5 Myths about Trauma and Healing Debunked

Are you stuck in a cycle of 'thinking' through your healing? Discover the 5 myths about trauma that reinforce the mind-body split and learn how somatic therapy builds a bridge back to your whole self.

Myth 1: “Trauma is a psychologically abnormal reaction that only happens to ‘broken’ people.”

The Debunk: Trauma is actually a normal reaction to abnormal circumstances (environments, events, life experiences, the systems we live, and the collective experience our generations/people experience/d).

When we are taught to view trauma as a personal defect, it becomes harder to move towards healing and view healing as an action that is life affirming and life enhancing. When the system is sick, the body responds. It’s not a pathology; it’s intelligence. What if we saw it as a systemic survival response?

Myth 2: The “Mind Over Matter”: You can think or talk your way out of trauma.”

The Debunk: Trauma is an unintegrated, fragmented energy held in the autonomic nervous system. The amygdala doesn’t care about your logic; it cares about your survival. We cannot ‘outsmart’ an incomplete fight-or-flight or Orientation response because it doesn’t happen in the conscious mind so it cannot be processed through the conscious mind.

Myth 3: “I’m fine; you’re the one with the trauma history.”

One of the most dangerous myth in relational fields and in the wellness industry is that trauma is something 'other people' have.

The Debunk: If you have a nervous system, you have likely experienced a form of trauma. It isn’t just about what happened; it’s about what stayed behind in your body.

We we tend to analyse Trauma in others because it’s a safer way to interact with the concept. When we point to a system or a person and say "they are traumatised," we create a psychological distance that prevents us from feeling our own racing heart or shallow breath.

Myth 4: The “Past is Past” Myth: “we should just leave the past behind and move on.”

The Debunk: Unhealed trauma from decades ago contributes to the “stuckness” of today. Paulo Coelho said: “you drown not by falling into a river but by staying submerged in it.” Does this resonate?

Myth 5: “Trauma is the same for everyone.”

The Debunk: Trauma is not ‘fair,’ and healing isn’t just a matter of willpower.

For marginalised communities, people of colour, and those living in poverty or war zones, trauma is systemic and environmental. It is essential to confront the ‘Collective Denial’ often inherent in privilege. This denial acts as a barrier, preventing us from acknowledging the historical and intergenerational wounds that continue to shape our present-day systems. True somatic work requires us to look at the ‘Soma’ of the community, not just the individual. Real systems change requires acknowledging the historical wounds still active in our bodies today.

Beyond the Myths — Reclaiming the Whole Self

Somatic therapy invites us to do more than just debunk these myths; it calls us to transform that awareness into life-enhancing action.

We cannot pretend that everyone starts their healing journey from the same place. In Somatic work, we need to acknowledge race, marginalisation, injustice and the generational and cultural burdens we carry.

Somatic therapy recognises that modern Western psychotherapy often reflects a profound fragmentation. For too long, psychology has divided the human experience: assigning our thoughts and feelings to the analyst’s chair, while relegating our physical bodies to the bodyworker’s table. This artificial divide has reinforced the body-mind split that so many of us struggle with today. Therefore, Somatic Therapy exists to build bridges across those once-separated processes of Psyche, Soma, and Spirit. It is a movement toward a truly holistic approach to being human. Somatic brings us back into movement together that restores the principles and foundations of existing in a community to move beyond what’s been lost due to fragmentation and individualism If trauma flows through our connections and ripples across communities, then healing must be a communal act alongside our own individual journeys.

Unfortunately, this recognition of our need for integration often only arrives when the body begins to speak through suffering—particularly through the heavy weight of unresolved issues like chronic health problems and systemic exhaustion which limit our capacities for connection.

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