“Where’s my holy shift? “This was the question that my peer asked me after I had shared my process with her on exploring money trauma. I was a little surprised that this trained coach thought that information guaranteed transformation. I kindly replied that there is no holy shift, that revealing and releasing childhood trauma or any kind of trauma requires a rewiring of the brain and nervous system. So no, there is no holy shift.
What there is, is an A-HA moment where our patterns of behavior come into focus, a moment of clarity if you will. But what usually follows is an OH SHIT moment where you then see that you have got some work to do. This is is the fork in the road where I see some people go back into denial and forge their familiar path. And, sometimes I see people with determination in their eyes, roll up their sleeves and say, “let’s get to work.” Bliss!
It pains me to see people get stuck in an expectation that they can have a holy shift or ah-ha moment and that this is enough for transformation. Even with a moment of enlightenment you still have to take that information in, embody it, practice it and make decisions daily not to revert to old thoughts feelings and behaviors.
Information is wonderful, if it weren’t I would not be doing my research on how childhood trauma impacts entrepreneurship but it is not enough. I remember listening to Tim Ferris’s podcast a year or so ago and he was interviewing Derek Sivers. Tim says, “One of my favorite quotes that I’ve ever heard him put out there: “If more info were the answer, we’d all be billionaires with perfect abs.” I agree, we crave information and it is out there in abundance because that is the EASY thing to provide. It takes real guts, and dedication to transform and even more wisdom and courage to allow someone to walk that path with you. You can listen to that episode here, enjoy!
You see to go from A-HA, OH SHIT, to I GOT THIS, you need someone with experience, training, an understanding of how trauma works and how it impacts your business. You need someone who knows how to create safety while you gather insight and disrupt old patterns of behavior.
What is ALSO very important here is that if you are working with human beings in any way that impacts their mindset, emotions, success, or personal development, etc. YOU need to understand that the people you work with ALSO need more than just information, they need transformation.
One of the most common mistakes that I see coaches, healers, and transformational leaders make is to bypass the emotional needs of their clients. They bombard their clients with more information, more strategies, more tools, instead of being curious about the emotional patterns underneath their client’s resistance.
As leaders, we must begin to offer more transformation and to do this we must all become more trauma aware, informed and most of all WE MUST do our internal work to understand how childhood trauma has informed our patterns of behavior and how we can disrupt this pattern for the benefit of ourselves, our clients, our business, our community, and the world.
Are you curious about how to do this? Download my Trauma & Entrepreneurship Assessment to get you started.