As a continuous learner, coach and people leader, and someone whose purpose is creating value through talent potential & learning agility, I recently read the book, “What Happened to You.” I highly recommend it to my family, friends, organizational leaders and talent.
- “What’ happened to you” vs “What’s wrong with you”
- "Evocative cues (basically any sensory input like sight, sound, smell, taste, or touch) can activate a traumatic memory"
- "All experience is processed from the bottom up (brain)"
- "Experiences in the first years of life are disproportionately powerful in shaping how one’s brain organizes"
- "Brain develops sequentially, from the bottom up and inside out"
- "Unpredictable or extreme stress = dysregulation"
- "Emotions of people around us are contagious (transmissibility)"
- "The roots of health are rhythm and regulation"
- "The capacity to connect, to be regulating and regulated is the glue that keeps communities together"
- "We elicit in the world what we project in the world-what you project is based upon what happened to you"
- Brain makes sense of the world> creating associations and memories>characteristics cataloged > default response
- Our brains have the capacity to change and adapt through neuroplasticity
- "Belonging and being loved are core to the human experiences"
- "Anything that can cause unpredictable, uncontrollable, or extreme and prolonged activation of the stress response will result in an overactive and overly reactive stress response"
- "Glue of love is the small moments, when we feel the other person fully present, fully engaged, connected, and accepting"
- "The more we face moderate challenges and succeed, the more capable we are of facing bigger challenges"
- "The more threatened or stressed we are, the less access we have to the smart part of our brain (the cortex)"
- "Dissociation is a complex mental capability, in involves disengaging from the external world and focusing on our inner world"
- "A person will think, learn, feel and behave differently when they are afraid compared to then they feel safe"
- States of the brain are: Calm, alert, alarm, fear and terror
- "National Survey of Childrens Health found that almost 50% of the children in the U.S. have had at least one significant traumatic experience"
- "U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that 60% of the American adults report having had at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE), and 1/4th reported three or more"
- "30-50% of children in public schools have three or more ACEs"
- The neural networks involved in relational connection and regulation are very responsive to moments
- Three Es, event, experience and effects – PTSD is about the effects
- "Different patterns of stress can lead to: sensitization or reslience"
- "Transgenerational transmission...we absorb things from previous generations and pass them onto the next generation"
- "Regulate, relate and reason (trying to reason with someone before they are regulated won’t work and increases dysregulation)"
- "To impact anyone’s feeling of safety in any interaction, brief interactions to minimize dysregulating elements and maximize regulating and connecting elements"
- "All of us tend to gravitate to the familiar, even when the familiar is unhealthy and destructive"
- "People feel better with the certainty of misery than the misery of uncertainty"
- Our brains are changeable and malleable
- Post-traumatic wisdom: Journey from traumatized to typical to resilient
- "Resilience is a capability that can wax and wane, not a permanent, innate trait"
- A healthy community = a healing community, and a healing community is full of hope because it has seen its own people weather, survive and thrive
- Everyone has a different personal “code” book
- Connectedness regulates and rewards us
- "Trauma permeates all aspects of life"
- "A truly trauma-informed system is an anti-racist system"
- "The more you learn about trauma and stress response; the easier it is to understand certain behaviors you encounter in a workplace, in a relationship, or at school, etc."
- "Somatosensory regulation opens up the cortex and makes the reasoning parts of the brain more accessible for learning"
- "The major predator of humans has always been other humans"
- Our brains are always using shortcuts, and these shortcuts are not accurate – they make us vulnerable to stereotypes and “isms” …contributes to biases
- "The challenge of addressing implicit bias is first recognizing you have it"
- "You don’t get trained in cultural sensitivity- you go spend time immersed in the culture, spend time with other people"
- "Moderate, predictable, controllable stress can build resilience"
- How might you make the uncontrollable and unpredictable more controllable and predictable?
- How might you be intentional about creating safe, stable, and physically regulating interactions?
- How might you, your team or organization be experiencing relational poverty?
- How might connectedness and organizational health be related?
- How might you enhance organizational health through connectedness?
- How might you build space for building a community?
- How might there be an opportunity to flex empathetic fluency?
- How might positive reciprocal relationships create a new sense of belonging?
- How might disconnection be making you, team, or the organization more vulnerable?
- How might not fully listening to, and being fully present make you, your team and organization more vulnerable?
- How might you need to flex repairing?
- How might there be an opportunity to get better at listening, regulating and reflecting?
- How might you seek to understand the pervasive and complex effects of trauma at work?
- How might there be an opportunity to see unexpressed potential?
- How might shared experiences and challenges enhance connectedness and belonging?
- How might there be an opportunity to ensure connectedness, sense of safety and belonging on your team?
- How might you create opportunities for leaning within your team, organization, or community?
- How might you avoid unpredictable, uncontrollable stressors that will exacerbate effects of trauma?
- How might we ensure we don’t retraumatize someone by unintentionally marginalizing or dehumanizing experiences?
- How might you recognize the built-in biases in yourself and structural biases in systems in order to be trauma informed?
- How might there be an opportunity to consider “techno-hygiene” to enhance relations and connectedness?
- How might you practice regulating, relating and reasoning?
