Is Trauma a Gift WeWant To Accept?

Is stroke, a heart attack, divorce or any kind of major physical trauma somehow a gift?  Should we accept it 'just because'? ('We're taught that 'nice' people 'should' accept their gifts with a smile...)

PS - Whenever I hear the word 'should' I think "aha... the trick word..." Whatever the thought is around the word, I immediately doubt it and check it out. The word 'should' is a signal to me to question whatever it is that I 'should' do...

Back to the thread: I certainly question this...

From my perspective, I don't think we need to accept anything. Unless we want to. If acceptance works for you, great. If not, I think that's fine too.

I hear people talking about their illness or troubles as 'a gift' and I must admit I’m gobsmacked!  Do they really believe that or have they been brainwashed?  Have they been convinced somehow that they 'have to' believe that in order to do as well as possible?

Sure, we learn from every little thing that happens to us, good or bad. Is that any reason to welcome adversity with open arms? I’m angry for all those who didn’t make it and I find it hard to listen. What about those people?  Is death their gift?  What about those of us that cannot 'accept'... Is there no healing for us? My instincts shout "poppycock" - or words to that effect.

Trauma happens all around us, every day, to anyone. I think we have no choice but to do the best we can with whatever life throws at us. And to learn from it. We can resist change or not, that is our choice. Do we need to stop and 'accept' in order to heal, as is often lectured to us? Or is life simpler and easier than that?

Can we just take each moment, as is, and do our best? Do whatever we think is best... Sometimes we'll do well and sometimes we won't - either is OK. We alone have to live with the consequences of our actions, whatever they are.

It is a huge thing to demand that someone 'accept' their trauma. Yet according to letters and posts here on the site, that is what is still asked of people.  Despite the new brain research and the living proof - in myself and many of our readers - that if you keep on reaching for your goals you will make amazing progress...

For myself, I am very thankful that I didn't 'accept' because I did walk again - and much more. Had I accepted it, I may not have tried so hard... Would I have been a more contented person, albeit in a wheelchair? Perhaps... Is it just my nature to be stubborn? (My mother would agree that it is!)  If it is, so what?  To try and get our heads around such a massive demand as 'acceptance' is, in my mind, a waste of precious energy.

I would say that to live every moment as fully and passionately and kindly and compassionately (including compassionate to yourself) is the crux of the matter. Life will take care of the rest. Accept or not, does it really make a difference? Why waste energy trying to accept the future (because any prognosis - on which acceptance would be based - is 'future') when the future may well not happen as planned anyway?

Unfortunately there is big business in feeding on and fanning our fears. Our western society is too often greedy and consumerist.  We allow the media, which is run by Big Corporations, to show us ‘the light’.  I think this might be where the current talk of ‘gift’ came from: we’ve been packaged!

Cancer and all things pink seem to be today's latest fashion.  I am touched and very grateful when an individual helps another with an intention of kindness.  If a company offers to help and is honest about its reasons, whatever they are, I am OK with that too.  But when a company tries to fool me and uses people’s misery as part of their 'marketing plan', I cringe.  The whole ‘gift’ elaboration seems to be a clever marketing idea, fed to us by big business.

Surely, there (post trauma) but for the grace of God go each and every one of us? To give is as important a human need as to receive.... Not part of a clever marketing plan.

Even the concept that our life in itself might be a gift is one I have some trouble with.  To me, life just 'is'... I love it and it's wonderful...  But was it conferred on me?  'Should' I be grateful to anyone?  (Watch out for the 'shoulds'...)  Or is love and gratitude just something I can choose to give - or not?

Perhaps our life is a gift to our parents?   No, wait…  That definitely doesn’t ring true!  While some people long for a child, I think my parents were just ordinary, young people and they were kind of shocked when they learned I was on the way.  Horrified, even!  They were delighted, after the initial shock and the 180 degree turn my arrival - and any baby - necessitated in their lives... Which is probably a good example of my theory? The best success, in terms of our own satisfaction with our own lives, is to take what comes to us and do the best we can with it: to be flexible.

But hold on... That means, surely, that my parents did accept me? Yes and no... I think they embraced me and did their best, moment by moment without stopping and considering whether or not they accepted parenthood.  In retrospect, they may well have done.  But no-one held it over their heads and told them they couldn't be parents unless they accepted me.  They didn't resist it and at every turn they did their best. What more can anyone do?

Perhaps life is just… life. We need to live it, the good, bad and the sometimes ugly.  Learn from it, if we choose.  Make the best we can of each moment – even the bad ones – for our own sake.  Share community and caring.  Love one another (if we choose).  And just do our best.  This IS our life.  Every moment.  And your best, like mine, is definitely good enough.

For me, all that has happened to me just ‘is’…  Nothing more or less.  It’s part of my reality.  Disappointingly simple really… Good things and bad things happen; pleasant and unpleasant; things that feel good and things that certainly do not. To embrace life, whatever it throws at us, and to to live it well and passionately is wonderful. It's contagious. It is an example to all of us. But does it make us heroes? Did we volunteer for our trauma? In my eyes a true hero is someone who voluntarily puts his own life at risk to help others.

My real gift is my world - and I’m sure it’s different for everybody. For me it’s the ocean and the air and the birds – right down to each individual blade of grass.  It’s my mom and my friends and my beautiful kids.  It is the young men my sons have become and their ‘growing’.  I see them struggle with some of the same issues that have troubled me in the past and I feel so honoured to be able to share those times with them and, hopefully, to support them a little.  For me it’s a beautiful gift when someone takes time out of their day to share their knowledge and experience with me.  And it’s just as much of a gift, to me, to be able to give and share what I have learned with others.

Gifts to me are love and caring and community.  Definitely not cancer or a heart attack or a brain injury.  Those are just ‘things’ or ‘events’, a part of life – a part I don’t particularly enjoy - and a part I have no choice but to live with. And to live a good life after... I really object when, without my permission, my life and my personal and private struggle is used as part of some big corporation's marketing plan.

In the past, companies could dictate and influence individual behaviour in society quite easily. When I was a child in the Middle East, a famous powdered milk company influenced parents that the healthiest, bonniest babies were ones who were bottle fed and that no 'Modern Mother' would deprive her baby of this wonderful artificial milk. This company successfully influenced society by molding the belief that western women produced healthy, bonny babies because of their powdered milk. Similarly, now the media is trying to foist on us the belief that we can do better and be happier and thrive if we all eat pink candies!! You decide how well and how happy you are.  And thriving has nothing to do with candy...

Unfortunately the water in the Middle East in the 60's, with which the powdered milk was made, was not safe to drink. There was a cholera epidemic and many little lives were lost.

Now, thanks to the internet we - ordinary people - have a voice. Let's use it! It's harder for big corporations to successfully influence us and pull the wool over our eyes to enhance profit. We have an opportunity to speak out. To share our truths with each other, link hands and form strong networks. Let's use the internet to help each other when times are tough and to share information so every one of us can form our own truths.

I would love to hear your stories and I invite you to write to me