Why Therapy Doesn't Work and What to Do to Heal Your Trauma

Why therapy doesn’t work

"I have the awareness, the insight so to speak, and it's not enough. Nothing is changing for me. If anything, my awareness makes me feel more frustrated and disconnected from my self and my life. If I know why I am the way I am, shouldn't I be able to do something about it? And if I can't, does that make me insane?"

This is what I commonly hear from my clients when we first meet. Change for them often means getting to a point where they can let go of trying to control everything, surrender enough to allow themselves to be—just be. It sounds so simple theoretically yet this is the peak of their individual mountain. They yearn to pause, rest, take in the view, and experience the joy of their lives. On the peak they don't have to do anything else or be anyone else. On the peak they are enough. Being is enough. They are already complete.

What gets in the way between them and their Peaks of Being? What weighs down on them as they attempt to make the climb? They are like Sisyphus, condemned to carry a boulder up a steep hill only to find that just as they are about to reach the peak the boulder rolls down hopelessly forcing them to begin again. This is what traditional therapy, especially talk therapy, often feels like.

Traditional therapy is not for everyone. I would go so far as to say, the more intellectual, analytical, and hyperaware you already are, the less effective it will be for you. Chances are you have a strong critical thinking mind, you can shift between perspectives easily, you can relate to many sides of an argument, and you can focus your attention so inwardly you drown out the noise of life altogether. You may have a special knack for dissociating from the present and disconnecting from what matters to you most. And what matters most is showing up for yourself and others authentically and wholeheartedly with a sense of purpose, belonging, and aliveness.

Traditional therapy can pull you in the opposite direction. It can throw your boulder back down the mountain and force you to begin again regardless of how hard you try. That's because it reinforces the already hardworking intellectual parts of you that believe knowing more and knowing better will make you feel better and feel whole at last. You may seek to gain an understanding of what plagues you as a means to get rid of vulnerability and never again feel the same pain. Knowledge and information can become a type of armor, shielding us from the deeper wounded parts of our psyche that don't need to know more. They need to be known by us and communed with. The more they are ignored, silenced, or exiled, the louder and more intense they will become to get our attention and be seen, heard, and loved by us.

Traditional therapy can leave you feeling more stuck, traumatized, and desperate for change than ever. I can relate because I've been there. I've made it my life's mission to help other trauma survivors not have to go through what I went through, especially since I now know there IS another way.

4 reasons why therapy doesn’t work:

1. It’s unsafe and re-traumatizing.

Traditional types of therapy, especially talk therapy, either focus on symptom management without addressing the underlying root cause of trauma or go straight to the deepest pain point bypassing, invalidating, or challenging defenses and coping mechanisms that have been essential for the client’s survival. These survival strategies need our acknowledgment, gratitude, and compassion in order for true transformation to occur. If they are not given the respect they deserve, the result is no change and/or backlash leading to a worsening of symptoms, re-traumatization, and a downward spiral of hopelessness and helplessness. In other words, therapy can not work in the best case and make clients worse in the worst case.

2. It’s pathologizing and stigmatizing.

As a culture we have focused all our efforts on squelching or turning away from pain and suffering while moving toward “positive” experiences. We have lost touch with the Yin-Yang nature of Being. We want the impossible—the ascent to our Psychic Heavens without the descent into the Shadow Underworld. Everything in our Shadow Underworld has become medicalized or clinicalized to the point of being devoid of meaning that resonates on a soul level in deep primal, ancestral, and mystical ways. The misguided world of traditional psychotherapy has helped vilify and exile the vulnerable parts of our selves dwelling in the shadow realms. These are the very parts of us that hold hidden treasures and powers buried within them. Trauma at its most fundamental level is a vehicle for transcendence and traditional therapy misses the mark.

3. It’s one-dimensional and outdated.

Transformation is not linear and we are not monolithic minds driving around in flesh vehicles. We contain multitudes. There are entire worlds within us that carry personal, universal, spiritual, and biological truths. The parts of ourselves that we experience in our everyday life are more than meets the eye. We are divine beings having a human experience. At our very core, there is a Self that remains intact, undamaged, and a source of unimaginable wisdom and healing regardless of our wounding. Our bodies are sacred living, breathing organisms that shape and are shaped by our experiences. We now know more than ever what trauma does to our bodies and how healing interventions can target different pathways or structures in the brain and nervous system to bring about real change. Modern day psychotherapy still has not integrated this cutting-edge, evidence-based knowledge.

4. It overlooks the high-functioning trauma survivor who has coped with their woundedness by performing and achieving.

In traditional psychotherapy and psychiatry, there is a huge emphasis on functionality. For example, a patient meets the criteria for a diagnosis based on the degree to which the symptoms impair functioning in personal, social, and/or work domains. What about those amongst us who are the walking wounded? We look like we are thriving yet we are struggling to survive in the psycho-spiritual dimension of life. Perhaps our traumas have propelled us upward on an ascent from which great feats of success have been attained in the visible world. All the while we suffer an invisible spiraling descent into the Shadow Underworld. The walking wounded are masters of their hyper-functioning, orderly, busy, external lives and slaves to their chaotic, unknown, mystical yet mystifying internal lives. These individuals need specialized trauma therapy and a customized healing process that honors their outward journey of achievement and their inward journey toward deep healing and transformation.

What can you do now? How can you heal your trauma?

1. Envision your healing journey.

Visualize, journal, reflect or meditate on what your ideal healing journey would look like and feel like. What do you wish therapists could get about you and your experience? What frustrates you about the current booming culture of therapy, healing, self-help, or self-care? How would you like to feel as a result of embarking on your own unique healing journey?

2. Open your eyes and look beyond your current horizons.

There are so many types of therapy today that are cutting-edge, evidence-based, and trauma-focused. Do your own research, read the books, attend the workshops or retreats, and expose yourself to diverse ways of deepening and expanding your healing. You can start by reading books like "The Body Keeps the Score” by Dr. Bessel van der Kolk. You may want to look into Internal Family Systems therapy, Somatic Experiencing, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy. You can stay up to date on the latest through the Trauma Research Foundation.

3. Widen your circle and play.

You can widen your circle of healing to include other types of therapy and a spirit of play. You get to define what therapy is for YOU. Therapy can be contributing to your community, expressing through art, moving your body, finding a mentor, becoming a mentor, learning a new skill, providing a service for others, reconnecting to the divine or your higher power through spiritual practices. The beauty of the wound, trauma, or whatever calamity has befallen you is that it becomes a door, a passageway, an initiation leading you back home to your Self. Sometimes finding your home, your center, means widening your circle to welcome the vulnerability and woundedness of others. Sometimes healing means withdrawing into the caves of safety nursing your shadows and sometimes it means venturing out into the seas of freedom riding the waves as they come. You get to experiment and play with it. There is no one solution for everyone and there is no one solution for every season of your life.

Therapy becomes another way to fight or flee from our vulnerability that is desperate to be known, loved, and healed.

It's human nature to move away from discomfort or reel from pain. It's also within our human capacity to move towards our pain and suffering. We can become intimate with our own vulnerability and gather around our own and each other's woundedness with love and compassion. Our body knows what to do—white blood cells migrate toward the infected, vulnerable part of our body to help us heal without us having to thinking about or understand the mechanism behind "leukocyte extravasation." Similarly, our core Self, who we are at our core as divine beings, knows what to do.

And I hope by now I've made it clear, no—you are not insane for being aware and not being able to change or transform in the way you want to. Yet. You are awake and present to the fact that healing happens at a deeper, primal level that calls you to brave the inner wilderness of your psyche and befriend your vulnerability. You know deep down that there's a missing piece here and there's some divine wisdom that can lead you back to wholeness and inner peace. I'm here to tell you that yes, you can climb your Peak of Being, release your boulder, and ascend to your Psychic Heavens to experience your joy, peace, love, and aliveness. But first, let’s get to know who in there is stuck carrying the boulder of your woundedness. Let’s honor and celebrate all the parts of you that got you to where you are today. If you’re a survivor of complex trauma, you showing up at all for your healing is a miracle.


Ready to heal from trauma and find your aliveness?

Letters from Sofia #3: How to Live with Meaning

how-to-live-with-meaning

Let’s Go Inside

Last month I found myself in the second largest surf capital of the world, Ericeira, Portugal. I was there for my Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy Level 3 training. I arrived at 3am and made my way to the hotel right on the coast. I was met by the warm glow of the full moon, the sound of crashing waves, and the intoxicating ocean smell. Every afternoon upon finishing our 8-hour training a group of us, who came to be known as the "Wave Warriors," would answer the call of the ocean. The "call" is the only way I can put it into words. The waves possessed their own gravitational field pulling us in despite the parts of us that feared for our lives.

The ocean became a sacred space filled with splashes, swells, and surges. Everyday we returned to the waves as though we were making an offering. We were baptized by the water that beckoned us to bring forth what lay dormant within us. Heraclitus' words come to mind, "No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man." With each ocean embrace we surrendered our past self to give birth to our future self. The water became the meeting place, where past, present, and future converged. We reached the point of no return over and over again with each rising crest.

We entered the alchemical liminal space in which lead becomes gold, fear becomes joy, pain becomes pleasure. We met each wave as if we were meeting life, with equal force knowing full well each surge was an initiation demanding us to be present...or else. We were called to experience the power of nature. We answered this call by creating our own gravitational field pulling in the playfulness, laughter, and aliveness we yearned for--that was our birth right. Poseidon would be pleased with us, that's for sure.

This is catharsis, purification, and metamorphosis. It's what we're born to do. Trauma draws a veil over our minds and hearts, blinding us to our truth. It makes us feel like we deserve the fear and pain and are destined to carry the unbearable weight of lead for eternity. It makes us feel like we are not entitled to joy, pleasure, and life itself. The forgotten truth is that transcendence is our default. We have forgotten the rapture--the mystical experience of overwhelming emotion leading to divine knowledge. It's the inevitable result of accepting and embracing your unique hero's journey. We are destined for gold and other hidden treasures that lie in the depths of our wounded Being.

I invite you to think about the moments in your life when you're called to step into the "river" or dive into the "ocean" that beckons you to bring forth that which lies dormant within you. It could be a challenging project, a tumultuous relationship, an illness, the death of a loved one, a sense of disconnection or alienation from yourself and others. These are moments of potential transformation and transmutation. Perhaps they are dark nights of the soul. Perhaps they are an opportunity to throw caution to the wind and to surrender to something greater within you and beyond you. In this surrender, you can find the freedom that awaits you. “Whatever it takes for you to find your freedom, that's what you've lived," as author and teacher Byron Katie states.


Questions

  • Under what conditions or in which situations have you felt the call to step into your "river" or dive into your "ocean" and be transformed? When have you experienced a sense of rapture and undergone an emotional or spiritual baptism? What was that like for you?

  • I invite you to wonder about how this present moment can induce a state of rapture. What “lead” is here that can be transmuted to gold? What is your call to adventure in the here-and-now?

  • Can you get to know with curiosity and compassion the parts of you that are scared to be present and open-hearted to this moment? How are they burdened by past experiences and what are their concerns today?

  • What if transcendence was your default? What if you could turn whatever trauma or tragedy befalls you into your own myth? How would you rewrite your story so you can fall "upward" and come away with a greater sense of meaning and aliveness?


More from Sofia

Letters from Sofia #1: Your Way Into the Light / newsletter

My first newsletter in case you missed it. I share with you the hero's journey of trauma recovery, how to reconnect with your Self, and the importance of feeling at home in our minds and bodies.

Letters from Sofia #2: Your Invitation to Magical Living / newsletter

My previous newsletter on finding your magic inspired by Halloween. I invite you to reflect on your “mask” or persona, what lies beneath the “mask,” and how to integrate your “shadow” to live in more alignment with greater joy and fulfillment.

Invitations for Exploration

  • I'm Reading: 

Dark Nights of the Soul: A guide to finding your way through Life’s Ordeals by Thomas Moore. This book by Thomas Moore provides a reframe on the classic dark night of the soul. Reading it feels like a balm for the soul and make it feel not only okay but also essential and worthwhile to sit in the darkness and wait for the hidden treasures or elixirs of your unique underworld to shine forth.

  • I'm Watching: ​

Johanna Under The Ice by Nowness. This is a video of Johanna, who began cold water treatment to prevent the amputation of her broken leg. Through the brokenness and pain a beautiful, peaceful new world was revealed to her. This has become a metaphor for how the brokenness and fragmentation of our psyches can act as trailheads leading us to deep healing, transformation, and freedom.

  • I'm Listening To: 

​Doctor Gabor Mate: The Shocking Link between Kindness and Illness | The Diary of a CEO. Dr. Gabor Mate shares the link between relational patterns and the potential for illness. He reveals how emotional dynamics playing out in your relationships may be impacting your mind-body connection and overall physical health. By sharing his vulnerability and transparency, he invites you to reflect on how your body may be saying “no” and how you can say “yes” to being in alignment with your true nature.

 

Ready to heal from trauma and find your aliveness?

Letters from Sofia #2: Your Invitation to Magical Living

Letters from Sofia #2: Your Invitation to Magical Living

Magic happens when we release our constraints and cross the threshold from known to unknown. I call this braving the inner wilderness. Many of my clients come to me because they have become masters of their hyper-functioning, orderly, busy, external lives and slaves to their chaotic, unknown, mystical yet mystifying internal lives. The immense work it takes to manage the gap, or misalignment, between the persona and the felt sense experience of their psyche is so exhausting it leaves no room for magic….

Letters from Sofia #1: Your Way Into The Light

Letters from Sofia #1: Your Way Into The Light

Trauma robs our nervous system from a sense of self, agency, and capacity to be at ease with what is. We don’t feel at home in our bodies and minds. Quite the opposite is true–our bodies and minds become home to the most violent of battlegrounds. At our best, we’re simply sidestepping our inner landmines through useful distractions on the “outside.” At our worst, we’re playing hopscotch with our landmines, exploding into a million fragmented pieces, rupturing even deeper our relationships (whether to ourselves or our loved ones). We have spiraled downward into the chaos of our Unique Underworld and fallen asleep to the true essence of Being. We are in the dark, cold and untethered. There is hope. There is a way into the light…

Encounter the Monster Within: A mythical pathway to post-traumatic growth

Encounter the Monster Within: A mythical pathway to post-traumatic growth

A single fact can shed immense light on the path to genuine healing and trauma recovery: The most haunting aspect of trauma is the shame we feel at our action or inaction in the face of adversity, tragedy, and horror. This shame can be even more haunting than the suffering inflicted on us by others…

The Odyssey of Healing: A message to trauma therapists and wounded healers

The Odyssey of Healing: A message to trauma therapists and wounded healers

This article was originally published by the Trauma Research Foundation on. Aug. 4, 2023. My colleague Depy and I co-created and hosted a free online course for the Trauma Research Foundation entitled, “Embody the Hero Within: How 5 Ancient Greek Myths Can Help Us Unlock Our Healing Potential.” You can access it for free here.

How to Overcome Narcissistic Abuse Using Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy

How to Overcome Narcissistic Abuse Using Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy

Have you ever heard the joke: Why did the narcissist cross the road? He thought it was a boundary. A part of me loves dark humor. Another part of me gets physically sickened at the thought of narcissistic abuse. Like pull out the barf bag sick! You see, I’m an adult child of a narcissist and many of my clients are survivors of narcissistic abuse. I grew up with no boundaries. Correction. I grew up with the boundaries my father set. And those boundaries had a very specific purpose: Create a reality in which my father had the most power and control over us. Raise your hand if you can you relate to this! I share with you 5 ways to overcome narcissistic abuse and get to experience joy, love, peace, and freedom through an Internal Family Systems therapy lens.

5 Signs You Need to Heal Your Mind to Body Connection

5 Signs You Need to Heal Your Mind to Body Connection

How do you begin healing the mind to body connection after trauma? The first step is to get curious. In Internal Family Systems Therapy terms, learn which parts of you don’t feel it’s safe or even possible to experience that attunement and oneness with your physical being. Trauma can live in your body in many ways. Different parts have taken on various coping strategies to help you get to where you are today. I share with you the 5 signs or strategies you need to heal your mind to body connection and feel peace, joy, freedom, and love.