Objectively, there's very little about The Body Keeps the Score that says "best seller," except the best-seller list, where it's been perched for nearly four years. Yet this 464-page, densely written tome by Bessel van der Kolk, M.D., a psychiatrist and trauma researcher, about how traumatic experiences impact your capacity for pleasure, engagement, trust, and even self-control, has a life of its own right now.
"Kindly asking my body to stop keeping the score," begs one viral tweet. "Can the score be like soccer and stop at around <3? I feel like I'm playing with basketball scores," cheesesteak 2018 asks in a Reddit forum on stress. A few posts down, another user chimes in with "This is a book my sister wants me to read and I'm waaaaay too scared to do it."
The book's big break can't be traced to one thing, like a celebrity tweet or a book club, although there are plenty of those. It's more like a series of little breaks and the vibe shift happening around understanding trauma and how psychological pain can cause lasting physical damage. From systemic racism and mass shootings to natural disasters and increased awareness of sexual abuse, trauma is everywhere, even to the point that trauma memes are actually a thing. "Collectively, we are becoming increasingly aware of the impact of personal trauma and generational trauma," says Arielle Schwartz, Ph.D., a licensed clinical psychologist in Boulder, Colorado. "People are seeking, 'What can I do about this?"
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