What is trauma?
According to Integrated listening Systems ‘trauma is the response to a deeply distressing or disturbing event. The event overwhelms an individual’s ability to cope, causes feelings of helplessness, diminishing their sense of self and ability to feel the full range of emotions and experiences.
What causes trauma?
Trauma arises when an experience overwhelms our nervous system. This can happens when we are unprepared or unable to process the emotional and physiological intensity of a situation. In other words, trauma isn’t just about what happens—it’s about how we experience what happens.
Trauma is subjective
The experience of trauma is deeply personal. It’s not the external event alone that determines whether something is traumatic, but rather how our body, mind, and nervous system respond to it. What overwhelms one person may not affect another in the same way.
Two people, two responses
For example, a client once told me about something that happened when she was around ten years old. She was playing in the park when an elderly man exposed himself. Her body froze, she couldn’t speak, and she began to shake—she was in complete shock.
But her friend, who witnessed the same incident, had a totally different response. She burst out laughing and shouted at the man, telling him how ridiculous he was. For her, the experience was absurd and even funny. For my client, it was frightening and disorienting.
This illustrates how trauma is shaped by our individual perceptions and nervous system responses—not simply the facts of what occurred.
Reflecting on traumatic experiences
Understanding trauma begins with recognising that it lives in the body as much as in the mind. Reflection, compassion, and practices that support nervous system regulation can help us gradually integrate these overwhelming experiences—so they no longer define us or derail us in the present.
Reflecting on my own trauma journey
My personal traumatic experiences occurred during mid-childhood, teenage years, and early adulthood. These, alongside many other significant life moments, have shaped the person I am today. The process has brought not only insight and pain—but also incredible maturation.
Reconstructing the puzzle of trauma
Piecing together fragmented traumatic memories takes deep, sustained effort. Practices like Nonviolent Communication (NVC), meditation, psychotherapy, and body-based techniques such as somatic experiencing, breath work, and movement therapy can help release blocked energy and support the gradual reconstruction of a coherent life narrative.
When the past feels like the present
Even with a strong commitment to healing, trauma fragments often remain. These can be reactivated by current experiences that unconsciously echo earlier wounds. The body—guided by ancient survival intelligence—does not always register that the original threat is no longer present.
In these moments, the nervous system can respond as if the danger is happening now. The limbic system, which governs emotional and survival responses, becomes highly activated. In this state, the amygdala—our brain’s alarm system—fires up, and the prefrontal cortex, responsible for reasoning, reflection, and regulation, can go offline. This neurobiological cascade can result in fight, flight, freeze, fawn, or even complete immobilisation, making it difficult to remain present, responsive, or connected in the ways we might wish.
Trauma stored in the body can trigger extreme stress responses during present experiences
Imagine a child who endures a frightening, violent situation, unable to protect themselves. Years later, that same child may unexpectedly feel threatened by something that seems unrelated to the original trauma. Perhaps panic arises when a teacher asks them to stop talking to a friend in class, prompting them to run out of the room.
Or imagine a teenager who was silenced—either by fear or force. As an adult, this person is asked to speak unexpectedly in public. Despite knowing the topic well, they freeze, words vanish, their heart races, nausea rises—they are overwhelmed.
These intense reactions are signs that the nervous system is still trying to protect us, even years later.
Trauma as a call for compassion
These responses, while rooted in the past, often signal our need for safety, boundaries, care, and respect. In moments of activation, it’s essential to meet ourselves—and others— empathy and compassion.
Things aren’t always what they seem
I believe most of us carry some form of trauma inside. When people behave in ways that seem confusing or unexpected, I invite us to pause and get curious. Often, behind those behaviors are protective patterns born from pain. With care, we can create environments where people feel safe to share their gifts—beyond the limitations of past wounds.
Is your treasure buried beneath old wounds?
As we deepen insight into our own trauma wounds, we begin to grieve for what we didn’t receive—the safety, love, or support we needed in critical moments. We gain the ability to rewrite old stories and imagine new beginnings.
Trauma awareness fosters compassion—for ourselves and for others. It reminds us that every moment is coloured by what came before.
There are many practices that help us reclaim our strength and honour the unique vulnerabilities that make us fully human. We are not here to be perfect—but to be real.
One of my favourite teachings on healing
A passage from The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams beautifully captures this journey of becoming “Real”:
“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near
the nursery fender, before Nanna came to tidy the room.
“Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”
“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse.
“It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time,
not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”
“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.
“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful.
“When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”
“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”
“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse.
“You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people
who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept.
Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off,
and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby.
But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real
you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”
Trauma impacts us all – individually and collectively
I’ve had the privilege of facilitating many personal development retreats in Mt Pelion, Greece. We speak of our wounds and dance with the myth of Chiron—the wise centaur and wounded healer. Mt Pelion is said to be his home.
No one escapes life without moments that leave lasting marks. Whether we are parents, partners, leaders, healers, teachers, or coaches, it’s an honour to work with people and practices that embrace vulnerability and humanness. Our wounds are part of us.
Sometimes we carry our own pain. Sometimes we carry it on behalf of our families, our communities, or even our nations. These wounds don’t make us broken—they make us human.
From reaction to responsibility
Becoming aware of our wounds, helps us recognise when our current experience is being coloured—or hijacked—by the past. When we pause to notice this, we can respond with choice rather than react from conditioning. That is the doorway to healing.
As we heal, we offer others not only strength but the lived example of how to meet pain with love and courage
Integration of body, heart, and mind
To truly heal, we need to engage the body, heart, and mind. This is why so many facilitators are incorporating movement and embodiment practices into their work.
In my own practice, I draw on modalities including:
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Nonviolent Communication (NVC)
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Mindful breath awareness
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Centering and grounding exercises
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Biocentric postures
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NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming)
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Internal Family Systems (IFS)
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Biodanza
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The Discipline of Authentic Movement
These approaches help us reconnect with ourselves and others in deeply transformative ways
If you’d like to talk
If something in this blog resonates and you’d like to explore it further, feel free to email me at tracy@tracyseed.com
I’m not a psychotherapist—but I am a holistic coach, trainer, and educationalist. I work with individuals, families, and organisations using a range of modalities to support emotional healing and communication that fosters wellbeing.
Trauma is everywhere. And because of that, it shows up regularly in the work I do.
Want to explore further?
🎧 Listen to this podcast on understanding trauma
💡 Explore trauma-informed therapies for complex trauma and PTSD
Peter Levine’s Self Holding exercise
Thanks for the insights. This article is very helpful.
I appreciate your comment thankyou:)