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CONTEXTS & CULTURES

experiences the events in our lives and our stories, not the the flower, he felt the stirrings of hope. He told me he
stories themselves. Singer writes a delightful imaginary thought to himself, “That flower is like me: living in a
exchange in which he is attempting to get someone to frozen place. If a flower can bloom in such an inhospi-
respond to the question, “Who are you?” The person table environment, then perhaps I can bloom too.” He
responds with biography. He replies, “Wait a minute, returned to the trailhead, got back in his car and literally
that’s a fascinating story, but I didn’t ask you what has began his spiritual journey home.
happened to you since you were born, I asked you, ‘Who An important fifth task for traumatized spiritual direct-
are you?’ You’ve just described all these experiences, but ees in the journey home to self is to recognize and honor
who had these experiences?” (24). the presence of a loving Being in their own lives and in
Fourth, to disconnect identity from story does not themselves. Perhaps the twelfth-century mystic Hildegard
mean the spiritual directee has no identity. In fact, it is to of Bingen phrased it best in her lines “You’re the Live
clear space in order to see the true self, the core self where in alive, the Be in every creature’s being, the Breathe
the Divine dwells. Nevertheless, it is initially a frighten- in every breath on earth” (Butcher, 36). Traumatized
ing place to stand. My trauma- spiritual seekers initially fail to
tized spiritual directees describe recognize the actions of a loving
it as being on the precipice of an Eventually, when God at all in their lives. If I ask
abyss. Trusting that there will be a traumatized spiritual directees
core—or at least trusting the pos- the time is right, where God was when their
sibility of one—can be a terrifying trauma experience happened,
place to stand. It involves trusting Spirit breaks through initially they generally will tell
the possibility of meeting a loving me “nowhere around.” Later,
God in the depths of the core. and deconstructs after some work with their story,
This journey is indeed a process of with their beginning awareness
going into the wilderness, seem- trauma survivors’ of a benign Presence or Energy
ingly without food or water. larger than themselves in their
Tied to identity is a sense of identities as limited lives, they may recognize ret-
meaning: if I identify myself as rospectively a sense of a caring
my trauma story, and my story to the trauma story. Energy which supported and
defines the meaning also of my held them at the time of the
life, to disengage my identity from trauma.
my story of trauma feels as if I also am releasing a sense Immediately follow questions of power, of accountabil-
of meaning and purpose for my life. It is, in a sense, to ity, and all the questions we ask in the face of unspeakable
throw the spiritual directee into a place of despair and horrors. As spiritual directors, we listen and hold these
apparent nonidentity. A man told me one day he had questions. I once facilitated a trauma group on images
driven to the trailhead leading to the rugged wilderness of of God. The group members wrestled deeply with ques-
the Rocky Mountains in the very early spring when the tions of God’s power (or lack of it) in the face of human
trails were still covered with snow. He intended to walk evil. The responses were varied, but one group member
into the mountains without food, proper clothing, or wondered if perhaps God’s power resided in the fact that
water, with no provisions at all, in the full knowledge that God continues to love strongly and well even in the face
he would die. He felt at the time, he said, without hope, of human evil. Her comment became a turning point
filled with despair. He saw no reason to live. He drove to for the group: divine power no longer resided in force or
the trailhead and began what he thought would be his condemnation, but in love.
final walk. He walked a short distance on the snowy trail, Eventually, when the time is right, Spirit breaks
looked down, and there was a pasque flower pushing up through and deconstructs trauma survivors’ identities as
through the snow, in full bloom. He said as he looked at limited to the trauma story. Traumatized spiritual seekers

Volume 20 No. 3 • September 2014 53