Employment Trauma
My protagonist today,
a Gay Black Religious Mature Male,
not quite ready for silver-grey Obama temples
Is off this morning
to a new full-time job,
8 to 5,
Monday through Friday.
He has been out of his calming,
regular custodial collared routine,
for over two years,
And has long been anticipating just this kind
of post-traumatic economic morning.
Up with the sun,
shower,
shave,
dressing just showman right--
not shaman flashy
but not beatdown polyester--
lunch in his red and white pristine cooler
generously filled with fresh
wholesome food
He is not feeling
like he will be able
to eat.
His stomach is Post Traumatic Employment Stress
churning.
He looks into his refrigerator
while telling me
he is in knots
and at least half a mind wishing to not show up,
To tell them he doesn't think right.
Doesn't feel he can get through his uncontrolled fear
and self-loathing for not manning up
while They background check
his suffering character references.
He doesn't think or feel he can survive this day
even though he has no doubt he can do this job
better without Them.
He wants to give up,
walk away if he can't freeze
in his more health and safety habitat place.
I am stunned into silence.
This is hard to hear,
to link up with how excited he was
to apply
and to get a call
from his would-be "nice guy" supervisor,
after meeting suspicious him.
He told me how surprised he was
to feel like this Straight White Male
was one of the good,
reasonable,
non-toxic guys.
Eventually,
after our anxious potential hero heads out
with heavy feet
and knotted stomach,
I recall how he might have felt
when he left his last full-time employment day,
dismissed
without notice.
His employment record reads "tardiness."
But, off his common knowledge record
is a victim of systemic racism,
a supervisor's personal superiority prejudice,
global heterosexist homophobia.
Victimized by StraightWhiteMales
for being who he is,
and not getting support from brown-skinned guys
he thought were potential allies
because he has no proper heterosexual credentials.
Talk therapy may be widely used
to prepare his LeftBrain to reconstruct
past traumatic experiences.
The therapeutic goal,
to resolve through better contextual understanding
in a LeftBrain verbal
rational way.
This can be helpful, I suppose,
but PostTrauma disordered victims
need PreAbundant nurturing anticipations
fading frozen fears
of further victimization,
economic and/or political trauma
due to personal identity rejections
that have historically been cause for criminalization,
colonization,
enslavement,
sending out evangelical missionaries,
in nationalistic Patriarchal/Capitalist
drunken salvific supremacist history.
Dissociative experience of eco-political trauma
is as deep margins felt
in our RightHemispheres
interdependent serotonin/dopamine fading flight
outside our BusinessAsCompetitionUsual,
patriarchal-capitalist,
Either elitist in
Or deleted out,
deductive verbal labeling LeftHemispheres
Capable of calmly,
curiously,
courageously distinguishing thought-out purposes
for our win/lose past behaviors
within an overwhelming evolutionary
Fight Makes Patriarchal/Capitalist Right
competitive manly worldviews
justifying punishing severances.
Trauma,
to ecological
and psychological
and economic
and political relationships,
deeply retains fear and/or anger
neuro-sensory systemic
terrifying memories
Post-Loser re-victimized
by re-experiencing active distrust,
dissociation
as the opposite of Attachment's sacred experiential promise
of cooperative warm-wombed peace,
Win/Win behavioral and verbal communing safety,
personal health prosperity
on a planet growing in eco-wealth anticipating provisions.
In my protagonist's developmental
special employment case,
I also hear theological trauma--
deeply felt shame
and blame,
and White-righteous Straight Capitalist/Patriarchal
divine judgment.
Such deep trauma responds most resonantly
to having a positive gain experience today,
this morning,
while filling out pre-employment paperwork,
feeling those he meets are divinely delighted
and delightful.
Then he may feel already a bit relieved.
He may, thereby, rediscover sufficient environmental resonance
therapeutic courage
to continue showing up with a positive,
let's get it cooperatively done,
nonviolent gratitude attitude
To open sufficient hope
for potential healthy and safe team players,
we all need respect
for human and civilizing rights,
but we are transformed
by downright resiliently appreciative
multiculturally experienced values.
Each day, at work and play,
can invite affirmation
for polypathic transparency
The gospel's "Poor in Spirit"
are our vulnerable person-ego identities,
expecting merely reasonable
eco-therapeutic compassion
and actively hoping
for polyculturally intelligent communication.
Best therapeutic practice
for anger
fear
hate
greed
exploitation
enslavement
criminalization
colonization
predation experiences
ruminating traumatic employment narratives
are new compassionate work and play environments
of cooperative courage
to get through our shared sacred vocations
in this another EarthBeauty
and SacredTruth
re-education day.
All Mattering Employment's vocationally Great Again
meaning is found in our economically felt
politically experienced solidarity,
our cooperative win/win generosity,
our co-investment
in pro-active peace
and co-passion;
Not our traumatic enslavement,
repressive employment,
and past discrimination
by retributive Patriarchal/Capitalist
straight white gatekeepers
who have also had traumatic losses.
Perhaps our collective loss experiences
are more systemically acute
for those with more difficult personal
and political
and economic births
into a Straight White Patriarchal/Capitalist religion
where one's own dark and ***** embodied experience
may be unjust
unhealthy cause
for a traumatic can't win Loser
Life is a slow
unfair death sentence
Uttered by LeftBrain dominant
Patriarchal/Capitalist
anti-peace excommunications.
Copyright © Gerald Dillenbeck | Year Posted 2021
Post Comments
Poetrysoup is an environment of encouragement and growth so only provide specific positive comments that indicate what you appreciate about the poem. Negative comments will result your account being banned.
Please
Login
to post a comment