0:00 Today, we are going to be talking about how to restore your sense of
0:03 safety when you've experienced trauma
0:06 or chronic stress.
0:08 And I am just so excited to have such an amazing guest today.
0:13 It's Dr.
0:14 Arielle Schwartz.
0:15 She has like written a book.
0:17 She's written eight of the books on this topic
0:20 and she has so much depth of knowledge
0:23 as far as somatic approaches to healing trauma,
0:26 polyagal approaches, EMDR, also teaches trauma-informed yoga.
0:31 She's also written a book, the poly vagal theory workbook for trauma,
0:35 and I've gone through it.
0:36 It's great stuff.
0:38 So, today we're going to be talking about how trauma shows up in the
0:41 body,
0:42 how to restore your sense of safety.
0:44 We do two exercises together where I get to uh release a little bit
0:48 of trauma from my body
0:50 and u we talk about is healing from CPTTSD really possible like actually
0:56 and I think you'll be really happy to hear the answer.
0:58 So let's jump in.
1:08 Well, thank you so much for being here today. really appreciate you taking the
1:12 time out of your schedule to join us.
1:14 Yeah, as I mentioned, I've really been looking forward to this.
1:16 I I admire you.
1:18 I admire the information you put out there.
1:20 Um I recommend it to lots of folks to listen to you
1:23 and so it's exciting to be part of your work.
1:26 Oh, thank you so much.
1:27 That is like the highest praise.
1:29 So, I really appreciate that.
1:31 Oh, okay.
1:32 So, today we're going to be talking about how to restore a sense of
1:36 safety after trauma.
1:38 And I was wondering if maybe we should start.
1:42 Would you be willing to do a quick overview of polybagel theory
1:45 and how that works um for the audience?
1:48 She's uh written her eighth book
1:51 which is the poly bagel theory workbook
1:53 and I've just been working through it
1:54 and I'm like this is good stuff.
1:56 So I'd love to hear your perspective.
1:58 Yeah, I'm happy to.
1:59 I'm going to give you poly bagel theory in a nutshell.
2:02 How's that?
2:02 Perfect.
2:03 I love it.
2:04 All right.
2:05 So there are some key elements
2:07 that um I think really help us understand what is polyagal theory.
2:12 Probably the first thing
2:13 that I'll name is
2:14 that if we think about the the name polyvagel poly refers to multiple veagal
2:20 is referring to the vagus nerve.
2:22 Vegas nerve is our 10th cranial nerve.
2:25 It's a mindbody superighway of connection.
2:28 And this idea that we have multiple circuits of the vagus nerve basically means
2:34 that we have um kind of from an evolutionary standpoint,
2:38 one of those circuits is very much about social connection and sensing safety.
2:45 We also have a circuit of the vagus nerve
2:48 that is very much connected to the lower body,
2:52 our digestive organs, our reproductive organs,
2:54 and it's often associated with the parasympathetic nervous system
2:58 or our capacity to go into a rest
3:01 and digest state.
3:03 So why do we have multiple circuits of the vagus nerve?
3:07 It's maybe the kind of short answer to
3:09 that is that if we think about going into stillness
3:13 as mammals,
3:15 and I'll kind of broaden this out beyond humans,
3:18 in order to rest in stillness, we need to know that it's safe enough,
3:22 that there's not a predator out there, that there is not some danger lurking.
3:27 And so we utilize this upper veagal circuit
3:30 and where that travels into this the um kind of fibers of the vagus
3:35 nerve go into our sense organs,
3:38 our eyes, our ears,
3:40 as well as our ability to call out or or express through our voice.
3:46 And so we're going to track our environment.
3:49 Is are there cues of safety
3:51 or are there cues of threat
3:52 or is there something super dangerous out there?
3:56 We're going to listen with our ears for cues of safety, cues of threat,
4:01 cues of danger.
4:03 And depending on whether we're receiving those cues of safety or threat,
4:09 basically our vag nerve helps our nervous system
4:13 and our body respond to
4:16 that without us even having to think about it.
4:18 Mhm.
4:20 So what would be a cue of safety, right, that allows us to rest,
4:26 that allows us to go into stillness?
4:28 A cue of safety might come from the loving gaze of another person where
4:34 we really receive that kind smile,
4:38 the body language, the facial expressions.
4:43 Another cue of safety
4:44 that we might receive is um the voice tone
4:48 that comes in through our ears
4:50 that are basically letting you know through soothing tones,
4:55 I'm right here.
4:56 I've got you.
4:57 Mhm.
4:58 And if we think about an infant that is totally dependent upon our caregivers,
5:05 an infant is going to rely on those cues
5:08 that lets the infant know it's safe to rest in the arms of my
5:12 caretaker because essentially they're going to protect me.
5:16 They're going to know whether there's dangers out there.
5:21 They're going to give me the cues
5:23 that let me know it's safe enough
5:25 and therefore I can rest. into stillness in closeness to
5:30 that person that's going to protect me.
5:34 Yeah.
5:34 One other phrase I'll add here and then I'll pause.
5:36 But one other phrase
5:37 that I'll say is
5:37 that we think of this upper circuit of the vagus nerve
5:43 as prioritizing connection as a biological imperative.
5:50 Okay.
5:50 I need connection to you in order for my psychobiology, my body, my mind,
5:58 my my capacity to digest my food,
6:03 my capacity to um to navigate this world.
6:07 I need that connection, especially as as infants,
6:12 we need those connections in order to survive.
6:17 A biological imperative.
6:19 So, if we're feeling um rejected
6:21 or isolated or alone
6:22 or we don't feel like anyone's around us to support us,
6:26 that feels like as real of a threat
6:28 as if some other physical threat was coming after us.
6:32 Especially if that was true for us when we were young, right?
6:37 One thing about my kind of career focus is on complex PTSD,
6:41 especially as related to developmental trauma.
6:44 And what that means is
6:45 that it's the accumulation of the experiences of lack of safety,
6:50 of the dangerous experiences, of the rejections, of the not belonging,
6:56 of of the betrayals that may have gone on for many many years.
7:01 And when that begins in early childhood or even in infancy,
7:06 we basically have an impairment now in that early wiring.
7:11 U because that that upper veagal pathway is experience dependent.
7:16 That basically means that I need those experiences of safety,
7:20 those cues in order to develop that within myself.
7:25 So that now I can basically cultivate a sense of connection
7:29 and safety on the inside independent of whether someone else is there.
7:34 But that's because I had enough of those early relational kind of root systems
7:39 that really support the tree to grow.
7:42 Interesting.
7:43 Yeah.
7:43 And it makes so much sense.
7:45 and and um I have four daughters
7:47 and every one of them
7:49 as a baby they're looking for your eyes.
7:51 Well, I mean after they're about 3 weeks old
7:53 when they can focus their eyes,
7:54 but they're constantly scanning and looking for that eye contact.
7:57 They're looking to see is there someone here, you know,
8:00 and and we're primed for that, right?
8:02 We're wired to seek that safety.
8:04 So when when especially children don't get that,
8:07 you're saying that can impair the the ability to feel
8:11 that felt sense of safety throughout their lives.
8:15 Yeah.
8:15 So another key component of the polyagal theory is this idea
8:19 that we go through a tiered response to threat.
8:23 Oh yeah.
8:24 Meaning that we have kind of three levels
8:26 that we go through in order to help us navigate a potential threat out
8:32 there.
8:32 Yeah.
8:33 The first of those is
8:35 that if you know there I experience something that's a cue of danger,
8:40 I'm going to seek connection.
8:43 I'm going to use this upper pathway.
8:45 Steve Borges who developed the polyfagal theory,
8:48 he refers to this as the social engagement system.
8:52 Yeah.
8:53 The social engagement system is basically can I make connection with you through eye
8:57 contact or calling out for help that's going to help resolve
9:00 that potential threat.
9:03 Yeah.
9:03 If I cannot establish
9:05 that sense of safety
9:06 and connection through the social engagement system,
9:10 the next layer of my threat response in this tiered response to threat is
9:15 to go into the fight-flight system
9:17 which is our sympathetic nervous system. you know,
9:19 you speak so much about this and you know,
9:22 and basically like how we mobilize our bodies to get away from the threat
9:26 or protect ourselves from it.
9:28 That's that's so good
9:29 that you highlight that
9:30 because it's something I'm completely aware of
9:31 and I forget to mention moving through those states,
9:34 right?
9:35 So if we talk about like a like I consider it a default state
9:39 of of safety and
9:40 then if something if something happens like oh I trying to think of a
9:45 good example and I can't
9:46 but the first thing people do
9:48 when something is like startling is they scan
9:50 and they look for someone right they look to connect with someone oh am
9:55 I okay they look their eyes get big
9:57 and they're looking for someone to connect with to create a sense uh to
10:00 see if they're okay
10:00 or they're safe that's right
10:02 or they'll call out ah Right.
10:04 And that's communication.
10:06 That's like communicating and and are you okay?
10:09 Oh yeah.
10:09 Okay.
10:10 I'm okay.
10:10 Right.
10:11 It's beautiful.
10:12 It's so it's built in kind of biologically wired in.
10:16 And I think that's what's
10:17 so important about the poly bagel theory is kind of recognizing
10:22 that like that that desire within us to reestablish connection
10:27 or you know kind of tend
10:29 and befriend through through relational sources of safety.
10:33 Mhm.
10:33 That is something that we're wired for.
10:36 Um, and that, you know,
10:39 I think sometimes we can feel a sense of shame,
10:41 like why can't I handle it on my own
10:43 or what's wrong with me
10:44 that I,
10:45 you know, that I keep kind of reaching for other people when I'm suffering,
10:49 but actually that's what we're supposed to do.
10:54 Yeah.
10:54 Yeah.
10:54 You know, set up for that.
10:55 And there's so much cultural messaging that's like self-help
10:58 when it's like like such individualized languaging like our entire culture is full of
11:03 individualized language and it's like well other help like connection help might be more
11:08 like valid and actually fulfilling
11:10 and restore that felt sense of safety more than just trying to be alone
11:14 and feel like safe,
11:16 right?
11:16 Yeah.
11:17 Yes.
11:17 Yeah.
11:17 Interesting.
11:18 I love how you highlight that.
11:19 That's so good.
11:20 Okay.
11:20 All right.
11:21 So if we go back to the the tiered response to threat
11:23 and there's three layers to this.
11:25 So the first is social connection.
11:27 The second is fight flight.
11:29 But let's say we can't run away from that source of danger.
11:33 Let's say we can't fight back.
11:35 We can't protect ourselves.
11:37 The next layer that can come in is the basically a a urge to
11:44 withdraw,
11:45 to hide, to get smaller, to feel fatigued,
11:49 to feel disoriented or what we can sometimes even see
11:53 as a figned death
11:55 or a faint response,
11:57 a deep collapse within the nervous system
12:00 that once again is driven by the vagus nerve.
12:04 So the sympathetic nervous system is not a veagal Um it's not it's not
12:09 driven by the veagal system,
12:12 right?
12:12 But the social engagement system is the upper veagal pathway
12:16 and this what we call dorsal veagal figned death response
12:20 or faint response is driven by the lower veagal system
12:25 that goes into our organs
12:28 but also has a kind of safety mechanism built into it.
12:33 and the urge to get very still,
12:36 to get small, to immobilize in in the context of a threat.
12:43 It's if we look at the animal world, right,
12:46 we can see the ways in
12:48 which going into stillness
12:50 and getting smaller or hiding would help an animal survive.
12:57 Yeah. the respiration rate gets very slow,
13:01 the heart rate slows down in order to be less noticeable by a potential
13:07 predator out there.
13:09 And in the cases of what we would call a full vaso veagal syncopy,
13:14 right, is a faint response.
13:17 That vasovagal syncopy is basically taking us into a fullon collapsed state in the
13:25 way you can think of a possum.
13:27 Yeah, that also often accompanies nausea, dis dizziness, disorientation, sometimes loss of bowel control.
13:36 But if we go back to the animal world for a moment,
13:40 those experiences like if we go back to the possum,
13:43 if the possum goes into a faint death response,
13:46 it often emits a foul smell.
13:49 And um if a predator approaches it and senses that says, "Ooh,
13:56 like maybe you've been poisoned and if I eat you, I'll get poisoned, too."
14:01 So we as humans have way of ways of deterring the predator out there.
14:08 Yeah. feigning death, becoming less interesting, becoming smaller, hiding away, feeling like I,
14:17 you know, um I just want to stay in bed.
14:20 I I have lots of conversations with a colleague of mine, Deb Dana,
14:23 who also teaches a lot about applied polyagal theory and in psychotherapy.
14:28 And she, you know, she and I have different ways of describing this.
14:32 You know, I kind of call it like I want to go into my
14:34 cocoon.
14:35 And she calls it her duvet day.
14:37 It's like the day you just want to pull the duvet up
14:39 and be like,
14:39 "I'm not getting out of bed today."
14:41 Right.
14:42 Yeah.
14:42 Yeah.
14:42 You just want to curl up, cover up, hide, not move.
14:46 Yeah.
14:46 I feel that.
14:47 I feel that.
14:48 Uh this is maybe a tangent,
14:50 but where where would you put the like fawn response
14:54 or the peopleleasing response in the within the polyagal?
14:57 I've heard various takes on this.
14:58 I'd like to hear yours.
14:59 Yeah.
15:00 Yeah.
15:00 So generally the way
15:02 that we think about the fawn response is we call it a hybrid nervous
15:06 system state and that it's engaging
15:10 that social engagement system
15:13 but there's also a sympathetic vigilance.
15:16 So now when we look at kind of both of those co-activations of sympathetic
15:22 I know that there's a threat out there.
15:23 I'm trying to navigate.
15:24 I'm trying to mobilize to take care of that threat.
15:27 But how I mobilize,
15:29 how I move in response to that threat is through taking care of you.
15:34 If I take care of you, maybe you won't hurt me.
15:38 If I take care of you,
15:40 maybe I can take care of you enough that you'll take care of me.
15:45 Mhm.
15:45 And so we recruit in a sense
15:48 that social engagement capacity to sense what somebody else is feeling,
15:53 sense what they might be needing,
15:55 and then we go into some kind of peopleleasing
15:58 or appeasement behavior in order to promote our own safety.
16:03 Mhm.
16:04 So within polyal, would that be a sympathetic state usually or mixed state?
16:08 You would you would consider it a mixed state.
16:10 That's what you were saying.
16:11 That's right.
16:11 It's a mixed state.
16:12 So we can think of pulling in the the recruiting the vagus nerve of
16:18 that social engagement system.
16:20 Okay, and co-activating the sympathetic mobilization.
16:23 Okay.
16:24 Okay, that makes sense to me.
16:25 That makes sense to me.
16:26 I've I've heard some people place it within like the shutdown response
16:29 or the dorsal veagal response
16:31 and it has never quite sat right with me
16:33 because it is so activated.
16:34 It's such an activated state.
16:36 Yeah, there's a there's a closely related state to the fawn response
16:41 that I think doesn't get discussed
16:43 as much.
16:43 Um, and this one we'll call the submission response or there.
16:49 Yeah.
16:50 And what happens here, and again,
16:52 we'll describe this as a hybrid or co-activation of nervous system states.
16:57 But what happens here is I'm still recruiting my my social engagement system in
17:03 order to keep that biological imperative of connection up
17:07 and running.
17:09 But the person who is who I'm trying to connect to,
17:14 my attachment person or my partner, is also a source of harm.
17:20 Yeah.
17:20 And so now in order to keep that that biological con, you know,
17:26 imperative of connection, in order to uphold my need for relationship with you,
17:33 I actually have to submit to the harm that's occurring.
17:39 I go into an immobilization, which would be that that more collapsed state.
17:46 And sometimes what happens with this submit state is that I have to dissociate.
17:52 I have to dissociate from what my body knows about
17:56 that harm in order to stay in relationship with
18:00 that same person.
18:02 Yeah.
18:02 So it might be like like a a teenager who's whose parent is really
18:07 controlling or just setting really strong boundaries
18:09 that they really don't like
18:10 and they say,
18:11 "Fine, I don't care."
18:12 And he's like, "I don't care.
18:13 That's a form of dissociation.
18:14 I'm not going to feel this anymore or fine,
18:16 I'll just go along with it.
18:18 And that could that could be on various levels of of severity, right?
18:22 We could take that to a much more severe um state,
18:25 but it's like I I don't care
18:28 or I'm just not going to care
18:28 or I'm going to stay in this relationship
18:30 and I'll be numb
18:30 and I'll just give in,
18:32 you know, like that and I'll do whatever you tell me to do.
18:35 And that makes sense.
18:37 Yeah.
18:37 I'll just go along with it.
18:38 I'll comply.
18:39 I'll be submissive.
18:40 Try and like not make things hurt worse.
18:43 And Yeah.
18:44 And you'll see this in marriages where um people go through these stages where
18:48 they're like,
18:48 "Hey, we're in love.
18:49 We're great.
18:49 We're awesome."
18:50 And then they go through like, "Oh, we're fighting a lot."
18:52 And then when they go to the last state, it's like, "We're detached.
18:56 We don't really care about each other.
18:57 We don't really talk about the issues anymore.
19:00 We just kind of like and then they're like just living as roommates, right?"
19:04 I really appreciate polyagal theory and um I think it's so applicable.
19:08 Before we talk about how to restore a sense of safety,
19:10 how would you describe trauma?
19:12 Can you give us that in a nutshell?
19:15 Yeah, there you go.
19:17 What is trauma?
19:18 Anything that overwhelms our capacity to integrate an experience,
19:22 our ordinary human capacity to make sense of kind
19:27 and of integrated into my overall sense of identity
19:30 and who I am
19:31 as a as a person.
19:33 Um to make that experience
19:35 that I had useful in some way. uh to process it,
19:40 if we want to use that word, to kind of process through what happened.
19:44 And I I like the definitions of trauma
19:47 that are out there
19:48 that emphasize more what has happened on the inside of an individual versus what
19:54 was the event itself.
19:56 Because I think if we identify trauma as an external event,
20:00 it feels like it just happened to me
20:03 and and there's nothing I can do about it.
20:06 When we locate trauma as the internal event, the emotions,
20:12 the sematic experience that I that I had in relationship to something,
20:17 then I can actually do something with that interior landscape of who I am.
20:24 I love that.
20:25 I love that.
20:25 And I one of the things I'm I'm noticing a lot on social media
20:29 is there's a lot of conversations about,
20:31 hey, the reason you feel insecure is
20:33 because your parents did such
20:34 and such and such
20:35 when you were a child.
20:36 And I don't want to invalidate that.
20:38 I don't want to say like that that's not the case.
20:41 Um and of course there's a broad spectrum of parenting out there,
20:46 but um what's what happens is some of the most comforting messages out there
20:51 on social media are basically saying trauma um was not your fault.
20:54 It's caused by your parents.
20:55 It's in the past and now you're broken and because of it.
20:57 And it's like no, no, no, no, no.
20:59 Trauma is a response, a learn, like a response to an event that happened.
21:03 And it's a response that's continuing to go on in your nervous system
21:07 because you haven't integrated it.
21:09 And because it's continuing in the present moment,
21:11 it's I'm not saying it's your fault,
21:13 but there is an opportunity here in this moment to practice responding differently to
21:20 those experiences.
21:20 Not to invalidate someone's experience,
21:23 but we got to remind people
21:25 that we do have capacity within our nervous system to create change.
21:29 Yeah.
21:30 And there's a few pieces to name about this.
21:32 One is that like if you put several people in the same situation.
21:36 Oh yeah.
21:36 Not right.
21:37 You know, like let's say a car accident,
21:39 not everyone in that car might would would feel traumatized by what happened.
21:44 It depends on were we able to respond?
21:46 Did we feel effective?
21:48 Right?
21:48 One of the classic studies done by a colleague of mine, Ruth Lannius,
21:51 speaks about a car accident in
21:54 which uh one person in the car went into more of a collapsed immobilization,
21:59 right?
22:00 Like like basically kind of froze and the partner mobilized,
22:06 pulled her out of the car before it caught on fire, saved their lives,
22:09 right?
22:10 And so the the even
22:12 though it was objectively a traumatic event
22:15 that they both went through,
22:18 She suffered from more post-traumatic stress
22:21 because her her body basically went into a place where she struggled to respond.
22:27 But because he took action in that moment,
22:30 he didn't have the same symptoms afterwards of post-traumatic stress.
22:34 And I've seen that in my work
22:35 so often that that
22:37 that that if we were able to kind of complete an action
22:43 then our our bodies feel in some sense like the the process had an
22:49 arc and I'm okay I did something.
22:54 And Peter Lavine who developed sematic experiencing he often says
22:58 that what is housed in the interior experience of post-traumatic stress is the incomplete
23:04 actions or the thwarted actions
23:08 that didn't get to happen.
23:09 I didn't get to climb my way out
23:13 or call for help
23:14 or reach for connection
23:16 or say no.
23:18 Yeah.
23:19 And then that gets kind of stuck
23:20 and your body gets trapped in
23:22 that in that state
23:23 because it hasn't moved through it.
23:24 Yeah, that's right.
23:25 And that ties us back to the nervous system
23:28 because when we look through the lens of the nervous system,
23:32 when we have an incomplete action,
23:35 we're basically cycling back around either the experience of an urge to flee
23:42 and we're always looking for the exit plan.
23:44 We're restless.
23:44 We're irritable. we we don't feel it comfortable resting in stillness in ourselves.
23:50 Maybe conversely, we're constantly stuck in a fight response.
23:54 We're always kind of looking for the next battle.
23:57 Um and again, it becomes hard to rest.
24:00 There's a lot of muscular tension.
24:03 We feel vigilant.
24:05 Um or sometimes where we get stuck is in
24:09 that place of no matter what I do,
24:11 it's not going to make a difference.
24:12 So, what's the point of trying?
24:15 And that state of collapse is what is known internally by the individual
24:22 and therefore we just keep returning to what is known.
24:27 Yeah.
24:27 When our stress levels increase or whatever, we're quick to revert back to that.
24:31 Yeah.
24:32 Yeah.
24:32 I often getting stuck in this trauma response.
24:35 I often use the analogy of it's like watching the Lion King
24:38 and right after Mufasa dies,
24:41 turning it off because that's so stressful.
24:43 Now, every time you think of The Lion King,
24:46 the only thing you can think of is that that stress response.
24:48 And if Simba like never if the if the movie stopped right there,
24:53 Simba's stuck in in shame
24:56 and helplessness and guilt for the rest of his life.
24:59 if we just stop the movie there.
25:01 And if we keep playing through that movie,
25:03 we come to this place where he works through his shame
25:06 and he understands he wasn't actually at fault
25:09 and he goes back to Pride Rock
25:10 and he takes action to like save Pride Rock,
25:13 right?
25:13 He's he's mobilizing and he's working through this process instead of getting stuck like
25:18 turning off the movie right
25:19 when that stopped.
25:19 And then he has this lovely experience with his dad uh his spirit dad
25:24 and and it's all resolved
25:25 and and I think I mean
25:27 if only resolving trauma were
25:29 as easy as watching a movie
25:30 but that is the process right like working stuck it's such a perfect movie
25:36 example and and thank you for bringing
25:37 that in and I have another kind of example along a similar lines
25:41 that I use when I'm teaching about the you know kind of processing through
25:45 the incomplete experience of trauma.
25:47 Our minds are always looking for how does the story end?
25:51 It's just how we think, right?
25:53 And I remember one time I was going to teach a training for therapists
25:56 and um and I was traveling from Colorado where I live to Ohio
26:02 and I had started the movie a little bit too late into the into
26:06 the airplane flight and
26:07 so by the time we landed we had I had 20 minutes of the
26:11 movie yet unwatched.
26:12 Right.
26:12 Yeah.
26:13 There you go.
26:13 And it was a great movie,
26:15 but my mind for like the rest of the evening was like, well,
26:19 how did it end?
26:20 Did it end this way?
26:20 Did it end that way?
26:21 Do I want to Google it?
26:22 Because then I my mind can finally rest.
26:24 Do I want to wait till I get on the return flight to watch
26:27 the ending of Right.
26:28 Yeah.
26:29 But that's how that's what happens with trauma is
26:32 that when we have the incomplete experience.
26:35 There is some way in
26:37 which our brains are basically wired to live on repeat inside of
26:44 but wait how is it going to end?
26:46 What's the ending of this story?
26:49 And how can I take an active part in creating the ending of this
26:54 story?
26:55 And you know, and that's partially kind of going to lead into this next
26:59 question of like how do we create safety,
27:02 right?
27:02 Yeah.
27:03 Yeah.
27:04 So, and and I mean,
27:05 one of the things you're describing is something
27:06 that can be done with narrative therapy,
27:08 right?
27:08 People can write out their their trauma story and say with an ending.
27:12 They call this a contamination story of like, well, that's how I got broken.
27:15 That's how my life got ruined.
27:17 Or you can write this story and say, "Okay,
27:19 let's write a redemption story at the second half of this."
27:22 And we're going to, even if it hasn't happened yet, let's visualize this.
27:24 But that's a form of cognitive therapy.
27:26 That's a form of like word therapy.
27:29 How do we do this with our nervous system?
27:31 How do we do this with our bodies?
27:33 Yeah.
27:34 And I think we need both.
27:35 Like I just want to pause on the narrative piece on this.
27:37 I one of my books is called the post-traumatic growth guide book.
27:40 And the and the purpose of
27:42 that book was basically to guide the reader through a narrative therapy journey of
27:47 how do you write through your own trauma story
27:50 and the book includes polyagal theory
27:53 and it includes sematics
27:55 and so so it it's kind of weaving in the both
27:59 and because as humans we are storytellers
28:02 and in some ways we also
28:04 as part of healing need
28:06 that truthtelling.
28:07 We need our stories to be known by us
28:09 and to be heard by others in order to feel validated
28:14 and in order to have some redemptive elements to it.
28:18 Yeah.
28:18 And then let's include the body.
28:21 Yeah.
28:21 Right.
28:22 So when we look at the remnants of trauma
28:25 as they live inside of us,
28:27 we might notice chronic tension patterns, chronic vigilance patterns,
28:32 the way that it interrupts our sleep,
28:34 the way that interrupts our digestion
28:36 or our um uh like kind of all of those rhythms of
28:42 that are also where trauma intersects physically with our health,
28:47 right?
28:47 Oh yeah.
28:48 If we're in chronic states of fight flight
28:52 and that sympathetic nervous system
28:54 that a sense in essence is living on repeat,
28:58 we are basically staying in more of an elevated heart rate, elevated respiratory rate.
29:05 It's going to impair that rest and digest system.
29:09 Um, and conversely, sometimes where we're stuck in in post-traumatic responses is in more
29:16 of that collapse,
29:18 depression, nothing's going to make a difference.
29:22 Um, fatigue, malaise, like I have no appetite, I can't feel anything,
29:28 I can't even cry.
29:30 Like I feel dead inside.
29:31 Right.
29:31 That dissociate.
29:32 But like in the body, right?
29:33 That the heavy feeling.
29:35 That's right.
29:36 So, let's start there.
29:38 Let's say that that heaviness
29:41 that um again maybe depressive thinking
29:45 or more desparing thoughts are where we're stuck.
29:49 One of the phrases
29:50 that we that we sometimes use in the applied polyagal theory model
29:54 and this comes from Deb Dana is this idea of climbing up the polyvagal
30:00 ladder.
30:00 Yeah. in the sense
30:02 that we have to go from
30:04 that dorsal veagal shutdown
30:06 and collapse back through mobilization in order to come back to social connection.
30:14 So we think about reversing that tiered response to threat.
30:18 So we can't we can't go from a state of shutdown to a state
30:23 of like I feel calm,
30:24 safe, and relaxed.
30:25 We have to go through like a little bit an activated state sometimes.
30:30 And I'll say that like that's one of the trajectories.
30:33 It it doesn't mean that we always have to do that.
30:36 There are actually ways of layering in
30:39 that sense of relational safety right into
30:42 that collapse and shutdown
30:44 that can in a sense kind of help us to maybe
30:48 then reclaim mobilization.
30:50 So I don't always put it quite as linear.
30:53 Um but but and I think
30:54 that the field is continuing to understand this
30:56 and that's what's beautiful about it.
30:59 But very often at some point in the trauma recovery journey,
31:03 we do need to remobilize.
31:05 We do need to embrace our stress response, to befriend it,
31:12 and to recognize its value in helping us to feel empowered
31:18 and alive and um energized,
31:24 right?
31:24 So that we are feeling collapsed.
31:28 How do we re-mbbrace a little bit of All right,
31:35 I can look around, right?
31:37 I'm I'm going to just model for a moment the one of the most
31:42 simple and subtle remobilizations
31:45 that is so necessary for our nervous system
31:48 which is literally to use our orienting response
31:53 and to find something
31:55 that serves as a cue of safety right
31:59 and even though it's a subtle movement I am still turning my head.
32:07 I am look looking with my eyes.
32:13 And whether that point of connection and safety is with another person, you know,
32:19 right here with you,
32:20 or whether that's point of connection is through an object
32:25 or an item from nature,
32:27 a plant, or if I look out my window,
32:29 I see our sunflowers in our backyard.
32:32 It's late summer and the finches love to land on them
32:34 and it's such a delight to watch them.
32:37 They're like acrobats.
32:38 They hang upside down.
32:40 Sometimes the squirrels get on them and that's really fun.
32:43 Those little seeds.
32:44 Awesome.
32:45 Yeah.
32:45 Right.
32:46 But like all of a sudden you can feel like, "Oh,
32:49 I'm orienting my attention to something other than the trauma
32:56 as it lives inside of me
32:58 or as it lives inside of um inside of the mental stories about
33:02 that.
33:03 I'm orienting to something that is even if it's neutral,
33:08 it's a sign of okayess right now."
33:11 Yeah.
33:12 I love that.
33:12 And I saw that exercise in your book and I thought, "Oh,
33:15 this is such a a simple and basic exercise."
33:18 But it like there's two things that send cues to the body.
33:22 And one is your outside environment, which is safe usually, right?
33:25 Your environment in your room.
33:27 I'm actually safe here.
33:29 And that sends a message like through your eyeballs into your body
33:31 and your your nervous system.
33:34 But also just the act of moving your head
33:36 and opening your eyes
33:38 and expanding your peripheral vision,
33:40 right?
33:40 That also sends a message from your body up through your nervous system to
33:45 your brain to say I'm like
33:47 if I can move my eyes
33:48 and I can see around me like I am safe.
33:50 Right.
33:51 That's right.
33:52 That's right.
33:52 It's beautiful.
33:52 And we actually need Right.
33:54 It's it's one of the reasons why we need safe enough environments now to
33:59 unwind the trauma.
34:00 And it's also speaks to one of the biggest challenges in our world is
34:04 that sometimes the trauma is ongoing
34:07 and there isn't enough current safety to heal from the past.
34:13 And so instead we're still, you know, kind of bracing.
34:16 And when I am working with individuals where there is ongoing exposure to trauma,
34:22 we need in essence kind of, you know,
34:25 like like safe hubs in the midst of this world.
34:29 So we can kind of find the smaller temporary spaces where in this current
34:36 moment is it safe enough to reorient to yourself,
34:43 your breath, your body without feeling chronically overwhelmed.
34:50 Yeah.
34:50 It's so easy to do with our ability to hear about pain
34:55 and suffering or threats in the world.
34:57 It's so easy to feel like we're always unsafe.
35:00 And so I like that.
35:01 I like two things you said.
35:02 One is safe enough.
35:04 I'm safe enough now.
35:05 And to focus on like a hub,
35:07 an area like a or even sometimes I think about this is like, oh,
35:11 I can't do everything to make the whole world safe, right?
35:15 I can't do everything to eliminate all the threats
35:17 that I might read in the New York Times
35:19 or whatever.
35:20 But I can within my sphere, within my home,
35:23 I can foster safety in my backyard.
35:25 I can foster safety with my children.
35:27 I can try and be a safe place for them
35:29 and I can feel safe with them,
35:33 you know.
35:34 Yeah.
35:34 Yeah.
35:35 And I and you just named something
35:37 so key in this
35:38 which is that when I am capable of generating
35:43 that within myself,
35:45 I can also then generate it outside of myself.
35:48 So it brings us back to another key element of the polybagal theory
35:53 which is something that we call co-regulation.
35:55 Mhm.
35:57 When I'm regulating my nervous system
36:00 or maybe receiving the co-regulation from a safe enough environment,
36:05 I can then become a co-regulator for others, in this case, your children,
36:10 right?
36:10 And so it be it becomes something
36:12 that that is a bit of a ripple effect outward
36:17 as we generate more of
36:19 that positive state.
36:21 Yeah.
36:21 And I I immediately felt
36:23 that interacting with you like you emanate
36:25 that and it helps me calm down
36:27 because I get a little worked up about all the things I have to
36:29 do for my interviews.
36:30 And so like I can see you expressing
36:32 that and we all I think we can all I hope everyone can identify
36:36 someone in their lives who they can interact with
36:39 that helps them feel a little bit safe
36:42 or secure.
36:43 Um a lot safe or secure would be great thing.
36:47 I think in your book you mentioned that right?
36:50 um talking about like identifying a safe person
36:52 or even visualizing a safe person who's not present,
36:57 right?
36:57 Yeah, it's true.
36:58 And sometimes we can draw upon kind of real people in our lives.
37:03 And sometimes we have to draw upon allies, even allies that we've never met,
37:08 but allies that have been, you know,
37:12 like maybe a public figure
37:13 or a historical figure
37:15 that have served as represent representatives of what
37:20 that safe relationship could feel like.
37:22 And one of my favorite examples of this
37:23 and someone I grew up with
37:25 and maybe not as relevant for younger generations,
37:28 but I grew up watching Mr.
37:30 Rogers.
37:31 I loved Mr.
37:32 Rogers.
37:33 If you if you know
37:34 if if the viewers here have not seen the documentary about his show,
37:38 um I highly recommend it because it you just bring your tissues with you.
37:42 Like it's so beautiful
37:44 because what he intended in his show
37:47 that was on you know PBS public broadcasting system was to be
37:52 that offering of validation
37:56 and kindness and generosity
37:58 and compassion for children really you know throughout our country
38:03 and and I'm going to say beyond.
38:05 Um, and so, you know,
38:07 he's someone that I can pull on in my consciousness
38:11 as a presence that brings
38:14 that feeling of how,
38:17 you know, of what goodness should feel like.
38:19 And we can pull on spiritual presences
38:22 and we can pull on even our animal presences,
38:25 right?
38:26 Our our pets as those allies of what safety can and should feel like.
38:32 I love it.
38:33 I love it, Mr.
38:34 Rogers as your safe person.
38:36 I love it.
38:38 I think we could all like come up with someone like
38:40 that in our lives.
38:42 I hope so.
38:43 That's cool.
38:43 I hope so.
38:45 Yeah.
38:45 Okay.
38:46 Um, do you have another exercise
38:48 or activity you'd be willing to share
38:50 that can help us restore our sense of safety?
38:53 Yeah.
38:53 So, you know, part of what for me
38:56 as a sematic practitioner
38:58 and as a yoga teacher,
38:59 part of what I come back to again
39:01 and again are what are the sources of safety
39:05 that that do live inside of us
39:08 that therefore no matter where we are in the world,
39:11 no matter what we're doing,
39:12 we can tap into that which comes with us everywhere.
39:16 Right.
39:17 Yeah.
39:17 And um and this doesn't mean that we don't also need each other.
39:21 This is not a replacement for the social forms of connection and safety,
39:27 but it's a uh kind of once we have the foundation of those co-regulating
39:33 sources of connection,
39:35 we can then carry that inside of us.
39:37 So, you know, for example,
39:38 right before coming in to do this interview with you,
39:41 I spent an hour on my yoga mat, which is, you know,
39:44 pretty much my morning routine.
39:45 I have a meditation practice.
39:47 I have a yoga practice
39:48 and the practices that I engage in
39:51 which are basically an applied polyagal theory in yoga
39:55 or I just generally call it Vegas nerve yoga
39:57 and it's my YouTube channel.
39:59 You can, you know, can find it under Dr.
40:00 Ariel Schwarz.
40:02 But there's basically, you know, lots of tools that we have inside of us.
40:08 And the the basics that I'll share here are your breath and your posture,
40:14 your spine.
40:16 Because when we think about both of those
40:18 and I'll and I'll share about each one
40:20 and I'll kind of share just some basic practice around this is
40:24 that your breath mirrors your nervous system.
40:28 Every inhalation will key in a little bit of your sympathetic nervous system.
40:32 Every exhalation brings in a little bit of parasympathetic quieting.
40:36 Yeah.
40:37 When we look at the health of the autonomic nervous system
40:41 and this relates to safety,
40:43 what we want to see is this ability to move pretty fluidly between sympathetic
40:49 and parasympathetic.
40:50 We feel unsafe if we're stuck in sympathetic, right?
40:55 Activation, vigilance, um irritability, restlessness, anxiety, panic,
41:00 and we feel unsafe if we're stuck in the parasympathetic nervous system.
41:06 We feel shut down, heavy again, more depressed, more despair, more collapse.
41:11 So when we look at the health of the autonomic nervous system,
41:15 we are wanting to restore this rhythm of sympathetic parasympathetic.
41:21 It's built right into your breath.
41:23 Our physiology mirrors that, right?
41:26 So the basic practice is rhythmic breathing.
41:30 Mhm.
41:31 When I inhale for let's say four to 5 seconds
41:35 and I exhale four to 5 seconds,
41:37 I'm cultivating this rhythm rhythm of my nervous system and I'm maximizing on that.
41:46 Conversely, if I'm breathing erratically,
41:51 which I won't do very long because it feels terrible, right?
41:54 Even just a few breaths like that,
41:58 we can get that sense of erratic breathing being more linked to
42:03 that form of erratic breathing to panic
42:05 and anxiety.
42:07 Yeah.
42:07 Conversely, if I'm breathing shallow, almost imperceptible,
42:15 you can sense how
42:16 that breath pattern would be linked more to shutdown
42:20 and depression.
42:21 Yeah.
42:22 So, our rhythmic breathing
42:29 that allows for an even inhale
42:34 and exhale is restoring the rhythm of the nervous system.
42:44 And from the bottom up,
42:46 from your body to your brain via your vagus nerve,
42:50 sending signals of safety back to the brain.
43:01 I'm going to link it to one more piece and we'll breathe together again.
43:05 But the posture is also a mirror of our nervous system.
43:10 So when we think about curling forward, totally valid shape,
43:17 valid when we need to grieve, valid when we're sad,
43:21 valid when we feel helpless or powerless,
43:26 we just don't want to live here all of the time.
43:30 And that's a parasympathetic shape.
43:33 We sometimes need to curl upon ourselves, right?
43:37 In yoga, we would go into a child's pose or a forward fold.
43:41 And it allows us to make contact with what our body knows from this
43:46 shape.
43:49 And in its opposite, sometimes we go into spinal extension.
43:55 This is going to lift my gaze.
43:57 It's going to bring more breath into the upper chest.
44:02 It's going to be more sympathetic in nature.
44:05 I'm going to be very aware of my surrounds
44:07 and I'm able to respond to what's happening out there.
44:11 So, a spinal extension is more sympathetic in nature.
44:16 We want it, but we don't want to be stuck here.
44:19 Mhm.
44:20 So when we're looking at the health of the autonomic nervous system is related
44:25 to posture once again we can see how rhythmic postural transitions like in a
44:34 yogic cat cow or even a seated cat cow we are basically restoring the
44:41 rhythmic integrity of the nervous system.
44:46 Okay.
44:47 So when we put it all together, my favorite practice and I love it.
44:51 You're like, "Oh yeah, I feel it."
44:53 Right?
44:53 Every time you talk about breath though, it brings your awareness.
44:55 You're like, "Oh yeah, don't forget to breathe, Emma."
44:58 You know, we all do, right?
45:00 We all do.
45:00 That's, you know, I I I think what I love about poly bagel theory
45:04 is it's a compassionate way to understand ourselves,
45:08 our tendencies, and our symptoms.
45:10 It's so important when we speak about trauma recovery to not use these things
45:14 against ourselves.
45:16 If only I could breathe.
45:17 If only I were blah blah blah blah blah.
45:19 Right?
45:20 Like our tendencies to hold our breath, our tendencies to breathe shallowly,
45:25 our tendencies to be stuck in kind of postural inefficiencies
45:30 if you want to think about it
45:31 that way.
45:32 That's just called being human.
45:34 Yeah.
45:34 Right.
45:35 So, as we layer in breath, posture, and let's add in compassion, right?
45:42 Those are all kind of recipes for restoring a sense of safety.
45:49 And if we put this together in a practice,
45:51 a very simple one that that in yoga we call the robin's breath.
45:55 And I'll guide this here is with your hands on your shoulders, you inhale,
46:00 you lift your spine, maybe even lift your chin, open your elbows.
46:05 On the exhale pattern, we find the opposite.
46:09 We curl inward.
46:10 We let our chin tuck.
46:12 Elbows come to touch.
46:14 And then we move rhythmically, finding your rhythm with breath and movement.
46:22 Opening and closing back in.
46:28 And very often when we do this,
46:31 we also find the areas where maybe our spine feels kind of sticky
46:37 or maybe even a little bit painful.
46:41 And then you get to know what your body knows,
46:45 what it's holding on your behalf.
46:48 So say for example,
46:49 for me was I go into this kind of curling forward
46:53 and I feel into some of the tension
46:55 that sits between my shoulder blades,
46:58 I might pause and just breathe right here two or three times, right?
47:02 Just acknowledging, oh man, it can be so tight in there sometimes.
47:08 Can I feel into that with some compassion?
47:12 And then open back up.
47:14 Opening the eyes, reorienting to the safe enough here and now.
47:19 Even as we attend to where the body houses tension
47:24 or pain from the past.
47:28 And just two more breaths.
47:30 Your rhythm, your sensing into yourself.
47:45 Yeah, feels good.
47:46 It is good, right?
47:47 And it's simple.
47:49 It's a practice we can do even sitting at our desks.
47:53 Especially if we've been sitting at the computer a long time,
47:55 we get into good postural inefficiencies or my favorite, this one.
48:00 Right.
48:01 Yeah.
48:02 So, absolutely we have to restore
48:06 but notice and I'm sure for for our viewers too like notice the subtle
48:12 shifts from a relatively short practice.
48:15 I love it.
48:15 Yeah.
48:16 I felt I felt myself becoming more aware of my heaviness
48:19 and my tension back here.
48:21 And then as I breathed into it,
48:23 I felt like laughing a little bit cuz I was like, "Oh,
48:24 yeah." like like that release like a little bit of like it softening up
48:27 and like it was very I really liked
48:31 that.
48:31 Thank you for sharing that.
48:32 That's fun.
48:34 Yeah.
48:34 So, and and you know, of course,
48:36 there's always the thinking part of my brain.
48:38 It's like, am I doing this right?
48:39 Am I doing this right?
48:40 It's like, it's okay.
48:41 Just you can be there, but just go back to just feeling it.
48:44 The truth is there is no right or wrong way to do these practices.
48:49 And I think that's such an important element of it
48:51 because the more that we get to know our bodies,
48:54 the more that we allow ourselves to kind of follow sensation
49:00 and feel comfortable moving towards what the body holds for us.
49:03 And that can take time.
49:05 And you know, something something
49:06 that we were speaking about just a little bit um early on,
49:10 I think even before we started recording officially,
49:13 is just this idea of like can we really restore a sense of safety,
49:17 right?
49:17 Is that really possible?
49:20 And you know, when we're up against a lot of kind of neur neurological
49:25 wiring of trauma that may be accumulated over many many years,
49:31 what we need to recognize is
49:33 that to restore a sense of safety
49:35 as a new baseline requires repeated practice.
49:40 Yeah.
49:40 Right.
49:40 We we you know
49:42 when we look at the research on neuroplasticity
49:44 and you know kind of like what helps support us to change in a
49:49 positive direction and Rick Hansen has some beautiful research on this with something he
49:54 calls the heal protocol,
49:56 right?
49:56 He talks about how we have to counteract those negativity biases
50:01 or the the the ways in
50:04 which we are kind of again via survival orienting towards what is wrong
50:10 and what are the threats
50:11 because we as we orient towards
50:14 that it helps us prepare
50:17 and keep ourselves safe
50:18 and and know what's out there.
50:21 But the problem is is
50:22 that sometimes we're so oriented to the threats
50:25 or maybe historical threats
50:27 or it just becomes all
50:29 that we can see.
50:30 So we have to actively counteract
50:33 that by looking for cues
50:36 that let us know
50:37 that we're safe enough now,
50:39 that it's okay right now,
50:41 that this is a time
50:42 when I can go into myself
50:44 and I can relax
50:46 and restore that sense of safety.
50:48 And we need to repeat that every single day, right?
50:52 As we're trying to rewire something
50:55 that has been orienting us vigilantly into survival states.
51:02 And so this heal protocol, it stands for have a positive experience,
51:08 orient to that one thing, the finches on the sunflowers,
51:12 the the sweetness of another person and their their, you know,
51:16 kind of social engagement cues back of I'm with you.
51:19 I've got this.
51:20 We we've got this together, right?
51:22 Find that one thing.
51:24 Have a positive experience.
51:26 Enrich it.
51:28 Get to know all the details of how your body registers
51:32 that as a sense of safe of what about
51:36 that feels safe enough,
51:38 right?
51:38 It can be simple things like I like the color of your pink shirt.
51:42 It brings me a little bit of like oh wow I like I love
51:45 I love that you chose
51:46 that color today and it draws me towards you.
51:48 I like your smile.
51:50 I um you know I I like the way
51:53 that you gaze toward me in a very kind way.
51:57 Right.
51:57 Right.
51:57 So I'm like registering those details.
52:00 So heal, have a positive experience, enrich it, absorb it, linger,
52:08 don't jump away from it so fast.
52:10 Stay there for 20 to 30 seconds with whatever this this small yet meaningful
52:18 positive shift might be.
52:21 And then the last step, heal.
52:23 Have a positive experience.
52:25 Enrich it.
52:26 Absorb it. stay there longer.
52:28 And L stands for link it.
52:31 Link it to that one area of challenge where you've been suffering.
52:36 Whether that's a trauma related memory, whether it's an ongoing struggle in your life,
52:42 because what we're doing
52:43 when we're linking is we're basically building a new neural connection
52:48 that says,
52:49 "Sometimes I'm suffering, but sometimes I feel okay."
52:54 Yeah.
52:54 And I want to know that I can move between my suffering.
53:00 I don't want to ignore it.
53:01 I don't want to deny it.
53:03 Right?
53:03 That would be toxic positivity, right?
53:05 To just just focus on all this good stuff.
53:08 I want to know that I can turn towards my despair, my shame,
53:12 my worries, my fears, but I'm not going to get stuck there either.
53:17 So, I can I can link that sometimes I feel okay.
53:22 Yeah.
53:22 Sometimes I feel connected.
53:23 Sometimes I feel joy.
53:26 Yeah.
53:26 And sometimes I feel suffering.
53:28 And they both are part of me.
53:31 Oo, that is so good.
53:33 It's so so profound.
53:35 And it's something I've been thinking about a lot lately is
53:38 that like truly healthy people,
53:41 they aren't just calm all the time
53:43 and they aren't just happy all the time.
53:45 Truly healthy people do both. like they hold they can hold both sadness
53:51 and joy in the same day where someone someone who maybe gets stuck would
53:56 be like well I had this happen to me on my drive
53:58 so today's going to be a terrible day
54:00 and then they they scan for the bad
54:02 and then they pay attention to the bad I had someone tell me the
54:05 other day I have this theory
54:07 that all my even years are good
54:08 and all my odd years are bad like bad things happen in my even
54:12 years and I was like this is a self-fulfilling prophecy
54:16 and all the even years you were just looking
54:18 and scanning for all the bad
54:20 that happens.
54:21 And truthfully, like an even year probably has some bad
54:24 and probably has some good,
54:26 right?
54:27 And a an odd year probably has good and bad.
54:31 And so I love this idea of linking.
54:33 Um maybe I can give an example from my day today like um I
54:38 definitely have an an old story that's like never good enough.
54:41 Got to be better, got to be better.
54:42 Like just this constant like seeking of perfectionism or something. and I'm a parent.
54:48 It's like you literally cannot be like perfect as a parent.
54:51 It is not possible.
54:52 Like I mess up.
54:53 People are like, "You must be such a good mom.
54:55 Your girls are so lucky to have you."
54:56 This is in the YouTube comments.
54:57 And I'm like, "Well,
54:59 you should see my house at dinnertime cuz I definitely yell um occasionally more
55:05 often than I would like."
55:06 Today I picked up my daughter from bed.
55:08 She was like not wanting to go to school.
55:11 And I just hugged her
55:13 and I and she laughed
55:15 and smiled and I just paid attention to how it felt.
55:18 She's six to be like holding her
55:21 and to listening to her laugh
55:24 and like seeing her smile.
55:26 And I tried to like take a picture of this mentally
55:29 and like just stay with it for a few seconds even
55:32 though we were like late already late.
55:37 And I love what you're saying is like pair
55:39 that like oh I have this feeling like oh what
55:41 if I'm a bad parent?
55:42 What if my kids never want a relationship with me
55:44 and these like catastrophizing thoughts
55:47 if I can pair
55:48 that with like we just we try to have little beautiful moments each day
55:53 and try and linger on
55:54 that.
55:54 I love that.
55:55 So link it link it.
55:58 Thank you for sharing that.
56:00 Do you really believe Do you really believe in neuroplasticity?
56:03 Do you really believe like with CPTTSD people can can heal?
56:08 Yes.
56:08 Yes.
56:08 And with CPTTSD given
56:10 that the majority of complex trauma comes from relational betrayals
56:14 and relational wounds.
56:16 I just want to say this again and again.
56:18 We we don't heal alone, right?
56:20 We need relational sources of safety.
56:23 And that's where, you know, gratefully we we have those in our world, right?
56:27 Whether that's through psychotherapy or I love group work.
56:31 I love running.
56:32 I run veagal toning groups.
56:34 Um, I run uh Vegas nerve yoga classes.
56:38 I love these opportunities
56:40 that we have to come together with other people who are like-minded,
56:44 who are on the healing path where we get to show up
56:48 as we are and um be welcomed in whether that's one-on-one spaces
56:54 or community spaces. uh
56:56 that reduces the isolation
56:59 and aloneeness of of the kinds of suffering.
57:02 But the you know the research I've spent
57:04 so many years researching how we change
57:06 and why we change
57:07 and the research shows
57:08 that it's the commitment to the things
57:11 that make a difference
57:12 and that you know I often like in trauma recovery
57:16 and the practices that support it to the practices
57:19 that we need to do every day like brush our teeth right like
57:22 if I found a practice
57:23 that helped me feel good on Monday
57:25 and I think that that's good enough for the week it's probably not right
57:29 like you know we brush our teeth multiples couple times a day,
57:33 right?
57:33 So, like engaging in practices that are shifting your nervous system,
57:38 even if that dial is moving super slow,
57:41 um that are going to shift you in that positive direction.
57:45 And speaking of slow transition, when we think about the shift from, you know,
57:50 the summer solstice to the winter solstice or the winter solstice to the summer,
57:55 right?
57:55 Yeah, it's super subtle changes
57:58 that we don't really notice on a day-to-day basis,
58:02 but that each of those 10minute increments of the change in the sun
58:07 and its arc on the horizon dramatically changes a season,
58:12 right?
58:13 So, we have those seasons inside of us
58:15 and we just have to remember
58:17 that it's the small incremental shifts
58:20 that ultimately accumulate and build on each other.
58:24 I love that.
58:26 Yeah, the sun the sun the length of day changes by 60 to 90
58:30 seconds a day and it changes it from winter to summer.
58:36 It's cool.
58:37 Tiny changes.
58:39 When I when I first learned about poly bagel,
58:42 my trainer recommended um to like try to notice
58:48 and just touch base with your nervous system multiple times an hour.
58:52 What do you think about that?
58:54 Oh, I think it's great when we can remember to do those things.
58:57 I mean, how many of us remember to do those things?
59:00 I said, "Yeah, I use like a timer literally."
59:03 Totally.
59:04 When I'm when I'm rewiring something,
59:05 I use a timer to remind myself multiple times an hour.
59:09 Yeah.
59:09 Same.
59:09 I think it's really really profound to use uh use our technologies.
59:14 Um don't I have a fun little thing on the back of here?
59:17 It's my little popsocket, but it's cute.
59:19 Cute.
59:20 Anyhow, we use our technologies to support us to grow.
59:25 And I think that like there's nothing wrong with using these little crutches.
59:29 I prefer the little I have sweet timers like chimes
59:32 that go off versus the rubber band technique
59:35 that we learned way back in the day before we had smartphones
59:38 that basically basically said like every time you have a negative thought,
59:41 snap the wrap on your well
59:44 that doesn't feel like it supports my growth. gentle chimes
59:48 that says are you breathing right now
59:50 or take a twominut breathe break right like oh I can do
59:55 that right and so I think you know I think again like we can
60:00 look for what supports us to do the practices I think that's one of
60:05 the biggest barriers out there is
60:07 that we know what we should be doing
60:09 but we don't do it um I I actually want to shamelessly plug something
60:13 that goes along with the book
60:15 so the the um polyagal theory workbook for trauma.
60:19 One of the things
60:19 that I'm really proud of is
60:21 that I um Thank you.
60:24 I um collaborated with New Harbinger, the publisher of the book,
60:29 and we created a course that accompanies the book.
60:33 And the the course is less than the cost of a single therapy session.
60:37 It's it's less than $100
60:39 and it basically is me on video guiding you through every practice in the
60:45 book and it it's a lifetime access.
60:49 And so it's one of those kind of really deep um passions for me
60:55 which is to increase accessibility
60:57 because we all know
60:58 that psychotherapy is expensive
61:00 and that sometimes it's hard to find
61:02 that person and and
61:04 so on and so forth.
61:05 And so you know kind of like you I think
61:07 that shared mission of how do we increase accessibility to trauma-informed skills
61:12 and and therapy awareness skills um it's it's one of those tools
61:17 that are out there.
61:18 Oh, that's so good.
61:19 That course is called Let Your Body Hold You.
61:21 Let your body hold You.
61:22 Okay.
61:23 And where can people find you?
61:24 I'm so glad you plugged that.
61:25 And where can people find you?
61:26 Your books.
61:27 Do you have a website?
61:28 What is it?
61:29 Yes.
61:29 All right.
61:29 I have two websites.
61:31 One is simply drillshwarz.com.
61:34 So, it's pretty easy to find me drillshwarz.com.
61:38 The other is resilienceinformed therapies.com. resilienceinformed therapy.com.
61:42 And that one is basically a hub for all of the um kind of
61:48 people that have trained with me
61:49 or like-minded clinicians that are offering sim uh similar types of work out there.
61:55 Um I would say sign up for my newsletter
61:58 which you can do from either of those websites.
62:00 It's the same newsletter to get to know what are the courses
62:03 that I'm offering.
62:04 Some of which are for therapists on how to uh treat trauma
62:07 and complex PTSD.
62:09 Some are for lay person.
62:10 I offer retreats um called the beyond trauma retreat
62:13 and veagal toning retreats
62:15 and um I have a YouTube channel under Dr.
62:17 Ariel Schwarz where you'll find again lots of uh free resources on trauma recovery
62:24 on Instagram I am Ariel Schwarz Boulder
62:27 and YouTube Dr.
62:28 Ariel Schwarz.
62:28 So lots of ways to find me.
62:30 That's so great.
62:31 Okay, we will pop links to those in the description
62:33 or in the show notes
62:34 if y'all are on the podcast
62:36 and um it has just been a delight.
62:38 Thank you so much for your time, your wisdom, your years of experience.
62:42 Really appreciate you coming on.
62:43 Thank you.
62:45 Hi there.
62:45 If you found anything in this video helpful,
62:48 I would really appreciate it
62:49 if you could give it a thumbs up
62:51 or share it with someone who could benefit from it
