It may be five years since the first covid lockdowns, but in some ways we’re still navigating very disrupted times culturally and politically. In these challenging times, we can resource ourselves by acknowledging the feeling states inside of us. For me, the body is...
The very nature of trauma is that it is overwhelming – it’s more than our organisms can cope with. Trauma often shatters our worldview and rules of fairness and justice no longer seem to apply, which can lead to a spiritual crisis and a profound re-evaluation of...
A few years ago, several newspapers wrote stories about my Trauma and Tension Releasing (TRE) workshops, calling TRE “the new mindfulness craze set to take London by storm.” Today I thought I’d share one of the articles, from the London Evening Standard (you can see...
This article was written by Sylvia Benoist. (Note from Steve: Sylvia recently completed her training as a TRE - Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises - supervisor (mentor with me), and I asked her to share her journey with TRE and Ankylosing Spondylitis, a type of...
I think it’s very useful to define trauma as “anything that overwhelms our ability to cope”, as well as to view trauma as a continuum. The overwhelm that leads to trauma patterns in the body may be from a specific experience such as a car accident, sexual abuse,...
There is a lot of pain around: In a huge study (Breivik et al 2006) across 15 European countries, 19% of people reported living with moderate to severe pain for more than 6 months. That’s 1 in 5 people in persistent pain states, the majority for many years. Holy moly....
Over the past 13 years, I’ve had the privilege of teaching TRE (Trauma and Tension Releasing Exercises) to over 2000 people. Here are some of the insights I’ve gained about the power of this simple trauma healing practice: People expect change to be painful or...
Shaking can release long-held tension patterns and promote new feelings of connection and ease. It is a novel stimulus to the central nervous system. New stimuli, approached with safety and curiosity, can support learning and growth. TRE®, Tension and Trauma Releasing...
There is a moment in The Work at about 20 minutes. Two men are standing eye ball to eye ball. They are in a group of other men standing in a circle around them. You are aware of the noise of other circles of other men. The stillness and the intensity between the two...
When it comes to healing trauma, psychology isn’t unimportant, however, when we work with a body-up approach, we can reset the overactive triggers in our threat detection systems. When the body is calm and we’ve quieted its protective reflexes, we can make more space...
The psychologist, Dr David Bercelli has long worked in the Middle East and North Africa in war-torn communities. He was in a bomb bunker in Lebanon when he began to conceive the practice of TRE (Trauma and Tension Releasing Exercises). As the bombing continued, he...
If it is hard to feel, it is hard to heal. Our feeling states are often hidden, rarely simple, and sometimes scary. Embodiment tools can help us develop our capacity to feel, which is incredibly useful in resolving pain, anxiety and trauma. We’re all hardwired to...