“To move from where we are to what we want to embrace, we will need to overcome the fear and shame that get in our way of embracing love and truth as core principles of being; to welcome conflict and challenge as a path to greater wholeness; to examine our assumptions about ourselves and others.”
Miki Kashtan
In recent years neurobiology and polyvagal theory have offered us a robust understanding of trauma. Focusing allows traumatic events which have been stored in the body as pain, numbness, stiffness, tightness, to be released. When we do this together it is possible to feel the past in the body, even if there are no memories or if memories are not ready to be shared. By staying with bodily sensations it is much less likely that therapy is re-traumatizing than restating events and by following these feelings in the company of a compassionate therapist it is possible to learn, at a very deep level, that safety can co-exist with pain at this moment. In this way, the past no longer needs to dominate the present and adversity can be overcome.