III. Supporting vs Pushing

When interacting with children, we might feel a well-intentioned desire to learn more about their story or to coax them to move further down the road of trauma healing, by processing their trauma. Do not try to help a child do this, as it can be psychologically harmful. In Lala’s Journey, and everywhere, we want to support children, not push them, in their healing journey.

A helpful way to engage in stabilization (instead of processing) is to think about our actions from the perspective of supporting versus pushing. The difference between supporting and pushing can be subtle. The next activity highlights the difference.

For each of the next eight questions, choose whether the action would be mostly supporting or mostly pushing. While answers may be in a “gray area”, the answer we give will show you our perspective.