Trance logic describes logical glitches that can exist when people get hypnotized and enter a trance state. In that state of mind we can accept statements as true even though they deeply contradict each other. We simply don’t notice that they can’t possibly be true at the same time. Nothing is questioned or reality-checked, it is just accepted as a given truth. The statements exist parallel to each other without causing cognitive dissonance. In hypnotherapy this is useful, in DID therapy it can cause trouble.
Trance logic in DID
We can find this pattern a lot within DID even though we are not being hypnotized. Dissociation keeps us from noticing that things aren’t adding up. We are sure that there are people living in our head, sometimes there is one or even more inner worlds and we experience them in their shapes and qualities as physically existing in our skull.. But we would also agree that if we got an MRI we would see that in our head there is a brain that is made of brain cells. No people there, no rooms or landscapes. Just grey and white matter. Still just one brain that somehow produces the experiences we have. We tend to mentally separate these two statements so they don’t create any dissonance.
When we take a closer look at parts of the personality we will find more of this pattern. ANPs are sure that EPs are someone completely different and that the trauma that happened to these parts didn’t happen to them. This often comes with a conviction that there are separate people living in one body instead of dissociated parts of one personality. If you asked more questions they would agree that all parts live in one body and that the abuse happened to that body. But the connection, that therefore abuse happened to all parts and that is how they came to be, isn’t made. The understanding is kept parallel without touching. (And before you start arguing that parts have nothing to do with the body and they are separate things… without a body there wouldn’t be consciousness or an experience. Thinking that we are not our body is trance logic too.)
The same is true for controlling EPs who think they are an abuser and might threaten to kill other parts or the body. They don’t realize that they can’t kill mental structures because they have no separate body or that killing the body means dying themselves. In their limited experience they have their own body and are their own person who is independent from the others. If they aren’t stopped they will soon find out that this is not the case.
There are different ways to work with or work through trance logic, but the first important step is to realize that it is there. When we rely solely on our subjective inner experience our view of ourselves and the world will be heavily influenced by contradicting statements. People who look at it from the outside without knowing that the reason for this is dissociation might think we are a bit crazy. If I as an introject of my mother want to work through the trauma of giving birth to myself, I have gone too far into trance logic. Not everything we believe is literally true. Yet there are good reasons why we believe them that should be explored.
Working within trance logic
A lot of helpful therapy will happen when we work with our inner experience and influence it in positive ways. These interventions will have little to do with the world outside but they can change how parts of the system feel or act and that has a dynamic influence on every relationship between parts and the whole inner experience.
One of the standard interventions is creating Safe Places for every part of us to give them a space where they are free of threat, no trauma can reach them and they can calm down and relax. All modifications we make in our inner world work within trance logic since the body is in a completely different space and experiences different things. We create a parallel reality that can be vividly experienced.
Another standard is adding Inner Helpers or other soothing things for parts who are in distress. They don’t necessarily get oriented in space, time and the body. These interventions can happen without a realization of the outside world or grounding. We simply create an artificial reality around these parts to meet their needs in a way they cannot be met in real life.
Inner meeting rooms for team meetings are a pillar of DID therapy. While we meet in a circle in individual forms, the body sits alone.
Interactions between parts in a mindspace all happen within trance logic. This is necessary for healing and there is no way around it. Sometimes parts get in relationships with each other or there are complex stories unfolding in the inner world while the body is taking part in everyday life. Some of it is the mind’s way of processing certain topics where it is safe, which can lead to greater security and the capacity to do more of these things in the outside world or it helps to process deep issues. Sometimes I am not sure if maybe it turns into an avoidance of the outside world and there seems to be a lot of drama that doesn’t lead to any positive changes. My personal conclusion is that it can be tremendously helpful to work within trance logic but there might be a ‘too much’ of it where it seems like the DID equivalent of maladaptive daydreaming and we would profit a lot more if we got oriented and grounded in the real world.
Working on dissolving trance logic
Sometimes we need someone to shake us out of our inner experiences. They might not be happy ones. Child part who are stuck in re-experiencing trauma can benefit dramatically from getting oriented and grounded and experiencing the world today as safe, different, and much better. They can gain confidence, make new tangible experiences and take part in real life (nothing like being allowed to choose food items, if you ask our 5-year old. Real food rocks). Experiences within the body have a different quality than interactions in the inner world and some parts will prefer the real world and a new life with new opportunities.
When we deal with parts who harm the body or threaten to kill other parts or the body it is of utter importance to dissolve the trance logic and help them realize that they are part of a whole that shares a body and that killing the body means eliminating themselves. There is no way to pin-point the self-consciousness of one part in the brain, no way to remove it from our head. We cannot keep entertaining trance logic and keep them ignorant of this fact and be safe. Realities need to touch (More). A lot of crisis interventions for DID are just different ways of grounding parts in the outside reality to help them see that they are fighting against themselves or shadows of the past. Otherwise all we get is deep confusion or an inner power struggle up to situations that are highly violent and resemble a civil war.
When our goal is integration our path will be paved with dissolving trance logic. Integrative actions (synthesis, realization, personification, presentification) will all help us to see the bigger picture, to experience ourselves beyond the limit of single parts, realize that time is passing differently than in the inner world etc. Some of these integrative actions are really difficult to achieve and they usually just blow our mind or overwhelm us when we aren’t anywhere near ready to integrate that understanding. Realization needs capacity. When we try to force it, all we get is more dissociation. Dissolving trance logic happens over years, step by step. If you already know you want integration that could inspire you to seek this path more regularly. This is a path of healing instead of managing the symptoms and creating a life around them. Living in the Here and Now of the outside reality helps us not to slide into trauma memories all the time. One part after the other can finally move on.
Balance
If we decide to jump fully into our inner reality we might lose touch with life to a degree that makes us dysfunctional and encourages endless drama. It isn’t very adaptive and we cannot expect the world to accept us when it causes chaos in our relationships. That isn’t ableism, it is called boundaries. When there is fruitless drama unfolding in the inner world and it harms relationships it might be time to get more grounded in reality. Otherwise the drama or power struggles can take up all our time and energy and leave us with nothing to manage life. When our outside life suffers because we are so self-involved we need to pay more attention to that reality.
Still, we need to look at and work with the inside reality because it is really happening and avoiding it means keeping ourselves from solving our problems.
Dissolving trance logic is how integration/fusion is achieved so we can live without symptoms of DID. The more integrated we are the more our life can center around other things than DID, we gain functioning and more freedom to just have an ordinary life. How much trance logic we can dissolve highly depends on our integrative capacity. It doesn’t make sense to make this the goal for every system out there when capacity differs greatly between systems. Dissolving trance logic comes with a lot of hard realizations and grief about the reality that isn’t happening. Parts who are newly confronted with more of the outside reality often hit a small existential crisis in our experience. Life gets a lot more stable after they get out of it, but this is a rough path to choose. Some might find that it is easier to leave some things unintegrated.
Leaving it all unintegrated means maintaining the suffering though.
I hope you notice that this is not a black or white situation and it isn’t one where choosing one path alone would get us to a desirable place. For many systems it works best to make informed decisions on how to proceed with every single part. Some Littles will do best when they can just be inside and have an inner caretaker with them so they won’t get exposed to the stress of daily life and adulting. Being grown up isn’t that much fun for some. Others will prosper once they are grounded in the present and engaged in meaninul tasks. We need some kind of balance between our realities and from there, use whatever helps best and keeps us functioning in life. There is no one size fits all solution, just the effort concerning balance and the goal of becoming as functional as possible. Our Ts need to make sure to keep that balance as well, otherwise they will guide us into crisis.
DID therapy means working with all of our experience, inside and outside. It means accepting and working with what is there and increasing awareness of all that is there. We cannot avoid working with our inner experience and pretend it’s not real and we cannot fully withdraw from our outside reality and just live in our head. It needs a slow integration of both worlds and an awareness that we are living in both realities at the same time. How much we lean to one side or the other depends on personal goals and integrative capacity. Once we understand trance logic things will make more sense. We are living in two realities. The great challenge is to balance them and integrate them to improve our quality of life.
More about balancing in therapy
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