Page 41 - Creating Spiritual and Psychological Resilience

10 Creating Spiritual and Psychological Resilence

cultural collectives that take on a life of their own (such as governments,
ethnic groups, religious groups, professional groups, and other belief sys-
tems [spiritual, scientific, literary, and so on] to which we belong), and,
even more broadly, countries, and, finally, the global level. I also like to
add “wildcard” areas to this framework to create a conceptual space in
which to locate anything unexpected, unpredictable, unresolved, or con-
fusing, until such a time as they might resolve or fit in better.
While in actuality these levels coexist and interact complexly with one
another in a fluid and self-organizing manner, in order to combat confu-
sion, it is conceptually helpful to simplify and organize them in our ongo-
ing thought process in an organized manner, either from bottom-up or
from top-down (or both if you can). Having such a conceptual framework
in mind makes it much easier to keep track of everything going on during
a crisis, when traumatic experience can be flooding our minds and inter-
fering with our usual capacity to process information. As the complex cir-
cumstances surrounding disaster start to unfold, it is helpful to have a
loose system to plug experience into. At the same time, there is room for
the unexpected and for events to shape how we think about them as they
unfold without overly rigidly adherence to any one framework.

Phase of Disaster and Effects on Variable Groups

Disasters overlap and vary a great deal in terms of character and time
scale. Some disasters happen in an instant, such as an explosion or acci-
dent. Others are spread out in different patterns over time; the spread of
an illness, the course of a storm, a series of terrorist attacks as a cluster
versus a single event, or even the long, drawn out disaster of a war and
the return of aggregates of traumatized veterans and the resultant impact
on the family and culture. Some disasters affect the individual or a small
group, such as the death of a family member; others affect a town or city;
while others may affect a region, nation, or even the entire world, such
as a global epidemic or massive act of nature. Disasters have different
effects on different groups of people, as in racial or ethnic discrimina-
tion. Finally, though not comprehensively, the effects of disaster may be
unpredictable, more widespread, or affect unexpected groups (Halpern
& Tramontin, 2007).
Likewise, the aftermath of a disaster may follow different time courses,
ranging from a relatively brief initial response shifting into longer-term
chronicity, or a less protracted aftermath with more or less full resolution