Giving a definition of psychological trauma has been the subject of many debates in the psychological and psychoanalytic fields, but as far as I’m concerned, the one that contains its most peculiar characteristics is the following:
“By trauma one could mean an extreme threatening, unsustainable, inevitable experience, in front of which an individual is powerless.” (Hermann, 1992b; Krystal, 1988; Ven der Kolk, 1996)
After facing unexpected, negative and threatening events for individual and collective life, psychological trauma can manifest itself both in individuals and in entire communities, undermining their sense of stability, security, identity and mental cohesion.
The psychological and physical response to the traumatic event is called Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, a mental condition that can show up both immediatly and not close to the traumatic experience itself. This condition often includes frailty, feelings of helplessness and the fear of reliving the trauma, as well as loss of sleep, anxiety and irritability, leading to a inevitable deterioration of life’s quality.
To investigate the features and the possible solutions for the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is almost a moral duty, expecially in a year marked by a terrible and irrepressible global pandemic that has brought much of the world’s population to its knees, both physically and psychologically.
The history of humanity has always been full of personal facts, natural disasters, wars and other tragic historical events that sometimes resulted in devastating and irreversible consequences, from single individuals to entire communities. It still remains undeniable that the chasm opened at the end February 2020 is one of the largest and deepest of the new millennium.
In fact, due to the difficult conditions experienced in recent months, the addition of a series of traumatic events both for communities and individuals has been witnessed on a large scale: on one hand, the fear of being infected and infect others, the physical distance from our loved ones, the mandatory use of masks in public places trying to stop the infections curve from growing, the very deep restrictions in public life and sociality; on the other, a ferocious economic crisis, the loss of millions of jobs, the sudden and heartbreaking loss of loved ones without having the possibility to even give them a last farewell.
Now more than ever, it is crucial to understand how to deal with this disorder which, if left untreated, can take on a chronic nature.
Undoubtedly, it would be useful, for those suffering from this disorder, to start a good psychotherapeutic path, but the very first steps for the dissolution of this condition might, and should, be taken by relying on one of the most powerful resources available to mankind: creativity.
How can art in all its forms be a beneficial method to overcome a trauma?
Surely, the communicative potential underlying each artistic typology is a keystone in this process.
Behind any artistic creation, there is undoubtedly an expressive need, and the result of every creative act can always be seen as a form of communication.
Expressing oneself through a sequence of musical notes, brushstrokes, rhythmic gestures or words written on a blank page has the immense power of sublimating moods, thoughts and negative memories through the use of symbols that one has a certain ability to manage.
Channeling one’s inner world into artworks or artistic performances can create a positive and liberating connection between the subject affected by post-traumatic stress disorder and his emotional part, acting as a starting point for a constructive rework of what he experienced and how he feels about it.
Secondly, externalizing one’s inner world by giving it a defined and proper shape has a great cathartic value, allowing people to be able to examine their own experiences in a less sentimentally involved and more objective way.
Furthermore, many beneficial processes for developing a resilient attitude in response to past traumas underlie acts of artistic creation. Writing or acting a theatrical script, painting a picture and composing a musical score are activities linked by common elements such as the need to design a project, the risk of failure to complete the project itself, the need to perform multiple attempts before reaching the desired result.
All of this pushes the individual with post-traumatic stress disorder to develop a constructive attitude, to feel masters of what has been achieved, accepting the difficult phases of the process in view of a greater ultimate goal. What is exercised in the artistic field can only have positive implications in the active reorganization of one’s life and in the elimination of that feeling of helplessness which is so typical of the pathology.
What makes art such a precious tool for self-healing is the opportunity to rely on one’s own abilities and personal resources. In this sense, any creative act is a pure form of self-determination: from the choice to create something up to the creation of the work itself.
The creator continuously questions himself, he is even willing to go through the hell that is his own inner world to satisfy a very strong communicative urgency.
It is precisely there that each individual can find valid tools to face his own traumas, and then continue to fight them through the help of a psychoanalytic path: in the need to bring things out in an ordered way, to use the symbols as privileged method of communication, to affirm one’s presence in the world through art.
