Dynamic Flashbacks are triggered not by objects in the outside world nor by the vulnerability of the inside world, but rather in the interplay or dynamic between them. I tell a story about a friend of mine who, after buying me a coffee said… “I was just in a car accident and I am having flashbacks of having been abused as kid!!! what the heck is up with that????” “Great Question,” I said, “What happened in the car accident?”
She said, “I just came up to a red light. It had just turned red so I was reaching over to get something out of the glove compartment. WHAM. Right out of the blue, someone hit me from behind. I didn’t see it coming. It jarred my neck, had an impact on my body. Now, I have never suppressed the fact that I was abused as a kid, why would a car accident trigger such strong flashbacks??!!??”
What happened in the abuse?
She said, “It was an uncle of mine. Great guy. I loved him so much. He was the only one in my world to pay attention to me. …. then one night… right out of the blue…. I didn’t see it coming….” she stopped mid sentence.
“Like getting hit from behind?” I asked.
Usually at this point when I speak to others about this I stand up and walk across the room get out my 10,000 psi finger stand over the person point at them and look down my finger at them, and ask… How old do you feel when I do this? Overwhelm in 3.5 seconds. they mutter an age. 5 years old for some. Its important to know how quickly the dynamic flashback can happen. It may not be a memory. But what happens is the software triggered in the brain is 5 years old. Everything learned after that isn’t in that program. We may not be able to access memories.. because there aren’t any. Heck, in that moment, they don’t even know who I am. People who are triggered to emotional states prior to having the words to express them, lose the words again. It is overwhelming, and we feel like a little kid.
The Role of the Consciousness in Healing Dynamic Flashbacks.
Triggers are recordings. They are not objects in the outside world, they are objects in the inside world. An internal trigger starts the playback of a flashback. The conscious mind is like an incident commander at a fire scene, or like a ring master at a circus. Its job is much simpler and tougher than what first appears. The incident commander must be aware, set intention and communicate by listening and speaking. The incident commander does not put out the fire. If the incident commander decided to go and hook up a fire hydrant, the whole operation may be at risk because the commander is no longer paying attention. The conscious mind does not do the healing. It doesn’t know how. But it knows parts that does know how to heal, and sets the intention with will and voice, and stands back to let the part do the job, and looks for inconsistencies, communication miscues, and issues that block or interfere with the intention. In another part of this website I describe the human psyche using the metaphor of the circus. The Ring Master doesn’t know how to turn somersaults on a high wire, nor how to tame animals. The ring master may have a good sense of humour, but his/her role is not to become a clown. The Ring Master makes room for the other circus performers, coordinates and integrates those skills into a narrative. The most skilled Ring Master is a keen observer and knows how to communicate with the crowd what is going on while the performer does the work. An indirect flashback is not the same as a direct flashback, it may take some detective work to recognize the vulnerable state, and to trace the link from the event to the vulnerability and back to the event again. One asks how the experience is unfolding and what is the nature of the perspective of the seer? How old do you feel? Are you experiencing this through the eyes of a child, a teen, or an adult? We can’t coach ourselves out of a dynamic flashback. We cant be 5 and not 5 at the same time. Deprograming and defusing this takes the presence of a trained person.
Dynamic Flashbacks and The Shift
The shift technique, using the observation powers of the consciousness, focuses on which sense is being triggered, and how the experience is happening in the here and now. A woman once told me of her sister coming to visit. Her sister was rather high maintenance, and my friend was finding it difficult in feeling taken for granted. The stress from the situation was not high, but the vulnerability state which was accessed contained a lot of flashbacks of being abused as a kid. The shift technique then addresses what to do with the energy invested in those images and where the energy should go. The Shift is not self talk. It is not Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. It is not a matter of willing the impact to go away. Those approaches only create a duality and focuses on pushing past the intrusion. The shift focuses on what is happening at the moment, and not focused past the moment to the future outcome. I offer training in this technique and will offer an online course on its approach.
