When Grit Fails: Trauma, Group Dynamics, and the Cost of Ignoring Orientation
Handling the blowback from talking about psychology in high-pressure movements
Resistance movements tend to pride themselves on grit, discipline, and tactical thinking. Within those circles, anything labeled "psychology" often triggers suspicion; in some groups, words like “trigger” or “trauma” get dismissed as weakness. It sounds like navel-gazing. It gets seen as irrelevant to the mission.
I’m sure you’ve heard or even said things like this:
"We don’t have time for feelings."
"This isn’t therapy."
"Talking about trauma is pointless. We aren’t a support group.”
“Leave the past in the past. No one cares if your daddy didn’t love you.”
The problem is this: if your group is ignoring psychology, especially trauma psychology, you're losing operational clarity because you are missing critical factors in your group members’ orientation.
Individual orientation informs group culture. And if you're losing orientation, you're already behind.
Why Orientation Is the Real Battlefield
Yesterday we discussed this in depth, but if you missed it, go read it.
For the uninitiated, here’s a quick reminder of what the OODA loop is.
Observation: What’s happening?
Orientation: What does it mean?
Decision: What will I do?
Action: Execute.
People ignore the need for orientation all the time. They default to instinct or ideology…or feelings. Whether you realize it or not, your emotions actually make a lot of your decisions by default. We like to think that we make decisions based on our belief system, but we often think we believe one thing and then act as though we believe something else.
The problem is that even if you choose to ignore intentionality in Orientation, it still occurs. It still governs your decisions whether you’re intentional or not.
Let’s look at some examples:
Scenario 1
You know the group respects you. They’ve shown it repeatedly. But today, the leader ignored a question you asked. Instantly, your brain says one of the following:
“They’re mad at me. I must’ve screwed something up.”
”He’s such a narcissist.”
”Why is my voice being silenced?”
Later, you find out that there was a perfectly reasonable explanation, but you’ve already withdrawn, or left, or lashed out, or vented to another member and caused drama. The wild part is that if someone had asked you, “Do you typically assume that things are your fault or that people secretly dislike you?” you probably would say no, of course not.
Scenario 2
You text your spouse, and they don’t answer. Hours go by and you haven’t heard anything. Which of the following were closest to what you were thinking?
“Oh, they’re busy, no big deal.”
”I wonder if something happened.”
”Are they cheating? Did they leave? Are they mad at me? Why are they ignoring me?”
That is emotional decision-making, and people do it all the time—both males and females. We can take a neutral signal and turn it into a perceived threat, and it has nothing to do with the reality that exists; it’s part of the reality that we create and operate under.
And THAT is part of your Orientation.
Unresolved trauma can be fatal in modern resistance environments. Orientation is where narrative, trauma, worldview, bias, and culture all collide. And when those are scrambled, so are your perceived options for action.
Bluntly put, trauma distorts orientation faster than just about anything else. It alters how you read threats, who you trust, how you interpret silence, or whether you act at all. If you're not maintaining clarity at the orientation level, you're either misfiring decisions or creating feedback loops that destroy everything you’re trying to do.
What Trauma Does to Group Function
Trauma creates warped feedback systems inside people. Put a bunch of those people together, and now your group is running on corrupted inputs.
Here’s how that plays out.
Hypervigilance becomes internal policing and paranoia.
Fawning becomes over-compliance with toxic leadership.
Freeze response gets repackaged as tactical patience.
Groupthink is mistaken for discipline and unity.
Groups built on trauma-damaged orientation loops cannot sustain pressure. The more stressed the mission gets, the more likely the group will fracture from within.
Let’s show what this looks like in an actual group, only using attachment styles.
Attachment Styles in a Group
Attachment styles can best be described as how you emotionally relate to other people, shaped early by how safe, attuned, or chaotic your caregivers were. Trauma, especially chronic neglect, inconsistency, or abuse, can distort this relational blueprint. It results in you having warped ideas and patterns that you carry into adulthood.
Secure – Trusts others, handles stress well, and engages with confidence and flexibility. Often the emotional stabilizer in group settings.
Anxious – Craves connection but fears abandonment; hyper-attuned to rejection and often reacts emotionally. Can become a relational destabilizer under pressure.
Avoidant – Values independence and avoids emotional intimacy; disconnects under stress. May appear calm but resists collaboration or vulnerability.
Disorganized – Wants closeness but fears it; shaped by trauma and unpredictability. Often volatile, mistrustful, and prone to internal conflict and contradiction.
You can have a combo of styles, too, such as anxious-avoidant. It’s important to note that attachment style is a direct modifier of how Orientation functions. Let’s take a 4-person group, where each member has a different attachment style. Here’s what each person brings to the table.
Secure
Base: Trust and adaptability
This person is steady under pressure, takes in new info without getting rattled, and helps others do the same. When things go sideways, they’re the ones who stay calm and keep the group grounded. This person has good Orientation and is consistently reorienting as needed. Their value isn’t found in the group, but internally.
Anxious
Base: Fear of being left behind or not being enough
They constantly worry they’re being left out or rejected. They overanalyze everything, chase reassurance, and can create drama or urgency where there isn’t any unless someone keeps them anchored. This is often your drama queen, and they can suck the life out of your group.
Avoidant
Base: Fear of being controlled or vulnerable
They hate relying on others and keep their distance emotionally. They act like nothing fazes them, but they often ignore important input and resist teamwork unless their freedom or logic is at stake. This is your rebel or discipline problem.
Disorganized
Base: Fear of betrayal and chaos
They want to trust but can’t settle down. One minute they’re loyal, the next they’re pulling away or flipping sides. Their inner chaos can infect the group unless there are strong boundaries and clear structure.
If you're building a resistance cell or already have one, these attachment styles are invisible but massively influential. Each one filters Orientation differently; what looks like defiance, neediness, or coldness may be a misfire in the feedback system, not malice. To preserve agility and cohesion, the group must either screen for attachment stability or design its protocols to contain the distortions that each member brings to the table.
Now multiply that by ten, or fifty, and you see how fast trauma becomes a lethal threat to your group dynamics.
IV. The Resistance to Talking About Trauma
So why do groups resist talking about trauma? Here are the main reasons:
Performance culture that sees masculinity as lacking emotion: Emotional bandwidth is treated as a liability.
Fear of exploitation: Vulnerability is seen as something opponents can weaponize.
Bad experiences with manipulative psychology: Some people were burned by bad therapists or counselors, church abuse, or coercive healing groups.
So now, any mention of trauma gets filed with a big tag that reads “Threat Vector.”
If you’re looking to get your group more informed on how to handle trauma-affected Orientation, you might need to change your verbiage. Stop using words from the therapist’s proverbial couch, and start using words that your group can understand, without the connotations that will shut them down.
Instead of talking about healing, for instance, talk about calibration in pursuit of better Orientation.
V. Why You Cannot Skip This Step
Groups that refuse to confront trauma directly:
Get easily infiltrated
Confuse panic for urgency
Misinterpret silence as betrayal
Overreact to internal conflict, and there will be a LOT of internal conflict
Eventually, those groups blow up, turn authoritarian, or burn out.
If you want long-term movement durability, you need to invest in orientation maintenance. That means facing trauma head-on, both yours and your group’s.
One last thing. You’ll get objections; I can almost guarantee it. Here’s how you can handle a few of them.
Objection: "We’re not here to coddle people."
Response: "Correct. We’re here to adapt. Trauma distorts and can even prevent that."
Objection: "This isn’t a support group."
Response: "Agreed. That’s why we need people to calibrate."
Objection: "We don’t have time for psychology."
Response: "Then you don’t have time to win, because this is how you win."
If you're serious about resistance—real, durable, high-pressure resistance—you can’t afford to skip this. Trauma-free isn’t realistic, but you need your members to be trauma-aware. You need them self-regulating instead of self- and group-destructing.
You’re either running on clarity, or you’re running on ghosts, and the decision is yours.