“When pain monsters come to feed on your broken heart, you will move from a place of thriving into an existence of surviving. . . . But whatever name you slap on it, pain that isn’t dealt with will eventually require your immediate attention.”- Christa Black Gifford
Christa Black Gifford continues Chapter 2 of Heart Made Whole as she talks about two kinds of trauma. She cites neuroscientist Dr. Jim Wilder. Dr. Wilder describes two types of trauma that can occur in our hearts and also keep us stuck in the past, Trauma A and Trauma B.
- Trauma B – involves everything that’s happened that never should have: abuse, bullying, starvation, discrimination, etc. Since bad things continue to happen daily throughout the world, our hearts may find us victimized by Trauma B pain – pain we didn’t choose.
- Trauma A– God created our human race to thrive in life-giving relationships. Thus, Trauma A consists of the absence of all the things you should have received, but failed to. For example, nurture and affirmation. Most noteworthy, the absence characteristics of Trauma A possess the same painful potential to the heart as the abusive punches of Trauma B.
Yet, Ms. Gifford posits, God knew that Adam and Eve would eat of the tree in the Garden of Eden. Therefore, He fashioned our hearts in a special way. Christa explains:
“Out of His overwhelming love for me — for all of us as His children — God brilliantly fashioned our hearts in a way that equips us to survive in the world, giving them the ability to keep pain from overwhelming us so we can function.”
However, Christa cautions, God gave us this coping mechanism as a temporary solution to help us survive emotional pain. But He never intended it as a permanent solution to heal our pain. Sooner or later, the pain you fail to deal with requires your immediate attention.
Today’s question: What pain monsters feeding on your broken heart moved you from thriving to surviving? Please share.
Coming Monday: the latest addition to Crown’s Annotated Bibliography – Finding Favor: God’s Blessings Beyond Health, Wealth, and Happiness
Tomorrow’s blog: “Spelunking down with Jesus”