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There is a sort of consensus that there is an inherent good to talking about, actively processing, analyzing trauma. The feeling is there must be truth there -

There is a sort of consensus that there is an inherent good to talking about, actively processing, analyzing trauma. The feeling is there must be truth there - something to learn, and explanations for personal tendencies based on it. For some people who have been able to work through their own trauma, the processing may have been wordless, barely conceptual, not at all based in logical processing or traditional talk therapy. Maybe language-izing all that shit just brings the memories up for these people. For them the healing is not about learning or understanding. So so so much pain just can’t be understood. It’s not meant to be. We want to control it by knowing it, but that’s often not how it works. Maybe there is some hubris and cultishness in thinking it can or must be.

jancsika 3y ago
> For some people who have been able to work through their own trauma, the processing may have been wordless, barely conceptual, not at all based in logical processing or traditional talk therapy. That's a good point, and definitely at odds with what OP wrote here: > But there are a lot of people for whom "holding it in" and adopting general-purpose stoic principles are enough. In every case I've ever witnessed, "holding it in" meant that someone tried to refrain from showing any signs of distress (spoken or body language) when they are in fact feeling a very negative emotion. Outside of special cases-- say, someone who might get physically ill if they don't stop crying-- "holding it in" is so close to denial that we might as well call it functionally equivalent. Alternatively, wordlessly sitting with one's emotions is actively encouraged in any healthy setting I've ever been a part of. Often it is the thing that people try their hardest to avoid doing, using a host of techniques like misdirection, rationalization, even problem solving. And in the cases I've seen, that person isn't trying to hold anything in. You can clearly see the secondary signs of them feeling pain. Moreover, I'd be concerned about someone who cannot even put a few descriptors to what their pain felt like after the fact. It's a useful thing to do even for a simple check in over time. I have a hard time believing that doing so would actually hinder someone's ability to confront whatever it is they're dealing with. Finally, just to rankly speculate a bit more-- one who has stoicism as a target would almost certainly advance toward their goal by being open to fully feeling and expressing the deeper pains they struggle with. IIRC, identifying, feeling, accepting, and expressing certain pains oftenmake the impact of that pain decrease over time (if slowly). So, ironically, the non-stoic person slowly progresses closer to "indifference to pain" than the stoic who is (according to OP) holding it in.

jancsika 3y ago

> For some people who have been able to work through their own trauma, the processing may have been wordless, barely conceptual, not at all based in logical processing or traditional talk therapy. That's a good point, and definitely at odds with what OP wrote here: > But there are a lot of people for whom "holding it in" and adopting general-purpose stoic principles are enough. In every case I've ever witnessed, "holding it in" meant that someone tried to refrain from showing any signs of distress (spoken or body language) when they are in fact feeling a very negative emotion. Outside of special cases-- say, someone who might get physically ill if they don't stop crying-- "holding it in" is so close to denial that we might as well call it functionally equivalent. Alternatively, wordlessly sitting with one's emotions is actively encouraged in any healthy setting I've ever been a part of. Often it is the thing that people try their hardest to avoid doing, using a host of techniques like misdirection, rationalization, even problem solving. And in the cases I've seen, that person isn't trying to hold anything in. You can clearly see the secondary signs of them feeling pain. Moreover, I'd be concerned about someone who cannot even put a few descriptors to what their pain felt like after the fact. It's a useful thing to do even for a simple check in over time. I have a hard time believing that doing so would actually hinder someone's ability to confront whatever it is they're dealing with. Finally, just to rankly speculate a bit more-- one who has stoicism as a target would almost certainly advance toward their goal by being open to fully feeling and expressing the deeper pains they struggle with. IIRC, identifying, feeling, accepting, and expressing certain pains oftenmake the impact of that pain decrease over time (if slowly). So, ironically, the non-stoic person slowly progresses closer to "indifference to pain" than the stoic who is (according to OP) holding it in.