Even as the country is reeling from the unsettling events of Colorado—and even though there is no explanation available that can ease the pain—there is evidence that something beyond words is providing some relief for those who are suffering. Everyone will cope with the trauma in their own way, but according to Ernie Vecchio, there is an “invisible something else that is catching our attention and uniting us.”
An author and trauma psychologist who has practiced for over thirty years, Vecchio offers his perspective on what occurred in Colorado, giving a deeper meaning to the recent events: “We’ll spend a great deal of time making sense of the Colorado tragedy and still credit mental illness as the reason,” he said. “But in truth, personality dysfunction is at the core of mental illness, and this is an epidemic in our culture that is ignored until it erupts. This dysfunction has reached such a level that the culture is saying, ‘If everyone has it, then no one does.’”
The thousands of trauma patients that Vecchio has worked with have taught him that human beings can be free from the delusional judgments of ego that cause this break in our development, which he says is quite common. He argues that emotional maladjustment has become our culture’s “default position,” and that people are simply enduring the situation—until they can’t anymore.
Rather than focusing on diagnosis and blame, Vecchio brings a context of human understanding to the events that occurred in Colorado; while others are examining the objective information, he suggests that valid knowledge can be gained from the subjective truth. Objectivity alone, he says, does not allow for “useful suffering,” which is necessary for the advancement of our emotional growth.
Vecchio sees a lesson in the tragedy of Colorado, and hopes others will as well. “Whether you examine the parents, the media, the mental health profession, or society at large, objectively or subjectively, you come to the same conclusion,” he said. “All and none of these factors play a part when we’re talking about human development.”
Vecchio makes it clear that his perspective is not an opinion, but a reality, one that is informed by the many trauma victims he has treated. He says there is an answer for how and why a rise in tragic events is occurring, as well as a remedy.
“The new wisdom on human suffering suggests that a specific sequence of things has created our dilemma, as well as the psychological result,” he explained. “Essentially, no one is being taught how to suffer, let alone why we have to. Morality is offering little relief for our guilt, and narcissism is failing to heal our shame. At the end of the day, we are labeling psychological maladjustment a psychiatric problem, and using prescriptive and non-prescriptive substances as a remedy.”
He also notes that, although our outer society keeps changing and advancing, our inner world has remained the same, and is comprised of three inner qualities: an observing intelligence, the human spirit, and an inner compass.
“Essentially, born out of love, human beings come into the world a symbol of hope for the future. They possess gifts from which this hopefulness can grow. They possess a nonlocal observing intelligence that orchestrates and witnesses their life as they mature. Neutral and nonjudgmental, this observer creates external events for them to see internal obstacles. They possess an inherent angst of agitation, the human spirit, which forms when their intended sense of self is interrupted by expectations. Finally, and most important, they possess an inner compass to guide them along the way. Our initial intent of promise, guided by these three inner qualities, is to actualize our potential.”
Vecchio says that ego is a fourth quality that only develops as compensation when one or all of the other three qualities “breaks,” disabling a person’s guidance system. He gives us a glimpse of how this relates to what happened in Colorado. ”We can safely say that the ‘observer’ of our assailant was assigned to family and culture, which means he was unable to self-reflect,” he explained. “To imagine this condition, think of the actors and actresses in our culture that we consider exceptional: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Marlon Brando, Meryl Streep—we call them exceptional because they ‘become’ the characters they play. What many people don’t understand is that they are purging themselves, emotionally and psychologically, in order to become these characters.”
Vecchio points out that the difference between Hollywood’s character actors and James Holmes, the Colorado gunman, is that actors get to go home when their movie project is finished, returning to their reality. “What if the cameras were never turned off or the critics never stopped?” he asked. “There would be no going home. No return to a valid self.” He says that James Holmes lost his capacity to observe himself—a loss that inflicted a debilitating wound upon his soul.
“Moving from a heart-oriented beginning, shame disabled the assailant’s guidance system,” he said. “Misguided and detached, he introverted for self-protection. Ultimately, he escaped into the imaginary role of a character disorder.” He went on to say that a shame-based beginning was not the entire explanation, however: “The objective experts will call the assailant a sociopath who turned psychotic. This is valid. What is also a valid reason—and is happening to millions who may never act out—is that shame disabled his ability to see his own reflection except through others.”
Vecchio suggests that our culture has shifted from being guilt-based to being immersed in shame, and the senseless crimes we are seeing are the result of this shift. Many of us are standing in front of broken mirrors, just like the assailant, he says, but only extreme cases come into our awareness. The only thing that sets the rest of us apart from these cases, he asserts, is that our distortions have not erupted tragically.
“The human spirit is like the little engine that could, and its tenacity is unparalleled by any other quality, except for ego,” Vecchio said. “It is our feeling reaction to the immediate moment. When the spirit gets hurt, a ‘break’ occurs—it’s real, but no one seems to know how to fix it.” He notes that this break happens to everyone during childhood; when we become angry, there are only two places to go with our feelings, inward or outward. If we direct our anger inwardly, it manifests as self-blame and self-punishment. If we direct it outwardly, we become victims, and react by victimizing others. Feelings of shame cause us to experience self-loathing and to feel that we are the mistake. Guilt victimizes or punishes; shame detaches. Shame caused Holmes’s violence, Vecchio explains, because “losing any real connection to his feelings enabled him to do harm. Our feelings are a ‘feedback loop’ for the quality of our thoughts—not our emotions. His emotions charged his thoughts until he became delusional.”
Vecchio believes that Holmes re-enacted the memory of his shame so many times that he became removed from his own humanity. He felt that he was unloved, and he had no capacity to self-reflect, had a tenacious angst he didn’t understand and had lost his connection to his human compass.
“Inadequate guidance forms all kinds of ego characters,” Vecchio said. The problem is that many people use their ego as a moral compass, but the ego’s purpose is to defend us against the outside world. It protects us until we learn to protect ourselves—but “many of us have been afraid for so long, we’ve lost the capacity to distinguish real from imagined fear.” An underdeveloped ego will only see life as moral or two-sided, and will be incapable of generating ethical, contextual, “feeling” alternatives.
“The new wisdom on human suffering suggests that we possess four inner voices: comforter, critic, mediator, and bully,” Vecchio said. “Each carries a unique message, and is mirrored in our life experiences. Sociopaths and psychopaths believe it is them against the world, and are born out of a shaming experience. Neurotics feel it is them against themselves, and struggle with guilt. Subjectively examining Colorado, Holmes experienced an outer critique, an inner critic, the rage of his bully, and 16,000 distorted, repetitive thoughts every day. Rather than see who he was, we can see what he was: a shamed guidance system gone amuck.”
Vecchio says that the events in Colorado point to a widespread problem—that many of us are tiring of being afraid of being afraid, and that our inadequate compensations for our inner angst are literally killing us. The angst is not necessarily a bad thing—it’s the source of our motivation to create, grow, and evolve—but we need to find healthier ways to purge the human ego rather than simply pacifying its incessant need for distraction and vicarious cathartic moments.
“It is important to understand that the ego is overwhelmed because it is underdeveloped and asleep,” Vecchio explained. “The suffering we are feeling as a result of this recent trauma has awakened our egos, just as it was supposed to; now our challenge is to understand how and why to stay awake. Awakening activates our guidance system, and staying awake—which is a personal choice—advances our integrity as human beings.”
“The angst of the human spirit is provocation,” Vecchio said, “and this provocation is designed to push the ego into action. The question, of course, is what kind of action.” In James Holmes’s case, his angst provoked a negative action, with tragic results—but according to Vecchio, Holmes is evidence of a crack in the dam that holds back all of our feelings of dissatisfaction. Many people struggle with where and how to fit into the world, he says, but if we take responsibility for our disabled guidance system and reinstate the conviction of the human heart as our compass, we can become the hope we are waiting for.
