Real Affirmations for Trauma Healing | Not the Toxic Positivity Kind

Positive affirmations get a bad rap, and honestly, some of them deserve it. But in this episode of Hey Tabi, licensed trauma therapist Tabitha Westbrook walks you through affirmations that are actually rooted in truth and designed to help trauma survivors heal.

This is a practical episode. Grab a pen, download the free PDF (linked below), and let's do this together.

Resources Mentioned
📄 Download the Pocket Calm PDF → https://link.therasaas.com/widget/form/Dscl2vqQLVhPEWYDCRd6
🌿 Join the Transformational Topics Community → https://thejourneyandtheprocess.com/trauma-healing-support-online/

At The Journey and The Process we strive to help you heal. Our therapists are trauma specialists who use evidence-based tools like EMDR, Brainspotting, Somatic Experiencing, and Internal Family Systems to help you heal - mind, soul, and body. Reach out today to start your healing journey. https://thejourneyandtheprocess.com/

 This book is for every Christian woman who has been harmed sexually, whether that happened in childhood, adulthood, or even within your coercive controlling marriage, and you're longing to feel safe in your body again. We talk about the hard stuff, shame, desire, faith, and even questions like, is this sin or is this trauma?

You don't have to untangle it alone. Body & Soul, Healed & Whole is for you. Get a copy here today - https://a.co/d/8Jo3Z4V

👍 If this episode resonated with you, please like, subscribe, and share to help others who need this information!

📖 Order Body & Soul, Healed & Whole: An Invitational Guide to Healthy Sexuality After Trauma, Abuse, and Coercive Control

Wanna support Hey Tabi? Buy me a coffee here - https://buymeacoffee.com/heytabi

📩 Connect with Tabitha & The Journey and The Process:
💻 Tabitha's Website - www.tabithawestbrook.com
📲 Tabitha's Instagram - www.instagram.com/tabithathecounselor
🎙️ Podcast Homepage - https://heytabi.buzzsprout.com

💻 The Journey & The Process Website - www.thejourneyandtheprocess.com

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🚨 Disclaimer: This podcast is not therapy and is intended for educational purposes only. If you're in crisis or need therapy, please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.

Need to know how to find a great therapist? Read this blog post here.

Transcript

Welcome And Why We’re Here

SPEAKER_00 0:39

Welcome to Hey Tabby, the podcast where we talk about the hard things out loud with our actual lips. We'll cover all kinds of topics across the mental health spectrum, including how it intersects with the Christian faith. Nothing is off limits here, and we are not take two verses and call me in the morning. I'm Tabitha Westbrook, and I'm a licensed trauma therapist, but I'm not your trauma therapist. I'm an expert in domestic abuse and coercive control and how complex trauma impacts our health and well-being. Our focus here is knowledge and healing. Trauma doesn't have to eat your lunch forever. There is hope. Now, let's get going. Hey there and welcome to this week's episode of Hey Tabby. I am really glad that you are here. And I wanted to do something a little bit different today than I usually do. This is going to be one of those very practical let's do some things together episodes. I've been thinking a lot about just how dysregulated this world can be and how hard it is for so many of our clients and just people that I talk to, friends. And so I wanted to invite you to do some of the exercises in our nervous system reset pocket comb. And this is going to be our positive affirmations. And I want to talk about positive affirmations because they get a really bad rap. And rightfully so when they're dumb. Like, I mean, but it's like I'm going to one day be a seven-foot-tall NBA player. Like, come on, man. I can't positive affirm my way into that. It's utterly ridiculous. So we aren't going to do that. We're not doing silly things. But there are ways that we can talk to ourselves that help us break those curses and vows that we've made. So if you don't remember, we've talked about this before on the show, but a curse is something that was spoken over you often by an abuser, someone harmful to you. And they said, this is who you are as a person. And they said it in implicit and explicit ways. So implicit is they showed you by their actions or by the way that they treated you. And explicit is they said, You are this out loud. Like they were really explicit about it. And those things are the things that we drink in. And to keep ourselves safe, often we will make a vow with it and say, Yes, this is true. Or it will just become so normal to us that we believe it to be true. This happens a lot in developmental trauma where we have people that are being abused as children. And so, like when your caregiver says this about you, it's a lot easier to believe that that is true. And so we want to actively break some of those vows that we've made. And one of the ways to do that is a healthy positive affirmation. So I'm going to walk you through a few of them. And I will actually link to our pocket calm in the show notes if you want to have a PDF copy of this in order to help you walk through it. So the first thing that's really important is these all have to be based in truth. It is incredibly unhelpful if we say something and are speaking words over ourselves that we know are lies. You know, and I'm not talking about those things that feel like lies that are, you know, like, well, I'm not sure this is true yet, or I'm having trouble believing it. That's a little bit different. We want to make sure that these things feel as true as possible and that we are speaking truth. Again, if I say I'm going to be a seven foot-tall NBA player, my whole body goes, that's not true. I'm five foot two. I'm never going to be seven feet tall. And that is a really important thing to remember. So as we're walking through these, you want to pick the ones that feel the truest to you. So we're going to check with our environment, first of all. We are going to make sure that we are safe enough in the moment. So if you are in an unsafe situation, this first one's not going to be for you because it's not true and your body's going to know it's not true. So you want to use this one when you know that you can say it for real. So this first affirmation is this I am safe in this moment. I can take one step toward calm. And so sometimes we have to really slow ourselves down here so that we can actually say this and mean it. So if I am just on fire and I don't feel safe at all, I need to slow down for a minute. And we've talked about mindful connection before and where we need to just kind of like center in and make ourselves present. So if you haven't, I will link back to the episodes where we actually do some of those like calming things to help you settle in in the moment so that you can actually get to this particular affirmation. So again, our first affirmation is I am safe in this moment. I can take one step toward calm. And I'm going to say it again for us nice and slow. I am safe in this moment. I can take one small step toward calm. So once you feel this a little bit in your body, right? You may not feel it perfectly again, progress, not perfection. Then you will want to take a step toward calm. So what does that look like for you? It might look like taking a walk, it might look like making a sandwich, getting some water, it might look like reading a book. What feels calm to you? And that's going to be pretty individual to the person. What makes me feel calm and what makes you feel calm might not be the same place and it might not be the same activity, might just be different. And that's an okay thing. So you want to figure it out for you. And that might be some things where you have to try and start and stop and go, yeah, that worked, that didn't work, and you're building your toolkit. I think sometimes we get frustrated, and I can totally understand why, but we get frustrated that we don't have a set plan or something easy or whatever. And I get that. It makes perfect sense that we would feel that way. But I just want to invite you to enjoy the process of figuring it out. You might be like, you know, I was reading this book and it was a book that was intense. Maybe it was a thriller. That did not help me take a step toward calm. Maybe I needed a different book or a different activity. And all of that is learning to give yourself permission to be flexible. And when we're coming out of traumatic experiences, we're starting to heal from trauma, we're often very rigid. And that's because we've had to be to keep ourselves safe. So as we're learning to live in actual safety, then we learn to be more flexible and less rigid. So our second one, and this I see for so many trauma survivors, especially those who have endured sexual abuse or sexual assault, is our bodies become the enemy. I talked a lot about this in my book, Body and Soul, Healed and Whole. That's definitely part of my own story. But this one is a little bit tricky at times. It can feel tricky at times if you struggle with your body, but it's such an important one to really lean into. And it is my body deserves care. And I will give it kindness even when it feels hard to do so. Oh, some of us might have spelt that one, right? I'm gonna read it again. My body deserves care, and I will give it kindness even when it feels hard to do so. I also think for men and women that have chronic illness issues, that that can be hard, especially when you feel like your body has betrayed you. When you say, gosh, I'm doing all of the right things, whatever those right things are, and my body isn't doing what I want it to. It's not as healthy or as free or as comfortable as I wish it was. And so that kindness to your body can be so tough at times. And so once you are able to settle into this affirmation of it, my body deserves care, and I will give it kindness, even when it feels hard to do so. Then we can think about what does that kindness look like? Sometimes it is feeding yourself well. Sometimes it is moving your body, sometimes it is resting and not moving your body. I know so many trauma survivors that have come out of coercively controlling relationships where they literally were never allowed to sit down. Their destructive spouse would just rail at them and call them lazy and all kinds of things if they rested at all. So it may feel like you are breaking every rule known to man if you take a nap and have a snack, right? But we know even in the Bible, right? When Elijah was really struggling, that's exactly what God invited him to do. Take a nap, have a snack. I'll feed you by the birds bringing you food, right? So we know that that is necessary at times. So, what does it look like to give your body kindness and just know that you're not doing something terrible if it's hard, right? And I think that's where I really like that last part of the affirmation of even when it feels hard to do so. Because it does. I know for me it does. And I know that that's the story of so many of the men and women that I've worked with. And it can feel really hard sometimes when you're not used to it. So just acknowledging that, but knowing that our bodies deserve care and that we can give it kindness is really important. So I'll read this one one more time. My body deserves care, and I will give it kindness even when it feels hard to do so. Just let that settle in for a moment. So we're gonna move on to the next one. And this one is anchoring. It's helping us to remember that we can be rooted even in difficult situations. As I'm recording this, it's storming outside at the moment, thankfully, not super loud, or this would be a very difficult recording. But I think about the storms of life that come and move us. And I think this one reminds me of truth in this way. I feel my feet on the ground, anchoring me in the here and now. I am like a tree planted by living waters, strong and steady despite storms that may come. Give me a read that again. I feel my feet on the ground, anchoring me in the here and now. I am like a tree planted by living waters, strong and steady despite storms that may come. And we can stay strong and steady. It doesn't mean our hair is not gonna get whipped around in the wind if we have hair. You know, it doesn't mean that I might not see debris flying by occasionally, but I can stay strong and steady. I can stay present in the here and now, despite what is going on around me. And look, this one is simple but not easy, right? Like that's one of the things I talk a lot about with clients is a lot of these concepts are very simple, but they're not easy. When our emotions are high and things are difficult, this is actually really challenging. So be gracious, be really kind to yourself, because this is something that like staying in the present moment, keeping your feet where you are in this moment can be really challenging. And this is where you can add in like the five, four, three, two, one, you know, where you observe five things you can see, four things you can touch, three things you can hear, two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste. And that can be really helpful to help you get back into your body when you're out of it. And then you can use this affirmation to remind you that your feet are anchored, that you can be steady. And just the reminder of it. Sometimes, you know, these are really great to write on a post-it note or an index card and have it with you or put it on your mirror so that you can come back to it when you need it most, right? When we are really activated, our thinky thinky parts, our prefrontal cortex up here goes offline. It just chucks itself right out the door. And it's really hard to remember, like, hey, there are tools that I have that could be helpful right now. And to go and circle back to those tools. And so if you have them written down, maybe a note on your phone, maybe when you download this PDF, you put it on your phone, they can really help you. Cause you can go, yeah, I know there's this thing on my phone, or a post-it note on my mirror, or an index card in the car that I can turn back to that might be helpful for me. This one is a little bit of breath work. And again, it just helps you slow down. And I like it because it's also the ability to do some breath rhythm the way that it's read. So let me read it to you. My breath flows in and out, steady and strong. My breath flows in and out, steady and strong. So it actually has the rhythm of breathing in it, which is really fun. So my breath flows in and out, steady and strong. Now, what I would do with this one is I would repeat it. And I like saying things out loud. I think that's really helpful. It creates what's known as an auditory anger. So, for example, when I am breathing with clients in session, I'm a loud breather on purpose, not because I'm trying to be creepy, but because I am actively trying to have my client hear me breathe. Because oftentimes if they're holding their breath and they hear me take a breath, they'll breathe. And so this is one of those things where it's a good reminder that breath is helpful. It's also what keeps us going, right? It brings oxygen into our system. And so I would use this one by saying it out loud. My breath flows in and out, steady and strong. And then I would breathe and notice. I would notice my breath going in and out. I would notice trying to get it to be more steady, especially if I were anxious. And I would do my best to let my body relax. Now I have done so much breath work with clients that there is a particular type of breathing that when I'm doing it with a client, the minute I start explaining it, my body starts to relax because I've done it so many times, which is super fun. And so the more you practice it, especially when you practice these things in moments where you are not super distressed, then you are going to kind of build that muscle and build those neural pathways so that when you are distressed, it's going to feel a little bit easier to get there. And again, these are simple but not easy. So there are going to be times when it doesn't feel easy. So now let's go to this next one. And this one might be a little bit more challenging, depending on what you are believing. But this is one that you want to work toward over time. And we are really going to attack the curses spoken over us here. I release lies spoken over me. I choose peace. This is really helpful if you have a destructive partner who is just continuing to talk about you. We know that in 90% of cases, there is post-separation and post-divorce abuse. And so when you are in that place, there are all kinds of lies being spoken over you. And it can get really hard. You want justice, you want to speak back, you want to do a lot of things. And so when someone who is destructive is lying about you and, you know, keeping their, what is it, keeping their your name in their mouth or whatever, like, man, you want to do something about that. But the Bible talks about, you know, answering a fool isn't helpful. And these people are for sure fools. So we want to just let it go the best we can. And so we can remind ourselves of this. I release lies spoken over me. I choose peace. I don't have to be like this other person. I don't have to defend myself in this way. You know, not that I'm saying you don't speak against things when you need to, but you don't have to hold on to them. You can let them go. I release lies spoken over me. I choose peace. Okay, so this one is a definite skill, but it's a reminder. And sometimes we need this in our prefrontal cortex. Like we need this to be in our language area and our thinky thinky parts. You know, because when we are just feeling our feelings, then it's really tough to get to this place. But this is again a skill. I can notice this feeling without being overwhelmed by it. And this is learning to just be in that tapestry of feelings. A lot of times, this is something that we have to learn or relearn if we knew it before. Sometimes, even if you've practiced it a while, you got to remember it because it's really easy to start noticing your feelings and then start feeling like they're going to take you over. And this is one of the biggest fears that I have with clients when they first start therapy is I'm going to start feeling and I'm going to drown in them. And that is not true. We will not. And we can do things like this that will help us not get overwhelmed, you know, and stay overwhelmed by our feelings. And look, even with the most skill, sometimes you are going to feel overwhelmed. You know, there's just an exit of your window of tolerance because there are too many things, and that's okay. But you can return to not overwhelmed. That is actually possible. And so I just want to invite you to that. I can notice this feeling without being overwhelmed by it. So I can notice sadness, I can notice grief, I can notice shame, I can notice anger, I can notice all these things, and it doesn't have to take me over. All right, this is another one. We're going to kind of revisit that concept of rest. It's okay to rest. My body is healing one moment at a time. For people who struggle with chronic illness, this is a dicey one because our bodies may not fully heal this side of heaven. But also, you know, knowing that allowing ourselves healthy rest is such a healing thing. And when we're coming out of trauma and we've been in that fight, flight, freeze, fawn state for such a long time, our body's not used to real rest. And so we need to sometimes give ourselves permission to do that. So it's okay to rest. My body is healing one moment at a time. Okay, this one, when you struggle with worth and value, can be really profound as you lean into it. I am worthy of feeling safe and at peace. I am worthy of love and kindness and care. This one can be really tricky for trauma survivors, I'll be honest, because your worth and value has been so chipped away at that you may feel like none of this is true. Now, one thing I can say with absolute assurance is that it is true. This is true of every single solitary human being. And so I invite you again to just lean into this, even if it feels tricky and hard, because it's really important to help you heal and to help you shift your mindset on your worth and value. I am worthy of feeling safe and at peace. I am worthy of love and kindness and care. That includes self-care, right? Self-care is not self-indulgence. We have talked about that before. And sometimes we need to do some good care for ourselves. So I'm going to read this one again for us. I am worthy of feeling safe and at peace. I am worthy of love and kindness and care. An interesting exercise for you, just as we've kind of walked through a lot of these affirmations, is that you can notice how your body feels reading each one. So, how does it feel when I speak it over you? And how does it feel when you speak it out loud? Where is the difference? Where's the same? What do you notice? And those are things that can really help you lean into this practice a bit. So our next one is this wave of emotion will pass and I will remain steady. When we are overwhelmed by big emotions, right? So when we feel those big feels, then it can really feel like I am going to drown. I'm not going to make it out. And one of the things that we can say with assurance is that emotions rise and fall. So they are kind of like a wave. And when we feed them with our thoughts, the wave gets bigger. And sometimes we have to catch ourselves, you know, so that we're not feeding that wave. But the wave will pass. The stat that I read like a million years ago was that most emotions last about 20 minutes when we don't feed them with our thoughts. And anger's, you know, the exception, it can last up to three hours. And that is just kind of a little bit of a benchmark to know that, hey, this will pass. Sometimes, honestly, sleeping on it is the best thing, right? So sometimes it's like, man, today has been a really crap day and there's just been so much going on. I'm just going to go to bed. I'm just going to go to bed and try again tomorrow. And that can really help. And also using some tools like distraction, writing in your journal, praying, whatever works for you can help you kind of work through that emotion and let it pass. But I think reminding ourselves that it will pass is really important, especially when it's really intense. So this wave of emotion will pass and I will remain steady. Now, our final one here, and this one is again going back to our identity. I am not my trauma. I am whole, strong, and resilient. Now look, if you are just coming out of trauma, I know you don't feel whole. You may be way out of trauma and be like, I still don't feel whole. But it doesn't change the truth about that in you. You are in fact whole. You are strong. You are resilient. The fact that you're listening to this podcast and you have survived all of your worst days so far tells me that you are resilient. I think we don't often think about that. I'm going to be talking more about resilience in the future. I will invite you at this point. We are doing something called the Transformational Topics Community. And we're going to have a deep dive into resilience in our first episode of that. If you're interested in that, I will put the link in the show notes as well. But it is really important to know that you have gotten through all. Worst days so far. And I just want to remind you of that because again, it can be really easy to forget that to be true. So I'm going to read this one again. I am not my trauma. I am whole, strong, and resilient. One more time. I am not my trauma. I am whole, strong, and resilient. Now I hope that these are helpful for you. I hope that you are able to take some goodness from them. I hope that this episode has been one that is something where you can really take these things and give them a try. And I really do encourage that. This is one of those things where you know you can listen to it and think, yeah, that sounds really great. But if you don't try it, you won't know if it's effective for you. And so I would just encourage you, even if you just take this episode, get the PDF, take a look at it, and just listen to them, read them as I read them to you. And just notice how your body feels and like maybe even like take a chunk of each of these and you know, like stop it wherever we're at. Like, you know, let's say we're reading one of them, you can pause this episode and then you can go practice it, come back to it, see how it makes you feel, right? So I really encourage you to use this episode very practically. And I invite you into that space. Again, if you want more information about this, if you want to grab this PDF, it will be in the show notes. If you want to join the transformational topics community or get more information about that, that will also be in the show notes. And I am so grateful that you joined us here today on Hey Tabby. And I look forward to seeing you in our next episode. Be sure to go and like and subscribe. Follow us on all of the channels, and we'll see you again next time. Thanks for joining me for today's episode of Hey Tabby. If you're looking for a resource that I mentioned in the show and you want to check out the show notes, head on over to tabithawestbrook.com forward slash hey tabby. That's H-E-Y-T-A-B-I, and you can grab it there. Look forward to seeing you next time.