How to Heal Trauma with Somatic Experiencing (Updated Version) 

Visit thesomaticpt.com/subscribe to get your Free Trauma Flow Chart (a different graphic than the one used in this video). Want a 1-on-1 online SE session with me to help you come out of freeze? Visit thesomaticpt.com/book-an-appointment

This is probably the best video ive ever seen in my life. So much useful knowledge that makes so much sense. God bless you and whoever found out about this

Thanks for updating, as poly vagal understanding is now so important, it's a bottom up approach that caused the trauma feeling sensing first the body is the perceiver

So emotions are still with me....OK....this is very interesting.....

Hello Nina, thank you so much for sharing this. It really brings clarity to a lot of situations in my life, it does help that you are a great speaker. I would like to ask you 3 things. Feel free to not answer or to just point me to some direction. 1. Can emotions arise before thoughts 2. Do you know if different emotions are stored/released in/from different parts of the body 3. Is there such a thing as a healthy amount of times that we can rise up to sympathetic levels and a healthy amount of time to stay before decrease? Thank you again Tiago

Nina, you explain this soooo well! It makes so much sense. The examples are easy to relate to in order to understand the concept. Thank you, this was amazing!

So clear

Thank you deeply. Great content and clear explanation.

Very very interesting and helpful video. Such a new point of view for me. Thank you, Nina. Looking forward to more...

this was extremely eye opening! I know I've commented on some of your videos before, but I have struggled with going through waves of a cycle of depression and hyper-focusing on my job/hobbies. I thought this cycle was just going to continue repeating itself throughout my life. It was hard to continue because it was making me SICK. I developed digestive issues, back problems, and self destructive habits trying to cope with it. This year I hit the depressive side of my cycle again and it was BAD. I physically felt like I couldn't get up and do stuff. I was just pushing through considering going back on depression medication *which can be a great tool for some! but for me personally it made me feel like it was just forcing me to suppress my emotions* and I pretty much gave myself an ultimatum. I told myself that if the meds didn't work I would just end it all. It was hard. I tried everything traditional therapy told me to do and it still didn't feel like I had a solid GOAL. Everything I tried felt like I was shooting darts in the dark, hoping one of them would land and finally heal me. Then I found the polyvagal theory and somatic practices and in a desperate effort of trying to heal I became obsessed with it. It was a fresh perspective on my experience. It outlined achievable goals. It made me feel normal and seen. The fact that I wasn't just victim of a hereditary trait helped me see the light. I started slowly incorporating certain practices and habits into my life, but that isn't what had the biggest impact on me. What truly did it was being told that I didn't have to RUN AWAY from these emotions. That I wasn't abnormal or not good enough for feeling them. That the goal isn't to erase them, but rather to embrace them. THAT made everything just click for me. That knowledge helped me understand that I truly do have the power to heal myself. Now I'm obviously not "healed" (but who is ever fully healed anyway?) but I have taken the first step and accepted that if I want to heal both mentally and physically I have to turn these teachings into a lifestyle. It takes time, but in just a month I have been able to do a 180. I don't expect myself to have to feel "ok" in order to enjoy life. I don't "fear the fear" as much anymore. Now I'm able to get through rough days with the understanding that just because I cried, broke down, or felt uncomfortable feelings it doesn't mean I have failed. It's all progress! I now understand it won't be perfect or pretty, but it can be done. I just can't thank you and other practitioners enough! those of you who have shared their knowledge for free on the Internet have changed so many lives. Obviously we still live in a capitalist system, so I understand practitioners have to charge for their courses and services in order to survive themselves, but just taking the time to give people the fundamentals is a great gift.

You are soooooo amazing! Thank you sooo much for helping me understand my inner world!

Amazing work, you really open mi way if working un therapy!!

What a beautiful life changing video - but it ended when I needed it the most - how do I release those trapped emotions? the stored ones..how do I make the red box smaller? I've already worked on disidentifying from thoughts and willingly sitting with the sensations already here and befriending them. this takes care of future and present happenings, but how do I deal with the trauma already experienced as a child - the "stored or trapped" emotions. That's where the video ended :(

Is there a safe way to do this for complex PTSD crisis state with a recent severe trauma assault that triggered all the past traumas from very early childhood forward and with dissociative identity disorder issues? I tried to do the “where is this feeling stored in your body?” at home with a video and had a horrid flashback and alter meltdown. I’m afraid to try again, at least while alone. I do not understand how to do this with proper “titration”, without getting sucked into overwhelming flashback/trauma/alter reaction. I would greatly appreciate any insight you might have about this type of situation.

I have been following and implementing practices I learned from you and other trauma practitioners as well as diaphragmatic breathing and I feel that I am receiving some huge gains, thank you so much. Btw the pine needle tea that I mentioned before I got my dentist to order some online and after a month he told me that this hot sensation he had been experiencing for so long in his torso was all cooled down and he felt a lot better.

This really is excellent, Nina. I am planning to do some work with an SE practitioner after Xmas after half a year of trying to do a lot of this on my own. I know I have made a lot of progress on many little T traumas, but some of my bigger traumas still overwhelm me very easily. Watching your video has made me realise that I need that additional support to take that next step. One thing I do agree with is about your focus on thoughts/assumptions. Daniel P. Brown, creator of the Three Pillars model for attachment and trauma, talks about the fact that 'the absence of a negative does not make a positive.' It is so evident that working somatically is the first step, but then we must work on how we see the world in a wider sense. Only then can we be our very best.

Make friends with an emotion which was not allowed

How we have been socialised to be with the emotion

If jaw tension is related to anger, what is neck and shoulder tension related to?

this was so so so so great. thank you so much

Dear Nina , Thank You for the explanation !!! Really helpful ! Unfortunately due to my I think cptsd I'm unable to wwork, cuse my sytem shuts down from the smallest stress... I'd like to break this cicrcle, but don't really have resources to that. In the video you mentioned, that this is the theoretical part and You'll describe practice as well in another video. I scrolled through your vids ,but I can't really find out which one is the following or maybe You haven't recorded yet such ? WWWhen You'll have the opportunity would you please record it ? You describe such clearly and your vide is a kind of stepping stone for me now, don't really know any other chance to move forward. Really thanks !!!

Is it useful to use thought to trigger the feeling in order to feel them out and not be afraid of them? Or just allow them to come naturally and no actually attempting to draw out the feeling artificially

Thank you.Your explanation was so simple that l was able understand what l struggled with for many years. Stay blessed

This is great... thank you!

Credibility

So essentially this is shadow work

Well Done!!

I don't know how to thank you !

I was trapped in the peak of freeze and dissociation. Now I have intuitively started to make me feel the shame that I have buried very deep and realized that I have to give up the idea that I had some control over the situation and find somevways to admit I had not.

The best I have ever heard, thank you.

hi nina, is anxiety experienced in the spectrum of dorsal vagal shutdown, or is it predominantly a sympathetic dominant feeling?

Oh I've just read below your explanation . I'll aprreciate if you consider to share those ,but I understand your thoughts about it, I alsho had retramatized myself earlier with tryin some techniue (when I had money to that ) , but it brought up something so deep that I couldn't handle yet, but now I know that at first I have to build capacity, so if maybe you share , I'd be very very grateful !

Great overview of how the 3 aspects fit together, psychological thinking, emotions and unconscious stored material in the body. Where is the next video in this talk about the somatic experiencing side of it?

Wow! Amazing 🙏 so glad I found you I can’t wait to work with you 🥳

Thank you for the explanation but I found one thing confusing. You said that by doing the "pure SE" you weren't addressing the client's conditioning and beliefs. However, Peter Levine does also address the meaning and conditioning related to trauma and emotions etc. in his books, exercises, demonstrations and interviews. Does that mean that not every SEP learns to include that part in the therapy they offer?

great way of discriving trauma and recovery. I give Nina an A

What is the difference between fight or flight energy and emotions? In the presentation of the autonomic nervous system you talk about fight or flight activation and in the trauma chart you refer to emotions. What is the correlation between both of them?

I’ve been doing some somatic and body awareness exercises, tracking/discharging stuck energy since January 1, 2023 every day, my sleep has improved a lot, and I already feel way less immobile, however one thing that strikes me most is muscular tension in the face, particularly in the afternoon while sitting at the computer (I enjoy what I do), It’s hard and annoying, I always try to accept it and simply let it remain there, but it takes my energy away, it's like I need to spend the entire day just with the facial tension rather than focus on my goals and moving forward, any train of thought or advice to interrupt the cycle?

3 years ago i did have fight with neighbours about no matter what. I tried all therapies and i had to move out to second flat. But when i come back to my 1 flat all comes back. Its so painfull. Can this be cured. PLEASE HELP