Catharsis is a release of negative emotional tension that is experienced through the conscious act of revisiting, embodying, and re-interpreting a traumatic experience. As espoused by Aristotle, it is a process that is essential to emotional and psychological health, allowing us to explore and integrate difficult aspects of our lives into a meaningful narrative. Catharsis enables us to move through the victimization and emotional immobility of trauma and towards a place of personal power and agency. In so doing, we open the possibility to meet our discomfort head on, to become intimate with our past, and to actively seek a richer and more meaningful life.

See also: delta wave, peak experience, altered state, ecstasis, psychedelic experience