We begin whole/well and we can be whole/well again.
We begin whole. We begin well.
In the age of a capitalized, commodified wellness industry, I don’t mean this just in some sort of fantastical “we are all Wakandan” way, but I do mean that, too. I mean that we begin with complete access to a full range of emotions, sensations and experiences. I mean that is true for me as an individual, and you as an individual, and for us as a community, and as a species.
A human-induced global climate catastrophe, accelerating wealth inequality, multiple genocides, the rise of the far-right, and in the US, an assault on the rights of Black people, people with uteruses, and trans people. It makes perfect sense that we are craving wellness. Everyone and their momma is talking about increased political polarization and in fact we are desperate to be whole again. As someone who works with individuals and organizations who have rich trauma histories (and often rich trauma presents) one of the most important reminders we offer is that we can be whole again.
So why does it feel so hard to return to wholeness?
My favorite definition of wellness to date is from the book Burnout by Emily and Amelia Nagoski, “ to be well is not to live in a state of perpetual safety and calm, but to move fluidly from a state of adversity, risk, adventure, excitement, back to calm and out again.” Being under persistently traumatic conditions makes that fluidity really difficult to attain, let alone maintain.
Trauma, as prevalent and persistent as it is, is actually abnormal. Trauma is the disruption, the distraction, the dis-ease. And while we sometimes center it, we center it to get a clearer view on just how ‘not the norm’ it is. That it is surrounded, preceded, (and can be followed) by wellness, by wholeness.
Our innate wellness/wholeness does get interrupted, our connection to that wellness compromised, but it doesn’t break. We are not broken. I am not and neither are you. We may have experienced these interruptions to our safety, agency, dignity, or belonging (our four Fundamentals), and yet, we do not all end up traumatized. This is especially true if the events are few and far between. However, even if our trauma exposure is high, it’s easier to return to wellness when our Fundamentals are supported and resourced e.g. by loving community or a universal basic income.
In this age of wellness weekends, wellness aisles, wellness podcasts, etc. we are being sold a commoditized individualized version of wellness: take this supplement! eat this superfood! attend this retreat! But right now our political body, our social body, our collective body, even our planetary body is not well. So the fact is that we individually find it difficult to return to wellness, and it is because we are struggling against a current of illness.
When we have robust belonging and firm safety, we may not feel interruptions as intensely, and we may recover from them more fluidly.
So what can we do with that? Most of the literature would have you believe you need to be “post” the trauma to begin recovery. Nah. I have no intention of waiting for racism to end or patriarchy to be smashed in order to be free from their effects. So here’s what you do: go and get your Fundamentals. Now, don’t take them from anyone else, but find the places, people, communities, moments, and relationships that support and reinforce them. Where do you find yourself belonging? Able to show up in your fullness and authenticity and be welcomed? With whom are you safe? Able to take risks and be relatively secure? When do you practice agency? Making decisions, even erroneous ones, then getting to make the next one and the next. And who supports our dignity? Your unassailable sense of self-worth that isn’t tied to any achievement or behavior. Find those spaces and steep yourself in them.If you don’t have them, co-create them, and if you have an abundance of them, invite others into them. “We can be whole again,” is always plural: I can’t be well without you.