Trauma In My Family

I found it difficult to read the chapters from this week, without seeing it through the lens of stress and my closest relationships and potential effects they have on each other as it relates to the emotion in conflict. For example the following statement from our text really resonated with me. [Emotion sets actions ‘into motion”, leading to your own unique subjective experience. This is what makes reflecting others’ feelings so important, and so challenging](Hocker & Wilmot, 2014, p. 190). While in the midst of life stress do I respond to my loved ones with the cognitive brain or the emotional brain? Do I take into account their “feelings as fact” as stated in the text? The answer is obviously both in varying degrees. The other passage …show more content…
In our conflicts it has not always been that way and naturally the desire is to always improve how we interact with those that we love. One obstacle we face is the fact that my childhood was one of dysfunction and poorly demonstrated methods of resolving conflict. I have had to learn better ways of expressing my feelings and or frustrations both from a macro and micro level. Something unique to our family is our experience with trauma. Trauma has caused everyone in the family on some level to isolate and disassociate in conflict and in general. When I look at the model of emotion it is clear to see that prolonged stress and anxiety that leads to activation can easily turn to sadness, depression and deactivation which we as a family have witnessed in each other over the years. It has only been in recent years that we have truly built the tools of communication void of negativity or outright avoidance. In doing so we utilize the methods described in the text such as the X-Y-Z formula for clarity to share difficult emotions. Don 't get me wrong we are not masters in communication but we have made huge improvements to our communication and overcoming conflict. “Leadership is knowledge, experience and intent of heart and you can only teach two of those”. This quote from an unknown source has been a guide in my life and coincides with our text as well. The idea of being a “warrior of heart” (pg. 211) is all about moving through conflict in one of two ways, either with compassion or a cold hardened heart. I have tried to make it a point to lead by example with my family by having compassion in the midst of conflict. Or in other words to have true intent of heart to be compassionate. Because of our life of trauma it is imperative to avoid the anger-fear sequence described in the text to avoid feelings of undo vulnerability which at