I know first hand the amazing coping techniques that the brain can perform in order to protect it. However, what I have also learned is that without learning the correct ways to process things and coping skills that are vital to have healthy relationships, the effects of being a survivor of child abuse will always have an impact on your life. If you do not deal with things and instead merely forget about them or act as if nothing had ever even happened, they really don't ever go away. Statistically, adult survivors of child abuse are much more likely to find themselves in abusive relationships as adults, be dependent on drugs or alcohol, go to jail, not trust people, become abusive themselves, have psychological problems, have anxiety disorders, have periods of numbness or "zoning out" and are at a higher risk for certain health problems. So how does someone overcome these statistics? How can you change the outlook of your future without being able to go back and erase the past? How important are our childhood experiences in shaping our future? Can we coach our brain to go down a different path? .
Yes, to an extent I think we are fully capable of changing the way we think. "Faking it" is the perfect example and I know all to well the powerful impact that it does truly have and how it can change someone's life. There is evidence that supports my claim thanks to a Harvard graduate Amy Cuddy, who explains the concept behind "fake it till you becomes it." She did a study in which she evaluated the power behind power posing and if it had any impact on a person's brain. The focus was on whether or not it tricked the individual doing the pose and not if it influenced everyone else; did it make the people themselves feel more confident or less confident? The results that she obtained did in fact support her theory that an individual can make tiny tweaks resulting in huge changes to the way their brain functions.