In Conscious Motion…
[Formerly Princess and the Pea, Survivor Edition1]
In Conscious Motion is a publication about our personal striving to live consciously in motion, while integrating the pieces that remain to be reconnected as we recover from adversity.
Adverse and/or traumatic experiences, whatever ones you may have had, can create difficulty while you go about living your life. They can make us feel like we’re standing still and the world is just passing us by. It can make us feel disconnected from life and struggling to live as we would like. It can make it hard to build healthy relationships.
Here, we dissect cultural myths and underlying beliefs on healing. We examine annoying tests (big and small) that Life throws our way and the problematic attitudes that can compromise our quest to meet the items on our personal checklist towards wholeness after something terrible happens.
Spoiler alert: the checklist doesn’t end with a Perfectly Healed Self.
Instead, the checklist represents the steps on a journey to reclaim a sense of wholeness that is our birthright. It’s a journey on our quest to live a conscious life in motion.
My basic philosophy of life is this: What is there for us to do but continue on the journey we find ourselves on?
My hope is in talking about uncomfortable things, we can reduce the stigma that perpetuates harm for those living in silence. And help us feel a little more connected to one another.
Because coming out of trauma is hard.
Even if we’re feeling broken, we can find a way forward to make something new of ourselves, of our lives, even if it’s often challenging in ways others don’t seem to understand. And this can complicate both old and new relationships.
This publication started out focused mainly on surviving trauma, particularly those traumas that are unspeakable, like rape and sexual assault. This publication has evolved to encompass life after trauma, so we can live in a conscious way, keeping ourselves in motion even if we sometimes feel like we’re standing still.
Why subscribe?
Because it might change you.
I know that’s a bold statement.
But perhaps it’s more accurate to say: it’ll change how you think about trauma and healing and what it can mean to live in conscious motion.
And that’ll help you change you.
My intent is to help open your eyes to your inner world and invite you to consider ways to heal that you might not have imagined. You will see the outer world in a new light, and while growing awareness can be scary, what is scarier is living in the dark not knowing why things happen the way they do or why Life keeps testing you in the same way over and over.
This is not Insta-therapy - or any therapy2. But the words you read here are well-thought out with a no-holds-barred view of recovery from trauma, PTSD, cultural myths, and the soul-crushing shame that comes from stigma. My unique offering is that my work pairs personal sharing of what I’ve learned as a trauma survivor with my acquired knowledge from graduate and post-graduate training in the most up-to-date trauma theory and therapy practices.
I believe you won’t find this type of content anywhere.
Who I Am
My name is Faith Christine Bergevin - you can call me Faith. I am clinical counselor and therapist, with a master’s degree from a university with trauma-specific training. I am also a survivor of rape. The traumatic event occurred in the final year of my graduate counseling psychology program.
The ensuing trauma and challenges to get my life back on track prompted my decision to start this publication which I originally called Princess and the Pea, Survivor Edition (you can read about it here and here). In the immediate aftermath, I felt compelled to keep silent for a long time. But I reached a point where the question of whether to remain silent or expose my truth led me to perhaps a better one:
Which path will lead to greater freedom?
“Coming out” as a survivor of rape was no small matter. It felt (and still feels) risky for me. After all, I’m a clinical counselor and trauma therapist. I feel pressured to uphold a certain image as a professional. Still, there is a cost to having a secret so big, a cost that has impacted me negatively because I felt I couldn’t be fully authentic in the world. For my story about how I decided to finally “come out” as a survivor, read here.
The time it’s taken to come out is in part due to the social stigma that exists around this topic. No one wants to touch it - although kudos to Tarana Burke, founder of #metoo which led to a movement, as well as the folks at RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network), an excellent resource for survivors, as well as many others who work publicly and in clinical settings to support survivors and provide information on consent, sexual assault and rape, and reduce the shame and stigma. It’s a stigma that exists even though hundreds of people every day are affected by sexual violence, belonging to a not-so-exclusive “club” that no one wants to belong to.
“Every 68 seconds, an American is sexually assaulted.”3
For me, the stigma was so entrenched I believed I was not allowed to share what happened to me during my trauma training program.4 I was struggling and few knew. The message I received from those around me was, “I won’t tell and you shouldn’t either - I’ll keep your secret safe.” After all, it was almost unseemly that I could be a victim of such a crime because I was “supposed” to know better. I had to maintain my image as the “strong woman” people saw me as, a woman who could handle anything, a woman “untouched” by trauma. After all, I’m a mental health “professional.”
It has taken me a long time to release the pressure to maintain my pristine image and instead show up with greater authenticity in the world, both personally and professionally. I’d be lying to say it’s been easy because the shame that comes from being the victim of such a crime runs deep. That’s why I talk about it here.
Recently, though, I felt the need for a change, to no longer be boxed in by one story, a story of sexual assault trauma, but instead to expand.
What does life feel like in recovery?
What are the challenges?
How do we trust again?
How do we know who we can trust?
Theses are all valid questions to explore in the aftermath of betrayal trauma, which is what sexual assault, sexual violence, rape, intimate partner violence (including psychological, sexual, physical, and emotional abuse) is. It even includes recovery from childhood abuse and childhood emotional neglect. These are traumas based in relationship.
Essentially the question is this:
How can we be in relationship after severe betrayal by someone we trusted, cared for (and who was supposed to care for us), who we loved?
What started as a means to connect with other survivors of trauma and share my knowledge and path has evolved to a process where I am exploring life and relationships after trauma and adversity.
In other words, how we keep moving on in life, living consciously in motion.
What you can expect:
Essays on growing in awareness to live a conscious life. Varied topics on mental health with a focus on healing and recovery after trauma, challenges of living with PTSD, living with silence, living in the aftermath of an unspeakable trauma such as sexual assault and rape, dealing with difficult emotions, navigating the complexity of relationships post-trauma.
Audio readings (mini podcasts) of the essays, read by me, for those who prefer to listen. Often there is extra content from the essay and analysis on social issues, and sometimes a tangent to places I hadn’t initially planned on that further informs the topic.
Two important notes about the subject matter
I created In Conscious Motion for informational and educational purposes and this should not be considered therapy or any form of treatment. It is meant to be helpful and provide other perspectives. While I am a therapist, I am speaking from my lived experience that is informed by my clinical expertise. It is important to note I am not able to provide diagnosis or treatment plans for personal situations, or otherwise provide any clinical opinions. If you think you need immediate assistance, call your local emergency number or your local crisis line listed on your government’s mental health services pages. Seek a local trauma-informed therapist who can help you work through your specific needs.
I believe it’s important to share that while this publication sometimes discusses challenging subjects, like rape and other traumatic experiences, I will not include graphic descriptions in the posts. There will occasionally be references to traumatic events, most notably in this piece here:
What Burns in You
“One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.” - Friedrich Nietzsche My therapist read me this Nietzsche quote one time at the end of a session. It was in the early aftermath of my traumatic rape. He read it, then looked at me, quizzically.
However, my intent here is to explore what it takes to heal from trauma on a daily basis, not to trigger readers. It’s about how to keep going, even in the wake of trauma. How to continue in conscious motion.
Comments from readers:
On “Men, Stop Doing this Already: Cluelessness is not a defense”:
On “When the Dark Days Come: How to get through your tough emotions”:
On “When the Story is Unspeakable: On grief and your unexpected losses”:
On “Resilience. Really? Breaking down the myth of this buzzword”:
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In April 2023, I changed my publication name from "“Princess and the Pea, Survivor Edition” to “In Conscious Motion.” It was a… ahem… conscious decision to move away from a children’s story, a story that had a terrific metaphor I used to describe trauma and triggers and the concept of survivor. However, it felt wrong to continue using this as a title. Maybe because it foremost is a children’s story. Or maybe because it can be confusing and jarring to consider the title (a nice little story about a princess and her uncomfortable sleep) and subsequent content (trauma and survival). My aim is to be more in alignment which I believe “In Conscious Motion” reflects. For more on the decision to change the name, read “Healing is Change.”
Disclaimer: I think it’s important to note that this publication is not therapy. The intent here is to share my experiences and education grounded in personal stories and professional insight.
https://www.rainn.org/statistics
The irony does not escape me.
