Time Travelers

Trauma distorts a sense of time. This is true with personal trauma and collective trauma alike. As a more benign example, in the midst of this pandemic, how many of us have had trouble scaling an accurate sense of time? Experiences long-ago feel like they just happened, and experiences near in time can feel distant. I feel this sensation all the time, and I hear it from others too.

More challenging though, when we’re experiencing trauma on a deeper level in our bodies, we have moments in which the painful past feels re-lived and re-experienced in the present. On top of this, we likely project anxieties onto our imagined future too. These begin to feel real and present also. Past difficulties and future difficulties are converging inside us. Time is crashing within. This can feel very physical as it plays out in our bodies, and we may respond with fight, flight, freeze, or fawn reflexes.

But what if we could also hack this process a bit, reversing it and distorting time purposefully in our favor?

What if…

… we choose to recall the most supportive and affirming people, experiences, and chapters of our lives, remembering them and meditating on them in ways that allow us to feel their presence in our bodies? What if we make these present, and it impacts our physical sensations too?

… we choose to imagine a supportive and affirming future with beloved people, experiences, and next chapters at peace, with things likely working out (or with some bumps and resilience, turning out okay enough) and we encounter a future vision that energizes us in our bodies? What if we make these present, and it impacts our physical sensations too?

In this process, an affirming past and supportive future can also converge in the present, but now, we’re hacking this distortion intentionally.

–Renee Roederer