Two weeks ago, it felt like we were in a hurricane watch. A week ago, we’d been upgraded to a warning, with an ominous sense of impending doom looking at the reports out of Italy. This week, we are hearing
Landfall
Nervous Systems on Display
We now live in a different world from the one we lived in last week. Many people were already highly stressed before the virus reached our country and community. This week fear has intensified. We do not know what will
Codependence, a Trauma Response
Do you feel safer alone? What happens to a person who fears connection and longs for authentic relationships? Looking at social anxiety, lack of emotional attachment and isolation through a trauma lens, we can see the effect of having been
Take Off Your Shoes!
We all have a list of “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts” inside our head. We share many of these. Children who are hungry or hurt. Animal cruelty. Greedy people amassing fortunes while ruining the environment. Some things make the list because they
Gratitude
This week I had my 67th birthday, my dog Shantih turns one, and I celebrated my one year anniversary of living in the forest at the ocean. This morning in daily practice we did a gratitude practice. Neuroscience tells us
No one can prevent us from being safe with ourselves
It’s simple really. We need to be cared for. We need someone to see us, and love us, and keep us safe. When that doesn’t happen our nervous system knows that it’s not happening. Cognitive understanding is important. We need
Emotional Flashbacks
An emotional flashback is an emotional state of distress not necessarily experienced with specific memories or images. It is not like a memory from the past, in which we have an image of ourselves at a certain age, the people
We Are All Outsiders
The dictionary defines an outsider as a person who does not belong to a particular group. We are all outsiders from most groups. I am an outsider to marathon runners, medical doctors, and chess champions. That’s neutral for me. I
Showing Up For Ourselves
A recent Being Well podcast featured Dan Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson’s wonderful new book The Power of Showing Up: How Parental Presence Shapes Who Our Kids Become and How Their Brains Get Wired. Being Well Podcast: The Power of Showing
If I were free…
What comes to mind when you think of someone who is free? Free to be themselves. Free from fear and shame. Someone who doesn’t second guess themselves. Someone who isn’t afraid to be authentic. Take a few minutes now to
Kindness is All It Takes to Heal
There are two things I say that people are skeptical about or outright don’t believe. The first is that looking at our lives through a trauma lens reveals that most of our reactivity, compulsive thinking, anxiety, depression, fear and dread
What Will You Do With Your Courage?
A beautiful result of healing trauma is that we have less fear in our day-to-day lives. Our nervous system is less reactive and we are less afraid. We are drawn to authenticity in ourselves and others. We admire people with
Rewiring Your Safety Map Over Time
Some of the people I interview on the Radical Recovery Summit have a very similar understanding and approach to mine. Irene Lyon is one of those people. She synthesized her training and experience into her program SmartMind SmartBody where she
Calming Social Anxiety
When we feel afraid or anxious, we are responding to a threat. When we experience social anxiety, we are almost always responding to the abundance of associations & memories from past social interactions. We have a primitive brain and survival
Trusting Again
Malcolm Gladwell’s new book Talking To Strangers highlights a behavior that may not be immediately evident in our polarized world. Cooperating with others, forming communities where we look out for each other, is an evolutionary advantage. Two qualities that make cooperation easier
Love Flows in Both Directions
Hurt people hurt people. This is obvious to us when we see physical, sexual, emotional abuse or severe neglect. Children are also hurt when parents are too stressed, busy, distracted or depressed to get to know them. To really feel connected,
Radical Recovery Summit
This is one of my favorite times of year. Not because of the change in season. I prefer the warming days of spring. It is because I get to interview passionate people about their innovative, radical work healing trauma and
Kind and Compassionate With Ourselves
We have an understandable and not helpful mechanism of blaming and pushing ourselves. We think this will help us fix things. It is rooted in our survival instinct and primitive brain. When we are children, we blame ourselves for everything
Tall Two-Year-Olds
When a group of adults don’t get enough sleep, it’s like a meeting of tall two-year-olds. Family get-togethers often feature too many people in a small space, staying up late, and too much noise, alcohol, and sugar. Add in entitlement,
Inner Nurturing Committee
Who is on Your Inner Nurturing Committee? Contempt is the most destructive negative behavior in relationships. In Dr. John Gottman’s four decades of research, he has found it to be the number one predictor of divorce. The voice of our own
The Shame of Not Manifesting Abundance and Healing
Mindbody insights into healing can be used to shame us. People don’t generally say that there is something wrong with us if we don’t heal ourselves, yet it is a common interpretation and experience. There is complexity and nuance in
This is NOT the Time to Meditate
“I sit down to meditate and my mind explodes with catastrophic thinking. I don’t get a moment’s peace from my mean inner critic. What’s the matter with me? I even fail at sitting still with nothing to do.” Said by every
Do You Have Trauma?
Some of us have big T Trauma. Some of us also have ordinary trauma. Some remember what happened. Some have blocked out the memories yet we sense there is something fundamentally wrong with us. Big T Trauma is easy to
A List of Their Names
September 30th is Orange Shirt Day, commemorating children who were forced into Canada’s Indian Residential Schools. Today on Facebook I saw the list of 2,800 children who died in these schools. There are at least 1,600 more unnamed children who
Loneliness is the New Smoking
When we have been hurt by people, we are understandably wary of giving them another go at us. Our nervous system remembers the pain and puts up barriers to protect us. The problem with letting our survival mechanisms and primitive
Compliance
Do you ever go along even when you feel uncomfortable? In my experience, compliance is a form of freeze with some fawning to someone perceived as more powerful. This could be in a situation of feeling peer pressure. We do
Gratitude From My Older Self
Do you remember being in your teens and thinking about being old? It was disturbing to me to imagine my young healthy body morphed into a body that is arthritic, stooped over in pain, old, and wrinkled. It never occurred
Mary Oliver, One Wild and Precious Life
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” Summer Day, by Mary Oliver Mary Oliver was someone who was very tuned in to her system and to the natural world. Many of her poems
Nervous system on red alert?
“The effect of trauma is that we disconnect from ourselves, our sense of value, and the present moment.” Dr Gabor Maté We need a basic understanding of the trauma response and nervous system and of the particular way we have
You Look Just Like Your Dad!
When I was a teenager, people often commented I looked just like my dad. Not a welcome thought for a teenage girl! Later he researched the Frasers and gave us pictures of our grandfathers four generations back. I can see
I’m a Small-town Girl
I am a small-town girl from Saskatchewan, a prairie province in Canada that most people wouldn’t know how to pronounce let alone know where it is. I grew up in a home where I was well cared for physically. No
Getting To Know Our Younger Self
Our survival system calculates risk and the option least likely to lead to our death. One response to danger is flight. We run. We get out of there! We physically leave the scene. When we can’t remove our body from
Daring To Be Me
We need parents who are attuned to our needs. Nurturing emotional interactions with parents are an indispensable requirement of human brain development. Children in non-attuned relationships may feel loved but do not experience feeling appreciated for who they really are.
Grieving the Losses of Childhood Trauma
We are cheated out of childhood when our experience is one of fear, abuse and neglect. Before we move into understanding and compassion and into being reasonable and fair, we need to acknowledge the truth of our own experience. I was
Adverse Childhood Experiences Score (ACES)
The Adverse Childhood Experiences Score (ACES) This study is one of the largest investigations ever conducted (mid 90’s) to assess associations between childhood maltreatment and later-life health and well-being. It has since been studied in several states with similar results
What Kind Of An Idiot Would…?!!
We’ve all been there, at the wheel or in the passenger seat. We’re driving along and someone does something inconsiderate that sets off a flare of rage. They roar up beside our car then cut us off, forcing us to
Use Your Body to Calm Catastrophic Thinking
What is happening right now in the space your body is occupying? There are sense perceptions, of the air or clothes on your skin, sounds, wetness in your mouth and the movement of your body with your breath. Are you
I Need More Sleep!
I’ll turn off the screens at nine so my brain has a chance to settle before sleep. I’ll go to bed by ten and listen to a guided relaxation as I fall asleep. I’ll wake up early enough to go
Friends With My Body? Really?
Do you feel good will towards your body? Do you love your body? Could you be friends with your body? For most of us the answer is complicated, embedded with lots of history and memories of past experiences. One of
Hurt People Hurt People
We have all harmed others. How do we allow that in? I have harmed people I love. How can I sit with the sadness and regret and grief of that? Let’s look at it through a trauma lens. When we
Conditions for Happiness
What are the conditions for happiness for you? How many of them are present right now? In this inquiry practice, be firm with your mind so you don’t entertain negative thoughts. We’re not suppressing them, we’re just taking a break.
The Four Right Attitudes
What happens to the environment in our mind when we feel hate toward people greedily using their power for their own benefit, causing harm and destruction to others and the environment? Stress sky rockets. Our body tightens up. We are
Gratitude and Fear
The evidence is in. Gratitude practices rock! Oprah. Brené Brown. Scientists. So why do so many people find they turn stale and lifeless after awhile? It’s one more thing to tick off our already overwhelming to-do list. The promises of
A Field of Energy
Settle into a comfortable position. Shavasana is a classic relaxation pose – where you lie on your back with your arms and legs a comfortable distance apart. Become aware of your body from head to toes and the space your body is
Signature Strengths
Dr. Martin Seligman is a pioneer in the new (1998) field of positive psychology. Until then, western psychology was primarily focused on fixing what was wrong. My meditation teacher encouraged us to “enjoy what there is to enjoy, not suffer
Inner Critic
Do you have an inner critic that is always on the lookout for anything you’ve done wrong? That ridicules and shames you for the smallest mistake? That drives you to be perfect and doesn’t let you rest? Would you like
Solace in the Heart
The practice below is one of nurturing ourselves with comfort and solace in the heart center. Bring to mind a moment of joy, maybe someone you love or a favourite pet and bring your attention to your heart area. The
We’re not performing monkeys
Compassion arises naturally when we acknowledge truth. There is much joy and beauty in a human life and much hardship and pain. Our culture creates pressure to manage life in a certain way, to be successful, and to maintain a
Type with your Fingers
My meditation teacher commented once on how much bodily tension he saw when students typed on the computer. People put their whole body into hammering these sensitive springs that actually work best with a light touch. Try it next time
My Most Interesting Person
I am the most interesting person to me. What is your first response to that? Are any of these these familiar from childhood? “Don’t be too full of yourself!” “Who do you think you are?” “Nobody likes a show-off.” The reasons
Invitation to Rest
I’ve had a bad cold this week, the first one in 4 or 5 years. The feeling is familiar. Fever. Sleeping on and off all day. Headache. Coughing. Runny nose. Sinus pain. Foggy brain. When illness happens our body needs
Trauma Informed Mindfulness
Free online class Sunday March 3rd 11AM Eastern http://zoom.us/j/645904638 Following the instructions to breathe and relax can be difficult for some people with a trauma history. We’re asking people to let down their defenses and feel. Our brain and nervous