🧵 View Thread
🧵 Thread (21 tweets)
you can feel like total shit about yourself or your life, all of your worst fears can feel objectively and eternally true, and then one big enough cry later you’re completely outside of that reality. just transported somewhere else entirely
calling it “emotional processing” makes it sound like a skill you have to learn but i’m still convinced it’s mostly about unlearning - there’s a natural process that animals allow effortlessly that we actively train children to interrupt in a million ways
when an impala is captured by a predator it plays dead; if the predator goes away it literally shakes off the experience until it's able to move normally https://t.co/nVT1QVSfhl
meanwhile, human children are raised as follows: sit still. be quiet. don't make a fuss. don't start laughing or crying in the middle of the classroom. you wouldn't want to bother the other children would you https://t.co/eQrBaVnjM4
this kind of thing is why i never felt comfortable with sitting meditation and why i wouldn't recommend other people start there if they have any kind of trauma history at all. you're just practicing a freeze response. we need sound, movement, and breath https://t.co/279Ux8VTNp
meditation does not have to involve sitting down, you do not have to be still, you do not have to be quiet, you do not have to be alone, you do not have to be in a group, you do not have to be inside, you do not have to control your thoughts, you do not have to control anything
"After being hurt, an infant will cry loudly and continuously and, if permitted to do so, will seem to recover from the hurt very quickly. After being frightened badly, an infant will scream and shake and perspire." https://t.co/6hWSv4dJJO
also wow the co-counseling link above has some good stuff, here's a few choice quotes. interesting claim here that "discharges" happen in a specific order: grief (tears), then fears (trembling, shivering, laughter), anger (loud words, movement), boredom (talking, laughter) https://t.co/Qley3DOOKf
periodically i see takes along the lines of "oh man wouldn't society be so much better if we taught children how to process their emotions in school" my statement on such takes, now and forevermore: https://t.co/5hC01nxa9X
once i attended a memorial service for an acquaintance who had killed herself not a single person cried. a friend of hers who went up to the podium to say something almost cried but then she *stopped herself* because apparently it would have been... *inappropriate*???
speaking of @DougTataryn, his daughter @hojialexandra is co-facilitating a 6-week emotional processing intensive starting may 5th, possibly of interest to some of you. i have met her and she is great and i trust her work a lot https://t.co/0JYpXlyhG2 https://t.co/GLuVntLOGg
@QiaochuYuan Maybe it has something to do with the fact that it's a social setting. E.g. perhaps there's a belief that you crying may cause others to feel more hurt/pain? In other words, perhaps it's based on some kind of consideration towards the living?
@QiaochuYuan I loudly agree — meditation is not for releasing trauma — but it can still help the traumatized you need a release practice and a sit-through-anything-with-equanimity practice. both are helpful if you find one of these impossible, practice the other for a while & return later