Be Like Water, Not Like Clay: The Necessity of Alignment and Detachment for Trauma Survivors

Hey y'all,

It's been about a year since I put pen to paper—or should I say fingers to keyboard—for a blog post. Here's why.

Over the past year, I've spent a lot of time communicating with and centering purpose. Doing so included leaving my full-time leadership role in healthcare (more on that later), entering the dissertation phase of my PhD program in Mind-Body Medicine, and completing certification in Pranic Healing. It also included finishing my three-year program in Somatic Experiencing and, soon after, mourning the loss of my beloved Somatic Experiencing teacher.

So clearly, life was lifin'.

Through it all, I've come to develop an unwavering trust in God.

Trust is central to this post and is represented in the phrase:

Be Like Water, Not Like Clay.

Water Flows. Clay Conforms.

So, what do I mean by this?

Water is a complex, multifaceted force. It has the power to heal, nourish, support growth, and destroy. It does all of this while remaining water. It doesn't shapeshift into whatever surrounds it. It flows.

And that flow can create a vast range of outcomes.

Clay, on the other hand, is moldable. It can be shaped into whatever its user desires, often moving further and further away from its original form.

And this is where I think the metaphor becomes especially powerful for trauma survivors.

When Survival Teaches You to Become Clay

For trauma survivors, many people become conditioned into being like clay.Often, this happens out of survival.

Trauma can teach us to pay very close attention to our external environment. The nervous system becomes highly attuned to potential threats, changes in tone, facial expressions, body language, conflict, rejection, abandonment, or anything else that might signal danger. One manifestation of this is hypervigilance, a heightened state of monitoring the environment for potential threat.

This heightened attention can make sense when viewed through the lens of survival. Our nervous systems are designed to detect and respond to what may be dangerous. When our environments repeatedly teach us that danger can appear unexpectedly, constantly monitoring the outside world can become an adaptive response.

And there is science behind why these patterns can become so deeply ingrained.

Our brains are constantly learning from experience. Repeated experiences can strengthen particular neural pathways and make certain responses easier and more automatic to access. This is one of the key features of neuroplasticity—the brain's capacity to change in response to experience, learning, and behavior.

In other words, what we repeatedly practice can become what our nervous system expects.

If saying yes keeps you from experiencing conflict, you may learn to say yes.

If making yourself small keeps you from being targeted, you may learn to disappear.

If anticipating everyone's needs keeps you from being abandoned, you may become hyper-attuned to everyone else's emotions.

If independence means you never have to depend on someone who might hurt or disappoint you, you may become fiercely self-reliant.

If appeasing someone reduces immediate tension, your body may learn that appeasement equals safety.

These responses can be incredibly adaptive.

Until they aren't.

When Adaptation Becomes Identity

It is important to distinguish between who you are and what you learned to do to survive.

Many trauma survivors become masters at flexibility. They say yes when they mean no. They put others first. They make themselves small. They become unseen. They become hyper-independent. They over-function. They anticipate. They appease. They shape-shift.

They become clay.

And to be clear, these patterns didn't come from nowhere.

They came from survival and have served important functions.

But what repeats over time can become familiar. What becomes familiar can begin to feel normal. And what feels normal can eventually be mistaken for identity.

This is one reason trauma healing isn't simply about "changing your mindset." Sometimes, you are not trying to convince yourself to think differently. You're learning to recognize a pattern that your brain and body have practiced for years—and discovering that you now have choices.

Resmaa Menakem describes this beautifully when he says, "Trauma decontextualized looks like personality."

Becoming Water

Becoming like water is not about becoming passive.

Water can be gentle.

Water can be powerful.

Water can nourish.

Water can erode.

Water can create.

Water can destroy.

Most importantly, water flows without losing its nature.

And this is the invitation.

For trauma survivors, becoming like water can mean learning to remain connected to yourself while moving through relationships, environments, expectations, and change. It means developing the ability to adapt without automatically abandoning yourself in the process.

This is where alignment and detachment become powerful concepts in trauma recovery.

Alignment asks: Does this belong to me? Does this feel true for me? Does this reflect who I am becoming?

Detachment asks: Can I allow something to be what it is without needing to control it, fix it, chase it, or contort myself around it?

Together, they create space for something many trauma survivors have been disconnected from: the ability to trust themselves.

Becoming like water means connecting to the power that lives within you, owning that power, sharing that power when you choose, and allowing that power to be what it is—powerful. It can also mean beginning to release attachments to people, places, roles, and expectations that have required you to continually abandon yourself in order to belong.

Your Nervous System Loves Repetition

So, how do you begin becoming more like water?

Start by developing practices that give your brain and body repeated experiences of something different.

Your nervous system learns through experience. Repetition matters. Consistency matters. And this is one of the gifts of neuroplasticity: we are not permanently defined by every pattern we've learned.

We can practice new ones.

That doesn't mean healing happens overnight or that we can simply "rewire" ourselves through positive thinking. Trauma healing is often nonlinear, relational, embodied, and deeply personal. But we can begin.

Practice "I Am" Affirmations

Practice affirming who you are. Affirmations are not magic words, but they can become intentional opportunities to practice a new relationship with yourself and bring awareness to beliefs that may have been shaped by past experiences.

Here are places to begin:

I am worthy. I am allowed to take up space. I am allowed to change my mind. I am safe to be seen. I can honor myself without abandoning others.

Move Your Body

Healing is not exclusively cognitive.

Somatic movement can create opportunities to reconnect with bodily sensations, boundaries, agency, and choice. Move slowly. Stretch. Shake. Walk. Dance. Breathe. Notice what happens inside your body when you say yes. Notice what happens when you imagine saying no. Notice where you tighten. Notice where you soften.

Your body is communicating with you all the time.

For many trauma survivors, somatic healing can be an important part of learning to recognize those signals rather than automatically overriding them.

Practice Saying Both No and Yes—with Intention

If you've spent years saying yes automatically, practice saying no.

If you've spent years saying no to your own needs, practice saying yes to yourself.

You don't need to become rigid to stop being clay. The goal isn't to say no to everyone. The goal is to become more intentional about your yes.

Sometimes healing looks like setting a boundary.

Sometimes it looks like receiving help.

Sometimes it looks like leaving.

Sometimes it looks like staying.

The work is learning to recognize the difference.

Explore Energy Healing

Trauma healing and personal growth also involves exploring the energetic dimensions of your experience.

Energy healing can provide a space for slowing down, cleansing, energizing, and develop a spiritual hygiene practice.

Develop a Stillness Practice

Stillness creates an opportunity to hear yourself. To hear God. To notice your intuition. To notice what your body has been trying to tell you.

You don't have to begin with thirty minutes of meditation. Start with five minutes. Sit. Breathe. Listen. Allow yourself to exist without immediately responding to something outside of you.

Stillness isn't about doing nothing.

Sometimes, stillness is where we finally become available to ourselves.

Becoming More of Yourself is Healing

Maybe the work isn't becoming someone new.

Maybe the work is becoming more fully who you already are underneath the survival patterns.

The goal isn't to become clay that can never bend. And it isn't to become water that never has boundaries. It is to become flexible without abandoning yourself.

To flow without losing your form.

To love without losing yourself in someone else.

To adapt without constantly betraying your own needs.

To detach without becoming disconnected.

To trust without needing to control every outcome.

And perhaps most importantly, to develop enough internal safety to ask yourself:

What happens if I stop shaping myself around everything outside of me and start allowing my life to flow from within?

Maybe that is where alignment begins.

Maybe that is where detachment begins.

Maybe that is where freedom begins.

Explore Embodied Healing in Baltimore, MD

This is the kind of work I love exploring with people: the space between what you know intellectually and what your body, nervous system, and spirit are actually experiencing.

Through RISE in Baltimore, Maryland, I blend together trauma-informed care and integrative mind-body approaches to support deeper awareness, embodied change, and intentional living. Depending on your goals and needs, this work may include somatic approaches, mind-body medicine, and energy healing.

I also offer consultation, training, and presentations for, helping professionals, organizations, and agencies who want to deepen their understanding of trauma-informed practice, somatic approaches, mind-body medicine, and integrative healing for true system change. Reach out, to get started