477: Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness with Dr. David Treleaven

Summary

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Therapy Chat Podcast Episode 477

Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness with Dr. David Treleaven

Host: Laura Reagan, LCSW-C
Guest: Dr. David Treleaven
Original Air Date: April 10, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this compelling conversation, Laura Reagan interviews Dr. David Treleaven, mindfulness practitioner, trauma therapist, and author of Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness. The episode explores the intersection of mindfulness and trauma, addressing both the healing potential and the risks of mindfulness practices for trauma survivors. Dr. Treleaven shares his personal and professional insights, offering practical advice for clinicians and mindfulness teachers on how to effectively and safely integrate mindfulness with trauma-informed care. The discussion also delves into systemic trauma, privilege, and the need for culturally and socially aware mindfulness practice.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Double-Edged Sword of Mindfulness and Trauma (04:59–10:35)

• Mindfulness as Both Help and Hindrance:

  • Mindfulness can be deeply beneficial for trauma survivors, but it can also inadvertently exacerbate symptoms if not handled with sensitivity.
  • Quote:
    “Mindfulness meditation can be both helpful for people who've experienced trauma. It can also hinder them. It can also be problematic.”
    — Dr. David Treleaven (05:23)

• Exposure to Secondary and Tertiary Trauma:

  • Dr. Treleaven explains how working with trauma survivors, particularly male sex offenders with high rates of personal trauma, led to his own secondary traumatic stress.
  • His experiences during meditation retreats illuminated how mindfulness, without trauma awareness, can trigger dissociation and intensify trauma symptoms.

• Personal Story:

  • During a meditation retreat, Dr. Treleaven experienced a “circuit breaker” moment—intense dissociation and worsening symptoms—which retreat facilitators, lacking trauma training, could not address effectively.
  • This personal crisis prompted his research and advocacy for trauma-sensitive mindfulness.

2. Why Mindfulness Can Trigger Trauma Responses (11:25–16:42, 30:02–36:03)

• The Mechanism:

  • Mindfulness encourages stillness and focused awareness, which for trauma survivors can unearth unresolved memories, sensations, or emotions.
  • Being asked to “sit with” overwhelming sensations without adequate resources or support can be destabilizing rather than healing.

• Attachment & Safety:

  • Lack of interpersonal support—especially in retreat environments—can mirror attachment wounds and make participants feel unseen or unsafe.
  • Quote:
    “If the teachers that we're counting on to help us stay safe in retreats aren't aware of what can happen... it can really do harm to a person.”
    — Laura Reagan (13:08)

• Overemphasis on Mindfulness as a Panacea:

  • The widespread belief that mindfulness is universally positive can overlook its risks for vulnerable individuals.
  • Quote:
    “I want to interrupt the idea that mindfulness is a panacea... Mindfulness reduces stress. We know that. What could go wrong?... For the majority of people, that will be hugely helpful. But there’s a select number who, when trauma is revealed, that’s going to overwhelm them.”
    — Dr. David Treleaven (15:17)

3. Trauma-Informed Practice: The Four Rs (17:27–20:02)

• National Center for Trauma Informed Care’s ‘Four Rs’:

  • Realize the widespread impact of trauma.
  • Recognize trauma symptoms.
  • Respond to them effectively.
  • Prevent retraumatization.

• Implications for Clinicians:

  • Trauma-informed care is not a quick checklist or fix.
  • Practitioners must understand both individual and systemic influences on trauma.

4. Systemic Trauma, Social Context, and Privilege (20:02–27:53)

• Trauma as Collective, Not Just Individual:

  • Trauma is deeply connected to systems of oppression, economic disparity, and social injustice.
  • Who experiences “accidents” or trauma is often socially determined, not random.
  • Quote:
    “Accidents are not happening in a vacuum... Who are the people that need to do potentially more dangerous work? Folks who are poor, working class…”
    — Dr. David Treleaven (21:31)

• Mindfulness Communities and Privilege:

  • Mindfulness spaces often lack diversity and can be alienating for people of color and others from marginalized groups; microaggressions and lack of safety inhibit healing.
  • Mindfulness practitioners with privilege bear responsibility for cultivating greater inclusivity and awareness.

• Using Mindfulness to Face Discomfort:

  • Dr. Treleaven challenges mindfulness practitioners to apply their skills not just to internal experiences but also to the discomfort of confronting privilege and social injustice.
  • Quote:
    “What would it be like for the mindfulness movement to really turn and face the places where we tend to get uncomfortable and not have conversations?”
    — Dr. David Treleaven (26:18)

5. Spiritual Bypassing & Dissociation (36:03–44:56)

• Spiritual Bypassing Explained:

  • Using spiritual practice to avoid necessary psychological or developmental work, such as confronting trauma or acknowledging privilege.

• Mindfulness and Dissociation:

  • Some meditators praised for their ability to “sit for hours” may be deeply dissociating—a trauma response rather than spiritual progress.
  • Quote:
    “They were getting a lot of props inside of a mindfulness community... because that's actually my safety strategy, a survival mechanism.”
    — Dr. David Treleaven (38:34)

• Positivity as Bypass:

  • Dismissing past trauma with “I’m not a victim, I’m staying positive” can prevent genuine healing and reinforce avoidance.
  • Quote:
    “It's not helpful to your healing process to pretend that you're not affected by something that is affecting you.”
    — Laura Reagan (41:22)

6. Practical Strategies for Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness (46:41–51:18)

• Modifications and Concrete Tools:

  • Dr. Treleaven’s book details 36 specific modifications to make mindfulness safer for trauma survivors.
  • Example: Instead of instructing everyone to focus on the breath—which can be highly triggering for some—offer alternative anchors like body sensations or sounds.

• Invitation vs. Command:

  • Always invite, never command; frame mindfulness guidance as options, not directives.
  • Quote:
    “The importance of being an invitation into practice instead of a command... It's just a different tone.”
    — Dr. David Treleaven (49:20)

• Enhancing Sense of Agency:

  • Emphasize autonomy and choice for trauma survivors in all mindfulness and therapeutic settings.

• Further Principles:

  • Attend to the physical environment—seating, exit access, objects—in ways that increase felt safety.
  • Leverage relationship and attachment within mindfulness practice, not just solitary practice.

7. Resources and Further Learning (53:11–54:06)

• Dr. Treleaven’s Website and Book:
  • More about trauma-sensitive mindfulness, including practical resources and links to purchase the book: davidtreleaven.com
  • 60% of book proceeds are donated to:
    • Generative Somatics
    • Black Lives Matter Healing Justice Initiative
    • Sogorea Te Land Trust

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Personal Experience with Mindfulness and Trauma:
  “Something happened... it's almost like a circuit breaker went off in my body. For a couple days, I was really dissociated... and the basic instruction to pay attention to this different stimuli that was happening seemed to actually make things worse for me.”
  — Dr. David Treleaven (09:41–11:13)

• On Trauma as a Social Issue:
  “Trauma isn't this isolated thing happening in a bubble. It's a concept that really asks us all to be in reflection about the world and what's happening.”
  — Dr. David Treleaven (19:10)

• On Spiritual Bypass:
  “Sometimes we don't know what we don't know. So we're actually, like you said, kind of skipping an important step or task that needs to be touched on, to move through.”
  — Laura Reagan (41:04)

• On Safe Mindfulness Teaching:
  "We want to create an environment without going so far as to be so overly protective... but there's all these modifications we can bring in that I think are just practical and helpful for us to have in our toolkit."
  — Dr. David Treleaven (49:20)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Time | Segment / Topic | |-----------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 04:59 | Dr. Treleaven’s personal/professional journey into trauma-sensitive mindfulness | | 11:25 | How mindfulness can both help and trigger trauma responsivity | | 17:27 | Introduction to the Four Rs of trauma-informed practice | | 20:02 | Systemic context: Trauma beyond the individual | | 30:02 | Why mindfulness can trigger trauma responses – retreat and isolation issues | | 36:03 | Spiritual bypassing and dissociation within mindfulness culture | | 46:41 | Concrete strategies for trauma-sensitive mindfulness | | 53:11 | Resource sharing, book proceeds, and closing info |

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Closing Thoughts

This episode brings a nuanced, compassionate, and deeply practical conversation on how mindfulness practices intersect with trauma healing and the dangers of oversimplifying mindfulness as inherently safe. Dr. Treleaven and Laura Reagan both advocate for trauma-informed, socially-conscious, and invitational approaches—emphasizing the need for the mindfulness movement and mental health professionals alike to embody greater awareness, humility, and inclusivity.

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Learn More:

• Dr. David Treleaven: davidtreleaven.com
• Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness (book): Available via independent and large bookstores
• Beneficiary organizations: Generative Somatics, Black Lives Matter Healing Justice, Sogorea Te Land Trust

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Transcript

[Laura Reagan]

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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.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Foreign.

[Laura Reagan]

Welcome back to Therapy Chat. I'm your host Laura Reagan, and this.

Week we are bringing back a previous interview with Dr. David Trelevin. David Trelevin is a mindfulness practitioner and trauma therapist who has taught and practiced meditation and mindfulness for a long, long time. And he wrote a book, Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness, to address the issue that people go to meditation and mindfulness thinking it will make their lives better and it will make them feel good. Of course, we all want to feel good. That's our human drive. Sometimes it doesn't feel so good. Sometimes as we strip away our defenses, the things that keep us from connection with ourselves, we get closer to our wounds. And that's really, I think, what meditation is about in the west and the way we practice it. There's an idea that if I want to relax, if I want to feel better, I need to do mindfulness.

And a lot of therapists think that too.

And bring mindfulness practice into our clinical work, not realizing that trauma symptoms can resurface during these experiences. So this is a must listen for anyone who practices mindfulness or meditation and any therapist who uses or is thinking about using mindfulness practices in your clinical work. It's important to understand what can happen and and what to do if those things happen. So I'm hoping to do an updated.

Interview with Dr. Treelevin at some point, maybe this year.

But in the meantime I hope you will find this conversation to be helpful and informative.

I will add that when we recorded.

This originally years ago, I was just beginning to explore these practices for myself now. It's something that I've committed to using for the rest of my life and in my work. So it's always nice to listen back to when things were more fresh. I hope you're taking good care. I'll leave you with Quick Meta Loving Kindness mantra. May you be safe, may you be happy, may you be kind to yourself.

May you be free from suffering.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Foreign.

[Laura Reagan]

Hi, welcome back to Therapy Chat. Today's interview is one that I have been so excited about and really looking forward to bringing to you today. I'm talking with Dr. David Trelevin. David, thank you so much for being on Therapy Chat today.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Thanks for having me.

[Laura Reagan]

The pleasure is all mine. I came across your work because you have a new book out called Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness. But after I found that and got in touch with you for an interview, other people have been coming to me and saying, wow, look at this amazing work that this man is doing. You should see if he would come on the podcast. I'm like, hey, I'm already there. I'm. I'm on this. He's gonna be on the podcast soon. So I know my audience is gonna really love hearing from you. So if you can, will you just start off by telling our listeners a little bit about yourself and your work?

[Dr. David Treleaven]

I'd happy to. I just want to say I'm really flattered to hear that. It's still very novel to hear that anyone's reading it. I'm visiting with my grandma right now. She's 93, and she started reading it last night and she fell asleep within five minutes. And so it's really exciting to be getting to talk about it. And, you know, I'm happy to be on listen to your podcast and excited to engage around it.

[Laura Reagan]

Thank you.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

So, yeah, happy to tell you a little bit about me and frame what I'm up to. I'd say there's. I'll just want to give your listeners up front sort of the two main points that I'm making, almost like the punchline. And basically what I'm arguing in the book is that mindfulness meditation can be both helpful for people who've experienced trauma. It can also hinder them. It can also be problematic. And the second point is that all of our conversations about trauma are much more effective and more powerful when they're grounded in an understanding of systemic trauma. And so you just had this podcast recently around healing justice, so I'm very much in that world. And those are the two points that I want to make mindfulness is more effective and powerful paired with trauma, and trauma is more powerful when it's paired with social justice. And I'll just give you a little bit of my background. I'm originally from Canada. I trained as a psychotherapist in British Columbia. And the specialty that I ended up in was working with male sex offenders. I was really interested in the intersection of trauma, restorative justice, sexuality, and ended up doing a lot of work with men who were coming out of prison or on parole. And 80, 85% of the guys that I worked with were themselves survivors of sexual trauma, sexual abuse. So I did vent for a number of years and was struggling under the weight of the work. It was, you know, just really challenging work, as listeners will know, working with trauma. And ended up mindfulness. At the time, and mindfulness meditation was becoming more popular, I had a couple friends recommend I come on a retreat. So I did, and really dove headfirst into mindfulness meditation. It became a really integral part of my life. Took it really seriously for a number of years, and went on a retreat. And I found that when I was on retreats, some of the images from my work with the guys I was working with were coming up. And it was almost like I was working through some of the trauma that I was being exposed to on the retreats. And on one particular retreat, this one particular image kept coming up. And at some point, something happened. And I'm happy to dig into this a little bit more, but basically, at some point on the retreat, it's almost like a circuit breaker went off in my body. And for a couple days, I was really dissociated. I went to the teachers and I said, hey, I don't really know what's happening here. I can't really feel my body. I'm really checked out. And the teachers, with the best of intentions, kept encouraging me to just go back to the cushion and really utilize the basic instructions around mindfulness. So I did that, but it didn't seem to make things better. It was actually making things worse. And then I got back. I got back after the retreat, and a couple people around me said, you know, it seems like the retreats that you're doing are actually making things worse for you. They're exacerbating something. And long story short, is this all kind of pooled around the conversation of mindfulness and trauma. I didn't realize it at the time, but some of the symptoms that I was experiencing were really related to the work I had been doing. So for listeners that have Done any work around secondary trauma or tertiary trauma. It was that, you know, I was going through my own challenges on retreat and applying mindfulness meditation, and it got me into a little bit of hot water. So I did a couple years of study. I did a dissertation on the topic. I started talking more publicly about this intersection of mindfulness and trauma. And what I discovered was that I wasn't alone in terms of people that had had challenging experiences with mindfulness meditation. People started to write me. My dissertation defense ended up a little bit viral, though. I use that in air quotes. You know, it was just, you know, a couple people. Thousand people watched it, and they just started to get. I started to get a lot of emails from people saying, hey, I've been meditating for a year, two years, five years, and I've actually had difficult experiences. So the end, basically where this landed me, and I'll. I'll pause, is I got to a moment of saying, oh, my gosh, I love mindfulness meditation and what it can offer people. I also think it can be very helpful for survivors based on some things that we can talk about. But I also had the sense that there might have been people, a small percentage of people who were out there in the world, who were falling through the cracks inside of meditation and inside of retreat structures. And so the primary question I've been in is, how do we leverage the potential benefits of mindfulness for survivors of trauma while at the same time protecting people from the potential pitfalls of practice? It's been the guiding question around my research around this book, and it's really the conversation that I'm now in, you know, doing podcasts and coming more out into the world. It's really. I'm not coming here to the conversation to say I have all the answers, but I definitely have a number of suggestions about how to offer mindfulness interventions or mindfulness meditation in a way that's sensitive to the needs of survivors of trauma.

[Laura Reagan]

Okay, that's wonderful. Thank you so much for sharing your experience. Because to me, it's so powerful to hear how, you know, you had been doing meditation, mindfulness practice for a while, and all of a sudden this thing happened that seemed like it was out of the blue. You know, I mean, I understand that you're saying you would be meditating and you would have some, you know, thoughts and images and some kind of stuff from your work coming up. But there was one time where something different happened. It was like a really deep reaction. Am I. Am I understanding that right?

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Yeah, that's right. It Felt like, for the most part, mindfulness meditation. And the practice was actually really helping me inside my clinical work. I mean, I was happier, I was more able to get some perspective and distance from strong emotions. I just felt more present for myself and the clients that I was working with. So for the most part, I found mindfulness and mindfulness meditation super helpful for me over a number of years. And then, yeah, on this particular retreat, I got caught in a bit of a loop where this particular memory was coming up. I'd apply basic mindfulness instruction. I'd attend to it, note it, not grasp it. But what I found was happening was that it was actually seeming to exacerbate a feeling of anxiety. It wasn't actually just passing like a cloud in the sky. And what I was doing was, well, I kept attending to it, kept attending to the thought. I'd note it, just let it go by. And then sometimes I'd have some requisite sensations like a feeling of anxiety in my chest or a tightness in my stomach, and then I'd be mindful of that. And the basic instruction to pay attention to this different stimuli that was happening seemed to actually make things worse for me. I ended up more dysregulated after the retreat than I was before. And so that just got me curious, like, well, what's happening for me and what might have been happening for other people that have trauma symptoms who are going on longer term retreats.

[Laura Reagan]

Yes, exactly. So I think this is just a really important point because so often, you know, I mean, I love mindfulness. I find it really helpful and I find it makes me a better clinician and I feel like a healthier person because I use it so personally and professionally, it helps me. And, you know, I think I have my own trauma and I, I think that it makes sense that as a trauma therapist, of course I'm aware as well that something can really sneak up on you that you don't realize is there, whether it's the impact of secondary trauma from work or your own trauma history, maybe attachment stuff that you just didn't know was there. Unmet attachment needs. So even for most people who don't have a specific experience of trauma, unmet attachment needs. Attachment wounds are extremely common too. So, you know, when you kind of look at who's out there, most of us have been through something that could come up and if we aren't aware of it and the, the teachers that we're counting on to help us stay safe in, in retreats aren't aware of what can happen and how to help and maybe how to prevent it, maybe how to notice when someone's not okay. You know, I think that it can really do harm to a person.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

I mean, I think that's spot on. And I think a lot of people who are teaching mindfulness interventions or practices or meditation, that they know that mindfulness is such a powerful, it's such a powerful medicine. And in many ways mindfulness, I think it will naturally reveal trauma or it will naturally reveal what you just said around attachment wounds, particular places where we were overwhelmed or where we weren't able to integrate a particular experience. So mindfulness is powerful that way. And I think a lot of teachers who teach it move in with the expectation that mindfulness will naturally reveal what needs to be addressed and healed. And to your point, what I'm really wanting to encourage with anyone teaching mindfulness. Well, I'll back up for a sec. What I, what I want to do actually is interrupt the idea that mindfulness is a panacea because I, I think that's been by virtue of a number of factors, the media included. You know, there's been, there's a story out there that, well, hey, we have three decades of empirical research now online. What could go wrong? Mindfulness reduces stress. We know that. What, you know, what could sitting and paying attention to your experience in the present moment, how bad could that be? And this isn't a fear monger at all. Like, for, for the majority of people, that will be hugely helpful. But then like you're saying, there, there's a select number of people who, when trauma is revealed, that that's going to overwhelm them. And just being alone in a contemplative environment, that's not necessarily going to help them. Actually that could end up exacerbating the problem and that could make things worse. So that's what I'm trying to, that's part of what I'm wanting to bring into the conversation. And I think it's happening in different circles now is really bursting the bubble around mindfulness just being this, you know, panacea and then trying to provide people with some really tangible, practical, grounded skills to help them offer mindfulness still in ways that are sensitive to the needs of trauma survivors.

[Laura Reagan]

Yes. So I always talk about this on this podcast, but we, we in our culture are so we're always looking for the answer, the quick fix, you know, the thing that's going to make everything okay. And I love mindfulness, like I said, and you know, just like anything, it's not all One thing, it's something that can help you get more present in your body. And what you might find when you get present in your body is that there's a reason why you didn't want to be in your body because what you're feeling is too intense for you to manage. And so, you know, I think it's, it's very important to be aware of, of how trauma can impact people.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

I agree, I totally agree. The. I'll jump in and just say to you and listeners too that the. I borrowed a four part definition around trauma informed practice that comes from the national center for Trauma Informed Care, which I found super clear and helpful and very practical. And it's, it's four Rs and it's realizing the widespread impact of trauma. Reckon being able to recognize trauma symptoms, responding to them effectively, and all in the service of preventing retraumatization. Beautiful.

[Laura Reagan]

So simple and clear.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

So simple. And the thing that I'm really interested in is that I've, I've started to meet people. One of the things I appreciate about your podcast is that you're, you're looking at trauma in a depthful way. In my experience, it's not a quick fix. You're not looking for, you know, just give me the pill. This is a path, it's a really deep path. And that's not, that's not against medication. By saying that about pills that can be also be really helpful but that, you know, trauma is depthful. It gets created at a, in these deep grooves that require time, over time and patience and practice to really resolve and heal. And what I want to get away from with trauma informed practice is any idea that this could just be a checklist and say, you know, a mindfulness, say a therapist who's using mindfulness who just says, well just give me the, give me the top 10 list. And I, and we, I have that, you know, I have, I'm happy to give lists and suggestions, but this first R I find so helpful about realizing the widespread impact of trauma. I think this asks us and this gets to the Healing justice podcast you just did. It asks us to really reflect on what do we mean by trauma. Who does trauma impact and how does that relate to the, to the larger systems that we're surrounded by. And that's part of my work around as well. It's not just an individual tragedy. It's actually something that's deeply connected to the world around us, especially systems of oppression which ties us into me, achoovement, Black Lives Matter, you know, there's just so much happening. Trauma isn't this isolated thing happening in a bubble. It's a, it's a pr. It's a, it's a concept that really asks us all to be in reflection about the world and what's happening. So that's why I love this definition is it's really saying, hey, this is a long term path that we all need to be on.

[Laura Reagan]

Yes, I love what you just said. I mean, it's like a different way of looking at the world. It's like, why are things the way they are? It's not really as random as it might seem. Like, why do we have wars? Well, there are reasons why we have wars. It's not just, oh, well, war is inevitable. No, there, you know, you can trace a path how we got to that point. Whatever, whatever conflict it is, you know, like if you look back, you can see what led to this and you know, systems of oppression, you know, basically exist to, I guess, reinforce or give power to specific groups only, and that's it. So, you know, when you look at it that way and you realize that that plays a fact, you know, it factors into how we, how our culture got to be, how it is. And all of the, you know, the violence and the pain that people have experienced individually and collectively over generations, it's all playing a part in what's happening. It's not. These aren't just like things that are isolated and random. And you know, I love what you said on your website about things that may seem accidental are often, you know, some groups of people experience a lot more of those types of quotes, unquote, accidents than others.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Right, right. I have to say that was one thing that really surprised me. I actually just hadn't. When I started learning about trauma, I thought, well, you know, trauma is a bad thing. That it's the, it's the really, it's the really, really bad thing that happens to humans. And, you know, there are accidents. And when someone broke it down for me and said, well, actually, accidents are not happening in a vacuum, who, who are the people that need to do potentially more dangerous work? Those folks who are poor, working class, who really don't have options about what work they're doing in that moment. And so, yeah, it's all happening inside a very deep social context. And to me, one of the most practical things, you know, folks that I've worked with will say, well, you know, what does that mean for me as a clinician? Like, how, what am I, what am I meant to do about that depending on one social context, you know, really what's, what's the move to make. And one of the stor. A lot of the stories that I've heard since doing research on the book was people that were going into mindfulness communities that were predominant. They were pretty privileged, predominantly, predominantly white folks, a lot of middle upper class folks who had a lot of class privilege. So these were, you know, friends of color people that were moving in to these spaces and, and, and didn't necessarily. They weren't working with an active trauma and yet they were in a space where they were fundamentally unseen and in many ways unsafe. And there are all these, you know, folks have probably heard this term around microaggressions. The teachers, teachers are making assumptions, were failing to see the stresses that these particular folks who I knew were facing. And it just created an environment where it was like this is so not practical for me to actually be doing deep transformative healing work. I can't because I don't feel safe, I don't feel seen. And so for those of us who work as clash clinicians or mindfulness teachers, for those of us who have privilege, and I include myself here, you know, cisgendered man, white, that it's an onus is on us to really do our work, to see how we've been shaped and that we haven't been targeted around oppression and that there are privileges we do have that, that really shields us from experiencing certain kinds of trauma. Now we're all vulnerable to experiencing trauma, but just to get that. And this isn't, I mean, not meaning this is some moralistic thing though it has that element to it around morals. To me, this is actually very practically how we can be in best service of the people who are our clients. Who we're working with is if we've done our work, no matter our social location or our context, we actually just, we're just more effective as practitioners. So that's one of the conversations I'm interested in, is how we learn about social context and do well when we're working as clinician.

[Laura Reagan]

So thought provoking. And I know that conversations about privilege often lead to a lot of discomfort and then we choose to just try not to think about it again because and, and I say we meaning people who are in a more privileged position, which I am too like you to when it brings up some kind of cognitive dissonance, something where I don't like how this makes me feel, you know, nevermind, this is too complicated. I'm just not going to think about it, which is, of course, a privilege to be able to just not think about it, because if you, you know, are affected more directly by systems of oppression, you have no choice but to think about it because it's what you're living in. And, but, you know, for those of us in a position of privilege. And again, I agree with you, it's not being moralistic, but I don't want to do harm, and I want to be part of the solution and not part of the problem. So if I'm not willing to look at these confusing questions, then I am part of the problem. And, you know, you. You sit with it in the way that you can and you do the best you can and.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Right, right. I, you know, I actually think, I mean, I, I'd love to get to. For you and for your listeners, I'd love to get into some of the, kind of the bigger questions about, well, why can. Why can mindfulness meditation be potentially triggering for people that have experienced trauma? And I just would like to say one more thing about where you just took it, which is, well, what do we. If we pull back for a second and say, really, really, what's the intersection of mindfulness and trauma? I mean, halfway through writing the book, I thought, what have I done? This is such a huge topic. I don't know, who am I to say anything about this? Just follow these threads. I mean, these are vast, complex traditions in both ways that have so much incredible history. But what I'm in, what I'm really fired up about right now is being in conversation with the mindfulness movement or mindfulness community, especially those who are in positions of privilege and saying, hey, you all, you've been spending years developing the capacity to be uncomfortable. You've been working that, that muscle in such a sustained and helpful way. It is the most amazing practice to be with what you just said around discomfort or cognitive dissonance. And what would it be like for the mindfulness movement to really turn and face the places where, where we tend to get uncomfortable and not have conversations? I think. Me too. I think Black Lives Matter is a prime example of places where folks who are in more positions of privilege will just pull back, myself included. I'll get uncomfortable. I check out. I don't want to be there. And what does it mean to take mindfulness as a power of mind and really apply it for the sake of justice, for the sake of more equity? And I, I think that's the long game that we're in when it comes to this conversation about mindfulness. And trauma. I want to get into the weeds with you a little bit and say, well, why? And what do we do? And I think that's the big play.

[Laura Reagan]

Yeah.

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So well said. Thank you. And I'm hoping that maybe you and I can have a deeper discussion about the trauma and systems of oppression conversation in a future conversation if you decide that you'd like to. But yeah, let's go to that. Why does trauma get triggered in mindfulness practice for some people and what causes it and those kinds of things and what can be done about it? Because I know that's the focus of your book.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Yeah, yeah, definitely. Well, I mean, I'd be curious to hear what you think of this and whether it makes sense to you. But the primary argument here is that when you ask, well, I'll back it up for a second. Those who are trauma, the listeners and naive working with trauma, you know that people can often be bombarded. Survivors can be really bombarded by sensations, thoughts, flashbacks, intrusive thoughts, and this feeling of being out of control in the body. And, and so when you. You could just imagine if you're asking someone who has a history of trauma or who's actively experiencing trauma symptoms to be still and silent and to pay close, sustained attention to their present moment experience, that you can just assume that at some point they're going to bump in to the traumatic symptoms that are. That are really in their consciousness. Now, that can be a great thing. But if you can just imagine being on a retreat, what it's like for someone who, you know, say they're on a weekend retreat, they get halfway through, they start to feel really dysregulated because there's a certain sensation that they're feeling related to a trauma, and they open their eyes and they look around and everyone else is in their own space doing their own practice. And this gets into attachment conversations as well, because there's no one there to really attach with. Now, there might be a teacher there who you can have a interview with. You can request an interview, or you have one every day or two, but unless the teacher is versed in trauma, then they may just apply basic instructions, which is, well, just keep paying attention. Just keep bringing your mindful attention back to your predominant experience. And this can. It can be problematic. Peter Levine, have you done any podcasts on somatic experiencing or has that been in the mix?

[Laura Reagan]

Not somatic experiencing. I do talk about sensory motor psychotherapy, which is similar, but not the same.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Yeah, awesome. Well, for folks who know it or are interested, this. It's a psychotherapeutic approach to healing trauma called somatic experiencing, developed by a biophysicist named Peter Levine. And I've done some training in somatic experiencing. And in one of his books, Peter Levine uses this myth, which I think is really helpful here around Medusa. And for those who know the myth, Perseus is in the cave and has this task of trying to defeat Medusa. But if you look directly into Medusa's eyes, one turns to stone. It's her superpower. And Levine uses this myth, I think, so aptly, around trauma. And to me, this is a real punchline of somatic experiencing work, which is more is not more when it comes to trauma and working with trauma skillfully. If you go as a clinician, if you go right at traumatic symptoms, it can overload the system. And that won't be news to a lot of listeners. But for me, as a, as a new therapist, you know, if someone's in an emotion, I'm thinking, I'm doing great. I'm I'm, I'm. They're getting their money's worth, so just, just go into it, do more of that. And somatic experiencing really said, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait. Actually, people need to have a certain amount of resource before they can really integrate symptoms of trauma. And so Levine uses this myth to say if, if you're going to be going at Medusa to try to heal, you're going to need to do it with some particular strategies. And, and my point is that mindfulness meditation is really plunking people inside of Medusa's cave, often without, without a lot of strategy or tools that they can use to avoid just looking at Medusa. Because if you can imagine you put a survivor on the cushion and, and pay attention to their breath, but say don't, don't pay attention to your racing heart. It's so hard. So that's, that's the basic idea here with mindfulness meditation, is that survivors can end up over attending to traumatic stimuli which can run them into trouble. It can create dysregulation, and if they're not working with someone one to one, it can really land them in trouble.

[Laura Reagan]

Yes. Something you said about being at the retreat, I have never done mindfulness retreat yet, but it really made me think if the person, if they go and ask for an interview and the person doesn't have an, an awareness of trauma, the teacher and doesn't have maybe an awareness of attachment or like so many people out there in the world, they may have their own attachment injuries that they don't know about. So their way of relating could be possibly to be a little bit dismissive or it could seem dismissive and how that could really, really exacerbate, you know, because the attachment thing is, you know, going to someone needing help and no one's there or you're, you know, you're denied the support you're seeking and, you know, so even though it may not be the intention of the teacher, if someone's trauma is really activated and they go and ask for help and the other person isn't really attuned to what they need, it could very much be re. Traumatizing like an attachment injury that might have happened when they were, you know, a baby crying in the crib and no one came, you know.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Totally, totally.

[Laura Reagan]

And you're not going to go into a retreat knowing that you were a baby crying in the crib and no one came.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

I know.

[Laura Reagan]

Because we can't remember back that far, but our bodies do.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Exactly, exactly. I think you get, you're touching here on one of the things I feel passionate about, which is this notion of spiritual bypassing.

[Laura Reagan]

Oh, thank you for bringing that up. Oh, I love that you said that. Keep going.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Yeah, yeah. So for folks that Robert Augustus Masters wrote a book on it and the term darn it, I'm going to forget right now. It was, oh, John Wellwood. John Walwood originally coined the term a psychotherapist in California. And it's really saying, when are we using spiritual practice to bypass certain developmental steps that we need for healing? And I, this is, I think that's some of the terrain that I'm in with the book. I want to hear what your. What, what gets you jazzed about it. But I'll just, just as an example. So I've met people who are big dissociators. I'm, I mean, I, I have that as part of my, I don't know if it was my full major, but I know people where as a result of their, either their attachment wounds or particular traumas they faced. Dissociation was really the place that they went pretty consistently over time and on a spectrum, of course. And here's an example. Now what, probably if you pull back what a person who's experiencing dissociation needs, I mean, a number of the guests that you've interviewed on your podcast would be able to give them really grounded, tangible suggestions and be able to work with them skillfully. Often they need to work with someone, you know, but imagine this person saying they end up in a mindfulness community and they are doing medium to longer term practice. They're going on five, seven, 14, maybe three month retreats. 14 day, three month retreats. And what I've seen happen is that people who can dissociate end up getting a lot of props inside of a mindfulness community. Now, not always, but I, you know someone who said, hey, listen, I can sit down and I can basically sit there for three hours at a time. I don't move because that's actually my safety strategy. That's, that's actually a survival mechanism. That is a well worn groove inside my brain. And, and teachers would come up to them and say, you, your practice is so powerful. You are so skillful. And they were, they were getting, you get the point.

[Laura Reagan]

They meant for the.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Exactly, exactly. And they were thinking, well, I guess I'm a good meditator. But then five, ten years later they're saying, I don't think I'm healing. I'm doing everything I can. I'm doing these longer term retreats but I'm actually not living a happier life. And so I think this is an example of spiritual bypassing where, again, not intentional at all.

[Laura Reagan]

Right.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

But there's no one inside the system who's saying, actually, you know what? I think you're skipping over something that needs to be addressed either in therapy or another modality, but that mindfulness wasn't actually. Or meditation, I should say, was not the medicine. But tell me more about what, what gets you fired up about spiritual bypassing.

[Laura Reagan]

Well, yeah, I'm not that good at hiding when I get really excited about something. But I, I, I just think that we can so easily tell ourselves, oh, yeah, I'm doing all the right things. And we think we're, you know, we're doing our work through yoga practice, through meditation practice, gratitude practice, you know, finding joy. And those things are so wonderful. And yet sometimes we don't know what we don't know. So we're actually, like you said, kind of skipping an important step or task that needs to be touched on, to move through. And, you know, I just think it's the, the lack, the lack of awareness about trauma is still so astounding to me. There are so many people who just really don't know about it, don't, don't realize how pervasive it is. And even among clinicians who know about it, many don't recognize it because it's not what they learned or, you know, they have their own blind spots. I mean, we all have those. So I've, I have seen how spiritual bypass can happen, and some, some ways that certain communities, you know, not any that I would want to call out specifically, but sometimes people are really, they're, they're working really hard and they believe they're doing their healing work, and they're totally missing some really important pieces, I guess. One example, I don't know if you would see this as spiritual bypass, but I think that's what the process is, is when people say, oh, I'm not getting into a victim mentality. I've, you know, yeah, I was raped or, yeah, I was abused as a child, but, you know, I don't want to be a victim, you know, so I'm just putting that in the past and just, you know, I'm moving on, I'm staying positive. And I think that it's great to have a positive attitude, but it's not helpful to your healing process to pretend that you're not affected by something that is affecting you, you know, and so I think, you know, we can Quickly kind of dismiss our own pain and say that that's our healing journey. You know, I'm. I'm not staying down in the negativity. I'm going towards the light. It's not, you know, I don't have time for that. That's in the past, you know, and it's like, if it's really in the past, then great. But if it's just something that you can't actually look at and you're telling yourself that you are looking at it, but you aren't, you know, that's where spiritual bypass. I think it can be a little bit frustrating because I, you know, if I'm working with a client who has experienced trauma and I want them to be able to heal and we're all on our own path, so I don't need to control someone else. That's my little blind spot, one of them. But, you know, I, it can be. It's just like you, you want the person to see what they're missing, and if they don't see it, you know, they just have to come to it on their own. But, you know, I mean, if you gently try to get them to try to consider or be curious and they're just not there, that's just where they are and that's okay. But, you know, it's. It's hard to see people suffering and unaware that of what they might be missing that could help them in their healing process. So I, I think that spiritual bypass topic really is like something I get really into.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Yeah. Yeah, me too. I think that's the, that's the domain that we're in here with this conversation. I, I actually on your point, I, I think this is one of the things I've learned about trauma and I find so humbling is the way that you just can't BS trauma, right? You. You cannot. You. Do you know what I'm saying? That this is where all the cognitive behavioral work that I had done, no matter the new thoughts that I was thinking, I. If I was just building new practices over top of a shape that was contracted and trunk would just sloth. And I just, I hear you. And I think that's one of the profound things about the way that traumatic stress, the more we learn about it, we see it's just impacting the oldest parts of the brain, the limbic system, the reptilian brain, that, that when, that when we get shaped that deeply, whether it's around our attachment, whether it's around traumatic experiences we've had, whether it's facing oppression our entire lives that were shaped so deeply at that really foundational biological level in our brains that you can't just. Yeah, you just can't make nice over top of it. You can't. That's not what you were saying about making nice. But you really cannot. If you, if your body is functioning on that deep of a level, you can't, you can't really do much but actually work with it at a body based level. So I actually just want one other example I want to throw in around this, around social justice is. And maybe you've been in communities like this. I know I have. Where people have done this intense spiritual bypass around social justice work and told people who are really facing oppression and said, you clearly, you just need to go, either go to the light or you need to do more affirmation practice or you just don't understand. And so that can be such an intense bypass that I think communities can do.

[Laura Reagan]

Yeah. And talk about microaggression. I mean, it's almost not micro, but you know, to the person who's trying to be in that community is like, wait a second, are you wrong or am I wrong? Like what, what happened?

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Exactly.

[Laura Reagan]

Yeah. I also thought of when people say, oh, I don't see color, it's like, no, no, you're still missing the point. You're still missing the point.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Right. And that's a great place to dig into. I have that part of me. I said that a couple times in my life where I really thought that was equity and then had people who really helped educate me around. Oh, maybe that's, maybe that's not true. There's a book that just came out called so youo Want to Talk About Race. And I'm. I apologize, I don't remember the. Someone just handed me the book and I don't have the author's name, but she lays out black writer from the uk I believe. No, Seattle, my bad. Who lays out a whole argument about what you just said about, well, why, why that's actually hurtful and why that's a microaggression. And she just did a great job writing about that.

[Laura Reagan]

Oh, good. I'll find out who she is and put a link to that in the show notes. And thank you for bringing that up. And yeah, I mean, this. There's so many ways that we can go with this. And I. That's why I want to talk to you more if I can, because, you know, I think that we're. We're both picking up what each other's putting down and I just want to hear more and, and share your. All that you have to share with everyone who listens, I guess, to keep us focused on mindfulness and trauma for this conversation. What would you say about what can be done to help either? I don't think you can necessarily prevent. Maybe you can help prevent and also to address when people's trauma does get triggered in mindfulness practice.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

This is what I'm learning about. Thanks for the question. And what I'm learning about this topic is that it's really easy to talk for however long we've been talking 40 minutes and not actually get into the, the practical suggestions because it's just such an evocative and, and it's, it's a topic that can go in so many different directions. So yeah, that's why, I mean that's really the book that was. The whole, was, the whole thing was to say people were saying the, the book was originally a critique and I, I brought it to a couple different publishers and they said, well, if you're going to write a critique, you really need to help people who are going to ask the question, well, what do we actually do for those of us that are practicing mindfulness or teaching it? So I'm happy to give some headlines and if there's any you want to go into here, I'm happy to. Or folks can go and just check it out themselves.

[Laura Reagan]

Definitely. I hope they will check it out themselves because there's no way we could discuss everything in your book. I wish.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I mean a lot of them will be practical and common sense to folks. There's 30, there's 36 different modifications that I cover in the book. And they range from things like taking a break, knowing this is around basic mindfulness meditation instruction, or using different anchors of attention. So in the Vipassana and insight movement, which is the meditation tradition that I came up in, the typical place to focus one's attention is the sensations of the breath. And that can be at the nostrils, that can also be in the belly. And for survivors, the breath, it's not often neutral. It's often highly charged with sympathetic responses that are either locked into the nervous system or are still being triggered. And so the breath is not an easy place for a lot of survivors to rest their attention. So one of the modifications can be offering people different anchors of attention to work with that could be the sensations of one's buttocks on the cushion or touching their knees or working with sound like there's lots of different Options. And I'll give you one more, which is, and a lot of your listeners will know this, the importance of being an invitation into practice instead of a command. It's just which for a lot of folks is common sense. And then for some folks, they just wouldn't have considered the importance of inviting folks in versus telling them. So, you know, for a lot of trauma survivors, the feeling of being out of control is a big one. Or that their trauma is connected to someone having dominated them, or just the simple languaging about inviting people in. Like, hey, if you'd like to, we'd like you to like, invite you to close your eyes in the next couple breaths instead of, okay, close your eyes, which just comes. It's just a different tone. And so we want to create an environment without being. We don't want to go so far, I don't think is to be so overly protective. Like, people have deep resilience. If survivors got this far, we have to respect. We want to respect that. And at the same time, there's all these modifications we can bring in that I think are just practical and helpful for us to have in our toolkit if we're working as clinicians or teachers. So those are, those are a couple headlines.

[Laura Reagan]

Yeah. You know, what you said about inviting instead of commanding is just such a simple way to remind someone that the teacher knows that the person has a choice of what they choose to do and not, you know, not being powerless and not being without agency.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Exactly. I mean, I think you interviewed David Emerson at some point. Trauma sensitive yoga. I mean, that's a huge component of trauma informed practice, especially around body based practice, is people have to know. Survivors have to know they're in choice. And what that opens up when they know that they have that choice and autonomy and that it's granted in a really powerful embodied way. And not just lip service. I think that can be profound. Just, just that alone can be profound. And some of the other things I talk about in the book, there's these different principles. One is, well, what do you do with attention? How. How do you work skillfully with attention? How do you work with the body? What do you do with relationship? I mean, a lot of mindfulness meditation is solitary for good reason. But how do you leverage interpersonal relationship attachment? How do you leverage that towards trauma healing? What do we do around the meditation environment? If we're in an office as a clinician, like, what are the things at a really practical level that we can do to set everyone up for success? That's What I'm most interested in.

[Laura Reagan]

Oh, it's amazing. It's, it's wonderful. And I mean, so practical because you know, everything you're talking about. I do practice in a trauma informed way. I'm sure there are some times where I don't get it right. But, you know, just knowing there are so many things, like you don't walk up behind someone. You don't, you know, force people to sit with their back to the wall. You don't put some, something between, you know, you and the person where they can't.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Right.

[Laura Reagan]

Escape. And, you know, just being aware of how someone who, what, what helps create a safe space. I mean, that's just so there's. The safe container is so many things. It's not just the physical space. But your book sounds amazing and the work you're doing is incredible. I, I just, I'm really grateful that you were willing to come onto therapy chat and all the ways that you're out there spreading your message. I'm just really in awe.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Thanks, Laura. Thanks. I really appreciate it. And thanks for all the work that you're doing and the people you're having on. And I know it's no small thing to hold what you're holding. So I welcome, I welcome contact from you. Any listeners, they want to reach out and get a hold of me, they're definitely welcome to do that. My, my email's on here, so anytime or on my website, anytime. And I also want folks to know that 60% of the book is going to three different social justice organizations that are really doing work around shifting conditions, shifting conditions of oppression that really exacerbate trauma. So if folks want to learn more about that or interested in engaging me about that, they can get in touch or they can just pick up the book and see what they think.

[Laura Reagan]

Yeah. So please, David, tell our listeners where they can find you. And I would love if you wanted to tell them what organizations you're donating the proceeds to as well.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

So if folks, if they just look me up, it's David trelevin.com, which, so they can look on the website that'll give lots of information about the book, where they can buy it, independent bookstores, larger ones, whatever they want. And the three groups are a group called Generative Somatics, which I partner with. It's a group, we're doing social justice informed, somatic work with, with organizers and activists, basically trying to empower them to be doing the work they're doing. Black Lives Matter has a healing justice program that I'm donating to and there's a group in the bay called the Sogorete Land Trust, which is facilitating the return of land there back to Indigenous stewardship. And that was a big nod for just the fact that I wrote this book in the San Francisco Bay Area and wanting to lift up Indigenous leadership and also the amazing activism that they're doing. So if folks want to learn more, they can go on the website and check it out. And again, really happy to engage with anyone around it.

[Laura Reagan]

Thank you. I love it. You're putting your money where your mouth is, literally.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Thanks. Yeah, it feels a good stand.

[Laura Reagan]

Yeah. Well, David, thank you so much for coming onto Therapy Chat today. I'll be sure to put links to your website and your book in the show notes and I just really appreciate you sharing your time today.

[Dr. David Treleaven]

Thanks Laura. Happy to be on with you.

[Laura Reagan]

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Thank you for listening to Therapy Chat with your host Laura Reagan, LCSWC. For more information please visit therapychatpodcast.com.