After 30 years or more of medical practices and of addiction medicine, what I found was that the common template for virtually all afflictions, mental illness, physical disease, is in fact, trauma. And there is a wisdom in trauma. When we realise that our traumatic repsonses and imprints are not ourselves, then we can work them through and thus become ourselves.’ (Mate, 2021)
Just as trauma imprints our experience of being human, making an imprint on paper is one of the first ways in which we understand that as a child, that we can make movements that create marks. This new mark or marks is a new entity, over which, unlike life, we have full control. De Charms (2013) defined an innate sense of satisfaction that comes from making marks and Buhler defined this as ‘function pleasure’ (1959). We can take pleasure in the control of making marks as well as innately in the process of making the marks themselves as a separate entity. From this position, we can thus return to a sense of inner order and innate pleasure that is lost as we grapple with the imprints of survivable trauma.
Art making also allows us access our subconscious, opening doors to a deeper understanding of ourselves, our triggers and our ways of being after uncontrollable life happens to us and around us. As Klee attests, “art makes the invisible visible.” Therefore, as trauma itself has a non-verbal core (in Telwar, 2007), pictorial expression can be absolutely key in accessing that non-verbal core of traumatic memory. In that sense, we create for ourselves a unique and contained frame of reference to explore sensitive inner material, where trauma can be non-verbally stuck. Within a depressed, anxious, dis-rupted or dis-regulated human organism, creating with the hands safely, induces function pleasure. Inducing function pleasure : feeling that sense of being safe, held and seen, is a relief for the organism : an evaporation of all worry in the now moment and safely letting go : through hand ; heart ; mind : can bring the body out of the guarded state, into resting state. This function pleasure thus works to send soothe signals to the Vagus nerve, the primary body regulator of the somatic safety system (Porges, 2009) From here, safe exploration, sharing and ultimately lifetime positive resilience & healing habits can begin to unfurl.
This innate knowing of the human being to use marks to process the non-verbal phenomenological core of dis-rupted being, goes to the core of why children draw so innately and why it is such a large part of the process of working towards growth, towards 'finding the wisdom in trauma. (Mate, 2021).
According to Eisner, (1978) 'children learn that they can create images with material and that the activity of making such images can provide intrinsic forms of satisfaction.' He goes on to explain that this knowing then provides a child with a sense of control external to themselves...
'The making of a mark on paper or on wet and or in moist clay is an alteration of the world. The forming of a new entity. When children are first given the opportunity to use materials, this is one of the first things they learn, namely, that consequences have actions.' (Eisner, 1978)
De Charms (2013) refers to this as developing a senes of 'personal causation', representing an empowered disposition towards creating in the world...
'The rhythmic movement of the arm and the wrist, the stimulation of watching lines appear where none existed before...are intrinsic sources of satisfaction.'
This has on flow for improved self esteem, confidence and sense of independence.
Using creative arts as a vehicle for trauma informed therapy also enables the community through sharing of common experiences, and discussing, responding to and processing these experiences via the moderating nature of images. Other modalities work equally well in this respect, but the innate sense of control gained by children through drawing & painting cultivates life long, healthy creative impetus that can be joyously passed to others, turned to on a rainy day or developed as a career in the creative arts. Creating is a magical thing and can have a positive ripple effect of increased robustness across entire communities.
by Melani du Jardin for cre8ofit. All rights reserved.
REFERENCES
Buhler, C. (1959). Theoretical observations about life’s basic tendencies. American Journal of Psychotherapy, 13(3), 561-581.Buhler Charlotte
De Charms, R. (2013). Personal causation: The internal affective determinants of behavior. Routledge.
Eisner, E. W. (1978). What do children learn when they paint?. Art Education, 31(3), 6-11.
Mate, G. (2021) 'The Wisdom of Trauma'. Science & Nonduality, Sebastopol, CA.
Porges, S. W. (2009). The polyvagal theory: new insights into adaptive reactions of the autonomic nervous system. Cleveland Clinic journal of medicine, 76(Suppl 2), S86.
Talwar, S. (2007). Accessing traumatic memory through art making: An art therapy trauma protocol (ATTP). The arts in psychotherapy, 34(1), 22-35.