tap into deeper levels of one's being are valuable healing tools for issues related to trauma. Hypnotherapy, energy psychology, energy healing, meditation, shamanic healing, spiritual healing, and other mind-body healing approaches are the most effective resources to help lead people toward healing shifts. People dealing with trauma don't heal the trauma by merely remembering it - it is healed by reprocessing it from a higher perspective which is not traumatized by it. Therapists seeking to help their patients will want to help connect the patients with that higher realm of consciousness when guiding them to face the past.

Shamanic traditions consider healing trauma as a type of soul retrieval - using spiritual resources to access a part of oneself that is stuck in time-space due to trauma. This involves helping that part or soul fragment reconnect with the self so the individual can be fully present in the now rather than having a portion of one's essence frozen in the past. Meditation, hypnosis, and other tools that help bridge the conscious and unconscious can be used to facilitate this healing process.

While support groups and talk therapy can help people feel that they are understood, accepted, and cared for, they are not a very reliable or effective way to resolve trauma. If you have been attending therapy, support groups, or recovery groups, but don't feel healthy and whole, then perhaps it's time to use another approach and address these challenges at the level where they are arising from. If you merely want to suppress your symptoms and suffering with drugs - either medications or recreational drugs - then don't delude yourself into thinking this will resolve anything - more often than not resorting to chemical suppression of emotional pain eventually compounds people's problems. Finding healthy tools to handle stress and connecting with spiritual resources for healing is a wise path to pursue - and a path that is always available for those who are ready to step away from the role of victim and step into their spiritual power.


Jed Shlackman, LMHC, C.Ht. is a counselor, hypnotherapist, and energy healer in Miami, Florida.
http://www.phinsights.com