Healing without Excuses
Image by The Voice of Eye via Flickr
Many Veterans have to live with memories and realities that they find inexcusable and therefore unforgivable.
When working with such deep trauma and despair, I find it important to not offer pseudo reasons or other constructs as an excuse for what happened. In my experience, Veterans don’t want to hear that there is something good about a kid that died in a cross fire, about the accidental death of civilians, or anybody, for that matter.
Even a well meaning attempt to find something good about what happened, for the sake of helping the Veteran relax, can be easily misunderstood as me just not getting it, as being fake and not trustworthy and real.
Trust is such a vulnerable thing with most Veterans, and I don’t want to risk any break in rapport.
With EFT, we don’t have to excuse what went wrong. We don’t have to find methods and strategies to live with the guilt and trauma. By tapping on the different aspects of what happened, which usually include guilt and grief, we can help a veteran find peace. Having peace does not make us not responsible for what we did in our past. It allows us to stop reliving the trauma as if it was real, and puts us in an even more powerful place of taking charge. As long as we suffer, we are so occupied with our overwhelm, that it is hard to do anything.
But when we come to a place of peace, we can see our life, and also the trauma that happened, with all the unexcusable, in context. Not because it was right, but because it happened for reasons that we often forget or don’t find valuable enough to mention.
Tapping with EFT on the inexcusable allows us to find peace and release the need for excuses.
In my experience, this is very acceptable for my Veterans. It makes sense and feels right. It allows them to refocus and let go of trauma, and take charge in a way that works for them. Most of my Vets decided to teach others about what they have learned, and transcend their experiences in a powerful and important way.