The Moment

We all have memories from childhood. Some are good, and some are bad. But have you ever wondered why some of the bad ones feel alive, like you’re stuck in that moment? In this blog I’m going to be talking about “The Moment”. Why specific moments feel alive, and how you might be able to put that feeling to rest.

Sometimes when we’re children and something overwhelming happens, something we can’t FIGHT or take FLIGHT from, we FREEZE. It’s not a conscious action, it’s instinctive. We disconnect from the overwhelming moment to survive it. It’s a natural trauma response. It’s biological, like a possum playing dead. Dr. Peter Levine says “After being faced with a threat, animals are capable of returning to a regulated, healthy state relatively quickly. Humans, on the other hand, tend to remain stuck in hyper-vigilance after experiencing trauma far more than animals do. This happens because moving out of a trauma response often involves coming back into contact with painful sensations. For more primitive animals, this is a process they can’t resist. But as humans with higher-order thinking, we’re capable of avoiding those uncomfortable experiences.” This avoidance leaves our painful feelings stuck in that moment.

Here’s another way to look at it... one day, a friend might tell you a secret. They confide in you and tell you a traumatic story of what happened to them as a child. You listen and support them as best you can. Then you talk about something else, and never bring the subject up again. It’s as if they opened a door and showed you a child standing in the darkness, then quickly shut the door, locking the child away. This is how trauma endures, through silence, shame and secrets. A way to heal trauma is to open that door and gently keep it open. Allowing the child to come out of the darkness and into the light.

I teach a workshop called Defining The Moment : Addressing Trauma Through Screenwriting. It’s a creative journey of self-exploration. The goal is to write a scene about a specific moment from childhood. It’s all about “The Moment”. We carry these traumatic moments with us throughout our lives. For me, it was a boat accident when I was eight years old. Before I healed this traumatic moment, when I thought about it, in my thirties, forties, fifties… it felt like it happened yesterday. But today it feels like it happened a long time ago.

When people take the workshop, the first step is to identify the moment. One participant in his fifties wanted to write about a moment when he was six years old. He saw his older sister fall off her horse and hit her head. After being in a coma for two weeks, she died, and then his family never spoke about it. He said it didn’t affect his life. Another participant in his fifties wrote about a moment when he was eight years old and got raped by two older boys. Throughout the workshop, he defended the older boys, saying they were the cool kids, they were his heroes, and that nothing really bad came of it. I used to tell people the same thing about my boat accident, saying it was no big deal, even though I watched my uncle drown. That’s how we learn to cope with these overwhelming feelings. It’s what our ancestors did to survive the dark ages. We bury the painful moment, pushing forward not looking back. But the moment stays alive.

Not every moment is a Big T trauma. There’s also Little T traumas, a child who wasn’t seen by their parent, who wasn’t accepted, who was never good enough. We’re born wanting love and connection. When we don’t get this, we might bury the painful feelings to survive them. Then we become strong and build an armor to protect the pain. We tell ourselves and others it wasn’t a big deal. But it was.

I’m not proposing that everyone address their childhood traumas. When I taught my workshop in a women’s jail, one woman said to me “Why would I want to open up that can of worms?!” Fair enough. I don’t know what you’ve been through. I don’t pretend to know how it feels. All I know is it wasn’t your fault.

Story runs deep into our bones. It’s woven into the fabric of our humanity. Cave paintings were our first movie screens. A way to see ourselves and share our journey.

In the workshop, the traumatic moment is expressed like a screenplay. When you read a screenplay, it’s like watching a movie. It allows you to see yourself as a character in a movie. Movies are a reflection of us. They offer hope, and the possibility for change.

One participant wrote about a moment when she was four years old and saw her father beat up her mother in the kitchen. After identifying the moment, she begins writing the Raw Material. This is writing about everything she can remember about the moment. What did the kitchen look like? Did the windows have curtains? When did it happen, day or night? Where were your parents? What kind of emotional state were they in? It’s finally being present to the overwhelming feelings you disconnected from. The feelings that got stuck in that moment and have been avoided since it happened. After the raw material is expressed, you begin crafting it into screenplay format. When you read it, it’s like watching a movie: “INTERIOR KITCHEN - NIGHT. A streetlight glows outside a window with curtains. Mom cooks tortillas on the stove wearing a red flowered apron. The sound of a truck parks in the driveway...” The screenplay creates a visual frame, allowing you to see yourself as a child in that world. It gives you safe distance and solid ground to stand on, where before were only overwhelming feelings.

Writing about the moment takes courage. A leap of faith into the possibility of changing how you feel. It’s being curious, like a detective at your own crime scene. The workshop offers guidance, support and creativity to process a trauma response that has been frozen inside you.

There are many ways to heal trauma. Many ways to put those feelings finally to rest.

“Transformation is always a conscious choice.” - Dara Marks

I heard you need two things to heal trauma. One is a safe space, that’s the workshop. A safe space to be vulnerable and let your armor down. This allows the pain that’s stuck to come up. Once you allow this, you need the second thing: a place to put that pain, and that is the screenplay. A place to put your truth, getting those dark feelings out of your body and into the light.

What is your moment?