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From the archives: Full Human-Beingness & Trauma with Manuela Mischke-Reeds · The Trauma Therapist

0:00
Speaker 1: Today we even another episode from the archives with one
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Speaker 1: of my incredible guests. Enjoy Welcome to the Trauma divers podcast,
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Speaker 1: a show about the incredible people dedicated to helping those
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Speaker 1: who experienced trauma. My name is Gay macpherson and my
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Speaker 1: mission is to raise the awareness of trauma and to
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Speaker 1: inspire each of us to help those around us. All right, guys,
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Speaker 1: welcome back again. My name is Gay McPherson and so
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Speaker 1: excited to get going this morning with my guest, Manuela
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Speaker 1: Michiga Reid's Manuela. Are you ready to start?
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Speaker 2: Yes?
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Speaker 1: Sure, all right, you're a welcome so. Manuela is a
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Speaker 1: licensed somatic psychotherapist. She is an international teacher of psychology
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Speaker 1: and trained health professionals in California, Australia, New Zealand, Israel,
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Speaker 1: and Europe and starting in China next year. Manuela co
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Speaker 1: directs and teaches at the Halcomi Institute of California that
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Speaker 1: hosts her trauma training from Trauma to Dharma that starts
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Speaker 1: up again in April twenty sixteen. We'll have that linked
1:01
Speaker 1: up at the show notes page. This training integrates current
1:04
Speaker 1: neuroscience of trauma theory, somatic and mindfulness based interventions. With
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Speaker 1: the dharmaic teachings and embodied meditation practices. Her recent book,
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Speaker 1: Eight Keys to Practicing Mindfulness, Practical Strategies for Emotional Health
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Speaker 1: and well Being has been published by Norton in twenty fifteen.
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Speaker 1: Awesome aright, Manuela. Obviously, just a little bit about you.
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Speaker 1: Take a moment, share with our listeners where you're calling from,
1:28
Speaker 1: where you're from too, and then let's dive.
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Speaker 2: In thank you guys. Well, I'm originally from Germany actually
1:35
Speaker 2: and came to the US about twenty six, oh my gosh,
1:39
Speaker 2: twenty seven years ago, and I'm calling from northern California.
1:43
Speaker 2: That's where I reside in practice or middle of Park area,
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Speaker 2: so not.
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Speaker 1: Too far from me in Oakland, that's right, all right.
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Speaker 1: So this podcast here really is about inspiring clinicians trauma.
2:00
Speaker 1: There's trauma therapist people just getting into this field. And
2:02
Speaker 1: we start Manuil with a quote, a mantra, an idea
2:07
Speaker 1: of what has gotten you excited, what's inspired you share
2:12
Speaker 1: with our listeners. They're a quote or an excerpt whatever.
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Speaker 2: Thank you. There's a quote that's kind of guided me
2:21
Speaker 2: ever since I've come here to the US, and I
2:24
Speaker 2: was a student at Naroba university and I'm probably gonna
2:28
Speaker 2: not do it justice don't have it in front of me.
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Speaker 2: But basically it's a cote. But Sugam trump A Rambachet,
2:34
Speaker 2: the founder of Naroba, and he said, the job of
2:37
Speaker 2: the health professional is to inspire full human being nos
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Speaker 2: and that inspiring a full human being This has been
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Speaker 2: kind of my guiding post as I studied and practice
2:50
Speaker 2: psychotherapy with trauma clients in particular, So that's been I
2:55
Speaker 2: know it's a short quote, but I felt like when
3:00
Speaker 2: I was training as a clinician, there was a lot
3:02
Speaker 2: of emphasis on skill and on techniques, but not so
3:08
Speaker 2: much on what really motivates the therapist to wanting to
3:11
Speaker 2: engage in healing excuse me, And so that quote spoke
3:16
Speaker 2: to me because I felt like what needed to happen
3:19
Speaker 2: was to come back to that full human beingness quality,
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Speaker 2: and that's what I saw my early training. The kind
3:27
Speaker 2: of suffering that trauma clients were going through was actually
3:31
Speaker 2: taking them away from their full human beingness, and they
3:34
Speaker 2: didn't feel complete, they didn't even feel human at times.
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Speaker 2: And it also speaks to the kind of relationship that
3:41
Speaker 2: I found was healing and trauma therapy. So that quote
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Speaker 2: in a way sums it up that I feel like
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Speaker 2: it's guided me personally in my personal life but also professionally.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that quote. And you know, despite its
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Speaker 1: uh the fact, even despite the fact that it's short,
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Speaker 1: but it's just so powerful and I love the emphasis
4:06
Speaker 1: on uh, you know, full human being. This it's something really,
4:12
Speaker 1: you know, we we haven't talked so much about on
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Speaker 1: this podcast, and I'm really glad you're kind of setting
4:18
Speaker 1: the context here. Obviously, you know, there's there's the topic
4:21
Speaker 1: of skill and what we need to learn and also
4:25
Speaker 1: the desire to do this work, but we really haven't
4:27
Speaker 1: talked a lot about kind of focused the spotlight, if
4:31
Speaker 1: you will, on what what does it mean to well,
4:36
Speaker 1: from what you're saying, to be full human beings? What
4:40
Speaker 1: does that mean? When did that become important to you?
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Speaker 1: A resonant for you? This this kind of teasing that
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Speaker 1: part out, if you will.
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Speaker 2: Well, as as I mentioned, as a student, it was
4:53
Speaker 2: an inspiration that there was more to therapy healing than
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Speaker 2: just technique. So it made me I was a very
5:00
Speaker 2: young clinician. I was twenty five when I started out,
5:03
Speaker 2: and when I was kind of brimming with this energy
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Speaker 2: of wanting to heal, and so that quote inspired me
5:11
Speaker 2: that this was the motivation from which to start from.
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Speaker 2: But when it really came into action, I moved. As
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Speaker 2: I said, my early training was here in the US
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Speaker 2: after Germany, was at Naropa University, and then I went
5:25
Speaker 2: to the Bay Area and got another degree in somatic psychology,
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Speaker 2: and one of my first internships was with political torture survivors.
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Speaker 2: That was my early training ground as a clinician. And
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Speaker 2: I was referred to a client that had suffered from Cambodia,
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Speaker 2: that had suffered political torture, and it was a very
5:46
Speaker 2: pivotal moment where she turns to me and she says,
5:49
Speaker 2: you know, they could break my bones, but they couldn't
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Speaker 2: break my spirit. And that was another quote in a
5:57
Speaker 2: way that guided me. But it matched with that full
5:59
Speaker 2: human being this quote as well, and I got it
6:02
Speaker 2: that It was like, this is this is what trauma
6:05
Speaker 2: healing is about. It's about helping people to find their spirit,
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Speaker 2: their connection with life, their body, hope they will and
6:17
Speaker 2: to make them feel whole in their dignity and their integrity.
6:23
Speaker 2: Because so much of trauma experiences puts us exactly in
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Speaker 2: the opposite. People feel broken and shattered and disorganized and
6:31
Speaker 2: disregulated and you name it. And I felt like when
6:35
Speaker 2: that when that client sat in front of me and
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Speaker 2: looked at me and said this to me, that they
6:39
Speaker 2: could break my bones but not my spirit, I realized
6:43
Speaker 2: that that quote had carried me to the doorstep with
6:45
Speaker 2: this client, and I realized, Oh, this is what this
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Speaker 2: is about. It's about bringing back dignity and connection to self,
6:54
Speaker 2: body and others. That that's the gist of it.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, did you feel that, you know, you talked about
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Speaker 1: yourself brimming with kind of passion and to heal. Did
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Speaker 1: you feel that in some way there was maybe a
7:12
Speaker 1: a gap or a chasm between being able to implement
7:18
Speaker 1: the skills you were learning. I mean, obviously you were
7:21
Speaker 1: learning skills, you were being educated. Did you feel there
7:25
Speaker 1: was more you needed to do to hone that concept
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Speaker 1: of you know, full human being is again? How did
7:33
Speaker 1: how did that come about? For you?
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Speaker 2: Absolutely? And I was very lucky that I had the
7:38
Speaker 2: Naropa training in my bones early on as a young person.
7:42
Speaker 2: I only appreciated it really years and years later, what
7:46
Speaker 2: kind of incredible education I've gotten there? And it was
7:49
Speaker 2: a little unusual. I had come from a more traditional
7:52
Speaker 2: psyche background in Germany into the University of Hamburg, and
7:57
Speaker 2: that was more traditional per se. But the seed that
8:02
Speaker 2: got planted back then was really meditation practice, and it
8:06
Speaker 2: was the kind of meditation practice that was referencing the body.
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Speaker 2: And that became a guiding post and my rescue as
8:16
Speaker 2: a clinician and my toolkit of what I teach now
8:20
Speaker 2: to other clinicians. But what it was is that I
8:24
Speaker 2: had learned a very powerful tool to take care of
8:27
Speaker 2: my own mind and body. Was sitting with very heavy
8:32
Speaker 2: duty trauma. As I said, a young clinician being thrown
8:35
Speaker 2: I call it the Wolvestine at a hospital here in
8:39
Speaker 2: the Bay Area where I was working with the torture survivors,
8:42
Speaker 2: and I was really over my head. I was way
8:45
Speaker 2: too inexperienced, way too young, and my toolkit wasn't as
8:49
Speaker 2: savvy yet. But what I did have was I already
8:53
Speaker 2: had a pretty stable meditation practice, so that helped me.
8:57
Speaker 2: It helped me to reference my own experience, to be
9:01
Speaker 2: calm in the midst of overwhelm, to be reading people's
9:06
Speaker 2: effective states pretty accurately, and also kind of to spread
9:10
Speaker 2: a kind of atmosphere of warmth and quiet. That was
9:15
Speaker 2: like a refuge, especially for those tortures survivor groups that
9:19
Speaker 2: I was working with back then. So that quality of
9:24
Speaker 2: being able to see you when my mind was healthy
9:28
Speaker 2: or spinning out or getting anxious, and the capacity to
9:31
Speaker 2: then know how to come back to myself proved to
9:34
Speaker 2: be the most essential skill and navigating the trauma world
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Speaker 2: with clients.
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Speaker 1: There's something so powerful about that, Manuela. And the way
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Speaker 1: you're talking it makes it sound as though that's the
9:51
Speaker 1: rudder in a sense, the kind of underpinning the superstructure,
9:54
Speaker 1: if you will, of our practice and the work we
9:58
Speaker 1: do as trauma therapist, as editions in general. Why is it?
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Speaker 1: Why is that a missing piece in our in training
10:10
Speaker 1: in general? I mean, obviously at the European Institute it
10:12
Speaker 1: was a focus there. But you know, I speak to
10:14
Speaker 1: a lot of therapists and especially the people who have
10:19
Speaker 1: been doing this for so long, always come back to
10:24
Speaker 1: you know, we've got to do our own work. We
10:26
Speaker 1: have to develop meditation practice. But why is that a
10:29
Speaker 1: piece that in a sense in general, we're missing as
10:34
Speaker 1: a field.
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Speaker 2: That's a really excellent question. And you know, again I've
10:40
Speaker 2: been so lucky because I've had that early training, and
10:43
Speaker 2: the second piece of that early training was also meeting
10:47
Speaker 2: the Hakomi method, which was a which is a mindfulness
10:50
Speaker 2: based or experiential psychotherapy work. So I was in good
10:54
Speaker 2: hands and didn't even know that back then. But why
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Speaker 2: that is so important is because I do think that
11:03
Speaker 2: underneath there's a biological process of trauma hea. So we
11:07
Speaker 2: when our client goes into what I called trauma states,
11:10
Speaker 2: when they get activated and disregulated into fear and anxiety depression,
11:17
Speaker 2: they go into a different physiological and emotional and I
11:22
Speaker 2: would even say spiritual state. They venture away from their
11:27
Speaker 2: own groundedness and their body and their own kind of
11:31
Speaker 2: knowing of who they are in that moment, and they're
11:34
Speaker 2: referencing traumatic memory, and they're feeling a high threshold of
11:38
Speaker 2: anxiety and so on. That state is what I would
11:41
Speaker 2: call in parentheses, is highly contagious because as mammals, we
11:47
Speaker 2: are wired to connect, but we're also wired to tune
11:52
Speaker 2: into one another for survival. So if one member of
11:56
Speaker 2: our herd is getting anxious, it alerts everybody else. Danger
12:00
Speaker 2: is near now, and that's how we, you know, as mammals,
12:04
Speaker 2: have survived. Now in the therapy office and our quafft
12:08
Speaker 2: beautiful therapy office. The biology doesn't leave. The biology is
12:13
Speaker 2: still there. And especially if I'm sitting in a kind
12:16
Speaker 2: of six foot radius of my client, our bodies, our
12:20
Speaker 2: heart rhythms, our breaths are beginning to link. There's been
12:23
Speaker 2: some evidence on that the Heart Math Institutist and Sunrest
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Speaker 2: Research and others that when we're in a close kind
12:29
Speaker 2: of what I called somatic kinisphere with another, we are
12:32
Speaker 2: beginning to link and tune in to the biology of
12:36
Speaker 2: the other. And so when my client goes into a
12:39
Speaker 2: trauma state, that contagious trauma state, even the subtlest level,
12:45
Speaker 2: they begin to transmit that kind of sounds kind of
12:48
Speaker 2: out there, but that frequency of anxiety, they begin to
12:51
Speaker 2: transmit it. I feel it in my own body, and
12:54
Speaker 2: I might not know it at first. I might just
12:56
Speaker 2: feel irritated or sleepy, or we're usually not sleepy, but
13:00
Speaker 2: irritated or anxious myself. Or I want to turn away,
13:03
Speaker 2: or I want to make the client wrong, I want
13:05
Speaker 2: to push it away. And that experience of getting triggered
13:10
Speaker 2: or a little activated, if we're not able to recognize it,
13:15
Speaker 2: we'll go right into it, and we go into counter transference,
13:18
Speaker 2: and we go into a somatic counter transference, meaning that
13:21
Speaker 2: we're beginning to either match it or want to do
13:24
Speaker 2: something about it. Hurry the client out of it, fix them,
13:28
Speaker 2: you name it the whole gamut. But if I have
13:31
Speaker 2: the ground of meditation, if I have learned how to
13:35
Speaker 2: stabilize my own mind, know how to reference my own
13:39
Speaker 2: body experience, know how to read my own body experience,
13:43
Speaker 2: I can feel that contagient coming in. I can feel suddenly,
13:47
Speaker 2: who there's a little flutteriness in my belly. My chest
13:52
Speaker 2: is constricting, my jaw is really tightening up. And then
13:55
Speaker 2: I can begin to track the cues of my own
13:59
Speaker 2: body and then look at the cues of my client.
14:02
Speaker 2: I can pick up the body cues and can track them.
14:05
Speaker 2: And because I have the ground of meditation I have
14:08
Speaker 2: practiced over and over and over again, I can now
14:13
Speaker 2: pretty much accurately read what has now been contagious, what
14:17
Speaker 2: I've taken on, and what's my or what's mine. And
14:21
Speaker 2: at the same time, through those, especially the embodied meditation
14:25
Speaker 2: techniques I want to stress here, when I begin to
14:28
Speaker 2: really feel into it, I can begin to use a breath,
14:31
Speaker 2: I can begin to kind of drop a little bit
14:34
Speaker 2: deeper into my sitz bones. I can plant my feet
14:37
Speaker 2: on the ground and I can begin to resource myself
14:40
Speaker 2: through a kind of meditative repertoire that I have practiced
14:45
Speaker 2: over and over again in the moment while I'm working,
14:49
Speaker 2: and I think that is a really potent application of
14:53
Speaker 2: mindfulness and meditation practice. So it doesn't take me away.
14:56
Speaker 2: I don't have to go into a retreat or huddle
14:59
Speaker 2: in the corner. In practice, I actually am doing it
15:02
Speaker 2: right there with my client, and I do believe that
15:05
Speaker 2: that is a very effective way to then work with
15:08
Speaker 2: the client's trauma state because in that moment, it allows
15:13
Speaker 2: me to regulate this state through my own body state
15:17
Speaker 2: and mind state, and then it beautifully it goes the
15:22
Speaker 2: other way. So if I'm taking a breath, if I'm
15:24
Speaker 2: able to reference my own experience and quote not buy
15:27
Speaker 2: into the contagion, then the client begins to get calmed down,
15:33
Speaker 2: because again biologies are linked. Because when I'm calm, chances
15:38
Speaker 2: are my client calmed down. And if they begin to
15:41
Speaker 2: get anxious and it meets with calmness, I can bring
15:45
Speaker 2: to them the lens of huh, you're very activated right there,
15:49
Speaker 2: or it seems to really rile you up. I'm noticing
15:52
Speaker 2: you're just getting tied there. Then they begin to get
15:55
Speaker 2: curious because there's no judgment, there's nowhere to amplify it.
15:59
Speaker 2: It begins to the activation of trauma itself or the
16:04
Speaker 2: trauma memory we can now work with. And that's a
16:07
Speaker 2: very hopeful experience and message for the client. Sorry there
16:11
Speaker 2: was a long answer.
16:12
Speaker 1: No, Manuela, this you are good. This is this is awesome.
16:15
Speaker 1: I mean, this is why I'm doing this podcast. I mean,
16:18
Speaker 1: that is just a mini workshop in really the benefits
16:26
Speaker 1: the need for us to us as clinicians to have
16:31
Speaker 1: a practice, and I just think it was so beautifully articulated.
16:37
Speaker 1: And you we can hear the uh force with which
16:43
Speaker 1: uh or maybe even the kind of laser like focus
16:47
Speaker 1: we then can intervene right from a from a calmer
16:51
Speaker 1: more uh what grounded state? I mean, I just think
16:56
Speaker 1: that was beautifully articulated. How did you get year, How
17:01
Speaker 1: did you get to this field of trauma? What tell
17:06
Speaker 1: us the story? Man? Well, I mean you just you're
17:09
Speaker 1: doing amazing. I love having you on here.
17:11
Speaker 2: Thank you. Well a long story, obviously, I make it short,
17:16
Speaker 2: but you know, as all personal healing stories go, it's
17:21
Speaker 2: a crooked path. Right, So there's obviously my own story
17:26
Speaker 2: in there. I again, I came to Naropa because I
17:29
Speaker 2: wanted to train, but really I wanted to heal. You know,
17:32
Speaker 2: I had my own my own shadow, was my own
17:35
Speaker 2: journey about it. And I was again lucky to find
17:38
Speaker 2: the loving arms of Naropa and also the Hakomi method
17:41
Speaker 2: that provided such a gentle and caring container. And when
17:46
Speaker 2: I came out of Naropa, I really did feel that
17:49
Speaker 2: kind of brimming quality. I felt full with the teachings,
17:52
Speaker 2: with the dharma that I had encountered, with the techniques
17:54
Speaker 2: I had learned. I actually studied dance therapy there, so
17:57
Speaker 2: I came from the moving arts. I was studying also
18:02
Speaker 2: movement in Germany. I was a dancer originally, and it
18:06
Speaker 2: was through the moving body that I felt like healing
18:08
Speaker 2: needed to happen. And I came then to the Bay
18:11
Speaker 2: Area and deepened more into Hakomi. And at the same
18:16
Speaker 2: time I also studied with Anna Halpern and studied more
18:21
Speaker 2: expressive arts, and I began to put together the kind
18:25
Speaker 2: of mindful quality of Hakomi and the meditation practices that
18:29
Speaker 2: I had encountered with the express of arts and dance therapy.
18:33
Speaker 2: And I was kind of really steeped in it, and
18:36
Speaker 2: I began to then go for another degree program at
18:40
Speaker 2: CIS and somatic psychology, and that's when I met a
18:43
Speaker 2: wonderful teacher named Marianna Ekberg. She wrote a book on
18:48
Speaker 2: Victims of cruelty, and her whole passion was around torture survivors,
18:53
Speaker 2: and she was the one that kind of roped me
18:55
Speaker 2: in early on to start sitting with torture survivors. She said, here,
19:00
Speaker 2: why don't you try this out? And she started a clinic,
19:03
Speaker 2: and as I said, I was so over my head.
19:06
Speaker 2: And it was good in a way, because I mean,
19:09
Speaker 2: I wouldn't recommend this experience to be honest, to like,
19:11
Speaker 2: this is not a good way to start out. But
19:13
Speaker 2: what it did teach me is that I had to
19:16
Speaker 2: rely on what I did now, which was the body,
19:19
Speaker 2: which was a complete faith in the body healing capacity
19:23
Speaker 2: that I knew because I had been so much studying
19:27
Speaker 2: movement and knew the healing power of movement and the body,
19:30
Speaker 2: and I knew that the path to what's healing was
19:33
Speaker 2: somewhere through the body. And being in that two year
19:38
Speaker 2: chuldron with her of that and that clinic, it brought
19:44
Speaker 2: me to some very existential places within myself. I had
19:50
Speaker 2: to do my own healing work, and also it made
19:55
Speaker 2: me kind of really question human nature. There was a
20:00
Speaker 2: time when I got very despairing working with these torture survivors,
20:04
Speaker 2: and I remember coming home and I've been filled with
20:09
Speaker 2: the stories of the day of horrors, you know, happening
20:13
Speaker 2: in countries. Had never been in a worked with them,
20:15
Speaker 2: mostly at that time with Cambodia Vietnamese refugees, and I
20:22
Speaker 2: felt really overwhelmed, and I felt like the kind of
20:26
Speaker 2: darkness of humanity to send on me, I wouldn't trust.
20:30
Speaker 2: I was I was joking at that time, I'd rather
20:31
Speaker 2: hang out with cats than with humans. And you know,
20:35
Speaker 2: but I realized that there was something really wrong with
20:37
Speaker 2: that worldview because that's not who I was. I was cheerful.
20:40
Speaker 2: I love human beings. I like human connection. I think
20:43
Speaker 2: that's where healing happens. But I would withdraw and I
20:47
Speaker 2: because I'm basically what I was experiencing was the first
20:50
Speaker 2: round of vicarious traumatization. And I was being traumatized working
20:57
Speaker 2: with this drama population, and my mind got very dark.
21:03
Speaker 2: As I said, I would retreat, I would treat for
21:05
Speaker 2: my friends. I would retreat from the world. I would
21:08
Speaker 2: immerse myself in just trauma psychology books, which was not
21:12
Speaker 2: a good idea. And I wasn't enjoying my life and
21:17
Speaker 2: I wasn't taking joy from life, and I even let
21:21
Speaker 2: go of you know, at that point, I was a
21:23
Speaker 2: Buddhist meditation practitioner. At that point, I even got mad
21:26
Speaker 2: at meditation, and I felt there was no solace anywhere,
21:30
Speaker 2: and so I was experiencing a kind of darkness that
21:33
Speaker 2: many trauma clients experience, the kind of dark vortex in
21:36
Speaker 2: a way, and I had to come back to a
21:40
Speaker 2: very bare bones experience of the body. And that's where
21:44
Speaker 2: I met a wonderful woman named Emily Conrad who developed
21:49
Speaker 2: a movement practice called Continuum. And this is about the
21:53
Speaker 2: most gentlest, kindest, inner breathing moving work I've ever encountered.
22:02
Speaker 2: And it was through her that I would lie on
22:04
Speaker 2: the floor and feel my breath and feel my connection
22:08
Speaker 2: to Earth and basically trust again in the goodness of
22:13
Speaker 2: my own body and life in human connection. And it
22:18
Speaker 2: was a very powerful, almost initiation. At that point, I
22:24
Speaker 2: wanted to give up doing therapy because I thought I'm
22:27
Speaker 2: not good at it. I can't help anybody. And it
22:30
Speaker 2: was through that movement work that I began to heal
22:34
Speaker 2: that faith, and I began to say, there's always breath,
22:37
Speaker 2: there's always movement, there's always connection with the earth. And
22:42
Speaker 2: that really kind of created a foundation in which I
22:45
Speaker 2: began to then go through a second round with I
22:48
Speaker 2: left the clinic at the hospital and I began to
22:50
Speaker 2: build a private practice and started to teach. And then
22:55
Speaker 2: of course my practice was filled with all kinds of
22:57
Speaker 2: different trauma clients you name it, from car accidents to kidnapping,
23:02
Speaker 2: to sexual abuse, to your name, it a whole variety.
23:05
Speaker 2: But I had found my ground, and my ground was
23:08
Speaker 2: my own body, and it was the connection to the earth.
23:11
Speaker 2: And as soon as soon as I had that, I
23:14
Speaker 2: felt like I could sit with my clients very very differently,
23:18
Speaker 2: and the skills now were in service of that connection.
23:22
Speaker 2: And so that was very very different way of working.
23:26
Speaker 2: And then later on, you know, I deepened more with
23:29
Speaker 2: Peter Levine, and I know Marianna was also at the
23:32
Speaker 2: time a student and a supporter of Peter Levine in
23:34
Speaker 2: the early days of Peter, but there were all these
23:39
Speaker 2: these wonderful people that I studied with and learned. But
23:41
Speaker 2: it was really through the continuum work and the body
23:44
Speaker 2: work that I began to have this unshakable connection to Earth,
23:48
Speaker 2: a resource within myself that I could always at any
23:51
Speaker 2: time access, no matter what was in front of me.
23:54
Speaker 2: And I began to realize that as a therapist it
23:58
Speaker 2: was no longer about healing others. But again back to
24:01
Speaker 2: the quote, inspiring others in their healing journey, and that's
24:04
Speaker 2: really all I could do, and it relieved me. It
24:07
Speaker 2: wasn't because my graduate school I was told, you know,
24:10
Speaker 2: you're the therapist. You need to help people, you need
24:13
Speaker 2: to heal them, you need to do this and that,
24:16
Speaker 2: and it was too much. And it was a great
24:20
Speaker 2: experience to be with the torture survivors because their healing
24:23
Speaker 2: journey was so beyond my own reference point. The suffering
24:28
Speaker 2: was so great it was impossible for me to heal them.
24:33
Speaker 2: And it was great learning. And getting burned out was
24:35
Speaker 2: a great learning because I realized I needed to find
24:38
Speaker 2: a different way to sit with that kind of suffering,
24:41
Speaker 2: and it came through a more dharmic lens where I
24:44
Speaker 2: had the connection with the Earth, a larger resource and
24:46
Speaker 2: really an embodied practice, and as long as I had
24:49
Speaker 2: that I could sit with pretty much any kind of suffering.
24:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what I am getting from listening to
24:57
Speaker 1: you Manuela and telling these really amazing stories that you're
25:02
Speaker 1: you're sharing with us is an emphasis on your own
25:08
Speaker 1: inner experience and your own healing and almost as if
25:13
Speaker 1: it's from that point that you can work to try
25:17
Speaker 1: to heal others. And I think there's something so powerful
25:21
Speaker 1: in your statement, which was there's no way I could
25:26
Speaker 1: heal those people. I mean, there's something so powerful in that,
25:30
Speaker 1: and it almost I could hear a collective exhalation from
25:36
Speaker 1: the from the listeners saying, oh, Okay, I don't have
25:40
Speaker 1: to heal because there's this sense that we need to heal,
25:45
Speaker 1: or there's this common thought that Okay I need to fix.
25:47
Speaker 1: I have to fix. And I think you were talking
25:49
Speaker 1: about this before, when you know, you were a sensing
25:53
Speaker 1: that oftentimes as therapists, we want to get in there
25:57
Speaker 1: because we can't, you know, maybe handle it our own selves.
26:02
Speaker 1: We need to fix and tweak that and you know,
26:05
Speaker 1: prevent the client from uh, you know, getting out of
26:09
Speaker 1: the window of tolerance and kind of squeeze them in
26:11
Speaker 1: that box. But from from from what you're saying, there's
26:14
Speaker 1: this great, powerful, nurturing emphasis on my own inner human
26:21
Speaker 1: kindness in a sense human being.
26:23
Speaker 2: This that's right.
26:25
Speaker 1: What would you share with our listeners in terms of
26:29
Speaker 1: kind of an early clinical ARAA you made, what you
26:32
Speaker 1: learned from that?
26:35
Speaker 2: Uh yeah, Well, going back to that same time frame,
26:39
Speaker 2: I seem to be referencing that particular training ground there.
26:45
Speaker 2: The I was working with a group of Vietnamese PTSD survivors,
26:50
Speaker 2: all men, and that in itself was interesting, the whole
26:54
Speaker 2: cultural difference, language barrier that very spoke very little English,
26:59
Speaker 2: and and it was an interesting this is you know,
27:03
Speaker 2: the field has come a long way. I was given
27:05
Speaker 2: literally almost the broom closet in the hospital to work
27:07
Speaker 2: with this group, because there was not much value at
27:11
Speaker 2: that time on the body or the kind of more
27:15
Speaker 2: somatic focus on trauma work. So they said, oh yeah,
27:18
Speaker 2: go ahead, you know, go in the broom closet and
27:20
Speaker 2: do your work. And one of the interventions I did
27:24
Speaker 2: was I knew they were all one of the hallmarks
27:28
Speaker 2: of PTSD is insomnia, so in flashbacks at night. So
27:32
Speaker 2: these men were suffering terribly, not being able to sleep
27:36
Speaker 2: and being haunted by these horrible memories, and because the
27:42
Speaker 2: way I was thrown into that setting, I wasn't briefed
27:45
Speaker 2: well enough. I did not know some of the background
27:47
Speaker 2: and the history of some of these men that came
27:51
Speaker 2: in with all these dysregulated sleep patterns, anxiety and so on.
27:55
Speaker 2: And so I would do an intervention, which is common
27:59
Speaker 2: for a young Zealod therapist. You have a few techniques
28:03
Speaker 2: and you want to apply them on everybody. And I
28:06
Speaker 2: would put them down on the floor and have them,
28:08
Speaker 2: you know, because I thought, oh, they needed to all relax.
28:10
Speaker 2: They were so stressed out. So I had them lie
28:13
Speaker 2: down on the floor and had them then I put
28:16
Speaker 2: some lovely music on and they were grateful to be
28:20
Speaker 2: resting on the floor. But the music had some water
28:23
Speaker 2: elements to it, like you know, soothing kind of water sounds,
28:27
Speaker 2: which for anybody would be lovely and it would make
28:30
Speaker 2: them drift into sleep and relaxation. Well, within about seven minutes,
28:35
Speaker 2: I had about twenty five men being extremely recommended, tense bodies,
28:41
Speaker 2: eyes wide open, and I've basically managed to completely reactivate
28:45
Speaker 2: twenty five men into their drama. And of course what
28:51
Speaker 2: I didn't do is I didn't check my facts facts
28:55
Speaker 2: good enough and didn't inquire the kind of torture that
29:00
Speaker 2: they had received, and I didn't, and I also didn't
29:03
Speaker 2: involve them in their choices of the music. I just
29:06
Speaker 2: basically had my little agenda, and my agenda was soothing
29:10
Speaker 2: music that was good for me. Well, these poor gentlemen
29:14
Speaker 2: were actually tortured through water tortures. So they were and
29:18
Speaker 2: I'll make it very simple, not to make it too graphic,
29:21
Speaker 2: but they were basically put in cages near the ocean
29:24
Speaker 2: and the tide would come in and almost round them,
29:28
Speaker 2: and so you can imagine that the sound of water
29:30
Speaker 2: was not a welcome sound and would highly activate them
29:34
Speaker 2: back into these trauma states. So the lesson was to
29:39
Speaker 2: first of all, you need to know the history of
29:41
Speaker 2: the clients, You need to check your facts a little
29:44
Speaker 2: bit if you can, and also involve I think this
29:47
Speaker 2: is the biggest learning piece and that I really believe
29:51
Speaker 2: in strongly. You need to involve your clients and even
29:55
Speaker 2: the smallest decisions in the therapy. So I could have
29:58
Speaker 2: just said what kind of music do you like? Or
30:01
Speaker 2: give them a little sample to hear, or had a
30:03
Speaker 2: little discussion about music, or bring in their own music
30:06
Speaker 2: that they could have related to so give them a
30:09
Speaker 2: little bit of a control and participation in the kind
30:12
Speaker 2: of interventions they wanted. And because trauma is so much
30:17
Speaker 2: about having your choices being taken away and and I didn't.
30:22
Speaker 2: I basically had a little agenda and a little program
30:25
Speaker 2: and what's good for me is good for you. And
30:27
Speaker 2: that's a very bad mistake to make. So it was
30:30
Speaker 2: very cute. Afterwards they came and said, they said, doctor,
30:33
Speaker 2: I'm not a doctor, but they would say, as a
30:36
Speaker 2: metal of respect, I said, doctor, your music is not
30:40
Speaker 2: so good. Could we have a different music? They were
30:45
Speaker 2: very respectful. They were so kind towards me. You know,
30:47
Speaker 2: I had totally blown it, basically, and they were very
30:50
Speaker 2: kind and gracious towards me. And I said, oh. And
30:54
Speaker 2: then I realized what had happened, and I said, what
30:56
Speaker 2: kind of music would you like? And they said, well,
30:58
Speaker 2: we liked German music, Mozart and Broms, and so they
31:03
Speaker 2: wanted classical, structured music. And after that I used that
31:09
Speaker 2: music and it worked beautifully. And then they called me
31:12
Speaker 2: the sleep doctor. Would sleep for fifteen minutes and my session,
31:18
Speaker 2: my group work with them, and I thought I had
31:20
Speaker 2: terribly failed, but I realized that they were looking forward
31:23
Speaker 2: to those fifteen minutes of rest, the slight out of
31:25
Speaker 2: the week. Actually, so it became a beautiful intervention in
31:28
Speaker 2: the long run, but it was a disaster when I
31:31
Speaker 2: first did it.
31:31
Speaker 1: Well, thank you so much for sharing that story. I mean,
31:34
Speaker 1: just this a powerful story and a kind of a
31:37
Speaker 1: gold nugget of wisdom take home there. Let's move on.
31:42
Speaker 1: I want to get to my favorite question before we do.
31:44
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32:37
Speaker 1: Therapists never stop learning, all right, Manuela, What I mean?
32:42
Speaker 1: You've shared some really incredible stories, inspiring stories, and the
32:47
Speaker 1: way you articulate the work you do is uh, it's phenomenal.
32:52
Speaker 1: I love it, and it's really the idea of what
32:55
Speaker 1: I had in mind when I started this podcast. So
32:57
Speaker 1: I really appreciate what you've done here so far. So far?
33:02
Speaker 1: What's your why? What keeps you going in this work?
33:08
Speaker 2: That's a really good question, and it's an evolving question
33:12
Speaker 2: because you know, I've been doing this now for twenty
33:15
Speaker 2: five years and the why has changed, and it's a
33:19
Speaker 2: very different why now than when I first was that
33:22
Speaker 2: clinician that I was describing to you in my early stages,
33:25
Speaker 2: and the beginning was all about helping others, and I
33:27
Speaker 2: thought I needed to help others, and of course not
33:31
Speaker 2: realizing that I needed to help myself first, but I
33:35
Speaker 2: thought about, you know, this is what I was trained for,
33:38
Speaker 2: and I need to help others. And then when I
33:41
Speaker 2: realized I needed to help myself, it was about and
33:45
Speaker 2: I thought I needed to be very savvy clinician and
33:49
Speaker 2: introduce change, and then through those burnout stages, I realized,
33:56
Speaker 2: as I said earlier, that I wasn't really that I
34:00
Speaker 2: couldn't help others, that all I could do was to
34:02
Speaker 2: inspire their own healing. And so as I was going
34:06
Speaker 2: through my own acceptance stages of my own healing and
34:09
Speaker 2: acceptance stages of the client's healing. And there's a very pivot.
34:14
Speaker 2: I want to tell a very short story, another one
34:17
Speaker 2: in that time frame, those years, those early years, where
34:20
Speaker 2: I attended a workshop with Joanna Macy, who was a
34:23
Speaker 2: very beloved Buddhist scholar and teacher and an amazing, amazing
34:27
Speaker 2: human being, and I was very despairing about my own
34:34
Speaker 2: trauma work. I felt like I couldn't make a dent. Basically,
34:37
Speaker 2: I couldn't help all these people that are coming to
34:40
Speaker 2: me with all their suffering. And I was asking her
34:43
Speaker 2: for advice. I said, what should I do? And she
34:45
Speaker 2: said to me, she looked at me them with the
34:47
Speaker 2: utmost kindness, and she said, well, what makes you think
34:51
Speaker 2: that you should be taking away somebody else's suffering. That's
34:56
Speaker 2: rather arrogant. And she said it was such a kindness,
35:00
Speaker 2: So it was not, but it's stung of course, you know,
35:02
Speaker 2: the words helping others and arrogance doesn't quite go together
35:05
Speaker 2: in my head at that time, and it's stung a
35:08
Speaker 2: little bit and I literally took a whole year to
35:10
Speaker 2: think about that, But she was absolutely right. I realized
35:15
Speaker 2: at that stage that it was arrogant for me to
35:18
Speaker 2: take away the suffering of another. And I began to
35:23
Speaker 2: realize that it was much more of a journey. And
35:26
Speaker 2: so the why then became the kind of journey quality
35:30
Speaker 2: that I was on a journey with a client towards healing,
35:33
Speaker 2: but how that would look like and the particulars was
35:36
Speaker 2: going to be revealed. And then becoming a parent made
35:42
Speaker 2: a big difference. I became a kinder person and I
35:47
Speaker 2: began again, it's been a journey of acceptance. So the
35:50
Speaker 2: why now? And then another person that I met that
35:55
Speaker 2: was very powerful in my journey was Reggie Rae meditation
35:59
Speaker 2: teacher who taught me the meditating with the body, and
36:03
Speaker 2: it was through all those components that I became The
36:06
Speaker 2: why now is a very different motivation. So as I
36:10
Speaker 2: said the early stages, the motivation was I want to
36:12
Speaker 2: change people. I want to help people. I want to
36:14
Speaker 2: get them out of their suffering, and it became about, no,
36:18
Speaker 2: I want to hold somebody's hand on their journey of suffering,
36:22
Speaker 2: and I want them to discover their own way out.
36:27
Speaker 2: I give them tools, I give them my knowledge, I
36:29
Speaker 2: give them my wisdom, but most importantly, I will hold
36:32
Speaker 2: them with kindness and compassion and already with a sense
36:36
Speaker 2: of that their whole already, that trauma is not what
36:41
Speaker 2: defines them. And so the why now is a much
36:45
Speaker 2: more joyous and not a burnout way because I can
36:51
Speaker 2: now joyfully see somebody who is suffering and already trust
36:55
Speaker 2: that they can go through that no matter how dark
36:58
Speaker 2: it gets. So the now is really just being helpful.
37:02
Speaker 2: I just want to be helpful now in a kind
37:05
Speaker 2: and generous way. So that's my motivation now, to be
37:09
Speaker 2: a helpful clinician, a helpful another human being that can
37:15
Speaker 2: that has obviously some skill and some tools and some
37:18
Speaker 2: knowledge of the path ahead. So it's like I could
37:21
Speaker 2: see the long range path. The client who starts out can't,
37:25
Speaker 2: of course, And I think that's my motivation now. I
37:30
Speaker 2: get a lot of joy now knowing that clients can
37:33
Speaker 2: make it through. So it's a very different motivation than
37:36
Speaker 2: when I started out. And certainly not what I was
37:38
Speaker 2: taught in graduate school.
37:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, there just seems so much wisdom in that. I mean,
37:45
Speaker 1: especially you know, listening to you talk about your journey
37:49
Speaker 1: and the kind of ups and downs and the hardships
37:52
Speaker 1: and the turmoil that you yourself went through and to come
37:56
Speaker 1: out you know on the other end, if you will,
37:59
Speaker 1: it almost sounds you know, easy, but we know it's not.
38:04
Speaker 1: Oh no, we know it's not. I think oftentimes we
38:08
Speaker 1: know we're when we're in the presence of wisdom when
38:13
Speaker 1: something does sound and maybe look so easy, but we
38:16
Speaker 1: know it's not. What you know. Obviously, there's been so
38:20
Speaker 1: many teachings and kind of gold nuggets. Who is what
38:23
Speaker 1: I like to call them throughout this talk here, But
38:26
Speaker 1: what would you share? What would you say the therapists
38:29
Speaker 1: who are beginning their journey you want to get into
38:31
Speaker 1: the trauma field and work with individuals who've you know,
38:35
Speaker 1: been traumatized.
38:38
Speaker 2: We need you. There's so much trauma and suffering out
38:42
Speaker 2: in this world. We need you. Don't give up and
38:46
Speaker 2: resource yourself, so get good good support structure. Obviously supervision,
38:51
Speaker 2: good clinical supervision ism is very very important. Being around
38:57
Speaker 2: mentors that have traveled this journey that you trust is
39:03
Speaker 2: very very important. Good guides along the way, that's paramount,
39:07
Speaker 2: absolutely paramount. But the guides can obviously there needs to
39:11
Speaker 2: be a good clinical guidance, but the guides can come
39:15
Speaker 2: from many different ways. So it might be the dharma teacher,
39:18
Speaker 2: it might be another spiritual teacher. To get guidance from
39:24
Speaker 2: the heart, and to keep that alive is very important
39:28
Speaker 2: because you can get hardened in this job. As I said,
39:31
Speaker 2: you can get overwhelmed by the suffering, or you can
39:34
Speaker 2: just don't know what to do, or you feel incompetent
39:36
Speaker 2: or in the beginning. But I think to keep your
39:41
Speaker 2: heart open and that's really important. So whatever cultivates the
39:46
Speaker 2: open heartedness is really important. And then for me personally,
39:50
Speaker 2: I think that I say to all the people that
39:52
Speaker 2: I train, is to have a body practice. And if
39:57
Speaker 2: it's movement, if it's taichi, if it's yoga, you name it.
40:02
Speaker 2: But some way where you begin to cultivate your relationship
40:06
Speaker 2: with your body in that ground where you can come
40:09
Speaker 2: back to over and over again, so that you know
40:13
Speaker 2: how to resource yourself, that you can read when you're
40:18
Speaker 2: getting spun out, when you're getting triggered, that you have
40:20
Speaker 2: a place to come back to that nourishes you. And
40:23
Speaker 2: I think that's that's absolutely key. And I think that's
40:28
Speaker 2: that's what kept me through all the years healthy, insane
40:32
Speaker 2: and deepening in my in my own work with people
40:36
Speaker 2: that I had always a body practice that I would
40:38
Speaker 2: come on, several body practice that I would come back to.
40:42
Speaker 2: So those that will be the key element. It's good supervision,
40:44
Speaker 2: good support, structure, a lot of resources for your mind
40:50
Speaker 2: and for your body. And have a playful attitude as well.
40:55
Speaker 2: I think play is very important and enjoying life, even
40:58
Speaker 2: if you're dealing with very hard clientele, to actually enjoy
41:02
Speaker 2: your life. Just because your client is suffering doesn't mean
41:05
Speaker 2: you need to suffer as well. That's a mistake of
41:07
Speaker 2: a lot of young clinicians, I think. And it's important
41:11
Speaker 2: to play and be frivolous and enjoy that. But life's
41:15
Speaker 2: giving you, you know, that's really because that joyful, hopeful
41:18
Speaker 2: energy the client that's sitting there in whatever space there
41:23
Speaker 2: and they need that. It's feeding ground for them, They
41:26
Speaker 2: need hope, they need that there's goodness and joy out there,
41:30
Speaker 2: you know.
41:31
Speaker 1: And I'll have each of those linked up at the
41:33
Speaker 1: show notes page at West Coast Trauma Project dot Com.
41:36
Speaker 1: Hit on the podcast tab and men's menuels episode will
41:39
Speaker 1: come right up. So your most recent book, eight Keys
41:42
Speaker 1: to Practicing Mindfulness Practical Strategies for Emotional health and well
41:45
Speaker 1: Being will have linked up. Also, you also have training
41:51
Speaker 1: coming up talking about that please yeah.
41:55
Speaker 2: In twenty sixteen, I'm going to start a new training
41:57
Speaker 2: call from Trauma to Dharma, and it's got two levels.
42:00
Speaker 2: There's a five week online component which has a lot
42:03
Speaker 2: of the didactic theoretic because there's a lot of theory
42:06
Speaker 2: to know about in the background on trauma. It's got
42:09
Speaker 2: the you know about the neuroscience, the psychophysiology, and also
42:13
Speaker 2: introducing people to the beginning practices of you know, all
42:16
Speaker 2: these ground practices I was talking referencing today. And then
42:20
Speaker 2: it's got to the level two is two five day
42:23
Speaker 2: intensives what we meet in person and I'm going to
42:27
Speaker 2: be doing a lot of demonstrations of the work. And
42:31
Speaker 2: the work is very much peppered. Is the ground of
42:35
Speaker 2: this is the dharmaic teachings of how to come back,
42:37
Speaker 2: how to be with suffering, and how to come back
42:40
Speaker 2: in to your body, and so a lot of meditating
42:43
Speaker 2: with the body practices. This is the work of Reggie
42:46
Speaker 2: Rae is going to be introduced here and really steeping
42:52
Speaker 2: the clinician is into the skill how to work with
42:54
Speaker 2: trauma and then how to resource themselves and sit what
42:57
Speaker 2: I'll call in the therapist seat. So that trauma training
43:01
Speaker 2: will happen next year, Okay.
43:03
Speaker 1: And we can link up up to that on the
43:06
Speaker 1: show notes page as well. There's a link on your website,
43:10
Speaker 1: Manuela for this training.
43:14
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, Yes, minding the Present dot com. Yes, there's
43:18
Speaker 2: two websites, says Minding the Present dot com. And then
43:21
Speaker 2: there's also Hakomi California, Hakomiica dot org. Yeah.
43:25
Speaker 1: Great, okay. So what is one go to book that's
43:30
Speaker 1: inspired you, you know, whether trauma related or not, that
43:33
Speaker 1: you'd like to share with our listeners.
43:37
Speaker 2: Well, I'm gonna recommend a book that's not a trauma book.
43:42
Speaker 2: I'm sure you've got lots of wonderful I'm sure Peter
43:45
Speaker 2: Levine's books I always love. I mean, you can't go wrong.
43:47
Speaker 2: I love them. I always pick them up back over
43:49
Speaker 2: and over again. I adore Peter's work. Meditating with the
43:54
Speaker 2: Body by Reggie Rae is a book, and that's more
43:56
Speaker 2: the inspirational, coming back to yourself, the resource, the ground
44:00
Speaker 2: I was talking about. Given what I talked about today,
44:03
Speaker 2: I think this will be a great recommendation, so meditating
44:06
Speaker 2: with the body. Reggie Ray, Okay.
44:09
Speaker 1: Again, we'll have that linked up. Manuela, so we've got
44:13
Speaker 1: your website. We'll have those links available the show notes page.
44:17
Speaker 1: I want to thank you so much for doing this.
44:19
Speaker 1: It's been a pleasure, and I know our listeners are
44:23
Speaker 1: as joyous as I am from listening to share your experiences.
44:27
Speaker 1: So thank you so much.
44:30
Speaker 2: Thank you very much for having me.
44:32
Speaker 1: Take care