Resource Yourself

Attachment Styles Decoded

This book is an absolute game changer. It helped me see both my attachment style, as well as the attachment style of the people I relate to. Basically, very very basically, there are Secure attachment: confident, resilient people; there are Anxious attachment folks who lean towards a fear based response; and Avoidant people who resist interactions. Lastly, there are Disorganized folks who flow back and forth between Avoidant and Anxious styles, depending on what’s happening with them, or what events they’re facing. And while attachment style is more of a patchwork quilt of percentages of style, making a whole picture, you can see your primary style and primary responses. While it doesn’t diagnose you or anyone else (and I don’t think it should be used to try and define another person’s attachment style,) it can show a person’s actions or reactions to certain events from the perspective of an attachment style. What do I mean by that? If someone is acting evasive, cagy, or committed to being non-committal, maybe they’re acting (or reacting) to events in an Avoidant attachment way. That’s not to say their whole style or persona is avoidant, but in this case, that’s the way they’re acting. It can help you re-calibrate your interaction, your responses, and help you take a step back to see what’s needed in any given situation. I recommend this as a foundational look at where you came from, who you are and how you show up in the world.

Healing, Breathing and Growing

If you have been traumatized by an event like an assault, abuse, or traumatized by a natural disaster, war, those events can leave lasting scars. Long term trauma experienced repeatedly or over time can also leave its marks. Long term abusive relationships, or repeated experiences that reinforce trauma can leave deeper changes that are harder to alleviate. The Transformation is the story of a physician who actively seeks out individual and collective trauma and approaches healing it with a choreographed series of activities: including (in order) breathing, dancing, meditation and awareness. The deep belly breathing helps calm, soothe and center an otherwise frazzled person. The ecstatic, joyful dancing helps release muscles, stress and promotes a sense of silliness that helps open a distressed person to the possibility of awareness that was formerly closed off or unavailable to them. And finally, after these first steps, the person is primed for meditation and is able to clearly, calmly, in a focused and open manner, meditate and open up to messages they need to hear. Working with the concept of the Inner Guide we all have within us, the meditation takes the traumatized person through to a new understanding of their experience. This is a fantastic read that compassionately lays out effective options for opening up to trauma healing, for both the healer, and those needing healing.

trauma healing

Review to come.