← Therapy Chat
Loading summary
Transcript61 lines
- [00:00]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
Therapynotes is the highest rated EHR practice management and billing software for mental health professionals. Its all in one platform is designed to streamline all aspects of your practice from connecting with clients via secure messages to scheduling, notes, billing and more. You can trust TherapyNotes has you covered and one of the best parts 24. 7 customer service with a live person, it's beyond easy to get help over the phone or by email at any time of day from their knowledgeable and friendly representatives. The best time to give TherapyNotes a try is now. Sign up for your free trial by going to therapynotes.com, clicking Start My Free Trial and accessing your first two months free with the promo code. Chat See why TherapyNotes is the most trusted EHR for behavioral health professionals today. Therapy chat podcast episode470.
- [00:48]
Laura Reagan
This is the therapy chat podcast with Laura Reagan, LCSWC. The information shared in this podcast is not a substitute for seeking help from a licensed mental health professional. And now here's your host, Laura Reagan, lcswc.
- [01:24]
Hi welcome back to Therapy Chat. I'm your host Laura Reagan and today I'm bringing you another conversation from last year. Today I'm bringing you a conversation which was recorded last year but is timely for all therapists and everyone who's on a healing path at any time. Today I'm bringing back my interview with Dr. Peter Levine. In this conversation we talked about the path of the wounded healer and how our wounds are not something to be ashamed of or to run from, but they're actually our way back home to ourselves. And in this time when things are confusing, overwhelming, scary, just want to remind you, if you are someone who's on a healing path, you're not alone. And if you are someone who is helping others along their paths of healing, you are making a difference. Your work matters. Keep believing that. Don't give up. And thank you as always for listening to Therapy Chat.
- [02:38]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
This episode is one that I have been so excited to bring to you.
- [02:44]
Laura Reagan
Ever since it was recorded a couple months ago.
- [02:48]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
This conversation was so deep and so.
- [02:50]
Laura Reagan
Powerful to me and I hope that.
- [02:53]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
You will find it interesting and inspiring like I did. My guest today is the founder of somatic experiencing, Dr. Peter Levine. Peter Levine, Ph.D. is the developer of Somatic A Naturalistic and Neurobiological Approach to Healing Trauma. He holds doctorates in both biophysics and psychology. He's the founder and President of the Ergos Institute for Somatic Education and the founder and advisor for somatic experiencing international. Dr. Levine is the author of several best selling books on trauma including Waking the Tiger Healing Trauma, which is published in over 29 languages. And he has received lifetime achievement awards from Psychotherapy Networker and from the US association for Body Oriented Psychotherapy. He continues to teach trauma healing workshops internationally, and some of his other books are in an Unspoken Voice, how the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness and Trauma and Memory, Brain and Body in a Search for the Living Past. In our conversation, you will hear Peter Levine talking about how he created the Somatic experiencing work and program where his inspiration came from, which you might be surprised to learn, and who he was conversing with as he was developing this understanding. And he speaks about, has he done.
- [04:26]
Laura Reagan
Enough and is he enough?
- [04:29]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
And I think it's a very relatable conversation between two people who are humans, who are wounded healers. And Peter Levine has seemed like someone who was kind of up on a.
- [04:45]
Laura Reagan
Pedestal in my mind for a long time.
- [04:48]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
Maybe not a pedestal, but in a distant space on an unreachable, unattainable person to speak with. And yet this conversation was very deep and meaningful in ways that surpass any expectation I had. So I hope you'll feel the resonance that I felt during this conversation and that you'll take something away that feels meaningful to your journey of healing, which is this thing we call life. And without taking up any more time, I just want to tell you that there is a warning for everyone who's listening. I just want to make a content warning that he speaks about in the beginning of our conversation. As he begins speaking about his family, he speaks about a very violent attack which happened to him as a young child, and it involves sexual violence. So I wanted to give you a heads up before we get into listening that if that is certainly it's a horrifying thing for all of us to hear about, but if that is a particularly sensitive issue for you, I wanted to give you advance warning of that. So, as always, thank you for listening. And let's get right into my conversation with Dr. Peter Levine.
- [06:09]
Dr. Peter Levine
Foreign.
- [06:13]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
Hi, welcome back to Therapy Chat.
- [06:15]
Laura Reagan
I'm your host, Laura Reagan, and today I am deeply honored to be speaking with a very special guest, Dr. Peter Levine. Peter, thank you so much for being my guest on Therapy Chat today.
- [06:28]
Dr. Peter Levine
Yeah, gladly.
- [06:29]
Laura Reagan
I'm so happy that we could make this happen, and I'm really excited to talk to you about your work, your new book, and your just your journey. So let's start off with, if you will, you telling our audience a little more about who you are and what you do.
- [06:45]
Dr. Peter Levine
Okay. Well, I'm The Devel Peter Levine. I'm the developer of Somatic Experiencing, which is a mind, body, neurobiologically based, naturalistic based approach to trauma and to accumulated stress. Let me just tell you quickly where my journey began.
- [07:05]
Laura Reagan
Great.
- [07:05]
Dr. Peter Levine
So when I started developing my work in the late 60s and 70s, I guess you could say I was fortunate because the definition of trauma as PTSD was still another 12, 13 years in the, in the advance. And so I didn't know that trauma was a disorder of the mind, the brain, and even sometimes said to be a disease that could only be treated or managed with helping people change their thoughts and, and using medications and so forth. And by the way, I'm not against medications temporarily. It's a, sometimes it can be helpful, but anyhow, it's certainly not the solution or a solution. So I started working with people and they would start experiencing very powerful sensations in their bodies. And these sensations, you know, a twisting of a gut, the fast beating of the heart and so forth. And then as I kind of pursued this, it became clear that these were due to traumatic events, what we'd call traumatic events. But I want to make something clear at the beginning. Somatic experiencing is not about getting the trauma or getting the trauma out or reliving the trauma. It's definitely not about that, but to change how it, it becomes stuck in the body. So instead of feeling gut wrench, we can feel an openness and spacious, spaciousness and warmth in the belly and then maybe to look back at the images that might be coming up or thoughts that are coming up. But the key again is really the, the living, sensing, knowing body. And that's the, the term somatic experiencing, the name of the mystery method, which means it's the experience of the living body, of the soma, not just of the anatomical, but of the living knowing body. And so I then started to teach this, I tried to teach this to a group of therapists in Berkeley, Berkeley, California. And so we would meet every week or two at my, they call it my treehouse in Wildcat Canyon. And I would work with people and I would try to find the language to explain what's going on. Now one thing I want to say about Somatic Experiencing is that it is not a therapy per se, but it's an approach, it's a methodology that allows people to do what they do better, to let them to, to do what they do, how they do what they do. So in a way it has a kind of a unique position in the therapeutic landscape. So that's basically the beginning of my work and then starting from the still, if people ask how many people have. Have been trained in this, I think, let's say I think it was about 12 or 15 people because my mind is still back at my tree house. So I was absolutely, quite frankly, shocked to find out that it, you know, that it trained. How many trained people trained. I think it was something like in 44 different countries that like 50 or 60 people were. Were trained in them in this method. So. So in a way, when I started to try to teach this, you know, the reception, let's just say at best was lukewarm. You know, it seemed like, you know, many people were saying this could be dangerous for people to feel their bodies, which I think was really revealing more about themselves. But that has really changed. So I felt a real burden to try to find a way to get this out in effective way. And this went on for some years really. And now I'm in the. So I really. It was a burden that I was carrying on my shoulders. But now I realize that there are at least 50 trainers, 50 or 60 trainers that are carrying the workout into the world. So I don't have that burden on me. So to the question, have I done enough? I can answer that in the affirmative. If I try to answer the question, am I enough? Well, that's a little bit difficult. And it's. Well, let's just say it's a work in progress and in order to go in this direction, I don't know if this. Maybe we want to go in this direction. Just let me know that about three years ago, because as you know, I'm at the age where I have many more years behind me than I have in front of me. I mean, even though I am fairly vital person, I thought it was time really to look back at my life and how I've dealt with adversity over the. Many. Over the 50 years. And so I. I started working on, I guess you could call it an autobiography, but really it was. It was just an excavation for me of my life and how the different things connected to in my life and many different dimensions. So I did that and it was. It was difficult, but it was, I don't want to say cathartic, but it was revelatory a way and really close friend of mine who, who I shared it with, she said, you really should write this as a book, publish it as a book. And I said, no, my God, I can't do that. It's too vulnerable. You know, it's. I just left it for a while and then one of the publishers that I worked with she, I don't know how he got a copy of it, but he got in contact with me and said, look, I think you can make this as a book, but it's not, it won't work yet. And, and he said, well, what's the, what would be the purpose? So I thought about that and the purpose for me would be to help facilitate other people's healings about their stories and really even encouraging them to do something like I did, to really go from, you know, really excavate their lives, look at the timeline, look at different ways that they've experienced adversity and dealt with it. So anyhow, one thing led to another and now two more years left and the book is finally now at the printer and it's called An Autobiography of Trauma, A Healing Journey. And one of the things that in Somatic experiencing that we don't just go into the trauma to relive the trauma, I don't, I don't think that that's really that helpful. So when I, I started the, when I wrote the book to myself with a violent. My family was under life threat from the mafia and I had been violently raped to, you know, ensure silence from my father. It was, yeah, but, and when I read that, I said, no, I can't expose people to something like this. It's just, just too much. And then I realized, in what if I was my therapist in Somatic experiencing, what would I do? And so what came up is a couple of events, but one in particular when I, I think I was about 4 years old and it was my birthday and my parents snuck in my room, maybe in the night or early in the morning, and they laid the tracks of a, of a model train, a Lionel train under my bed, out into the room, back and then under the, then back underneath the bed. And so when I awoke, you can imagine my joy, my surprise at my joy. And I felt that as I reflected on that. I felt that in my whole body, my whole being. I jumped out of bed, I went to the transformer, I changed the speed of the train, I made it go woo woo. Really. I felt cared for and I felt loved and I could feel that in my body. And so that then allowed me to, to navigate some of these horrific events that occurred, but also some revelatory experiences as I continued to kind of scan through my life. And at one time, well, I was working on my PhD in medical biophysics at Berkeley and also developing the methodology and beginning to teach it. So I had a lot on my plate, so to speak. Plate would be the operative. So there was a restaurant that I absolutely loved. It was called the Beggars Banquet. And it was on Solano. No, no, it was on San Pablo Avenue. And I would go there at least once or twice a week. Probably more like twice a week. And the waitresses there knew me. They would always greet me by name. Usually I started with a bowl of warm soup with some French bread that was like, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. Again, as I'm telling the story, I cut. My mouth is sort of watering, and I. Right, yeah, yeah.
- [16:29]
Laura Reagan
Sensory experience.
- [16:32]
Dr. Peter Levine
So then one day I was sitting down, and there was a shadow off to my left. And I looked up and I glanced and I saw the. An image of a man with unkept curly hair and wearing like, a jacket, like, was two sizes too big for him. And so it was all crumpled and it took my breath away. I, you know, because I usually don't have visions. And what I'm talking about is that in one sense, I knew that this is what, what sometimes is called active imagination. Jung wrote about that. I, I, when I did a little research on it, it says, only children exhibit that. I say, no, no, that is so wrong. We all have that capacity if we invite it in. So anyhow, I recognized this person as Albert Einstein. And so I invited him in. And we, I would, then we introduced ourselves to each other, and I would ask him questions about what I was doing and developing, and he would ask me questions about my questions, kind of like the Socratic method. And as I say, this went on for many months. And at one time, I been discovering that things that have happened to our ancestors can directly affect us. And so I asked him if he had some ideas, some guidance for me in working with this. So in the image, and more like a dream at this point, we walk together to a pond, and he's holding a yardstick with a number of small stones along the yardstick. So we're right at the by, by the pond. And so we twist it over like this, and the, the stones fall to the ground. And of course, you get ripples going out in all directions, not just forward, but sideways and back. And, and of course, this is very, I, I am, you know, the space, time. And then he said, okay, so the wavefront passes through each other. But what happens if, when it gets stuck is that anything after that is distorted. And if this happens in several places, the whole thing gets distorted. And so Our, our experience, our embodied experience is of that, that distortion. And I asked him, well, how do, how to work with that, how to help people heal from those kind of things? And he said, he said, peter, I'm going to have to leave that to you. And I realize what we need to do again, not going and reliving the trauma, but finding where things got stuck and then unsticking them enough so that they could again move in all directions. That was one of the last visits we had. And I was deeply sad when it was clear that, you know, that the, that encounter was, was now over. And so I let it go. I went back to my work. I continued writing my doctoral dissertation. I continued trying to teach people. I don't think I call it somatic experience until the 80s, early 80s, but my, my life was occupied and he didn't think much of it then. And this to me was one of the things that's. Again, when I talk about this, I'm. I'm untouched. So I need to create a little space so I can be touched and tell you the rest of the story, which I again penned in the autobiography. So some years ago, 20, 20, 30 years ago, I was visiting my parents. They lived in New York. And I spend the day going to museums and then came back. And as I walked in the door, I noticed the bookshelf. And on the shelf was one of Einstein's books, I think was the General Theory of Relativity. And so that clicked, kind of clicked the memories of my encounter with Einstein, my imaginary encounters with Einstein. And so I told that to my parents and my mother. Oh, she was a difficult person, but in some ways she was quite intuitive. And so I told her about these encounters and she looked startled, but in a. In a good way. And she said, peter, I know why this happened to you. And I thought, what. What is she talking about? She said, when I was. When you were in utero with me, I was eight months pregnant with you, and your father and I were canoeing on this lake. And then a wind squall came up and tipped the canoe. And we both were in the water and we couldn't right the canoe and couldn't. And so they were sure to perish. Just at that moment, a small sailboat came by and there was an old man and a young woman in the boat. And they pulled my parents to safety and they introduced themselves as Albert Einstein and his stepdaughter. And at that moment I said, oh my God. Because she reasoned that in that moment of life threat, Einstein saved all of our lives. And in that way, we were both bonded, we were melded together. And over my lifetime, he's at times of trouble, he's come to me and I've, you know, been able to ask him questions. I don't have the image of him being there, but I, you know, it's still something like that. So, in a way, my life was made up of these synchronicities, of these dreams, which really informed what I wanted to do, what I needed to do. When I, I was ambivalent about making this into a book. I also had an interesting dream. And I was facing into a meadow. And in my hands, both hands, there was a. A, A bunch of papers. And clearly there, there, there were. It was typewritten material on it, and I was confused. And I looked, you know, to the right, to the left, and I was in conflict or I was not knowing really what to do in that moment. Speaking of the wind, the wind came up from behind me, a breeze came up from behind me and took these pages and then scattered them along through the meadow. And then I realized at that moment that, yes, I would write the book as a autobiography, that it could help people heal. And it was, again, difficult to do, especially certain parts about my sexuality that were also very, very, very scary to write about. But then, you know, the publishers want you to get endorsements from different people. And so I got some of the most touching endorsements of people that I knew and friends, colleagues and other people. And I knew that I was doing the right thing and that they were supporting me. And that support means something to so much to me, so much to me, because in some ways, I had some support as a child, but in many ways, I didn't have support because these were secrets that were held that the Mafia was threatening to kill our whole family. So it was never talked about. My brothers and I knew something was wrong, but we didn't know what it was. And so we didn't get the support from them because, again, it was hidden. So when I got the support from my friends, from my colleagues, in a way, that was the support that I had been missing. I hadn't quite thought about it that way, but that's the truth. That's my truth.
- [24:44]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
Today's episode is sponsored by Psychotherapy Networker and Pessi. If you're a therapist, be sure to check out the partner page, which is linked in the show notes where you can get discounted trainings with previous therapy chat guests like Courtney Armstrong, Dr. Leslie Korn, Dr. Arielle Schwartz, Dr. Tammy Nelson, Dr. Janina Fisher, Rebecca Case, Dr. Peter Levine, Dr. Lindsay Gibson, Deb Dana, Lori Gottlieb, and many, many other. You'll find the link in the show Notes to my Partner page with PESSE and Psychotherapy Networker where you can find all these discounted training. If you need CES, this is a great place to go. TherapyNotes is consistently transforming the way therapists manage their practices with continuous updates designed to save money and improve efficiency. Their latest Game Changer Therapy Fuel, a powerful and fully integrated suite of AI tools that streamline documentation so you can focus more on your clients. With AI features that help by generating progress notes from summaries or transcriptions, creating contact notes directly from client secure messages, and automated summaries of client history forms, TherapyNotes users are already reporting hours of saved time and energy. Some other recent feature improvements include automated recurring client payments, electronic secondary insurance billing, and their constantly expanding library of outcome measures. The best time to give TherapyNotes a try is now. Sign up for your free trial by going to therapynotes.com, clicking Start My Free Trial and accessing your first two months free with the promo code CHAT. See why TherapyNotes is the most trusted EHR for behavioral health professionals today? Yes.
- [26:20]
Laura Reagan
And what you've shared is so moving. I. I was holding back tears when you told the part about the lake. And I mean, barely holding them back. I don't know how much you saw, but I was. I was like. I was overcome because it was. There was so much power in that story. And it's, you know, even before what you just said about those secrets that your family was carrying, the. The thread of how. What's not spoken. And I know that's some of your work is a major part of your work, and what's not spoken, what's not consciously known, is so still, so present. But we don't know why we feel that way. And so it's so. It's so confusing. So then we are, like, fighting against what's also feeling so important.
- [27:13]
Dr. Peter Levine
Yeah. Yeah. You know, sometimes I get requests. Somebody will send me a book, you know, and I. I guess they wanted me to say some, some kind of endorsement about that. And one of the books, I just happened to turn to this particular page and I read this couple of sentences there, and I said, oh, that is completely right on. I could. I totally agree with that. But then I noticed they were quoting me from my book in an unspoken voice. Yeah. How the body releases trauma and restores goodness. And the quote is something like, trauma is not so much what happened to us, but what we hold inside in our bodies, in the absence of that presentation, connected, empathetic, other.
- [28:07]
Laura Reagan
Yes.
- [28:08]
Dr. Peter Levine
And that was really. That was really. When I thought about that in writing that book, it was revelatory to me. I realized, yes, this is really how it should be, is really what we need to give to our clients, give to ourselves to some degree, but to give to our clients and others and people who were close with. So we. We're not holding this alone. Yeah.
- [28:34]
Laura Reagan
Yes. And I'm hearing. And I would be a liar if I said I've read all of your other books, but I know of them and I just haven't read them because of, like, time. But. But the message I hear there is like, whatever isn't being whatever. Whenever there's something and there's not someone there to witness and hold it with you is that's when it has to go underground and out of your awareness.
- [29:02]
Dr. Peter Levine
That's right. That's right.
- [29:03]
Laura Reagan
So that's really like that attachment piece that, you know, people don't always think about when they think about why people have trauma responses and resilience.
- [29:13]
Dr. Peter Levine
And I think we know many, many different researchers and so forth, that it's clear that the attachment piece is so important to what we had there, that holding environment when we were held, loved. And. But that's one of the things is that's always there as a possibility. Even if it didn't happen then it can happen later. Well, in the example I gave about waking up to the train, you know, I felt loved, but I had a very difficult childhood around attachment. It was actually quite terrifying. But. And I think this is. I think one of the things that somebody wrote some. A friend of mine, I think something like, it's never too late to have a happy childhood, and I think we can again come to that knowing in ourselves. Yeah. That we have that inner child. Actually, the last page of the book is a picture of me when I was about 18 months old. And the. The. That end chapter was called Living my Dying through the Eye of the Needle. And I connected with that child, with his. His aliveness, his vitality. And I don't think healing occurs necessarily all at once, but sometimes it comes and surprises us, as it did here just now. So that's my story, my autobiography.
- [30:47]
Laura Reagan
Well, it's so beautiful. And I have to share with you that back. Oh, I don't know, probably around 2012, 2013, I went to a Pesi program where you spoke. And this was in. In Hunt Valley, Maryland. It was when you were looking to bring SE to Maryland. And you were kind of trying to get participants to know about it so they could sign up. And when I attended that, I was fascinated with every. And I was. I think I was newly clinically licensed at that time, so I was very fascinated with everything you shared. And I was like, I'm doing this for sure. I want to do this training. And it ended up that it just didn't come together in the right timing, and I went another way. But when I heard you there, I experienced you and. And what you shared the way I did. And then when. Fast forward to last summer, last September, when I heard you speak in Oxford at the Master series with Bessel van der Culkin, Alicia, Sky, Deb, Dana, and, yeah, see Porges. And you. The energy that you exhibited there and the. The. The sense of you that was felt in that space, the sense was so different. Not to say you weren't that way then. I don't know how you were personally, but the vulnerability and openness that you're bringing here, it's. So. It's a gift to all of us because, for one, as a white man of your generation, that's not, you know, rugged individualism is the. The message. And to show vulnerability isn't exactly welcome. I know with, like, my dad and his people are the stoics, and, you know how profoundly that's impacted me. But to have you, like, model that, not only is it okay to acknowledge that you're a person with feelings and tenderness and vulnerability and fears and scary experiences and joy and love and connection and all of the flavors of what makes you who you are are not only okay, but, like, it's. It's a benefit to all of us, for us all to know that we. That is safe to show who you are.
- [33:19]
Dr. Peter Levine
And.
- [33:20]
Laura Reagan
And I truly believe that it's what we must have more of in our world if it's gonna, you know, not go the violent way that it's going.
- [33:31]
Dr. Peter Levine
Yeah.
- [33:32]
Laura Reagan
Or, yes, I'm really grateful.
- [33:34]
Dr. Peter Levine
Well, thanks. Yeah. I think it's really important that we can model for our clients our own vulnerability by our own capacity to heal. You know, one of the things I talk about in the autobiography, I talk about Chiron, and Chiron comes from the Greek mythology, but it's come to mean more of the wounded healer. And. And all of us. Well, I wouldn't say all of us, but mostly all of us have our own wounds. And that's what brings us into the work. I mean, we'd probably be.
- [34:10]
Laura Reagan
Or if we didn't I'm sorry.
- [34:12]
Dr. Peter Levine
Yeah. I mean, maybe somebody. I don't even. I was going to say maybe somebody who's doing cognitive behavior necessarily had trauma, but it's very likely that they also did. And so when we address our own wounding, our own inner healing, then we're much more able to be empathetic and to be present for our clients. And, and, and to me, somebody says, well, how do you know that the trauma is. Is over or something like that? And I say, well, when the person feels alive and real, that they feel connected to, for want of a better term, their true self, their capital T and capital S, that, that we manifest those attributes, and again, that's, to me, the counter side of trauma. You know, sometimes I've asked people what I. I don't see people now, so I'm retired from that, but sometimes I was working with somebody, and they also had really hard, horrific trauma. And when they had come to that place in themselves where they felt alive in their bodies, they felt tingling vibration, waves of warmth and so forth. And I would ask them, I was a little tenuous at first, but I would ask them, if you are the way you are right now, would you choose not to have had the trauma? And I think almost everybody, maybe, maybe everybody said, yes, I would. I would. I would rather that I had the trauma and I'm where I am right now. So I think, again, that's the great aliveness that. That transforming trauma can bring into our bodies and into our spirit and into our souls.
- [36:06]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
I cannot agree with you more.
- [36:08]
Laura Reagan
I literally was saying this now I'm trying to remember.
- [36:11]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
Was it on a podcast interview, or.
- [36:12]
Laura Reagan
Was I just talking with someone? But I was saying just yesterday or the day before that, would I take away the experiences that I've been through, the painful experiences that I've been through, and then I would have to lose this, like, incredibly deep, rich relationship with myself that I never knew was possible if I had to.
- [36:38]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
No way.
- [36:39]
Laura Reagan
I mean, the growth and the. I don't know how else it would have. Where I would have gotten to this point. And that's just. I mean, you know, you know this very, very well. So many people who have been abused and victimized feel that they are broken. And, you know, people will call themselves monsters and just say that you don't understand. You don't know what I'm really like. If you knew who I really was, you wouldn't say these kind things to me. And you know that what you're speaking about is that innate, like, power of Self love and healing that's in there even when you didn't get the attachment experiences that you needed, you know, like there's no broken.
- [37:28]
Dr. Peter Levine
Right. You know the word you said innate. Yeah, it is that we all have an innate capacity to move towards healing and wholeness. And as therapists we're not curing our patients, at least from my book, our patients traumas, but we're enlisting and helping them enlist that healing power that force the instinct to heal and to come to wholeness, to self.
- [37:57]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
Yes, yes.
- [37:58]
Laura Reagan
I find that so hopeful because when I know when I've been in my trauma reactions, when I've been in down in deep dark spaces where I thought that I was so, you know, hopeless, it was never going to get better that I, I didn't know that our drive is towards wholeness, not towards just like decline and crash, you know.
- [38:22]
Dr. Peter Levine
Yeah, I do, I do. I mean I think that's about, really about the human condition and I think we, the two choices, we either that or we go to violence. Not just violence to others, but violence to ourselves.
- [38:36]
Laura Reagan
Yeah, I know.
- [38:38]
I remember telling my therapist, well I'm non violent, I don't hurt other people. And he said violence isn't only towards other people. And I was like, oh well, I am deeply, deeply grateful and honored that you have taken the time to share a small piece of your story and your journey with us here. And I know that the listeners will be very moved by everything you shared and inspired. So I would love for you to tell us because you have like Somatic Experience Institute, you have Ergos, you have a lot of ways that in addition to your books, many, many books and this new book that you serve our world and you say a little about that, about the places that people can go from this point to more with your work.
- [39:37]
Dr. Peter Levine
Oh sure. Well, you go to the somaticexperiencing.com website and a lot of that material is there. There's also a link or you can go directly if you're interested in finding an SC based therapist or, or training, you can go to traumahealing.org and that's the Somatic Experiencing International Training Institute. So and then we have events like one that's coming up called the Immersion and I think that's also mentioned, you know, talking about, you know, talking about Oxford when, when we were there it was, you know, you could go to different workshops so you had the keynote speaker. So as me and Bessel and Steve and. But then you could go to, you know, breakout. So Melissa actually came up with the idea and Scott Lyons from Embody Lab that we would do an immersion where every day it would probably start with the old fogies, us, but then also young, the younger ones. Because I mean, I think if people ask me, you know, are you hope, Are you a hopeful person? I said, well, I'm hopeful as long as I know that the younger people are really also finding their selves. And so anyhow, and then there's also the opportunity. It's. I think it's streaming as well, but if you're there, it's also the opportunity to actually work with some of the se trained therapists who'll be there. So. But anyway, I think all of that is on that somaticexperiencing.com website. I'm not. I don't know if I've ever seen it, but.
- [41:20]
Laura Reagan
So it sounds like the immersion is through the Embody Lab and has other speakers too. Like, is that maybe Ariel Schwartz is.
- [41:27]
Maybe one of the ones I love.
- [41:30]
Dr. Peter Levine
And Gabor, my friend Gabor and my friend Vessel Van der Kolk will be there. And I think it'll be a really, a different kind of event. And so I don't know if I'm looking forward to doing one more thing, but I am looking forward to that.
- [41:46]
Laura Reagan
It's beautiful. I'll be sure to put a link to that in the show notes because I know people will want to know. And I just want to say one more time, Peter, thank you very much for the work that you do, for what you are doing to heal our world and in a teeny tiny way for coming here to Therapy Chat today and what you're going to be sharing with our listeners. Thank you so much.
- [42:12]
Dr. Peter Levine
Okay. And. And thank you, Laura. And walk tall. Walk in beauty.
- [42:18]
Laura Reagan
Yeah, I receive. Thank you.
- [42:20]
Dr. Peter Levine
Okay.
- [42:22]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
TherapyNotes is the highest rated EHR practice management and billing software for mental health professionals. It's all in one platform, is designed to streamline all aspects of your practice from connecting with clients via secure messages to scheduling, notes, billing and more. You Cantrust TherapyNotes has you covered and one of the best parts 24. 7 customer service. With a live person, it's beyond easy to get help over the phone or by email at any time of day from their knowledgeable and friendly representatives. The best time to give TherapyNotes a try is now. Sign up for your free trial by going to therapynotes.com, clicking Start My Free Trial and accessing your first two months free with the promo code CHAT. See why TherapyNotes is the most trusted EHR for behavioral health professionals today.
- [43:06]
Laura Reagan
Thank you for listening to Therapy Chat with your host, Laura Reagan, LCSWC. For more information, please visit therapychatpodcast.com.