Peak Performance
Issue 21, Fall 2021
Self-Forgiveness for Overwhelming Experiences
By Bruce Dickson
T
he word "trauma" is an abstraction. The acronym "PTSD" is an abstraction. What is actually present? Overwhelming experiences.
Overwhelming experiences come in only two "flavors." Sometimes an overwhelming experience has both flavors. To clearly conceive this, we're going to need the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model of the waking adult psyche, so let's review it. In the human experience, our adult psyche is primarily two-fold. We have a Self which is not an internal part. We have multiple internal parts, who are not the Self. Self is our capacity for calm, curiosity, compassion (and the rest of the Eight Cs). Our internal parts, are our Minions, all the memories, habits and behaviors inside us, learned and formed thru repetition. There are at least a few thousand of them in the Habit Body of every adult. Many of our learned habits are working for us: how we talk, how we work and serve, 95% of our responses to life in the human experience. In a well adult, your Self is leading your system more of the time. Your hyper-reactive, disturbed Minions are leading only when you are taken by surprise or stressed. KinesioGeek Magazine, www.gemskinesiology.com 30
