Unresolved trauma can make it difficult to regulate your physical and emotional state
Is performance anxiety a constant struggle? Are you frustrated by your efforts to manage worries and feelings of inadequacy that get in the way of staying present when you perform? It's possible that something deeper is going on - trauma may be interfering with your confidence and belief in your ability to succeed.
What is trauma?
Trauma is a very stressful or frightening experience in which the person feels that they have limited (or no) resources to cope with the experience and a lack of control over the outcome. We’ve all experienced trauma of some sort. Trauma can be a one-off event, such as a natural disaster or an accident, or it could be cumulative, like the effects of chronic emotional abuse and neglect in childhood.
The event does not have to be catastrophic to be traumatic - it could be a relatively small event that impacts the person deeply. For performers, this could be a negative performance experience
like falling apart on stage or being harshly critiqued.
The Trauma Response: Fight, Flight, or Freeze
Humans have an instinctual response to trauma or any feared situation which has evolved from a need to survive. This response brings us strong emotions and physical responses known as the fight or flee response which is necessary to call the body into action to keep it safe. In a trauma response, the sympathetic nervous system is activated: the stress hormones of cortisol and adrenalin are released, muscles become tensed and ready to go, and blood is directed away from the core and brain toward the limbs in preparation to fight or run away. After all, energy can’t be wasted digesting food (which is why people may feel nauseous) and there is no time to engage in step-by-step problem-solving. I'm sure all performing artists have had some experience with this whether it be clammy or cold hands, the heart pounding out of your chest, trembling limbs, and nausea. After the event passes, the calm-down response (aka the parasympathetic nervous system) kicks in and the individual can settle down and resume normal functioning.
Another way to survive traumatic events is to freeze. The individual shuts down or dissociates as a coping mechanism for the distress they are experiencing. Performers can experience a kind of brain fog and may barely remember the performance they just finished.
The fight, flight, or freeze mechanisms are natural responses to something frightening and traumatic. In the majority of cases, the memory of the event recedes and its influence lessens over time. This happens when people can feel their emotions, talk it through with others, and come out on the other end feeling okay with themselves and their world. For performers, this includes responding adaptively to a distressful performance or interaction with a growth mindset. For example, they work out the problems that realistically contributed to the performance breakdown and frame the experience as an opportunity to grow.
When does a Trauma become Traumatizing?
Whether the trauma is traumatizing has little to do with the traumatic event itself, but the meaning people make of it which keeps trauma from being resolved and successfully integrated into their life experience. Trauma may elicit or reinforce beliefs that the world and others are threatening. For a performer, the stage can become a symbol of danger. The audience, colleagues, or teachers may be perceived as overly critical, judgmental, and unsupportive. A performance that is considered to be a complete failure or even a series of disappointing performances can instill damaging beliefs about the performer and their abilities depending on the circumstances and the performer's perception and response to it. They can be left feeling inadequate, worthless, helpless, and hopeless.
A performer might continue to struggle with emotional and physical dysregulation in performances months or even years after a negative performance experience. The strong emotions associated with the original mishap continue to be triggered in the present and signal to the body and the brain that a real threat exists and the performer is not safe.
Effects of Trauma
Distressing emotional and bodily responses that are associated with the traumatic event can lead to avoidance of performance-related things such as competitions, recitals, auditions - even practicing. Unfortunately, the more performers avoid the source of their distress, the more their brain is convinced that the avoidance has kept them safe from danger. This means they are more likely to avoid in the future.
Trauma is embodied
There is more going on with unresolved trauma than simply avoidance, however. Research has more recently shown that trauma is embodied. People “feel” trauma. After all, how do you know you are experiencing emotion unless it is felt in the body? Trauma researchers have discovered that unresolved trauma becomes trapped in the right side of the brain - the part that is dominant for processing emotions - as a disorganized array of pictures, feelings, and sensations without a way to connect to the rational, logical left side of the brain. This is likely why people can understand the trauma as a past event and that they are no longer in danger but still don’t feel and act as though they are. Because trauma is not properly integrated into the part of the brain that can make logical sense of things, the traumatic event lacks a coherent narrative, including a sense of time. The individual then still reacts to reminders of that trauma as though it still poses a threat in the present.
This can be frustrating when performers know they are putting in the hard work to make their performances successful, yet they still feel as though they're entering into a performance as if it were a life-threatening situation. It doesn’t exactly instill confidence.
Physical effects of trauma
Performing artists who experience the effects of trauma or performance anxiety, both of which activate the nervous system to go into overdrive, often find themselves in a chronic state of stress due to being regularly triggered by the nature of their work.
Living in a state of high alert leads to a stressed-out nervous system. Chronic elevation of stress hormones not only causes physical discomfort and pain but also breaks down the immune system, making people more susceptible to illness and autoimmune disorders. It can result in mental health disorders such as anxiety, depression, and PTSD. People who are burdened with an underlying sense of inadequacy, helplessness, or hopelessness tend to have less capacity for managing daily stress and the big challenges that are an inevitable part of life.
Hope for Healing
Fortunately, there are ways to heal trauma. First line treatment for trauma is psychotherapy, specifically Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT) - a CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) approach to trauma - and Eye Movement and Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), endorsed by the World Health Organization (WHO), International Society for Trauma Stress Studies (ISTFS), and the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs.
As a performance coach, I can offer EMDR and CBT approaches to alleviate performance anxiety and trauma symptoms that stem from negative performance experiences. As a licensed mental health counselor I use EMDR and CPT to help heal the impact of trauma that stem from other traumatic events and childhood attachment wounds.
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