30 Quotes About Healing Trauma

Trauma is a form of emotional and physical damage that can occur when a person suffers a violent, shocking, or unexpected experience. The symptoms can be many and vary from person to person. In this collection of trauma quotes, we’ve gathered some of the most profound and inspiring quotes about healing from trauma. Whether it’s the aftermath of war, childhood trauma, or psychological trauma from any other source, these quotes about healing from trauma will take your mind off the pain and help you heal.

Hold yourself back, or heal yourself back together. You decide.
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Hold yourself back, or heal yourself back together. You decide. Brittany Burgunder
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Spirituality isn't some quaint stepchild of an intelligent worldview, or the only option for those of us not smart enough to understand the facts of the real world. Spirituality reflects the most sophisticated mindset, and the most powerful force available for the transformation of human suffering. Marianne Williamson
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Whatever happens to you, once you have hope you will survive. Lailah Gifty Akita
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In response to threat and injury, animals, including humans, execute biologically based, non-conscious action patterns that prepare them to meet the threat and defend themselves. The very structure of trauma, including activation, dissociation and freezing are based on the evolution of survival behaviors. When threatened or injured, all animals draw from a "library" of possible responses. We orient, dodge, duck, stiffen, brace, retract, fight, flee, freeze, collapse, etc. All of these coordinated responses are somatically based- they are things that the body does to protect and defend itself. It is when these orienting and defending responses are overwhelmed that we see trauma. The bodies of traumatized people portray "snapshots" of their unsuccessful attempts to defend themselves in the face of threat and injury. Trauma is a highly activated incomplete biological response to threat, frozen in time. For example, when we prepare to fight or to flee, muscles throughout our entire body are tensed in specific patterns of high energy readiness. When we are unable to complete the appropriate actions, we fail to discharge the tremendous energy generated by our survival preparations. This energy becomes fixed in specific patterns of neuromuscular readiness. The person then stays in a state of acute and then chronic arousal and dysfunction in the central nervous system. Traumatized people are not suffering from a disease in the normal sense of the word- they have become stuck in an aroused state. It is difficult if not impossible to function normally under these circumstances. Peter A. Levine
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So, what role does memory play in the understanding and treatment of trauma? There is a form of implicit memory that is profoundly unconscious and forms the basis for the imprint trauma leaves on the body/mind. The type of memory utilized in learning most physical activities (walking, riding a bike, skiing, etc.) is a form of implicit memory called procedural memory. Procedural or "body memories" are learned sequences of coordinated "motor acts" chained together into meaningful actions. You may not remember explicitly how and when you learned them, but, at the appropriate moment, they are (implicitly) "recalled" and mobilized (acted out) simultaneously. These memories (action patterns) are formed and orchestrated largely by involuntary structures in the cerebellum and basal ganglia. When a person is exposed to overwhelming stress, threat or injury, they develop a procedural memory. Trauma occurs when these implicit procedures are not neutralized. The failure to restore homeostasis is at the basis for the maladaptive and debilitating symptoms of trauma. Peter A. Levine
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One of the paradoxical and transformative aspects of implicit traumatic memory is that once it is accessed in a resourced way (through the felt sense), it, by its very nature, changes. Out of the shattered fragments of her deeply injured psyche, Jody discovered and nurtured a nascent, emergent self. From the ashes of the frantically activated, hypervigilant, frozen, traumatized girl of twenty-five years ago, Jody began to reorient to a new, less threatening world. Gradually she shaped into a more fluid, resilient, woman, coming to terms with the felt capacity to fiercely defend herself when necessary, and to surrender in quiet ecstasy. . Peter A. Levine
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Music, brings the soul alive. Music promotes wellness and sound mind. Lailah Gifty Akita
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You are not responsible for anything that happens to you as a child but you are 100% responsible for your own healing. Johnnie Dent Jr.
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I admire successful men and women who endured and overcome unusual circumstances to fulfill their dreams. Lailah Gifty Akita
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May you comfort and healing. Lailah Gifty Akita
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Nourish your soul, mediate daily. Lailah Gifty Akita
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Love is divine. Forgiveness is divine. Forgive for the love for yourself and others. Forgiveness is a spiritual healing for the person who forgives. Lailah Gifty Akita
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The hardest thing to ever do is to reveal the naked soul to the world. However, in doing so brings healing, growth, strength, and powerful inspiration! H.E. Olsen
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Remember, healing through forgiveness takes place in the soul and subconscious, not by a face to face confrontation that ends in hugging and tears of joy. In fact, chances are that would never happen anyway, so you are setting yourself up for failure if that is your expectation. Sharon Critchfield
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Music is a great healer. Lailah Gifty Akita
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Think about the stigma that is attached to the idea that alcoholism is a disease, an incurable illness, and you have it. That's a terrible thing to inflict on someone. Labeling alcoholism as a disease, a cause unto itself, simply no longer fits with what we know today about its causes. Chris Prentiss
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Healing doesn't just take a little time, it also takes commitment to get started and to complete the process. Sereda Aleta Dailey
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Then again, he supposed the healing process, in contrast to trauma, was gentle and slow... The soft closing of a door, rather than a slam.- John J.r. Ward
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Commit to the healing path and trust the process. Rosenna Bakari
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However, we have to acknowledge that living with DID presents huge challenges; it is complex and complicated. But our diagnosis was the key to us accessing services and funding, which has enabled us to return to life within the community and to have a positive future. We can see constructive, productive elements in our life, and our faith plays a strong part in this. Carol Broad
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When we believe a wounding story, our whole world is diminished. Sharon Salzberg
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While in principle groups for survivors are a good idea, in practice it soon becomes apparent that to organize a successful group is no simple matter. Groups that start out with hope and promise can dissolve acrimoniously, causing pain and disappointment to all involved. The destructive potential of groups is equal to their therapeutic promise. The role of the group leader carries with it a risk of the irresponsible exercise of authority. Conflicts that erupt among group members can all too easily re-create the dynamics of the traumatic event, with group members assuming the roles of perpetrator, accomplice, bystander, victim, and rescuer. Such conflicts can be hurtful to individual participants and can lead to the group’s demise. In order to be successful, a group must have a clear and focused understanding of its therapeutic task and a structure that protects all participants adequately against the dangers of traumatic reenactment. Though groups may vary widely in composition and structure, these basic conditions must be fulfilled without exception. Commonality with other people carries with it all the meanings of the word common. It means belonging to a society, having a public role, being part of that which is universal. It means having a feeling of familiarity, of being known, of communion. It means taking part in the customary, the commonplace, the ordinary, and the everyday. It also carries with it a feeling of smallness, or insignificance, a sense that one’s own troubles are ‘as a drop of rain in the sea.’ The survivor who has achieved commonality with others can rest from her labors. Her recovery is accomplished; all that remains before her is her life. Judith Lewis Herman
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Sometimes the people around you won't understand your journey. They don't need to, it's not for them. Joubert Botha
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Eradication of pain, deviant, or oppositional behaviors does not indicate healing; however, it can signify successful conditioning. Kierra C.T. Banks
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Eradication of pain, "deviant", or "oppositional" behaviors does not indicate healing; however, it can signify successful conditioning. Kierra C.T. Banks
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There is no one way to recover and heal from any trauma. Each survivor chooses their own path or stumbles across it. Laurie Matthew
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Unspeakable feelings need to find expression in words. However... verbalization of very intense feelings may be a difficult task. James A. Chu
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By listening to the “unspoken voice” of my body and allowing it to do what it needed to do; by not stopping the shaking, by “tracking” my inner sensations, while also allowing the completion of the defensive and orienting responses; and by feeling the “survival emotions” of rage and terrorwithout becoming overwhelmed, I came through mercifully unscathed, both physically and emotionally. I was not only thankful; I was humbled and grateful to find that I could use my method for my own salvation. While some people are able to recover from such trauma on their own, many individuals do not. Tens of thousands of soldiers are experiencing the extreme stress and horror of war. Then too, there are the devastating occurrences of rape, sexual abuse and assault. Many of us, however, have been overwhelmed by much more “ordinary” events suchas surgeries or invasive medical procedures. Orthopedic patients in arecent study, for example, showed a 52% occurrence of being diagnosed with full-on PTSD following surgery. Other traumas include falls, serious illnesses, abandonment, receivingshocking or tragic news, witnessing violence and getting into anauto accident; all can lead to PTSD. These and many other fairly commonexperiences are all potentially traumatizing. The inability to reboundfrom such events, or to be helped adequately to recover by professionals, can subject us to PTSD–along with a myriad of physical and emotionalsymptoms. . Peter A. Levine