Guided Imagery: Building the Healthy Adult Mode

Image by Sharon McCutcheon

One of the key aims of schema therapy is to build your Healthy Adult part (or ‘mode’ in ST language). This is the part of you that is calm, compassionate, strong, rational and resilient. For most of us, this process is not easy – especially if you have a trauma history and so struggle to feel or access these inner resources. But it is doable, for anyone, if you get the right help and support.

That’s why my latest recording for Insight Timer is a guided imagery that will help you do just that. Just click on the button below to listen to the recording, Imagine a Happier Future – Guided Imagery.

I record these meditations, guided imagery, talks and breathing techniques for my clients and as part of my Heal Your Trauma project. They are free for anyone to listen to – with an optional donation, if you would like to support the project.

I hope you find the imagery helpful – and do feel free to try any of my other recordings on Insight Timer, which I will keep adding to over time.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Humans Can Be Cruel – But Also Kind, Compassionate and Altruistic

Image by Tim Mossholder

It’s hard to live in this world sometimes. Of course, the crisis in Ukraine is dominating the news right now – as it should – and is utterly heartbreaking on a daily basis. But let’s not forget there are many other, less-well-covered, conflicts around the world right now. War is currently raging in Yemen and Ethiopia, to name but two, with many other places – like Syria and Afghanistan – experiencing shocking strife and instability.

Sometimes, as we view the world through the media’s negative, catastrophising prism, it can seem as if humans are terribly heartless and cruel. And in some ways, this is true – our species does have the capacity for great cruelty, aggression and barbarism. A quick glance at the history books will prove that to be true.

But we are also capable of wonderful things – acts of kindness, compassion, selfless generosity and altruism. Around the world, billions of tiny, good things happen every day, but go unreported by the media, because they are too small, too unexciting to make the headlines, rolling-news cycle or your social media feed, which can be dominated by scary and upsetting stories.

This is not an accident by the way – Facebook, Twitter and YouTube’s algorithm’s are designed to grab and hold your attention in any way they can. And, sadly, stories that scare or outrage people get more attention than sweet, simple, kind stories, so you get bombarded by the former and then think this is ‘the truth’, when it’s only a tiny fraction of most people’s daily experiences.

Are you a chimp or a bonobo?

As a psychotherapist, I am fascinated by the human mind and the capacity we all have for light and dark, good and evil, aggression and altruism. I’m also intrigued by evolutionary psychology, which seeks to explain where these capacities came from, in terms of our evolutionary history. I recently watched a Netflix documentary, Animal, which shed some surprising light on this.

One episode featured the great apes – a group of which humans are, of course, a member. And it compared the lives and behaviour of two closely related apes in the forests of the Democratic Republic of Congo. We first saw a ‘community’ of chimps, who could be tender and loving, but also shockingly violent. In this patriarchal group, males compete, fight and kill each other in a constantly evolving struggle for dominance. Chimps also kill members of local communities, as they seek to expand their territory.

The documentary then switched to a ‘party’ of bonobos, living just across the River Congo from their chimp cousins. Bonobos look a lot like chimps, but they are smaller and live in matriarchal groups, where women rule. And the difference is remarkable. They might squabble, but they live highly peaceful, pro-social lives. Bonobos don’t kill each other, or their neighbours. If young males get a bit over-excited, the women soon put them in their place. The contrast with über-violent chimps is stark.

Much has been written about this in the evolutionary-psychology literature, but as I watched this documentary I couldn’t help but think about some of our autocratic leaders: Putin, Assad, Trump, Bolsonaro, Modi, Orban – they are all basically chimps, no? Violent, macho, aggressive, lacking human empathy or compassion for the millions of people they hurt and even kill.

And then our (mostly female) bonobo-like leaders: Jacinda Ardern, Sanna Marin, Angela Merkel, Joe Biden, Barack Obama. Not perfect, of course, but still kind, compassionate, empathic, pro-social. They really seem to care about other people and do their utmost to help them. Again, the contrast with the chimp-adjacent autocrats is stark.

Humans are basically good

So, even at a time like this, when it can be so upsetting and depressing just to glance at the headlines every day, remember that the vast majority of people are basically good, kind and decent. Just look at the response to the Ukrainian refugees, which (apart, I’m ashamed to say, from the UK) has been wonderfully warm and generous. Neighbouring countries like Poland and Romania have take in millions of displaced people, with ordinary citizens giving up their homes, money, food, medicine, clothes, hotel rooms, rental cars – even driving refugees hundreds of kilometers to be reunited with their families.

It fills my heart with joy to see these generous, benevolent acts. And reminds me that as a species, we might be closely related to chimps – but we are just as intimately connected to bonobos (research shows that bonobos share about 98.7% of their DNA with humans—about the same amount that chimps share with us.) So please remember that, if the world seems rather dark and scary right now. Inside your heart and mind are wondrous capacities for kindness, decency, selflessness and other beautiful qualities. Putin can never destroy that, however hard he might try.

And if you would like to do something to help, please donate to Unicef using the button below, which is working on the ground in Ukraine to help children affected by the war.

Sending you love and warm thoughts, wherever you are in the world,

Dan

Try This Hardwiring Happiness Meditation to Boost Your Mood

Image by Lesly Juarez

This short practice is adapted from Rick Hanson’s wonderful book, Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm and Confidence. He reminds us that the human brain is overwhelmingly focused on protecting you from threats. Let’s think about why that might be. For millions of years, our ancestors evolved to live in the wilderness. They formed small bands of hunter-gatherers, living in caves or fortified villages surrounded by hungry, poisonous and dangerous animals, as well as other bands they mostly lived alongside peaceably, but who could attack at any moment. This was a dangerous time to be human.

So your brain evolved to live in this world – not the 21st-century world we live in now, which for most of us involves an urban existence, in peaceful democracies and with far fewer life-or-death threats than your brain evolved to deal with.

But your threat-focused brain still operates as if you were living in the forest, or out on the savannah. And this is why all human brains have an in-built negativity bias, meaning you are laser-focused on bad stuff – threats, worries, painful memories, financial difficulties, relationship troubles… You think about that a lot and pour huge amounts of mental energy into ruminating about the past or worrying about the future.

When good stuff happens, you enjoy it for a moment, then it’s gone. And you move quickly to hungrily searching for the next thing to worry about. This is not your fault – it’s just what brains do.

As Rick Hanson says, your brain is like Velcro for the bad and Teflon for the good. So we need to build our mental muscles to help us pay as much attention to good stuff as we do bad.

The practice

Here’s a short, powerful, neuroscience-derived practice I use with all my clients, as it’s so helpful for correcting that negativity bias, helping you focus on and enjoy pleasant experiences and stop obsessing about unpleasant ones.

1. Start by finding a comfortable position, either sitting or lying down and closing your eyes. Take some deep breaths, in through your nose and out through your mouth, counting four seconds in and four seconds out. Keep breathing, letting the breath be calming and nourishing for you. Let your abdomen rise and fall with each in-breath and out-breath.

2. Now think about something good that happened to you recently. This could be something from a whole spectrum of pleasant experiences, from tiny moments of joy, like eating a delicious piece of fruit, seeing pink blossom framed by blue sky, or reading a book you found deeply enjoyable; right up to powerful, profound experiences like asking someone to marry you, winning an award for your work, the birth of your first child, or someone you love deeply recovering from a scary illness.

3. Visualise that experience in as much detail as possible – really imagine that you are there and it’s happening to you in the present moment. Where are you? What do you see around you? Are you alone or with someone? How does this experience unfold – is it a conversation, phone call or email exchange? Or is it just something you see, hear, smell or taste? Focus on the sensory details of your experience as vividly as possible – the more vivid this is the better.

4. Now focus on how you are feeling during this experience. What emotions do you notice in your body? Do you feel calm, happy, joyful, excited, proud, satisfied, relieved, inspired, moved, awestruck… Or something else entirely?

5. Really focus on the visceral experience of the emotions in your body. For example, you might feel an inner warmth, or a lightness in your body, or perhaps a pleasurable upsurge of energy. Whatever you are feeling, just focus on it, enjoy it and let it soak into your body for around 60 seconds. Then take a deep breath and open your eyes.

6. So, here’s the miraculous bit – you just hard-wired that experience and the positive feelings linked to it into your brain. It only takes 10 seconds to do this, but the longer you allow for this process the better. Plus, you are simply enjoying pleasant experiences fully and completely, so the longer you do that the more enjoyable it will be for you.

7. Try to get into the habit of doing this whenever something good or enjoyable happens. If you build this practice into your daily life, over time you will start to tilt the scales of negativity and positivity in your brain. Eventually, you will find yourself ruminating and worrying less about bad stuff; and feeling calmer, happier and more content.

8. Now continue with your day, looking out for positive experiences to hardwire.

I very much hope you enjoy this practice – I have recorded it as a Hardwiring Happiness Talk and Meditation for Insight Timer. You can listen to the recording, plus my collection of meditations, breathing techniques and guided imagery using the button below.

Warm wishes,

Dan

The Story of You: What You Needed and (Probably) Didn’t Get as a Child

Image by Kelly Sikkema

So, you were born. And like all babies, you were beautiful, innocent and pure. You were like a little seed, packed full of energy, primed to flourish and grow. But to do that you needed certain nutrients like food, water, air and warmth, of course, but also things like love and safety, to feel cherished and valued for the little miracle that you were.

As well as all the basic ingredients you needed to nourish you day to day, what little you needed most was to be loved, held, whispered and sung to, told stories of who you were and how you came to be here. You needed to feel your mother’s skin on yours, your father’s strong arms as he rocked you back to sleep.

We call experiences like this attachment and it is so deep, so powerful, hard-wired into every human brain. You needed a safe, secure, reliable attachment first to mum – who carried you in her body for nine months, gave you life, fed and cared for you at your tiniest and most vulnerable – and then dad, siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, school friends and so on, out and out for the rest of your life.

Our first and deepest attachment

But for most of us this starts with mum, our first and most important caregiver, who should love us fiercely, viscerally, as if we were part of her, because we once were. And when this goes as it should, it feels wonderful – so good in fact that we call it ‘attachment bliss’ – being held and stroked and fed and soothed and cherished. And this creates, in us, a powerful feeling, in our bones, that we are good, lovable, worthy of kindness and respect.

So that’s how it should be – and for some lucky people, that’s how it is. But for many of us, it doesn’t work like this. Something goes wrong, somewhere – either very mildly wrong, or more seriously. And if it’s mild, and we have enough love, enough safety, enough nutrients to feed our growing brain and body, then we come out of it fairly intact. We may be anxious, or get depressed from time to time, but mostly we’re OK, able to do all the normal stuff of everyday life and be happy, enough, most of the time.

And for some of us – in fact, far too many of us – the things that went wrong were much worse than this. And they happened not just once, but over and over, throughout childhood, one bad thing or lots of bad things, one after another. And if this is you, you might know what these things were, or just have a vague inkling that all was not well. Either way, what I’m saying resonates somewhere inside and you’re thinking, ‘Yes, that’s how it was for me.’

If that’s the case, I am truly sorry, because I know that you will be left with wounds. And one of the deepest of those wounds is that you will think you deserved it in some way, that you were a bad person, or somehow dislikable or unlovable. Because that’s what children do – they make it about them, because it’s too scary and threatening to think that the people who were supposed to love and protect you, were in fact the ones who hurt you. That’s too much for a child’s brain to comprehend, so they go, ‘Well it can’t have been their fault, so it must have been mine. I’m bad. I’m naughty. I made all the bad things happen and deserved them.’

None of this is your fault

And here’s where I really need you to concentrate. Take in these words, because they may be the most important thing anyone has ever said to you. And that’s this: none of those bad things that happened were your fault. You didn’t do anything wrong. You were just that sweet, innocent, pure little baby who was born into a bad situation.

See you think you’re a bad person, but you’re not. You are a good person that bad things happened to.

That’s so important I’m going to say it again. You think you’re a bad person, but you’re not. You are a good person that bad things happened to.

And somewhere inside you is that sweet, innocent, lovable little boy or girl. They still live in your mind and body and nervous system, whether you know they are there or not. And they are the part of you that needs to hear this the most, because they hold all the memories of bad stuff and how it felt, and what they thought, and all the other stuff that goes with that.

‘I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become.’

Carl Jung

So let them know that they are not bad, or wrong, or naughty, or anything other than a beautiful little child, who deserves to be loved and cherished, and held, and made to feel good about themselves. Because that’s what we all want – it’s what we’re born for, really, to feel that from other people and to give it back to them. It’s why we’re all here.

I hope this helps you think a little differently about your life, about yourself, about why you struggle as you do. As ever, also know that these wounds can be healed, with enough time, work and loving, compassionate support.

And I will be here, every step of the way, giving you every ounce of knowledge, wisdom, guidance and support I possess.

Warm wishes,

Dan

PS I have recorded this as a talk for my InsightTimer Collection – click on the button below if you would like to listen (for free) now.

Hatred is a Poison – Don't Let it into Your Heart

Image by Nathan Lindahl

Watching events unfold in Ukraine, our natural empathic response as humans is to feel shocked, upset and overwhelmed at the images we see and stories we read about this terrible war. These are normal, natural emotional responses, so allow yourself to feel whatever you are feeling right now. I feel those things too.

It’s also completely natural and understandable to feel angry about what’s happening. And that anger can be a kind of healthy energy that fires us up to help in any way we can, whether that’s donating money, clothes, food or time; signing petitions and writing to our leaders, urging them to act on our behalf; welcoming refugees to our shores in any way we can; or sharing messages of support for the Ukrainian people on social and mainstream media.

Anger is like rocket fuel at times like this, as we refuse to be frightened or cowed and stand up to brutality and injustice – as our parents and grandparents did in the Second World War.

Why hatred doesn’t help

But there is one emotion that, although easy to feel at times like these, is not helpful – and that’s hatred. It can be easy to hate Putin, his inner circle, or the oligarchs who have made vast riches by stealing from the Russian people. We can find ourselves hating the soldiers who drop bombs on helpless civilians. You may find yourself hating people on social media, who express pro-Putin or pro-war sentiments.

It’s easy to do. But, however seductive hatred may be, it won’t help anyone or anything. The Buddha taught us this vital message 2,500 years ago. He called hatred a ‘poison of the mind’, because although it’s easy to feel and can be addictive at times of conflict or strife, it’s also toxic, corrosive and highly destructive to both the hater and hated.

Don’t believe me? Try this thought experiment. Think about a time recently when you hated someone – really hated them, deep down in your guts. If it helps, you can close your eyes and imagine you are right there, living through that experience again. Play it out, moment by moment, reliving everything that went through your mind – all the angry, vengeful or even violent thoughts you had about this hated person.

As you do, see if you can feel what it’s like to hate, in your body. You might feel a great upsurge in energy, a burning sensation in your gut or chest, or a bitter taste in your mouth. Your muscles will be hard and tense, ready for action. Your jaw might be clenched and fists tight. Millions of years of evolution are preparing you to fight, possibly even kill, this person you hate so much.

(I know – or at least very much hope – you have no intention of acting on these feelings, but it’s helpful to remember that this is why we feel them, in evolutionary terms. Hatred is inextricably linked to the fight part of your fight-flight-freeze response.)

The cost of hatred

Doesn’t feel so good, does it? This is what the Buddha meant by hostility and hatred poisoning our minds, because they feel so awful when we experience them. They really do feel poisonous in your mind, heart and body. And when we hate it also distorts everything, focusing all of your energies on the hated person’s negative traits, words or actions, forgetting that they are human too, with a mother and father, friends, perhaps a partner and children. They love and are loved. They’re not evil, or a monster, or some kind of subhuman creature. Even Putin. Even Hitler, Stalin or Mao.

Deeply damaged and so damaging of others? Of course. People who need to be stopped, with every non-violent tool we have at our disposal? Absolutely – we need to stand up to Putin, or he will do even more damage. Personally, I would like to see him tried for war crimes at the International Criminal Court, as well as every other tyrant causing suffering around the world.

Anger? Yes. hatred? No

But I refuse to hate him for what he’s doing in Ukraine, because if I do, he has won. The Dalai Lama teaches that we should never let another person’s behaviour disturb our inner peace. And I am trying to be guided by that wisdom, doing everything in my power to help the Ukraininan people, feeling anger, upset, outrage – but never hatred.

I feel so strongly about this that I long ago made a commitment to stop using the word ‘hate’ in my thoughts or speech (around the time I started learning about Buddhism, by the way).

I won’t let Putin or anyone else make me feel that, or break the commitment I made to myself. I refuse to let my mind be poisoned.

Instead, I am sending deep love, compassion, and a heartfelt hope for peace and an end to their suffering to the people of Ukraine.

And my warmest wishes to you, wherever you may be in the world,

Dan

Please donate to Unicef, who are helping children in Ukraine and those fleeing from the conflict in their country

A Compassionate Response to the Crisis in Ukraine

Image by Mathias PR Reding

It’s heartbreaking to watch the crisis in Ukraine unfold, as innocent people are attacked by Russia’s fearsome military machine. This situation is also deeply disturbing for the majority of Russians, who are baffled and ashamed about their country invading a neighbour. Like the rest of the world, they understand that this aggression stems from the top, where their authoritarian leader, Vladimir Putin – who seems extremely unwell, psychologically – has dragged his country into one needless conflict after another. He is obsessed with re-establishing Russia as a global superpower, whatever the human cost.

My heart goes out to everyone affected by this war – the Ukrainian citizens, who are experiencing unimaginable suffering as their homes and families are attacked; those fighting and dying on both sides – they are all human and have people who love them, whether Ukrainian or Russian; and the refugees pouring out of Ukraine every day, desperately seeking safety for themselves and their children.

One of the hardest things at a time like this is the sense of helplessness, as we watch on from afar. It can seem as though we are completely powerless and that there is nothing we can do to help. But that’s not true. There is plenty we can do – and taking action is so important right now, because it will help you feel less helpless and overwhelmed.

Two types of compassion

In her book, Fierce Self-Compassion: How Women can Harness Kindness to Speak Up, Claim Their Power and Thrive, Kristin Neff distinguishes between two forms of self-compassion: tender and fierce. Tender self-compassion is the more familiar version, involving treating yourself with the kindness and care you would offer to a beloved partner, friend, family member or child. And we call need to offer ourselves this form of self-compassion right now, as after two years of Covid-related stress and anxiety, we don’t have much resilience or the psychological resources to handle this horrible conflict, with all the scary and upsetting media coverage we digest about it every day.

I think we can also extend this tender compassion outward, to people we know who are struggling with the news about Ukraine, comforting them or offering a hug when they are stressed or upset; donating money to some of the many charities that are helping people on the ground in Ukraine, or working with refugees pouring out of the country (I recommend UNICEF, which is helping Ukrainian children traumatised by this conflict – please donate to them using the button below); and helping refugees settle in our countries. Refugee Action and Global Giving are both excellent choices for your charitable donations.

Fierce compassion

This situation also calls for the other form of compassion: fierce compassion. As Kristin Neff explains, fierce compassion (whether for self or others) helps us say no, set limits and boundaries, use our anger to fight for what’s right, combat injustice and protect the vulnerable. We are all looking for our leaders to act with fierce compassion right now, with severe economic sanctions as long as Putin is in charge, supporting the people of Ukraine in every possible way to defend themselves and their democracy.

I also think we should all put as much pressure as we can on our leaders, through social media, petitions, contacting your MP and the Government as much as you can, so they are crystal clear about the anguish and outrage we all feel about this awful situation. If you’re in the UK and are not sure who your MP is or how to contact them, you can do so here.

Look after yourself too

Finally, make sure you take care of yourself. This crisis is incredibly stressful, of course primarily for people in Ukraine and their loved ones – it’s hard to imagine how much they are suffering right now. But it’s also stressful for all of us in Europe, watching on with anxiety about what this disturbed individual will do next.

So go easy on the news – we can stay informed about what’s going on without watching every awful video or reading all the details about what’s happening, day by day. This is especially true if you have a trauma history, because you may find this situation highly triggering, in many ways.

Sending love, solidarity and prayers for peace to the Ukrainian people.

And sending you warm thoughts, wherever you are in the world,

Dan

Why You Should Forgive Yourself for Past Mistakes

Image by Dawid Zawila

‘To err is human; to forgive, divine,’ as Alexander Pope’s famous quote goes. Meaning: we all make mistakes. Everyone does things they regret, feel bad about or wish had never happened. That’s just part of living a beautiful, complicated, messy human life.

But for many of us, the problem comes with forgiving ourselves. If we make a mistake, instead of accepting that’s normal, we beat ourselves up, treating tiny errors like life-changing, unforgivable transgressions. And with that beating up come painful emotions like guilt, regret, anxiety or even shame – the most painful emotion anyone can feel.

So here’s a thought – why not just forgive yourself?

Why it’s so hard to forgive

I know this is easier said than done. And if it was easy, you would do it, right? So let’s break down the reasons so many of us struggle to forgive ourselves, even if we know, rationally, it’s a good idea.

The first reason for being unforgiving with yourself is that you probably feel you don’t deserve it, for some reason. You may have been raised in a family environment that was harsh, critical or that emphasised mental toughness over self-compassion and care. There might have been family rules about ‘pushing through’ or ‘toughing things out’, that made you think it was normal to be harsh with yourself, especially if you made a mistake.

Another reason for being tough on yourself is having a harsh inner Critic, who beats you up for every tiny failing, real or imagined. This Critic is a key focus for treatment in schema therapy, because it’s often a driver of your unhappiness, in various ways. This part is probably not the monster you imagine it to be, because it is trying to motivate you (using the stick, not the carrot) and protect you, by making sure you don’t say or do things that might get you attacked, rejected or hurt. Hard to believe, I know, but it’s true.

In therapy, as we work on this Critic, we also work on helping you be kinder to yourself and more self-compassionate. This will be the topic for our next Heal Your Trauma webinar, so do come along on Saturday 28th May if being compassionate is a struggle for you. Keep an eye on this blog for news about our next event and how to book your place.

Benefits of forgiveness

Even if forgiving yourself is a struggle, it’s important to understand exactly why you shouldn’t give up. I know, both from all of the research and over a decade of practising as a psychotherapist, that when people finally learn to forgive themselves, they can feel deep waves of calm, peacefulness and healing. This can be truly transformative and life-changing, so it’s worth persisting, even if you find it hard right now.

As I always say to my clients, what’s the point of beating yourself up for things that have already happened? You can’t change them, or take them back. You can only learn lessons from them to make sure you don’t make the same mistakes in future.

Another quote for you, from the Dalai Lama, to end with: ‘Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.’

Warm wishes,

Dan

Why Your Temperament Shapes Who You Are

Image by Treddy Chen

Temperament may be the most important idea you have never heard about. I say that because so many of my clients have never heard about it, or have a minimal understanding at best. And it’s so important, because the kind of temperament you have really does shape who you are. So, what is it? How does it develop? And can it be changed?

The first thing to understand about temperament is that we all have one – it’s essentially your character, who you are as a person. You are born with a certain kind of temperament – it’s probably mostly genetic – and it stays fairly constant throughout your life.

It’s possible too that early life experiences help shape your temperament, because we know how powerful and formative they are for us as people, but we’re really not sure. What we do know is how to measure it.

If you had your temperament measured by a psychologist, he or she would use around 20 measures, such as passive/aggressive, sensitive/robust, emotional/rational and introvert/extrovert (they would use more complicated jargon for these terms, but this is what they would mean). And where you scored on these 20 items would determine your temperament.

The Highly Sensitive Person

Most of my clients (and most therapists I know) are what psychologist Elaine Aron calls Highly Sensitive Persons (HSPs). Around 20% of the population are HSPs, which means they are temperamentally more sensitive than most people. This is crucial, because it determines how much you are affected by everything that happens to you throughout your life, but especially in childhood.

So if (like me) you are an HSP, even fairly mild negative experiences in childhood will really affect you. That’s not your fault, it’s just how you’re wired, in your brain and the rest of your nervous system. You might be more sensitive to sensory inputs like bright lights, loud noises, strong smells or crowds of people. You may find it harder to ‘shrug off’ hurtful, critical comments. You will certainly find it very difficult to ‘stop being so sensitive’ or ‘toughen up’, however often people tell you to do those things.

Can temperament change?

Of course, it’s not just sensitive people who experience traumatic things in their lives. And you don’t need to be highly sensitive to be hurt by things like family dysfunction, being yelled at as a kid, or bullied in school (as I wrote about in a recent post). These experiences are painful for everyone, to a greater or lesser degree.

So can your temperament change? If you are very sensitive, can you become less so? Or the other way round? Well, yes and no. I think your basic temperament does stay fairly consistent throughout your lifetime. A sensitive guy like me is not going to become highly insensitive overnight. But we know that so much about you can change, with the acquisition of knowledge, from blogs like this one, self-help books, therapy sessions, podcasts, and so on.

And, if you have a trauma history, we know that the wounds this causes can be healed, with the right help and support. So I think the answer is, yes, your temperament can change, in some ways – even if your fundamental personality probably won’t.

If you would like to know more about temperament and how it shapes us, especially in the context of trauma, do come along to my webinar on Saturday 26th February: What is Trauma and Can it Be Healed? Just click the button below if you would like to attend – I hope to see you there.

Warm wishes,

Dan

My Heal Your Trauma Project

In my decade of practising as a psychotherapist, I have worked with virtually every form of psychological problem. When you work in private practice, as I do, it’s a bit like being a GP – you work with all sorts of problems and end up helping whoever walks through your door. And that’s fine with me, because I love what I do and am passionate about helping people who are suffering, whatever form that suffering takes.

But in recent years, having trained as a schema therapist, I naturally found myself specialising in trauma therapy. That’s partly because schema therapy was designed to treat complex problems like trauma, which means that people seek me out to help them with long-term, deep-rooted problems resulting from trauma, abuse or neglect in childhood.

It is also because I believe there to be an epidemic of trauma across the globe. This was true before the pandemic but, sadly, we are now seeing a tsunami of psychological problems caused by the many layers of trauma that people have suffered because of Covid-19.

‘It would be better if it never happened, but trauma need not be a life sentence. Our bodies and minds were designed to heal, and we just have to know how to activate those powers.’

— Steve Biddulph

People around the world are struggling with grief, traumatic stress caused by time in an ICU, or the life-changing impact of long Covid, as well as the ongoing traumatic stress many of us have experienced due to living through a global pandemic. And, even more sadly, these problems will only get worse, as the impact of one of the most confusing, scary and stressful years in human history takes its inevitable toll.

Understanding trauma

Because trauma is so widespread, I think it’s crucial that health professionals like me understand the following things:

• Trauma is at the root of most psychological problems. For example, the evidence shows that for most people, what we call ‘Borderline Personality Disorder’ is actually just the impact of complex trauma. The vast majority of people diagnosed with BPD experienced complex trauma as children. And the same is true for most other complex mental-health problems.

• Trauma can be obvious, or subtle. It’s easy to see that a ‘single-incident’ trauma like a car crash or terror attack will cause traumatic stress. It’s less easy to understand the impact of day-to-day emotional neglect on a child; or how angry parents screaming at each other in front of their kids, day after day, is traumatic for those children. But it is – and the impact of that trauma can scar people for life.

• Trauma affects your physical health, too. Dr Gabor Maté is a brilliant physician and trauma specialist. His groundbreaking book, When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress, reveals the impact of childhood trauma on your physical health as an adult. Every kind of health problem you might face today – from obesity to diabetes, cardiovascular disease to cancer – is, sadly, more likely if you have experienced trauma as a child.

• If you are a trauma survivor, you need trauma-informed therapy. The treatment of trauma has undergone a revolution in the past 30 years. We now have a whole host of highly effective trauma-informed therapies, including schema therapy, trauma-focused CBT, internal family systems therapy, compassion-focused therapy, sensorimotor psychotherapy and many more. If you are a trauma survivor, please seek out one of these approaches. We know that just ‘talking about’ trauma is not a good idea, so traditional talk therapy could be retraumatising for you.

My Heal Your Trauma project

That’s why I have created my new Heal Your Trauma project. If you are a trauma survivor, or are struggling with your mental health for any reason, it will provide you with all sorts of healing resources, including guided meditations on Insight Timer, webinars, workshops and self-help books. I will develop this project over time – just like all good trauma therapy, it will be a long, slow, step-by-step process. I will start by adding resources to this site, writing posts for my newsletter and my Heal Your Trauma Blog – and do sign up using the form above to get my brand-new blog posts delivered straight to your inbox.

Through my writing and teaching I will use all of my knowledge, training, skills and experience to help you heal from your trauma, whatever it may be. I am passionate about this – it is my life’s purpose. I strongly believe that whatever you have been through, however frightening or painful it might have been, it’s never too much to heal from and it’s never too late to begin the healing process.

I know this from working with complex trauma every day in my consulting room. I see people who have been through truly terrible things make wonderful, miraculous recoveries. It is so inspiring and heartwarming to see these people heal, grow stronger, happier, calmer and more self-compassionate. This is why I have created Heal Your Trauma, so I can bring all of those healing resources to you, wherever you may be in the world.

Our core value is that we want to offer affordable help for anyone struggling with their mental health. So all Heal Your Trauma events offer half-priced, Reduced-Fee tickets for those who need them – but please do choose the Supporter Ticket if you are able to support the project.

I am so happy to start giving you all of the love, support and help that you deserve – and, as you embark on your healing journey, I will be with you every step of the way.

You can watch recordings of any of my webinars on this page.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Healing Your Inner Child

Image by Michael Parzuchowski

The idea that we have an inner child, who carries all the hurt, trauma and painful memories from our past, is not a new one one in psychotherapy. But all of the newest, trauma-informed models have a particular way of thinking about this young, vulnerable part of us. In schema therapy, this young part is called the Vulnerable Child – and is the main focus of therapy, because the idea is if we can heal this part then he or she (and so, of course, you) feels calmer, happier, stronger and more at peace.

In internal family systems (IFS) therapy, there is also a strong emphasis on working with this part of you. The main difference is that, in IFS, there isn’t just one inner child, but many. So you might have a three-year-old part, a five-year-old, a seven-year-old, and so on. And this makes sense to me, because these parts of you hold all the painful memories, feelings, thoughts, body sensations and experiences of you at the age of three, five or seven.

If we just had one inner child, then they would have to hold memories of being, say, three, 12 and 17 – ages at which we are completely different in terms of brain development, personality, ways of thinking and feeling. It just doesn’t really make sense. Far more persuasive to me, based on all the theory and my own experience of working with hundreds of people over the years, is that we have many inner children, not all of whom need help, but some definitely do.

What is a part?

This leads to an important question – what exactly do we mean by a ‘part’? In some ways, this depends on the therapy model you believe best represents our inner world. Various models have different ways of answering this question (and all think theirs is the right answer!). But let’s go with the IFS model for now, as it’s one of my favourites – and I like their answer best. Dick Schwartz, founder of IFS, says that a part is a neural network in the brain, holding all of the thoughts, memories, etc that we did at the part’s age.

Dick argues that this is how the brain creates what we perceive of as our self (or many selves). If you experienced trauma in your childhood, this is also how your brain helps you deal with that trauma. It creates one or more parts to hold those traumatic memories (called ‘exiles’). And then various parts whose job it is to keep those memories buried deep in your unconscious, so you don’t have to think about them all the time (called ‘protectors’) and can function in your day-to-day life.

Healing young parts

There are many ways to heal these young, traumatised parts of you. One way is through the relationship between you and your therapist – this is a crucial attachment relationship and will help those little kids inside you feel safe, understood and cared for. You may never have experienced this as a child, so it can be deeply healing to have those experiences in the context of a therapeutic relationship.

In IFS (and schema therapy), using imagery is also integral for the healing process. Many IFS sessions are spent ‘going inside’ – closing your eyes and imagining speaking to your parts, often through imagery, where you visualise them and engage in all sorts of powerful, healing techniques and interactions with them.

Developing self-kindness and self-compassion is also fundamental in trauma recovery. This can be tough, especially for trauma survivors, but is always possible, with the right support and problem-solving. You may find my guided meditations on Insight Timer helpful for this, or try Kristin Neff’s practices on the same app, which are fantastic. And the self we are being kind and compassionate to is usually a young one, so this is calming, soothing and restorative for them, too.

I will be writing a lot more about healing your inner child in these blog posts, as well as teaching about them in my Heal Your Trauma webinars, so I hope all of that proves helpful for you.

Warm wishes,

Dan

How to Transform Your Life-Limiting Schemas

Image by Darius Bashar

What is a schema? This is a question I have been asked many times in the five years that I have been working as a schema therapist. And my answer usually starts like this… A schema is like a blueprint in your mind, to help you do things quickly and easily that you do a lot. So you probably have schemas for making tea, tying your shoelaces, riding a bike, driving a car, reading a book, and so on.

Think about it like this – if you go to make a cup of tea, you don’t have to thumb through your tea-making handbook every time. You just think, ‘Make tea,’ and you do. That’s how schemas work. And your brain forms many (probably thousands) of these schemas, because it’s always trying to save energy. Your brain uses a great deal of energy as it’s working hard to run your body/life all day – research shows that although it represents just 2% of your body weight, it accounts for 20% of your body’s energy use..

Each schema saves a little bit of energy, so all of these tea-making, shoelace-tying, bike-riding, car-driving, book-reading schemas are very helpful indeed.

Not all schemas are helpful

In the 1990s, Dr Jeffrey Young developed schema therapy – one of a number of new, ‘third wave’ cognitive therapies springing up around the world. Central to his model was the discovery that there are 18 schemas, which are not very helpful. In fact, these schemas can be really painful for us, causing a great deal of problems in our day-to-day lives.

Let’s illustrate this with the most common schema, which is the ‘core schema’ for virtually all of my clients (and the person writing this), Defectiveness. I always tell people that this is the ‘not good enough’ schema, because it’s the one that gets triggered when you have low self-esteem, lose confidence, think we are boring, stupid, weak, rubbish or any other harshly self-critical way of perceiving yourself.

This speaks to key concept number one: that once you have a schema, you will always have it (unless it’s healed), but it won’t always be active. Sometimes your schemas go dormant, which is like them going to sleep. Then something stressful or threatening happens and the schema gets triggered and wakes up. As schemas comprise cognitive, emotional and physiological elements, this means that your thinking can become distorted or otherwise unhelpful, you feel intense feelings like anger, anxiety or hurt, which show up in your body as a burning in your chest, knot in your stomach or a sinking, heavy feeling all over.

How schemas form

So how do these painful schemas develop? Take that Defectiveness schema – if this is one of yours, it probably developed when you were a child, often between the ages of four and six, which is when we start to get ‘cognitive’ as children. Maybe your older brother was way better at everything than you, so you started to think , ‘I’m rubbish at everything - what’s wrong with me?’ Or you had a harsh, critical parent who always told you that you were lazy, or stupid, or a waste of space.

Both through your thoughts about yourself and negative messages received from people around you, the schema started to form in your brain. And neuroscientists teach us that, ‘neurons that fire together, wire together,’ meaning if you think a certain thought 10,000 times, you develop a powerful neural network in your brain, to make thinking that thought easier/energy-saving. And then, 30 years later, you don’t even know it’s a thought, this is just a fundamental truth for you – that you’re lazy or stupid, or some other bad thing.

How schemas heal

I know, this can all seem a bit depressing. But the good news is that schemas can be healed. In fact, there is a whole model of psychotherapy – schema therapy – devoted to exactly that outcome! In my therapy practice, we heal people’s schemas in many ways – through our warm, safe, compassionate relationship; by rewriting a negative, self-critical life story to make it a much kinder, more compassionate (and truthful) story; using techniques like ‘imagery rescripting’ to process painful memories and so gradually weaken the schemas they would otherwise feed on a daily basis.

Helping people with their painful, life-limiting schemas is also one reason I founded Heal Your Trauma. And is one reason I am writing this post – because knowledge is power, so reading blogs like this, attending my webinars, or of course any other helpful/healing resources you come across will all contribute to healing your schemas, rewiring your brain, healing childhood trauma, or whatever words we use to describe it.

I hope that helps – and do watch this space for future posts on this topic.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Why You Keep Falling in the Same Hole – and How to Stop

Image by Ian Taylor

My first counselling training began almost 30 years ago – way back in 1994. Although I was very young (probably a bit too young, in hindsight), I absolutely loved it. The three-year training, in Psychosynthesis – a humanistic/transpersonal model – was so stimulating and exciting. I had never experienced anything like it.

And I remember one of the trainers reading a poem to us and then using it as a metaphor for therapy, which has stuck with me ever since – I recently tracked it down and learned that it was Portia Nelson’s There’s a Hole in My Sidewalk: The Romance of Self-Discovery. I have used this poem/metaphor with hundreds of my clients, so think you will find it helpful. Here’s how it goes.

Part 1: Falling in the hole

Imagine that you’re walking down a road on a lovely sunny day. You feel fine and are enjoying your walk, not heading anywhere special, just ambling down the road. Then, bang. Without warning, you fall into a huge hole in the road.

You lie there, bruised and winded at the bottom of the hole, thinking to yourself, ‘What the hell was that? Where did that stupid hole come from?’

Eventually you manage to climb out of the hole and go on your way, shaken, sore and confused.

Part 2: Falling in the same hole

Months go by. You walk down the same road every day. And every single day you fall into the same damn hole. It’s like Groundhog Day – you never see it coming and it always takes you by complete surprise. You start really hating that hole…

Part 3: seeing the hole but still falling in

Eventually, something changes. Now when you walk down that road, you realise that the hole is there. You even see it as you walk towards it, but – and this is the most maddening bit – you still fall in! And when you find yourself, battered and bruised at the bottom of the hole, you think to yourself, ‘This is making me crazy now! How can I see the stupid hole but still fall in every time? Argh! So annoying!’

Part 4: Hole-enlightenment day

This goes on for way too long. You now hate the hole with a deep and abiding passion. Until, one day, something miraculous happens. On this special day, you walk down the usual road. You see the hole coming. You walk closer. And closer. And closer. Until, just as you’re about to fall in again, you think to yourself. ‘Wait a damn minute. I know you, hole! And do you know what? I have had enough of the falling. And the bruising. And the being shaken.’

So you do something quietly wonderful. You see the hole, decide to walk around it, then do just that. On you go with your journey, feeling deep-down-in-your-bones happy and proud of yourself.

So what does all that mean?

Here’s why I have told that story hundreds of times over the years. It’s because this is how the therapy process – and any kind of personal growth – works. At first, you get triggered by things you don’t even know are there, or are triggers, or even what a trigger is! So of course you keep falling in the same wretched holes, because you don’t know they exist.

Your holes might be the same as mine, or they might be different. So one of my holes/triggers is narcissistic people, especially men. People with this kind of personality can often be harshly critical, or demeaning, or shut you down rudely and insensitively. And one of my family members did that to me a lot as a child. So just being around a person like this is triggering for my young, hurt parts – because they expect to be hurt again.

It took me a long time (and a lot of therapy) to learn this, but now I know that this is one of my holes so I – mostly – manage not to fall in.

Achieving hole-enlightenment

Of course, the oh-so-glorious day is the one where you see the hole but manage not to fall in this time, instead walking around it and carrying on, with a huge smile on your face. But that takes time. It takes a lot of learning. A great deal of compassionate support. And all of this is especially true if you have a trauma history because, sadly, you will have more holes than most people, they will be bigger and deeper, and it will be even harder to learn not to fall in.

But, as I am always explaining in these posts, just because it’s harder for you doesn’t mean it’s impossible. I passionately believe that everyone can heal, including you. That’s because we have a range of life-changing, trauma-informed therapies at our disposal now, as well as a wealth of knowledge about the mind, brain, body and nervous system, what happens to them during trauma – and, crucially, how to heal those wounds.

If you would like to know more about all of this, start by reading my website and Heal Your Trauma Blog, which contains a huge amount of information about trauma and mental health in general. You could also come along to my first Heal Your Trauma webinar, What is Trauma and Can it Be Healed?, on Saturday 26th February, 2022. You can book your place, for just £49, using the button below.

I hope to see you there – and good luck with those holes!

Warm wishes,

Dan

Compassionate Breathing: A Step-By-Step Guide

This is a foundational practice that I use with all of my clients, to help them regulate their nervous system. You can use this practice any time you feel triggered and either ‘hyperaroused’ (high-energy states like being stressed, agitated, angry, upset, anxious) or ‘hypoaroused’ (low-energy states like being sad, ashamed, depressed or dissociated).

If you are a trauma survivor, you may experience one or both of these states on a daily basis, perhaps cycling between them – so having some simple, effective techniques to help manage that is crucial.

You can be guided by my video on Compassionate Breathing, below, but it’s helpful to read these guidelines first, to give you some idea of when to use the practice and what you are trying to achieve. The first two stages of the practice focus on calming and regulating your nervous system by adjusting the speed and depth of your breathing. I will send you a follow-up post which guides you through stages three and four, to help you generate self-compassion, sending warmth and kindness to the hurt little boy or girl inside.

It’s helpful to understand a little about the nervous system first. If you feel threatened and your brain decides that fight or flight are the best survival options, you feel either angry (signalling fight) or anxious (telling you that flight is the best option), your sympathetic nervous system is activated, you start ‘chest breathing’ (fast, shallow breaths from the top part of your lungs), your muscles tense up, heart rate increases and you get a bit shot of adrenaline/cortisol into your bloodstream.

All of this gives you strength and energy to either fight or flee – great news if you are faced with a hungry predator, not so good if you are on a busy Tube train. And if you can’t fight or flee, your brain triggers the freeze response, which can make you feel collapsed, exhausted, paralysed, spacey or numb.

This technique help you breathe deeply and abdominally, which is the opposite of fast, shallow chest breathing. And breathing abdominally stimulates the vagus nerve, which also stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system and the ‘rest and digest’ response to help you feel calmer, safer and more at peace – helpful whether you’re in a high- or low-energy state.

The practice

1. Adjust your posture. Make sure your feet are flat and grounded on the floor, then let your shoulders gently roll back so your chest feels spacious and open. Now lengthen your spine – sit upright but relaxed, with your head, neck and spine in alignment. Imagine an invisible piece of string attached to the top of your head, pulling you gently upright.

Sitting in this position helps you feel grounded, alert and stronger in your core. There is a great deal of research on the link between your posture and mood, so just a simple adjustment in posture can help you feel a bit more energised and stronger, with a subtle but noticeable uplift in your energy and mood.

2. Begin Compassionate Breathing. Close your eyes, take deep, slow breaths in through your nose and out through your mouth. Your breaths should be roughly four seconds in, four seconds out. Imagine that your abdomen is like a balloon, inflating on the in-breath, deflating on the out-breath. Keep breathing, noticing everything slowing down and letting your muscles start to relax.

Breathing this way should help you feel calmer within a minute or so, but if you have time, I recommend extending the practice for up to five minutes – it’s just deep breathing, so you can’t do it too much! I also love this practice because you can do it anywhere – on the bus, in a difficult meeting, at your desk…

Try using Compassionate Breathing every day, especially when you’re feeling triggered in any way. I very much hope that, over time, it will help you feel calmer, more relaxed and mindfully present in your day-to-day life.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Listen to My Guided Mindfulness of Breath Meditations on Insight Timer

Image by Hari Nandakumar

Mindfulness of Breath is the core meditation practice in both Buddhist and Western, secular mindfulness traditions. When you have established a regular meditation practice, it’s beneficial to sit in silence, mindfully focusing on your breath, sounds, thoughts, body or any other point of focus. But if you are a beginner, it’s a good idea to listen to guided meditations first, as sitting in silence for long stretches of time can be challenging (and will quickly introduce you to your busy, restless mind!).

That’s why I have recorded a series of Mindfulness of Breath meditations for Insight Timer: five-minute, 10-minute, 15-minute and 20-minute versions. All of these practices are free (as are tens of thousands of meditations by myself and other teachers on the InsightTimer app), with optional donations if you so wish.

You will also find Loving-Kindness practices, a Body Scan, a Safe Place Imagery, Box Breathing and Compassionate Breathing techniques, a Four-Stage Self-Compassion Practice and much more. I will continue adding to my collection of meditations on the app – including trauma-sensitive mindfulness practices. I hope you find these and my various other Insight Timer meditations helpful – use the button below if you would like to listen to them now.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Why Bullying is so Traumatic for Kids (and Adults)

Image by Kuanish Reymbaev

I was badly bullied at school. It was one of the worst years of my life – the last year of primary school, which should have been a happy time but was anything but. For some reason I’m still not 100% clear about, I got held back a year while all my friends went on to secondary school. I was then dropped, gazelle-like, into the pride of hungry lions that were the kids in the year below.

And although I have always been big, I was a sensitive, easily-hurt kid – perfect prey for bullies. So this gang made my life hell, for a year. And this experience was deeply scarring for me. It stays with me to this day, despite a great deal of work in therapy (I am finally close to healing those wounds, but it has taken a long time and much hard work).

Why am I telling you all this? Because, as with many painful psychological experiences, I know what bullying feels like, from the inside (known as emotional empathy). This is very different from intellectually understanding it (cognitive empathy), from reading books and being taught on a therapy training.

Why bullying is so traumatic

What I most remember about this awful time is the feeling of helplessness, of powerlessness. Whatever I did, or tried to do, didn’t make any difference. I told my parents, eventually, but – although of course they tried their best to help, especially my mum – when they told the teachers, it just got worse.

If I tried avoiding the gang, they always found me. I couldn’t fight back, even if I had been that sort of kid, because there were five or six of them and one of me. And this horrible kind of helplessness, in the face of attack – physical, verbal, emotional – is what turns a bad experience into a traumatic one.

I guess the silver lining of these events, which happened almost 50 years ago, is that they have helped me both understand and in turn, help trauma survivors. It’s why I always tell my clients that I understand trauma, dysfunctional families, alcoholism, bullying, depression and so much more, because I lived through it all as a child.

It has also helped me see that, as a society, we underestimate just how traumatic bullying can be for kids. I am still affected by those experiences, several decades later. And so will you be, if it happened to you. Those memories – like any kind of trauma memory – need processing, with an effective trauma-informed therapy like schema therapy or internal family systems therapy (the one I am currently having).

If you experienced bullying as a child, please don’t minimise or ignore it. The little boy or girl inside you still bears the scars of those experiences, however long ago they were.

Bullying hurts adults too

For many people, their bullying comes not in childhood, but later life. An abusive partner, horrible boss or vindictive colleague can be extremely painful, however old you may be. Again, please don’t ignore or dismiss these experiences. If you’re stuck in an abusive relationship, charities like Refuge or Women’s Aid can help you escape it – and stay safe once you have left.

If the problem is at work, and you have an HR department, speak to them about it right away. They have a legal obligation to protect you and prevent bullying or abusive behaviour in the workplace. If you’re a member of a union, tell them – they will be able to help. And, finally, if all else fails, find a new job! Life is too short to spend every day in fear of being belittled, targeted or abused in any way.

A key part of my Heal Your Trauma project is cutting through the fog of ignorance and misinformation that exists around trauma. It’s a huge problem, affecting millions of people around the world. Many experiences can be traumatic for us. And we can always do something about it, including reading blogs like this one, finding support groups, good therapy, reading self-help books, speaking to friends and family. All of those things will help – so please don’t ignore your traumatic experiences.

Get help – you deserve it.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Why Self-Compassion is a Superpower

Image by Rui Xu

Let me take a guess about you. I bet you’re a kind person. And that you’re good at thinking about, caring for and looking after other people. You may even be called ‘kind’ or ‘compassionate’ by those who know you.

But I’ll also guess that you’re not very good at being kind or compassionate to yourself.

Does this resonate for you? If so, you are definitely not alone. Most people I work with are decent, kind, thoughtful human beings. But they also find the whole concept of self-compassion at best a struggle and at worst completely alien. And this is a big problem, because there is now a huge amount of research into the beneficial effects of compassion – both for ourselves and others – and its antidote-like effect for all of the psychological problems we struggle with, like stress, anxiety, depression, low self-esteem…. and trauma.

So it’s a key skill, or set of skills, that you really need to learn. And if developing this healing superpower is a problem for you, we need to help you solve that.

How trauma affects self-compassion

Sadly, we know that people with a trauma history find self-compassion especially tough. There are a whole host of reasons for this, so let’s run through some of the most common.

First, your ability to be kind, compassionate, soothing and nurturing to yourself will be determined by the kind of relationships you had in early childhood, especially with your key attachment figures (for most of us, this is mum and dad, but can also include your siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, best friends, favourite teachers, and so on). Let’s focus on your relationship with mum, because for most of us she is the central character in the story of our childhood.

Remember that babies cannot manage their own emotions. They just don’t have the neural architecture to do that because their brains, bodies and nervous systems are not developed yet, so they literally cannot do it. If they are angry, upset or scared, they need someone else to help them regulate those emotions. And for most of us that someone is mum. If we’re lucky, we internalise her loving, caring, soothing presence (her kind facial expression, warm and soothing voice tone, kind words, just enough eye contact, lots of hugs and kisses) and eventually internalise all this goodness, so we are able to start soothing ourselves. Babies can’t do that, but older children can.

But, very sadly, many trauma survivors were not loved and cared for in this way. Their parents might have been heavy drinkers, or had a serious mental illness, or were just really harsh, cold, angry or critical. If that’s true of you, I’m afraid you wouldn’t have developed those self-soothing (= self-compassion) skills in the way that other, lucky kids did. So self-compassion would be a struggle for you from day one.

Negative core beliefs

Another problem for trauma survivors is that you may have negative core beliefs that get in the way of being kind and compassionate to yourself. Aaron Beck, the founder of cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) discovered that these beliefs usually form in early childhood, from around four to six. They can either be a direct result of the horrible things people say to us, if we’re called stupid, lazy, weak, a waste of space, or something similarly hurtful. Or they are an interpretation based on the way we’re being treated, so we start to think, say, ‘Mum clearly loves Johnny more than me, so I must be unlovable.’

And these horrible, hurtful ideas about yourself then stick, so when you are 40, you still think, ‘I am stupid/lazy/a waste of space/unlovable.’ Clearly not good – and also a huge, un-climbable barrier to treating yourself with care and compassion.

Finally, some good news

So far, so depressing. If some or all of these things were true of you, at this point you might be feeling hopeless, or that you are broken beyond repair and will never develop self-compassion skills. But, as anyone who often reads my posts will know, one of my core beliefs (and a founding principle of the Heal Your Trauma project) is, It’s never too much and never too late to heal.

I passionately believe this. It’s why I get out of bed every morning and come to the office, where I spend long days helping trauma survivors to overcome the painful legacy of their less-than-functional childhoods. It’s also, incidentally, something I have lived experience of. I recently wrote a post about how I healed the wounds caused by some horrible bullying at school – one of many traumatic aspects of my childhood.

This childhood trauma led me to form some pretty damaging core beliefs – and to be really harsh, critical and unloving with myself. But through a great deal of therapy, meditation, reading and more, I now do a pretty good job of being kind and compassionate to myself on a daily basis (which is why I provide all of these things for you, through Heal Your Trauma).

I will be teaching you some of the breathing techniques, self-compassion practices and guided imagery I use with my clients (and myself) on my 26th February webinar, What is Trauma and Can it Be Healed? If you would like to be more compassionate to yourself, do click the button below to find out more.

I hope to see you there, or at one of the many exciting Heal Your Trauma events we have planned for 2022.

And wishing you luck on your healing journey.

Warm wishes,

Dan

How to Manage Your Pandemic-Related Anxiety

Image by Miguel A Amutio

As I write this, I have just had to close my therapy office again – having only started in-person sessions around a month ago, after 18 months of Zooming. It’s extremely disheartening, for myself and my lovely clients – it was such a joy to see them, as fully formed, three-dimensional humans again, instead of just a head-and-shoulders view on a screen.

But just when we thought we might be turning a corner, Omicron happened. And in some ways, it feels like we’re back to square one. In the UK, that means offices closing, people being advised to work from home, parties and dinners cancelled, back to wondering whether we will see our loved ones over the holidays. It’s hard to keep your spirits up, to avoid feeling gloomy and wondering if it will ever end.

Reasons to be hopeful

And yet, there are reasons for hope, even in these challenging times. I, like millions of other people in my country, have been triple-jabbed. I am so profoundly grateful for that – and know how incredibly lucky I am. Billions of people around the world haven’t had a single dose of vaccine, let alone three. And my remarkable good fortune – being born in the right place, at the right time, with access to miraculous and life-changing vaccines – means I am around 97% protected against the Delta variant and 75% against Omicron.

What a blessing. And, although I will have to go back to seeing my clients on a screen again, what a miracle it is that we even have technologies like Zoom! Otherwise this last 18 months would have been infinitely harder, for them and for me. Another blessing.

Also, in the UK, we have a free National Health Service. Let me say that again, for those of us who take this amazing, life-saving wonder for granted. We have a health service that is not only word-leading in many ways, staffed by the most skilled, patient, compassionate, heroic people I could ever hope to meet – but it’s free. My jabs were free. The ICUs that have saved countless lives in the UK are free. The GPs who have also saved thousands upon thousands of lives, also free. The ambulances that rushed people to receive life-preserving treatment. Free.

It’s OK to feel anxious

Please remember this and try to find reasons for gratitude, especially on the darker days. (Research shows that gratitude is a great antidote for depression, among other beneficial effects). At the same time, I don’t want you to force yourself into feeling fake-positive, if that’s the last thing you feel right now. A global pandemic is deeply anxiety-provoking for us all, in different ways and to different degrees. So it’s OK to feel anxious.

In fact, it’s healthy to feel anxious, sad, upset, lonely, hurt, grieving, angry, frustrated, down or whatever emotions might be running through you right now. As I’m always telling my clients, emotions are what make us human. Of course, we all like the positive ones – joy, excitement, love, pleasure, pride… But in order to feel the good stuff I’m afraid you also need to feel the bad, because if you suppress, detach or dissociate from your negative emotions, I’m afraid that you won’t feel many of the good ones either.

That’s because the part that detaches is a bit of a blunt instrument – it just pushes all emotion down, good and bad. So it’s fine to feel anxious right now – I certainly do. And it’s also helpful to remember that getting through this pandemic is a marathon, not a sprint (and yes, that’s what the image is for). I know it already feels endless, but it will take time for Covid to become endemic, like flu or the common cold. Time, as well as vaccinating everyone (including those billions of people in poorer countries), mask-wearing, social distancing, room-ventilating and all of the other stuff we should be doing right now.

I hope that all helps, a little. And I would like to send warm, loving, compassionate thoughts to you, whoever you are and wherever you’re reading this around the world.

Warm wishes,

Dan

What is Internal Family Systems Therapy?

Image by Thomas Koukas

If you have a trauma history and are looking for a therapist to help, it can be bewildering. There are so many counsellors and therapists out there, offering a smorgasbord of therapy models, each claiming to be the best. As a specialist in treating complex trauma, I would advise you to find someone who knows what they’re talking about – ask them whether they have trained in trauma therapy and exactly how they would help you with your trauma history. If they don’t have a convincing answer, please find someone else.

I would also recommend finding a trauma-informed therapy, such as EMDR, trauma-focused CBT, compassion-focused therapy, sensorimotor psychotherapy, somatic experiencing therapy, schema therapy or internal family systems (IFS) therapy. As an Advanced Accredited Schema Therapist, Trainer & Supervisor and Internal Family Systems-Trained Therapist, I specialise in these two approaches, which are both excellent, trauma-informed therapy models.

In this post I would like to focus on the last one, IFS, because it offers a wonderful way to heal your trauma, whatever you might have been through and however bad your symptoms are today. IFS was developed by Dr Richard Schwartz in the 1980s and, unlike most therapy models, emerged from the things his clients were telling him. Dick (as he likes to be called) Schwartz tells the story of his clients saying, over and over, ‘A part of me wants to date this guy but another part really doesn’t like him,’ or, ’Part of me wants to binge-eat cake, but a big part of me knows that’s not a good idea.’

We all have parts

Dick came to realise that his clients were giving him a glimpse into their internal world – and the many different parts of them who lived there. This idea, ‘multiplicity of self’, is at the heart of IFS. Because even though we feel like we’re just us – I am Dan, or you are Carol – that’s not how the brain constructs our personality. Instead, we all have different parts, who think differently, want different things and often have conflicting impulses. (Date the guy/don’t date the guy; binge/don’t binge).

This isn’t weird, or the sign of deep psychological issues, it’s just how we all are. And in the IFS model, we have two different kinds of parts: exiles and protectors. Exiles are the (usually) young, wounded parts of us, who carry all the painful thoughts, memories, feelings and experiences from key times in our life. They are called exiles because they are often exiled in your internal system – meaning shut away, because their feelings are deemed too powerful and overwhelming for us.

Managers and firefighters

And the parts that shut them away are called protectors – they help protect those young parts from being hurt, but also keep them shut away so they don’t overwhelm you. And there are two types of protector: managers and firefighters. Managers do a job, like be perfectionistic, worry obsessively or people-please. Their job is to be proactive – anticipating threats or painful triggers to help you avoid them.

Firefighters are reactive. So the part that drinks, or binge-eats, or cuts, or smokes weed, or gambles is a firefighter. They use any tactic available to quickly extinguish the pain felt by young, wounded parts.

Who you are, deep down

Finally, we all have a Self. This is not a part, but you, deep down – a good metaphor is the sun (Self) behind the clouds (parts). Always there, but sometimes obscured by activated parts, thinking, feeling and doing stuff frantically all the time.

So the goal of IFS therapy is to find and heal the exiles; free the protectors from their tiring, stressful jobs; and help you access ‘Self-energy’ so you can feel calmer, stronger, happier and more at peace.

I use IFS with all my clients and they love it. There is something about the model and this way of working that just resonates with people on a deep level. And it works! Even with the most stubborn, hard-to-treat problems like complex trauma.

I will be writing more about this and other models in this Heal Your Trauma Blog – and you can sign up for the HYT newsletter below, to make sure you never miss a post or one of our events.

I really hope that helps – and wishing you strength, courage and perseverance on your healing journey.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Why (Good) Friends are Key for Your Mental Health

Image by Kingsley Osei-Abrah

Imagine being an eight-year-old on holiday, making sandcastles on the beach. Then another kid shyly approaches and asks if they can help. They have their own bucket and spade, are about your age and seem friendly enough, so you say, Sure. You probably don’t talk much, just dig, fetch seawater for the moat, focus on building your indomitable sand fortress. Then mum says it’s time to go, so you take one last, longing look at your construction and wave goodbye to the other kid.

The next day, as you start over, the same kid sidles up. And again, you probably don’t say too much, but spend the whole day digging, carrying, pouring, building. By the end of that day, you are firm friends – and every day for the rest of your holidays you hang out, gradually chatting more about inconsequential stuff, but things that might seem very important for a pair of eight-year-olds.

After the holiday, you might stay in touch or you might not (that’s up to both of your parents, really). Either way, you made a friend and, whether that was a holiday friend or a long-term friend, it felt good, right? You probably didn’t think too much about it, but you both had fun, you got on, neither of you did anything especially annoying. And that was enough.

We are wired for friendship

It felt good because, apart from the simple pleasures of sandcastle-building together, something much deeper was going on. When that kid shyly asked to help, your brain quickly checked him out and put him into one of two categories: threatening or safe. If he had been a hulking teenager kicking your castle to bits, you would have put him in category one and called your parents to protect you. But this kid was small, friendly and nice, so you gave him a ‘safe’ badge and got busy playing.

This might seem simplistic, but it’s what we do, all the time, with every person we ever meet. Your nervous system is constantly checking people (and situations) out to decide whether they are threatening or safe. If they are threatening (or just seem that way) your threat system kicks in, as your fight-flight-freeze response is triggered and you act, quickly and decisively, to deal with the threat.

But if someone seems warm, friendly, open, kind, trusting, nice or is sending a whole bunch of other safe-seeming signals, an equally powerful system comes online: your attachment system. And while the threat system says, Go away! your attachment system says, Get closer. This is how we make friends, whether we are eight years old on a beach, an adolescent at school, or young adult at college.

And we are wired for this – to attach, get closer, hug, love, commit, be open and intimate. Attaching like this is in your DNA, because your ancestors on this planet have been doing it since mammals first walked the Earth, because humans, like other mammals, are wired for attachment. It’s why cats and dogs care for and feed their young, keeping them close until they are old enough to fend for themselves (it’s also why sea turtles do not, just laying their eggs on a beach before heading back out to sea – no attachment system).

When relationships are hard

Of course, for many of us, making friends and forming lasting relationships is not so easy. If you have a trauma history, this may be especially true for you. That’s because your attachment system probably didn’t get the warm, positive, loving responses it needed when you were young. If your parent or other caregiver was angry, anxious, unpredictable, unreliable or downright hurtful to you, the person who was supposed to be your warm, safe, loving attachment figure was none of those things. Instead, their behaviour fired up your threat system, which is essentially the opposite of your attachment system in terms of how it makes you think, feel and behave.

So your attachment style (how you relate to other people) is probably not secure, unlike our eight-year-old’s on the beach. This style might be some form of insecure attachment, either anxious, avoidant or disorganised (which is basically a mixture of the two). This will make it hard to form friendships and romantic relationships; it might also make it difficult to fit in and feel relaxed among fellow students or colleagues, especially if they are new. Many of my clients struggle with all of these different types of relationship.

But, as I am always telling them, the good news is that your attachment style is not set or fixed. It can change throughout your lifetime. So if you have, say, an anxious attachment style, it can become more secure throughout your life. How? Well, an attachment-based therapy, like schema therapy, is designed to help with that. A long-term romantic relationship – especially with a partner who has a secure attachment style – will also help a great deal.

Keep working and everything can change

So, as I am always emphasising in these posts, however bad it was for you as a child – and if your childhood in no way resembled that idyllic holiday scene, above – and however hard you have found it to form warm, close, long-term relationships, please remember that this is not a life sentence. It can change, if you put the work in – and get help from the right person.

Keep going, even if it’s a struggle at first. Don’t give up if you try dating, for example, and it doesn’t go well. Eventually you will find the right person for you. Keep working at those friendships too, because the rewards, long-term, are absolutely worth the effort. And better to have one or two close friends than a whole bunch of superficial friendships, or relationships with people who don’t make you feel good.

You deserve love, warmth, intimacy and happiness with your fellow humans as much as any other person on this planet. I very much hope you find all of them soon.

Warm wishes,

Dan

Trauma-Informed Guided Meditations on Insight Timer

Image by Jeremy Bishop

When I am helping people with a trauma history, I always recommend adding a meditation practice to their daily routine. We know from all the research that meditation is incredibly helpful for trauma survivors – especially mindfulness and self-compassion practices. Building your mindfulness muscles is important, because it helps you stay focused on the present moment, rather than ruminating about the past (which can cause depression) or worrying about the future (which will probably make you anxious).

Mindfulness practice also helps strengthen neural connections in the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that helps you calm and regulate emotions, think more rationally, have perspective on your problems and step back to see the big picture, rather than getting bogged down in upsetting details – all crucial elements of trauma recovery.

Self-compassion is also key, even though it can be a tough skill to master for trauma survivors. You may find it hard to like or accept yourself, even if others like and accept you. That’s very common, so please don’t worry about it. There is a huge range of self-compassion resources available now, so try reading blogs like this one, listening to podcasts or using guided imagery/meditation practices. You may also find Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer’s eight-week Mindful Self Compassion course helpful.

Dan’s Insight Timer collection

I have recorded a wide range of practices for the Insight Timer app, including guided imagery and breathing techniques, as well as numerous meditation practices. I use these with my therapy clients and they also form a key resource of my Heal Your Trauma project. They are all free, with an optional donation. If you would like to try them today, you can find my extensive collection on the Insight Timer app: insighttimer.com/danrobertstherapy

I very much hope you find them helpful.

Warm wishes,

Dan