Do you find rest difficult? Your busyness could be a trauma response (or something else).
By a Holistic Psychology and Social Work Practice
Let me ask a few questions since you’ve landed on this page. Do you feel guilty when you’re not working or doing something “productive”? Did you ever get called lazy growing up? Do you find yourself overthinking or feeling anxious when you stop? Do you have trouble sitting still? Is meditation hard or frustrating for you? If you answered yes to any of the above questions, your busyness could be a trauma response.
Is busyness a symptom of anxiety or trauma?
Truth be told, as a social worker who specialises in anxiety, stress and burnout, trauma is often what sits underneath the veil of anxiety and is the driver for many behaviours. Anxiety is the symptoms you see, where as trauma is the cause.
You may be reading this thinking, but I’ve had a good life, I’ve never gone to war, survived brutality or have had it “that bad”. Often we think about the cruelest experiences in life when the word “trauma” comes up, but for therapists we often associate trauma with the following definition.
“a traumatic event or situation creates psychological trauma when it overwhelms the individual's ability to cope”.
The key here is that it overwhelms the individuals ability to cope. If we think about the typical symptoms and presentation of anxiety such as overthinking, changes in sleep patterns, changes in eating patterns, a feeling of dread or doom, reactions disproportionate to the stimuli, these are all symptoms of someone who is struggling to cope.
For some people, a past trauma is a very clear event or experience such as abuse, a natural disaster, an unexpected death to medical emergency or war. For others it can present as the two most common, but least obvious forms of trauma, emotional abuse and emotional neglect.
What is emotional abuse or emotional neglect?
Emotional abuse comes in so many forms that we would have all experienced one of the following examples at some point in our life. Two things come into play for it to be traumatic, it causes psychological trauma, and it overwhelms the individual’s ability to cope.
An example of emotional abuse that causes trauma is getting bullied at work. This individual may then start to ruminate, or get stuck thinking about “what if” situations at work, it may cause that person to distrust everyone at work which causes issues in their interpersonal relationships, the may find themselves avoiding work and feeling on edge all of the time. These feeling may lead the person to not feel like they can cope, this might look like drinking more, eating more or less, Sunday night anxiety before the work week, feeling exhausted or burnt out, heightened anger, increase in rigid thinking or black and white thinking and difficulty handling change. Emotional abuse can be experienced behaviours from others such as being gaslit, bullied, stonewalled, coerced or manipulated.
Emotional neglect however is more common in childhood than adult life, but can and does often occur in both. Emotional neglect is growing up never being taught about the range of emotions and how to deal with them (almost every millennial onwards). It’s never feeling like you had someone to talk to, and feeling like you had to push away some emotions because they weren’t “good” emotions. It takes some retraining to understand that all emotions are valid, and it’s completely okay to have sad days, angry days and “off days”. As children, we don’t understand our body cues in relation to emotion and we need an adult to teach us about this so we have the words to say, I am feeling.. because… and be validated in saying so. Without having the words to express ourselves, we can never be emotionally validated leading to emotional neglect. It really isn’t until more modern parenting styles that parents were taught how crucial this emotional vocabulary and emotional intelligence is for children to be healthy adults, and so for many of us we experienced emotional neglect, going our whole childhoods never really having an adult to share our emotions with.
As one can easily conclude, if you’ve been raised in an environment where emotions are not discussed than this behaviour is modelled into your unconscious that uncomfortable feelings are not to be discussed or worked through. What we now know thanks to books like “the body keeps score” by Bessel Van Der Kolk, when we don’t verbalise or process emotion even non verbally (such as through art) it gets stored in the body and manifest as illness, discomfort, anxiety and other mental health issues.
As Bessel Van Der Kolk states in the book
“Being able to feel safe with other people is probably the single most important aspect of mental health; safe connections are fundamental to meaningful and satisfying lives.“
Your tendency to be busy and uncomfortable with rest could also have to do with your attachment style
Your attachment style can also affect your tendency to be constantly busy. Your attachment style is one of four styles that have been identified of how you attach with others, based on the first attachment you had with your caregivers when you were under age 5. The four styles are secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganised. If you’re reading this article and relating to the feeling of constantly doing, unable to sit with yourself and be alone with your thoughts, feeling lazy when you do finally rest, have a tendency to people-please, find yourself having low self-esteem, and find yourself constantly doing things because you want to keep others happy than it is likely you have the anxious attachment style. Your attachment style and its influence over your sense of self and relationships with others can be changed over time with the help of a secure base such as a loving and attuned partner or a therapist who can help be emotionally attended to you, as well as developing your self-awareness of when these emotional responses are being activated.
This is what The Attachment project website has to say about anxious attachment (which is one of the insecure attachment styles) “Inconsistent responsiveness to a child’s emotional needs, misattunement and emotional distance, as well as preoccupation with and intrusiveness in the child’s life, are some of the risk factors for the development of an ambivalent attachment style in children. In addition to that, there are a few less common risk factors, such as, Physical or psychological abuse, Early separation from the caregiver. It is essential to note that having an insecure attachment style is not a mental disease or disorder. It is common among adults, and in most cases, is nothing to worry about. Still, having an unstable/insecure attachment style can cause distress, or harm relationships.”
What about Capitalism and the Fast-Paced world we live in?
The other reality for many of us is that living in a western world led by the capitalist, consumerist, go-go-go, fast-paced mindset can also influence the need to feel like you have stay busy or you are falling behind. Part of the work we do at Savasana Collective is learning how to release this conditioning and function at a pace that not only allows you to live a life you love, but stops you feeling burnt out, anxious and exhausted from the busyness of your lifestyle. Creating space in your daily life and schedule to be grounded and mindful can be game-changer for regulating the anxious self, formed by trauma, attachment or the fast-paced high demand world we live in. This can be done intentionally through meditation, exercise, music, art, creativity, sensory activities as well as learning how to switch off unnecessary notifications and setting clear boundaries with your time.
If you would like more tips about how to manage anxiety and help with your mindset check out our one on one services, our podcast, our free resource library or join our newsletter below
Sources:
Book: The Body Keeps Score: Bessel Van Der Kolk
The Attachment Project Website: https://www.attachmentproject.com/blog/anxious-attachment/
The Centre for Treatment of Anxiety and Mood Disorders https://centerforanxietydisorders.com/