Odcinek otwierający piąty sezon „Osobistych rozmów holistycznych” to spotkanie z amerykańskim psychoterapeutą somatycznym i fizjoterapeutą Dave’em Bergerem. Z jednym z najbliższych współpracowników dr. Petera Levine’a, legendarnego twórcy metody pracy z traumą Somatic Experiencing, rozmawiam o tym, co możemy robić na co dzień, aby leczyć i transformować traumy, które nas dotknęły.

Odcinek specjalny nagrany jest w języku angielskim. Na YouTubie dostępny jest videocast z napisami.

(ENG)

Somatic Experiencing. Transforming lives through healing trauma

Reactions to overwhelming experiences, danger and mortal threat are adaptive physiological functions of necessity but if the physiological processes cannot return to baseline in a reasonable timeframe the result can impact our future on physiological, cognitive, behavioral, spiritual and relational level. It is called trauma reaction.

What are basis for understanding these maladaptive patterns? How they can change to become less rigid, more stable and flexible? What is the differences between acute danger and pervasive trauma? What can we do on daily basis to heal and transform traumas?

Somatic Experiencing is a body-oriented modality that helps heal trauma and other stress disorders. Developed by Peter Levine, Ph.D., it is the result of the multidisciplinary study of stress physiology, psychology, ethology, biology, neuroscience, indigenous healing practices, and medical biophysics, with more than 45 years of successful application.

SE resolves symptoms of stress, shock, and trauma that accumulate in our bodies. When we are stuck in patterns of fight, flight, or freeze, SE helps to release, recover, and become more resilient. The large majority of people worldwide have traumatic experiences in their lifetime, which can have major impacts on their health and well-being.

Dave Berger, MFT, PT, MA, SEP. Somatic Psychotherapist, Physical Therapist, Integrative Bodyworker, Developer of Bodywork and Somatic Education™ for Trauma Therapists (BASE™). Dave has been in the field of Somatics for over 42 years having first found his way into it by developing his own undergraduate program, somatopsychology, at the University of Maryland. He went on to obtain graduate degrees in physical therapy at Stanford University and somatic psychology at California Institute of Integral Studies.

He has been significantly influenced by Peter Levine and Somatic Experiencing®, Marion Rosen and Rosen Method® bodywork, Paul Linden’s Being In Movement® and other somatics practices, as well as family systems, psychodynamic psychotherapy, manual physical therapy, visceral manipulation, and craniosacral therapy.

Dave is a faculty member of Somatic Experiencing International teaching the Somatic Experiencing Professional Training and has developed BASE™: Bodywork and Somatic Education™ for trauma therapists. His clinical work spans work with PTSD, couples, individuals, anxiety, chronic pain, medical syndromes/chronic distress, and acute musculoskeletal problems.

(PL)

Reakcje na przytłaczające doświadczenia, niebezpieczeństwo i śmiertelne zagrożenie są z konieczności adaptacyjnymi funkcjami fizjologicznymi, ale jeśli procesy fizjologiczne nie mogą powrócić do stanu wyjściowego w rozsądnych ramach czasowych, wynik może mieć wpływ na naszą przyszłość na poziomie fizjologicznym, poznawczym, behawioralnym, duchowym i relacyjnym. Nazywa się to reakcją na traumę.

Jakie są podstawy zrozumienia tych nieprzystosowawczych wzorców? I jak mogą się one zmienić, aby stać się mniej sztywne, a bardziej stabilne i elastyczne? Jaka jest różnica między ostrym zagrożeniem a nieustająco trwającą traumą? Co możemy robić na co dzień, aby leczyć i transformować traumy, które nas dotknęły?

Somatic Experiencing to metoda zorientowana na ciało, która pomaga leczyć traumę i inne zaburzenia stresowe. Opracowana przez dr. Petera Levine’a, jest wynikiem multidyscyplinarnych badań nad fizjologiąstresu, psychologią, etologią, biologią, neuronauką, lokalnymi praktykami uzdrawiania i biofizyką medyczną, które są przez niego stosowane od ponad 45 lat.

Somatic Experiencing łagodzi objawy stresu, szoku i traumy, które gromadzą się w naszych ciałach. Kiedy utknęliśmy we wzorcach walki, ucieczki lub zamrożenia, SE pomaga uwolnić się, zregenerować siły i stać się bardziej odpornym. Zdecydowana większość ludzi na całym świecie doświadczyła w swoim życiu traumatycznych doświadczeń, które mogą mieć poważny wpływ na ich zdrowie i samopoczucie.

Dave Berger – MFT, PT, MA, SEP, psychoterapeuta somatyczny, fizjoterapeuta, twórca pracy z ciałem i edukacji somatycznej™ dla terapeutów traumy (BASE™). Zajmuje się somatyką od ponad 42 lat. Naukową ścieżkę rozpoczął na studiach licencjackich z somatopsychologii na Uniwersytecie Maryland. Następnie uzyskał stopnie naukowe z fizjoterapii na Uniwersytecie Stanforda i psychologii somatycznej w Kalifornijskim Instytucie Studiów Integralnych. Duży wpływ wywarli na niego Peter Levine i Somatic Experiencing®, praca z ciałem Marion Rosen i Rosen Method®, Being In Movement® Paula Lindena i inne praktyki somatyczne, a także systemy rodzinne, psychoterapia psychodynamiczna, fizykoterapia manualna, manipulacje wisceralne i czaszkowo-krzyżowe.

Dave Berger jest członkiem wydziału Somatic Experiencing International, gdzie prowadzi szkolenie zawodowe Somatic Experiencing i opracował BASE™: Bodywork and Somatic Education™ dla terapeutów traumy. Jego praca kliniczna obejmuje pracę z osobami z zespołem stresu pourazowego (PTSD), parami, osobami indywidualnymi, pacjentami z zaburzeniami lękowymi, przewlekłym bólem, zespołami medycznymi/przewlekłym cierpieniem i ostrymi problemami układu mięśniowo-szkieletowego.

Good morning, this is Orina. Today's episode of the podcast will be about trauma and its

treatment and approaches to healing trauma. We'll talk about this, the connections between

body and mind, and a very, very special method of working with trauma. So somatic experiencing

developed by Dr. Peter Levine. But before we start, I would like to say that this is the first

time this podcast is released in English. So I'm quite nervous. And also, I'm sorry for any

mistakes in advance. I hope there will be just a little bit of them. But just to tell you, for those of you who haven't had a chance to listen to this podcast, because it's usually

in Polish, I would like to just briefly say what is it about. So we're looking in the podcast into methods of holistic approach to health, mainly looking into

how can we support ourselves on physical, mental, emotional level, in this

broadened, integrative perspective, and also treatment, and also prevention of chronic diseases. So this is what we're interested in.

And I have a huge, huge privilege to welcome amazing guests and talk to them and ask them

about their perspective of health building. And today with me, Dave Berger. Hello, Dave.

Hello.

I'm really, really honored. And I'm very, very happy to be able to talk to you today. And welcome in Poland.

Thank you. It's been great to be here so far. Yeah.

Please let me introduce you. Dave, you are a somatic psychotherapist, a physical therapist,

and body worker. This is the shortened version of your bio and of all the practices that you

are familiar with and all the practices that you teach also. So as we talked on the way,

you have over 40 years of experience in teaching, in also practicing all the methods,

psychosomatic, if I say it correctly, work with patients. Also, you lead, you're especially dedicated

to somatic experiencing work and practice as you lead courses, advanced courses. And maybe I can

let you speak now also, what is, what is very interesting and important also to hear.

highlight about your work? Well, first, thank you for having me. This is very exciting to be here.

What's important, I've watched the field of integrative healthcare grow over the course of

30 or 40 years, and that's exciting. And the recognition that it's not just our physical body

or our emotions or our relationships as separate entities, but really, really understanding more

and more that we are all one big system and everything, it's like a city, any city. This

street doesn't exist by itself. It's part of the city. So we're looking at really the interrelationship of all of these components.

And you use the phrase body-mind, body and mind, and really it's a continuum. It's one big

physiological system, let's say, with a lot of parts to it that work together. So this is exciting

that this recognition is increasing more and more. Can I ask you, how did it start for you, this interest? Yeah, this interest started so long ago.

Because I guess it wasn't that popular at the time. Because now we have seen in Poland, I'm very

interested how it is in the US where you come from. But I can observe by our foundation, I haven't

said also in the introduction, for those of you who don't know, I am also mainly, usually I am an actress, but also I co-lead a foundation here that is dedicated to holistic approach to health and

integrative medicine and developing it in Poland and health education. But I think it's a very important thing. And I think that this has been past few years that I can observe this amazing

growth of interest in holistic approach, in complementary approach. So we are seeing and

broadening our perspective. But I guess when you started, that wasn't a popular thing, right?

I don't even know how much existed, really. There were

elements of society, of healing arts society that understood this. But now we're talking back in

the era that I was in college, late 70s, mid to late 70s, when I was interested,

probably having heard something in a yoga class back then, that stimulated me to look around and say, hmm, how could I get any of this? I was a college student. So I actually designed-

What did you study? I designed my own curriculum and made up my own major at University of Maryland. They allowed us to do that. Yeah. And I called it somatopsychology.

I created the name. I thought psychosomatic-

So you are a pioneer.

I'm a pioneer. Psychosomatic has a very negative connotation, implying pathology. And so I reversed the term. Everything we do,

psychosomatic. If I suggest to you to go open the door, you have to think about it. There's an affect associated with it and a physical action. Sure. Everything we do. Sure.

And of course, there's nobody at the University of Maryland or anywhere else I could find that could teach me this kind of more complete whole approach.

So I took courses from a variety of different fields, including psychology and biology and education.

And sociology and combine that with all the requirements for a graduate program in physical therapy.

And I chose physical therapy because I love how the body functions. And if I went into psychology, I thought, I'm going to have to listen to people complain all the time. And I don't want to do that.

So to shorten a very long story, I grad programed physical therapy, worked in neurological rehab. People have head injuries, stroke.

Multiple sclerosis and a lot in pediatrics and then started diving into the world of body work.

And it was I don't even know if it was called complementary or alternative back then, but found my way into working with people with chronic pain.

And that's when I did go back to another second graduate program in psychology, specifically in somatic psychology. And that was in the early 1990s.

And then the rest is just sort of developed by itself, like kind of like one leading to

another thing.

Exactly, exactly, exactly. And it was in that program, not as part of the graduate program, but as an invitation to add to

it, that I did start my training 1993 with Peter Levine, who founded and developed.

So how did you hear for? Yeah, I'll ask you about somebody experiencing. But but interesting. Like, how did you hear about it at the beginning when it was just developing, right?

So it was just like, yeah, he started developing it in his doctoral work at UC Berkeley in the late 60s, early 70s. And so he was developing this method that eventually he named somatic experiencing in

the 70s.

So you were one of the first students, right?

I was early, early before there was a formal training. Yeah, yeah. And then I took some time off from it, became a professor in physical therapy. And so I was a professor in physical therapy. Came back into it.

And all of a sudden, there was a formal training. And I did that late 1990s. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so one thing led to the next, led to the next. Yeah.

I have this question that just came to my mind when you were speaking about like complementary alternative, also somatic experiencing that we will talk in a second.

But how do you see this change now if we talk about if we're in this field of integrative, holistic, complementary? Yes.

Even in terms of names. Right. Because alternative has this very strong suggestion already that it is something alternative to

main say idea, main main path. So conventional. Yeah. How do you see that changing over the years?

How do you see where do you where do you place yourself with your all your work?

Yeah. Yeah. It's a great question. For a long time, I would say, give a decade, give a name. It would be the same thing, but the name would change from alternative to complementary to this to that.

And integrative seems to have taken hold.

Although if we think back hundreds and thousands of years and different cultures like Eastern medicine, it's been integrative. Always. And holistic. Always.

And then it became reductionistic, and that's a whole other conversation.

I actually worked at one of the very first centers for integrative medicine in the United States.

What was it?

Center for Integrative Medicine in Concord, New Hampshire, where I lived for a very long time. And I started with them right before the doors opened in 1999.

And it was open for 15 years.

It's cool. Is it closed now?

It closed after I left typical of integrative medicine because insurance doesn't cover a lot of the practices.

It makes it difficult financially.

Although that's changing also, especially in the world of cancer, where oncologists, to their brilliance, realize we don't have all the answers yet.

And we need to look at a bigger approach. Chronic pain is the same way, I think.

Those two fields, immunology, psychoimmunology, recognize there's a bigger picture here than reductionistic medicine.

And I think because, and this is my personal opinion, because integrative has been attached to the word medicine, it's taking hold now.

Okay. So do you approve it having this medicine kind of like a part to it?

That it helps really into integrating it with conventional?

Because, you know, sometimes I feel that it's so not regulated with the names, with the what is what. The questions are always there.

So maybe conventional medicine, conventional way may feel a bit threatened by something another way. Which for me...

For me should be just one broadened perspective of, as you say, bigger picture.

You and I are on the same page with that. I agree. And I do understand the threat. You have to remember, I come from both worlds.

I worked in traditional or allopathic Western medicine as a physical therapist. And I do all the other things that I do.

So I understand why different models can feel threatened.

Financially, egos get involved, training is a particular way, and people feel threatened.

Whether it's, you know, a medical doctor with great training or an acupuncturist with great training, people can feel threatened.

Until they open their perspective up and say, oh, not only do I not have all the answers, but I can ask for assistance. I can learn. I can continue learning. So there's a bigger picture.

So I think that things are moving in a very positive way.

And gradually, things like medical schools, physical therapy programs, schools, other acupuncture schools, dieticians, etc.,

are broadening their understanding that we need to have all of it. You know, I've recently had, a couple of years ago, I had a total hip replacement.

I wanted a very skilled orthopedic surgeon that didn't practice a lot of alternatives. I wanted him to know his specialty. And he was great.

But also, I had acupuncture, and I used supplements, dietary supplements, hands-on work to support the healing process.

And it's like I never had a hip replacement. And a lot of people will say, oh, I don't know. that about a hip replacement but i've had other surgeries i've had a lot of clients also who look

before during and after to have a much broader picture and do really well yeah thank you because

you you just actually answered the question that i had in my mind like what what uh this integrative

um way can actually give us like why is it i wouldn't say needed but uh why would we say

we should follow this direction but you just you just actually answered it by saying like

how faster we can get uh better and the quality of life may may just um yeah um yeah be supported um i i do

have like to wrap up maybe this uh this part before going into somatic experiencing and trauma

that is like uh extremely interesting um i just would like to ask you what can we do

in order to loosen up a little bit these you know polarized um views towards each other

these maybe threats or fears that we have that's that you know the other perspective may be threatened

threatening our own so if we are we if we stick to both these you know if we talk about alternate

versus versus yeah what can we do on daily basis to you know to open up very good question and and

it's not just a healthcare question it's a political question yeah all levels all levels

if we can have one-to-one conversations in healthcare if one client or one patient can tell

their nurse practitioner or physician about something that they've had let's say it's acupuncture

or they've seen a dietitian and shifted how they eat and now they're feeling better and that one

physician or nurse practitioner can listen and just be curious so so the conversation has to be

one of curiosity and interest not one of defensiveness hmm and that's that becomes the big big issue

it's like doctor you know i just had this most interesting thing happen since our last visit

let's say someone with chronic pain i changed how i was eating and i had acupuncture and in

addition to the medication you've given me i'm feeling a lot better do you think there might be something useful in this mm-hmm right so it's it's it's that's something that is very important reasons

an idea a way of talking that invites the provide and you might have that same conversation with the acupuncturist or the or the herbal medicine provider in

that same way it's a conversation that invites people to be curious about each other hmm not a conversation says this is what should be done so we should

start with actually a communication learning process communication yeah good

communication yeah yeah NVC have you heard NVC is yeah yeah yeah yeah it's a

very nice nice approach to inviting conversation yeah yeah thank you but so

so jumping into we are actually in this world and field of psychosomatic but I

would like to ask you about a subject that is very I feel that it's coming up now very quickly and I think it's very important to talk about it because it's

very strong so so trauma also as and hue a huge impulse that reveals

psychosomatic effects now then on many levels so could you could you say

explain maybe a new perspective if we can say there is a new perspective of understanding trauma what is it how how should we

we perceive it and and where this new perspective of trauma may lead us to so

how can how can it help us actually yeah so here I'm gonna reference one of my main mentors which is Peter Levine because I think in many ways his work

and his understanding of trauma changed the entire field of trauma in so many

ways in one way it brought the word trauma to the foreground yeah before his

work people really talked about trauma as a physical injury major physical

injuries like from a car accident or the physical wounds from war or things like

that and he really built a model that addresses that and he really built a model that addresses

is and started talking about it so a little bit of history to that is that he he looked at how wild

animals who are under constant threat respond to uh an attack the when predator when a predator

prey situation that doesn't have to be like physical uh attack it doesn't it it can be just

a threat of an attack well yeah in humans for sure the the the emotional attack uh physical attack

etc are all responded to in a very very similar way by the nervous system

the the model from the animal world is makes it easier to understand this so i'll go through that

just a little bit when an animal when a prey animal is chased of course it's running as

fast as it can to get away and then at some point it will drop into shock so it'll just shut down after it's finished after the chase it could be right before the chase is finished often it is

because because that state when it's feigning death when it goes into this state similar to

death stops the attack or it might have been physically attacked but then it goes into shock okay predator

this isn't fun anymore i'm i'm not being able to chase it and my appetite is no longer stimulated

right so it goes away eventually it goes away this is one model this is one variation of several

possibilities eventually the prey comes out of the shock state and how the shock looks like what

is the yeah just a freeze freeze another word for it would be freeze yeah it could be a flaccid freeze could be a rigid freeze both are what in physiological terms are called tonic immobility

but the term phrase freeze is used in the psychology literature not in the physiology literature it's tonic immobility the same thing so it goes into this state to protect itself

deep energy conservation lower breathing almost no breathing lower heart rate no digestion etc like when we're in an anesthetic state yeah for surgery yeah right or we're

when we're in terror yeah same thing all right i don't can i ask you sorry to interrupt but on the mind level what happens in this shock let's get there in a minute because it's very complicated

but i definitely want to get there sure so great what you'll see gradually with an animal is that it'll slowly come out of it i do i'm very non-verbal too so you're going to see me do this

comes out of it it orients itself oh the coast is clear the predator's gone

shakes out all of that physiology the adrenaline the catecholamines the cortisol the

neuroepinephrine etc it tremors it all out and for how long it sets it could be for a few minutes

it could be for hours really yeah in humans it could be for even longer yeah yeah because it's

built up such a charge depending also on the survival charge right right on the level of tension that it's built up so it's built up so it's built up so it's built up so it's built up

before exactly exactly sure and what might be attached to it is anything that's happened in

its life before that especially with humans it's like velcro right so it sheds all that

physiological metabolic and resets its nervous system and then goes about its merry way until

the next attack mm-hmm okay the shake really can shake out all the levels but

how with a wild animal many times it can reset itself many times not a hundred percent because

it has been shown elephants are a great example of this it has been shown that they will be

traumatized okay they may not reset okay completely yeah with humans of course it

gets more complicated because we also have a way to cognitively or intellectually override

an attack meaning we'll fight back which is a good thing or we'll judge ourselves I should after

the fact I should have gotten away let's say a sexual assault all right I I should have done

this or I should and what that does is it shuts down the ability to discharge or shadow like the

natural impulse of the body it shuts down the natural impulse exactly

and then if you add all the experiences that a human being has had until that moment

let's say at 18 years old or maybe at three years old what's happened before that or we were talking

about this earlier transgenerationally historically what has been brought into that moment right and

that's still in there yeah I have like a question of obviously like I have my own uh intuition about it and also very interested in the subject yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

Is it really stored in the body like really really physically stored in the body can we say it that's interesting question

It's stored in our brain But our brain and body are only separated by everything going through the neck

It's the same thing and one relies on the other the other relies on the one so they're in constant constant communication

But our brain is where our memory is sure it's not in our big toe sure, but our big toes reacting Right. So in that way, it's in our brain and

We rely on it to quickly quickly quickly assess Do I know this sensory input from the outside of the body sounds sights tastes smells?

From the inside of the body the way my body my gut etc is reacting. We have a gut reaction That's a real thing. Yeah that happens before we understand what's going on

So this is like a impulse that is like It goes directly connects to our memory. Let's say it

Indirectly, but but it's rapid

And we are we faster than we faster than we cognitively exactly exactly

So so we have a reaction then we know what the reaction is

hmm, so Now sorry to jump over to healing. Yeah, but then is it that? Huh? Okay, so how much we can heal ourselves really from the trauma?

That are already stored in the brain in our memory Yeah, if the reaction is so fast and so rapid that so I see the process here

Yeah, an impulse comes right so for example, let's say I'm walking the street I have a traumatic memory from my childhood related to let's say a certain smell. Yeah

So I'm walking the street now and I smell this smell and it reveals a body reaction

It reveals right away because it's so rapid. Yeah that it activates, right? Yeah, so

My job is then to realize and to undo or quickly, you know massage

Myself out of this state. Is it the only way or or you know to kind of like work? With the reaction that we have no power over or can we actually?

Can we heal ourselves from the traumatic like deeply rooted wounds, you know Can we heal ourselves from the traumatic like deeply rooted wounds, you know

The so there are two questions in there one is what do we do in the immediate moment? If I can feel my physiological reaction

This smell comes in I react to it and that's exactly what happens. You're right It's not I think about it or I have an emotion about it

I react to it if I can feel that reaction so the body is first right the

body's first if I can feel that reaction then I can choose I can soften I can

soften my tongue I can relax my belly as examples if I can't feel it then I'm at

the whim of what is going to happen next and so that that that's a primary

thing if I can feel then I can do something not all the time but many

times if I can't feel then there's no choice the so that that's one thing can

we heal from trauma the answer is yes if it wasn't I wouldn't be doing the

this work now two aspects of that one is Carl Jung at the end of his toward the end of his life

and I will get this quote wrong but it said something like we don't really completely change

with all the therapy that we do but we loosen up a lot we become a lot softer to our edges now

he was probably talking my guess is more about character structure personality etc it loosens up

it's not as rigid and with trauma healing yes sometimes there's complete healing other times

it really eases up a lot and that's healing so part of it it depends on how do you find healing

yeah exactly one of the beauties of somatic experiencing

what Peter realized is that doing a little bit of work at a time and I don't mean like

one session but even within a session just the exposure to the similar physiology and awareness

of it in present time of this traumatic experience yeah if we say it's a one-time trauma experience it's easier to understand it in terms of one-time shock trauma but it gets more complex with

developmental trauma relational trauma more pervasive trauma experiences and we can talk

about that if I if I can help a client feel the physiology of it in present time and pay

attention then the so it so it comes toward matching the physiology of what happened mm-hmm during the car accident say just a little little bit of the car accident not

all of it then they can downregulate then they can settle from that right and then we could do a little bit more it's like last night I was taking a pierogi making class we added just a little bit

of water to the flower first and stirred it then a little bit more and so if you add it all at once

you get globs that's like prolonged exposure therapy you get a mess but if you do a little bit at a time it can come out smoothly it's like with now the big subject matter therapy is like

this retraumatizing retraumatize it could be retraumatizing exactly exactly exactly and the beauty of his work is you do just a little bit at a time but how do you provoke these memories in

the body that varies sometimes you need to trigger somebody a little bit just a little bit like I

might say so you're walking down that street where you smelled that aroma what do you remember I don't even necessarily have to ask what you remember sure

because I'm seeing or word and somatic experiencing is tracking what's happening physiologically what's going on with someone's breathing how about their heart rate what are their eyes doing the

color of their skin are they starting to look around for example uh-huh and that's enough that's

all we need and and then you concentrate on the body sensations as that'll vary now that'll vary

techniques and somatic experiencing and then there's a lot of art to take the concepts and the principles the supporting science and apply it so how we do it will be different each practitioner

each client Etc but let's say I say to you so you're walking down that that Street see and already

you're starting to tighten up your jaw is getting a little tight you feel it if I your eyes yeah and

I say hey what are you I might ask what are you noticing or it might be a little too much to say hey let's wiggle let's move around right come out of that freeze state I might invite you to soften

your tongue you might know yeah your breathing changes immediately so that's what we call

titrating it just a little bit and shift it or pendulate shift it right really give that time to settle that's part of the discharge that couldn't happen initially

the shake and then it might move to a shake if a shake is going to be there it doesn't always

okay okay so I guess that there's like a how'd you say like variety a lot of variety variety of

exercises and then possibilities and possibilities right right right a lot of variations on the theme

part of it depends also on how traumatized someone traumatizing somebody's life and history have been

so back uh to uh trauma itself yeah um so you were we jumped into physical um trauma yeah and it was

trauma was perceived for many years as this uh yeah huge probably on physical level event yeah

that left or say um I don't know um probably people going into war that was also perceived of

a huge traumatic event right um but now there's so many like on so many more subtle level levels

also we can we could say something was traumatizing traumatizing for us traumatizing for us um so

could you could you give examples for what could it be for us and how to what could trauma be for us

little examples and also how to track if we have this PTSD syndrome and how does it um reveal itself

yeah there's so many different experiences we can have yes certainly from war car crashes relational

trauma being shamed over and over so emotional yeah now we're in the emotional realm um uh being

bullied which is emotional it's physical it's so it can be a constant thing so for example or a

long-term process yes or or instant very acute yeah and I call the long-term process more

pervasive meaning that the environment we live in is pervasively traumatizing growing up in poverty

growing up in a family where there's domestic violence growing up in a war zone growing up without food

um growing up in relationships that are over and over again abusive there's sexual trauma motor

vehicle crashes natural disasters um and the list goes on there's no shortage okay of trauma uh

experiences environments in the world so do we say that uh trauma is actually our reaction to an

event or to an external situation almost almost

to redefine trauma okay moment are we have two major branches of our nervous system there are

more details than this there's one uh that is called voluntary and that's when I say to myself

Dave you're recognizing your mouth is dry put your hand out to pick up this glass of water and have a sip so the top down I'm directing myself to do it mm-hmm about

10 to 20 of how we function most of how we function is automatic or autonomic or involuntary meaning that when I for example put my hand out I have to adjust my posture I'm not thinking about how to do

that when I take a sip of water my breathing has to change all my physiological processes Etc Etc

the autonomic nervous system has different couple of different branches to it one is called sympathetic increase action so oh there's a

side of stairs I have to walk up my heart rate has to increase my respiratory rate has to increase my muscles have to have more blood flow Etc Etc if I have to really do it quickly I have to run

for whatever the reason then my digestion decreases as well then there's the parasympathetic which is

the reverse of all that my heart rate can come down my respiratory rate can ease up I um I can go back into a digestive mode

rest and digest that goes into another direction if I'm under threat or perceived threat or mortal

threat then I'll shut down like the prey animal I'm going into shock okay so these two branches of

the nervous system uh have a relationship that is supposed to be quite a regulated relationship supposed to be supposed to be

and will be under healthful circumstances the question is how how um when it's yeah yeah do we

live in this you know in this world that supports um yeah all these uh natural and balanced regular

you know connections well we live in a world that provides us with a lot of opportunities to practice

getting there okay yeah right sure um and so we're often dysregulated where this nice balance is not quite balanced

um if we look through the words of um Chinese medicine yin and yang are not in balance

and uh sympathetic parasympathetic are not in balance they're dysregulated so if if we want to speak in terms of neurophysiology we can say rather than the word trauma we're dysregulated

and that opens up the understanding to a much bigger realm emotional chronic pain

physical an emotional chronic pain uh Etc Etc in fact chronic emotional pain registers neurologically

just like physical pain they are the same yeah they are the same thing in many ways yeah yeah so

we can we can actually um yes sorry I had two thoughts at the same time I know that feeling yeah um there is a I just I just actually because maybe only really um with with um those that are uh at least a long way from that with you okay well maybe we kind of don't have to deal with our opponent family 19 year old and

it's interesting to say that so you're here in Poland because of integrative medicine Congress that we organize with our foundation and I think three

Congresses before there was with us amazing dr. dr. and Lee Smith from Utah

University also a huge pioneer in in the field of mind-body research and as a

doctor as a medical doctor he was one of the first one two years years years ago to introduce the scientific evidence of the mind-body connection working with

chronic pain so I just like when you said it it just like ring was was ringing the bell what he was saying also about that that it actually it's at the

same it's the same print it's the same print it's the same imprint it's the

same principle yeah yeah and the other thing that I was like the second thought that I had

Tracks remember your no I'm just thought so sometimes instead of saying

trauma we can say dysregulation do I correctly understand it but I yes not

all dysregulation can be αυτό Espadas the ave symptoms right this

might be how you define PTSD now the the official psychiatric diagnostic movie ptsd symptoms this might be how you define PTSD now the the official psychiatric diagnostic

manual that's used probably around the world um certainly in the united states defines it with particular criteria chronic pain is not part of that for example could you say about these

criterias like for i'm thinking about people who may be interested listening to us people

have intrusive thoughts flashbacks um people avoid certain situations there's a whole list

i don't even pay attention to it so i don't have it all memorized because i i look at it as a much much broader field an area in fact i think bessel van der kolk who's also one of the

forerunners in research in this area um in mind body kind of work uh has even said almost

everything in that manual should be under ptsd yeah yeah yeah that's how broad it is and and

And like I said earlier, we live in a world, sadly, that provides a lot of opportunity for healing.

Yeah, this is actually a question that I have for you about preventing trauma in the world of this much tension.

And I have to bring it in with we're in Poland with a discussion of war threat.

We have our neighbors, our friends at war. There is a war is happening in the world. And definitely the danger grows.

That's one type of huge trauma on level of it happening already. On the other hand. On. On the level of this anticipation.

And the question would be also if anticipating such an event could be already traumatic. Oh, yeah. That's one thing.

Another thing is we are actually regarding to the Integrative Medicine Congress that we are holding just in a few days.

But it also much of it will regard nature, ecology. Our relationship to to nature.

So we're not like as talking about holistic approach to health, integrative perspective of life, we're not separate from within ourselves, but also we're not separate from each other.

And also we're just part of something bigger that it's like sometimes, you know, it's like just surprising to me that we have like, how is it possible that we really put ourselves in the shoes of nature?

Yeah, how is this possible? How does this even possible? Yeah, we do. Right. Which makes us obviously individuals, which is it's not bad.

It's not that it's like, it's easy to say, like, this is good. This is bad. It's just like I see, I see it more as the extremes that are there are dangerous. Right.

So it's natural that I see myself as a independent human being with my own individual needs and listening to these needs and emotions. Right.

very important but on the other hand the separation led us to an edge I see right

and in individualistic cultures that's what you're defining collectivistic cultures it's a little bit different mm-hmm

oh boy there are so many questions in there and I love all this where to start

so in terms of being in Poland and threat and Russia and Ukraine but we can

name regions all around the world what can we do to not go into that kind of

trauma freeze reaction and override it and again and again and again in in one way it's very simple in other ways it's extremely complicated but come back to softening your

tongue just if you allow it to soften all right then you can be worried you

can be anxious but you don't have to do anxiety right your your body you can think I don't know what's gonna happen tomorrow but I don't have to I don't

know what's gonna happen tomorrow they're very different the thought can be the same but the reaction different so you say like loosening the body if I feel like the start from the body start from the body well in a way you

got to start with knowing what you're thinking yeah sure but you're reacting and then your body's reacting to the thoughts and then your thoughts are reacting to the body and it's non-stop so how

do you interrupt somatic experiencing is often i call it an interruption therapy as well so if we

can interrupt that process and i find doing it physically the easiest way it's easy access right

you maybe even just tighten your jaw yeah right tighten your jaw just a tad like five percent

tighten it and now release the tightening right there and everything calms down a little bit right

so if we can interrupt that process then we can go on with what we need to do now is that going to change the world is it going to change the politics is going to change the whole environment

no but it's going to change you and then that can begin to change other people if i can't feel if i can't change that

then i can't choose then i can't do anything what if it comes back if it's just like loosening up

for five seconds and then it comes back again it's not if well if it comes back it will come back

it will until it doesn't and it will again it's can it change not necessarily will go away forever

we're meant to do that we're meant to because that makes us pay attention it also if we need to run if we need to protect ourselves that's the start of it the question how

do we um how do we judge or how do we choose when is the moment of running you know and listening up

yeah we don't always choose consciously right we if i'm walking again simple relatively simple example if i am crossing the street and i hear a loud screech of the brakes

my body's gonna react and then behave the behavior let's say it's running is one non-conscious choice

stopping freezing is another non-conscious choice which one is chosen it's not a it's so instant

but what about if we have say um public exposure right so you you're you have to make a lecture

or something yeah oh yeah i have to my my heart i have to in a couple of days you do you actually do

but i guess you're familiar uh but so let's let's yeah let's take my example so i have to give a

lecture my heart is bumping um it's not a thread it's not a life thread right it's not something

um that my body instantly as you described reacts and it's natural and it's

it's meant to protect me right so it all starts with my mind and how i perceive the threat

it makes it way more difficult to to like to follow this dialogue right so to loosen up if i

like for example if my level of anxiety and my level of stress is so high that it doesn't work anymore to just you know loosen five percent ten percent and sustain it

where do i start from there yeah well that's where it needs to be individualized to each person

so softening i'll give you an example i i was working with a guy this was a number of years ago and he was a pianist he was a concert pianist

um but there was he said that there was something happening the way he was playing that was changing and not

for the good it was and he couldn't figure it out so we're working around his anxiety and his depression and um some of his history and all that's going well but his playing is not

um the way he wanted it to be and so he said you know let's do this how about i meet you

at your studio and i watch you play and i knew he's great pianist and i just wanted to hear him play too so

i used it as an excuse um and and i watched him and he did the most subtle little thing

with his with his jaw and i'm going to get a little bit more anatomically detailed here with his pelvic floor pelvic floor is the base of all our anxiety and our fear and our terror

that's where we start just a little bit and so in an exaggerated form he's playing like this and heart rate is up not as much as you're

describing but it's a similar situation so i had him soften soften his tongue and that worked for a

little bit but then he went right back to it said look around the room and this is for him look

around how many people are here right now softens i guess just you i said yes exactly what did you

think before i asked you he said well i always practice as though i'm in a hall of fame and i'm performing and i said well don't do that it was very simple in some ways but for him it was really

novel it was really new and then we did some other things too because he was so focused forward he

would forget that there's a whole room there so we had him expand that i said next time you perform

next time you're performing at a concert just forget about everybody just that just it's

doing the piano and it changed everything right so it was very top down combined with the bottom

up the physical changes and it changed how he was playing so that was very individualized you've really got to get to know the individual instead of make a blanket protocol yeah for everybody yeah

that actually reminds me um uh a talk an interview that i had with sharon salzberg who's um she's a

meditation uh teacher but mostly loving kindness meditation teacher so she was uh saying about

uh just in simplest simplest uh way actually what meditation is about is to

let go of these additional perspectives and layers of perspectives that we have just to really find ourselves at the root of the thing

of the like in the in the core of the thing what is like the pure presence so in the room i'm only

you and me yeah that's it yeah there's no crowd behind me but usually we go with uh with these

thoughts and with these interpretations and uh yeah the future the past yeah yeah and i i agree

with her a hundred percent not just for meditation but in trauma healing work as well and so much of it so much of it can be at a non-conscious level and then we also consciously

know some of our past whether it's our lived life or transgenerationally um you know so many

questions so many questions yeah because i wanted to ask you actually like how for for okay i'm gonna throw it in like quickly yeah so so for for healing trauma how do you um think how important

it is to dig into the history that's a really really

really great question um in some ways it's very very important and we're not working with the

history we're not working with shock trauma events we're not working with pervasive trauma history or presentry we're working with the physiological reaction in somatic experiencing

in somatic experiencing um we're working with the physiological reaction to it so i can't change

we're in poland we're in europe i'm jewish as you know and and i have spent time very purposefully in the past many days visiting as you know some of my roots are from poland

visiting because i want to feel it more than when i in the united states and i would react right

but i'm not work i can't change what happened in the 1940s i can't change what happened in the i can't change a car accident that happened 10 years ago

but I can change my reaction and my relationship with them. And that's what has to change. If I'm always reacting as though they are present now

because I'm not conscious that they're not, then I'm constantly reinforcing this dysregulation.

And also, I guess, staying in the past is like this disconnection. It is a disconnection, that's right. And it doesn't root us present. That's right.

And so I have the last question for you. I have like a hundred more. But actually, it relates to what you say

and what we talk about in terms of loosening up, opening up versus, I guess, this disconnection.

And also fragmentation. So just like a big, big circle to integrative approach

versus, how did you say, fragmented or reductionistic.

So how would you say in the times of we are really difficult with rising tension,

what can we do on daily life to loosen up, accept what you already said with being as aware as possible of our bodies,

but to loosen up, to stay curious?

Yeah. Well, I think you just said it, to loosen up, to soften, and to receive, to be really curious about what people are saying,

who don't agree with you, who you don't agree with. To get to know them as human beings, not as... a belief, not as a value.

Can I get to know this person?

Even though...

Can I allow them to get to know me as a person? Even though they disagree with me. There's a lot of polarization, for example, in the United States now, a lot.

But I like to engage in conversations with people who agree with me, of course, but with people that don't. And I don't get into arguments.

You don't feel threatened?

Um, I don't feel threatened. Not at a personal level, no. I do at a political level. Yeah, sure. But I can feel threatened and stiffen up, or I can feel... That is threatening.

I don't like the possible direction this is going to go.

Okay.

From this loosening up state, do you feel that it also allows an impulse into taking action?

Yeah, if we can't feel, we can't change, we can't take... We can't choose action.

Mm-hmm.

So I might choose to do... I might choose to do nothing. I might choose to get involved politically. I might choose to have other conversations. I might choose to walk away.

Say, thank you, I need to go now. Right? If I choose to fight, then it becomes a problem. Right? But if I choose to be curious, then there's possibility. Yeah. Yeah.

But again, if I can't feel, then I can't choose.

So freedom of choice.

Feeling my reaction allows me freedom of choice, yes. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Thank you so much, Dave.

You're welcome. Thank you. Thank you.