💡 Why Does This Matter?
🌠 Steps to Fix the Drift
🎥 Video Bite: Dr. Natalie Feinblatt on What is Trauma
✨ Words of Wisdom
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In 2023, Gabor Maté, a well-known trauma expert, publicly suggested that Prince Harry showed signs of ADD, anxiety, depression, and PTSD. His informal diagnosis was based solely on reading his memoir. Maté framed these not as illnesses, but as “normal responses to abnormal stress.”
His perspective on Prince Harry—and the fact that he included PTSD OR the fact that his emotional experiences were labeled as trauma—was significant because it reflected a big cultural shift that has been taking place for a while: Trauma has become the default explanation for almost everything. From social media to bookstores to wellness retreats, pain is increasingly labeled as trauma and sold as a product.
What was once a clinical term related to extreme experiences (such as war or assault), has expanded to include everyday struggles: procrastination, relationship issues, workplace dissatisfaction, even boredom. The result is a world where suffering is constantly named, shared, and monetized.
Why Does This Matter?
This shift matters because it quietly changes how we see ourselves—and what we believe we’re capable of overcoming.
Several things happen when trauma becomes a catch-all label:
Normal pain gets pathologized. Discomfort, grief, fear, and confusion are part of being human. Treating them as symptoms of trauma can make an ordinary life feel like a very damaged one.
Identity narrows. If you use trauma to define who you are, it can limit growth. The wound turns into both an explanation and an excuse.
Agency erodes. Trauma framing often moves responsibility outside the self. People can end up thinking, This isn’t my choice, it’s my trauma. That can feel relieving—but it’s also paralyzing.
Resilience gets overlooked. Most people who experience genuinely traumatic events recover over time. Focusing only on harm hides the human capacity to adapt and heal.
Real suffering is diluted. When everything is trauma, the experiences of people who endure things such as war, torture, abuse, or extreme poverty risk being trivialized.
Ironically, while we talk about trauma more than ever, we don’t seem to be doing better at handling our pain. Awareness has increased, but so has our sense of fragility.
Steps to Fix the Drift
Overuse of the word “trauma” doesn't mean you should deny pain or dismiss traumatic experiences. What we need to do is be more precise and more humane. Here’s how:
1. Separate pain from trauma. Pain is universal. Trauma is specific. Not every painful experience needs a diagnostic label to be valid.
2. Be careful with self-labels. Names can help, but they can also trap. Ask whether a label is expanding your options or shrinking them.
3. Focus on function, not identity. Instead of thinking “What’s wrong with me?” ask:
“What am I struggling with right now? What helps me cope? What small action moves me forward?”
4. Make room for resilience. Most people recover and are not “broken” for good. Healing is often quiet, gradual, and unremarkable, and that’s normal.
5. Resist commodified healing. Be skeptical of anyone selling certainty with messages like,“You are broken, and I have the solution.” Growth is rarely that linear.
6. Keep context in view. Some distress isn’t personal pathology, it’s a rational response to economic pressure, isolation, instability, or loss of purpose. Not everything needs an inward fix.
Pain is part of life. But so is recovery.
When trauma becomes the main story we tell ourselves, we risk turning suffering into destiny and identity into limitation. Naming pain can be powerful, but only if it restores optionality, not replaces it.
The goal isn’t to deny hardship or minimize harm. It’s to remember that most people are more than what has happened to them. We are not just survivors of wounds. We are also agents of adaptation, meaning, and change.
Trauma is real. But so is resilience—and your ability to bounce back deserves just as much attention.
Here is how to rebuild your resilience.
Video Bite
Sol TV Creator, Dr. Natalie Feinblatt shares what is trauma and how to heal from it.
Words of Wisdom
I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.
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