Francesca Maximé sits down for a conversation with somatic psychologist Pat Ogden about applying mindfulness towards the ways that our bodies and minds relate to trauma.

Pat Ogden, PhD, is a pioneer in somatic psychology. Pat is both Founder and Education Director of Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute. An internationally recognized school specializing in somatic–cognitive approaches for the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder and attachment disturbances. Learn more at sensorimotorpsychotherapy.org

Getting Unstuck with Mindfulness

Pat talks about the Embedded Relational Mindfulness practice that uses with her clients. Francesca and Pat talk about how mindfulness can be used to bring awareness to our experiences.

“The way that we organize experience drives the content of our lives.” – Pat Ogden

Learn more about healing trauma through Somatic Experiencing with Dr. Peter A. Levine on Ep. 5 of the ReRooted Podcast

Standing Tall (7:15)

Francesca and her guest discuss our relationship to past trauma. How does trauma relate to the posture of the body? What is the potential for Relational Mindfulness to address trauma linked to our bodies?

Relational Alchemy (27:35)

Pat speaks about the principles that guide our lives. What is the importance of acknowledging and working with these unique principles?

“I think therapists don’t really consider the philosophical and spiritual principles that inform the context that we work in.” – Pat Ogden

What Privilege Means (41:15)

How do the issues of privilege and race factor into trauma and how we relate to experience? Pat and Francesca look at how progress in this area relates to our individual and collective journey of awakening.

Dr. Peter A. Levine, a pioneer in the field of psychology, visits the Rerooted podcast to discuss healing trauma through Somatic Experiencing.

Dr. Peter A. Levine has worked in the field of stress and trauma for over 40 years and is the developer of the Somatic Experiencing method. Peter was awarded the Lifetime Achievement award from the United States Association for Body Psychotherapy (USABP). He also received the honorary Reis Davis Chair in Child Psychiatry for his innovative contribution to therapy for children and adolescents. Learn more at traumahealing.org.

Trauma and Memory

What is the connection between trauma, stress and our memory? Peter speaks about the important differences in explicit (declarative) memory, body (procedural) memory, and emotional (limbic) memory. He and Francesca discuss the interconnection between these forms of memory and how they relate to trauma.

“A specific class of procedural memories are the memories that have to do with threat, danger, helplessness, and shutdown. These are profound global states that the nervous system and the body goes through. What happens, if we have been unsuccessful where we have been threatened and we were overwhelmed. Is that memory will become long-lasting. Sort of like how the memory of riding a bike becomes long-lasting. These memories tend to be permanent. But they are not. We have to access them. And the way to access them is through the body. Through sensation.” – Dr. Peter A. Levine

Healing Through Somatic Experiencing (12:35)

How can working with sensation relieve our deep-seated traumas? We explore the mind, body, connection that allows Somatic Experiencing to heal in an integrated way. Peter shares a practice that uses with clients to get in touch and work with the senses.

A Gateway to the Heart (24:00)

Can the journey to healing trauma become a portal to a spiritual awakening? Francesca and Peter discuss the way that traumatic experiences can get in the way of our social engagement system and cause isolation from our interconnection with the world. They look at the ways that trauma shifts us out of our natural state of calm and locks us into a detached state of fight or flight.

“To really have an authentic experience in the meditation practice, we do need to in some ways

address the trauma that is there in the territory of consciousness.” – Dr. Peter A. Levine

https://traumahealing.org/

My latest #ReRooted podcast on Be Here Now Network is out! Diana Fosha PH.D. of AEDP Institute https://beherenownetwork.com/francesca-maxime-rerooted-ep-4-diana-fosha/

Therapist Diana Fosha visits the ReRooted Podcast for a conversation about innovative methods for healing trauma.

Diana Fosha, Ph.D., is the developer of AEDP, a healing-based, transformation-oriented model of psychotherapeutic treatment, and is the Founder and Director of the AEDP Institute. She has been on the faculties of the Departments of Psychiatry and Psychology of NYU and St. Luke’s/Roosevelt Medical Centers (now Mount Sinai) in NYC, and of the doctoral programs in clinical psychology at the Derner Institute for Advanced Psychological Studies and The City University of New York. Learn more about Diana’s AEDP method at aedpinstitute.org

The Healing is Always There

Diana discusses the principals of her AEDP method of therapy and trauma recovery. She and Francesca discuss AEDP’s emphasis on the relational connection between the therapist and the client.

“I think this is something that is so fundamental to AEDP and to how I work, that the healing is there. It is about engaging it and bringing it forth. Getting it to engage with that that is broken. It is not like we are broken and, at the end, we are healed. It is like the two are side-by-side.” – Diana Fosha

Explore healing from a different perspective with Somatic Experiencing Practitioner Oren Jay Sofer on Ep. 86 of the Metta Hour Podcast

Existing in the Heart and Mind of an Other (14:30)

How can a deep relational connection low our defenses and allow us to heal from trauma? Diana shares how recognizing another for who they really are can open them to this kind of healing.

“Sometimes the small things, little details, can provoke a profound sense of, ‘Oh, I exist for you. Feeling seen and cared about in those terms is just huge – people just melt.” – Diana Fosha

No Longer Lost (40:00)

Francesca and Diana discuss the breakthroughs that occur during therapy and spiritual practice which awaken a person to a deeper understanding of themselves. They discuss the life-changing shift that is inevitable once someone realizes their potential for positive transformation.

#ReRooted on the Be Here Now Network, Dr. Diane Poole Heller

https://beherenownetwork.com/francesca-maxime-rerooted-ep-3-dr-diane-poole-heller/

video of interview: https://youtu.be/Clw7Mxk4pfc

Francesca Maximé is joined by Dr. Diane Poole Heller for a conversation around viewing trauma as a portal to spirituality and creating deep and lasting relationships.

Diane Poole Heller, Ph.D., is an established expert in the field of Adult Attachment Theory and Models, trauma resolution, and integrative healing techniques. She is a trainer, presenter, and speaker offering workshops, teleseminars and educational materials on Trauma, Attachment Models and their dynamics in childhood and adult relationships, as well as many other topics. Learn more about her practice at www.dianepooleheller.com.

Trauma as a Portal

Dr. Heller looks at the possibility of gaining wisdom and developing a spiritual connection through traumatic experiences. She and Francesca discuss ways we can integrate those experiences back into our body and grow from them.

“In these cracks and fragments between these parts of ourselves, we often have this experience of having easier spiritual access. One of the challenges is, how do we then come back into our body and integrate it in a way that is healing? How do we integrate all those continuum of experiences?” – Dr. Diane Poole Heller

The Power of Attachment (19:25)

What can we do to develop a deeper connection and a more secure attachment in a relationship? Diane looks at methods available for regulating our relationships and mindfully connecting to another person.

Ram Dass speaks about the interconnection between spiritual awakening and our relationships on Ep. 78 of the Here and Now Podcast

When Attachment Goes Wrong (34:30)

How do we work with the negative potential of attachment? Francesca and Diane talk about what happens when attachment goes wrong and how we can move back to secure and supportive attachment.

#ReRooted podcast on Be Here Now Network

https://beherenownetwork.com/francesca-maxime-rerooted-ep-2-why-does-patriarchy-persist-with-carol-gilligan/

video: https://youtu.be/h5xtlFGMjEI

This week on the ReRooted Podcast, Francesca is joined by psychologist Carol Gilligan for a conversation around how our identity, development, and relationships are impacted by systematic inequality.

Carol Gilligan is an American feminist, ethicist, and psychologist best known for her work on ethical community and ethical relationships, and certain subject-object problems in ethics. She is a professor at New York University and a visiting professor at the University of Cambridge. She is teaching as a visiting professor at New York University, Abu Dhabi. Carol is best known for her 1982 work, In a Different Voice, and has been credited with inspiring the passage of the 1994 Gender Equity in Education Act.

Why Does Patriarchy Persist?

Carol shares the inspiration for her most recent book, Why Does Patriarchy Persist? – which explores the persistence of patriarchal societies with her co-author, Naomi Snider. Carol and Francesca explore the impact of patriarchal systems on the men and women that they suppress.

“Patriarchy is a hierarchy, democracy is equal voice. You have to have an equal voice if you are going to deal with conflicts in relationships. Whether it is your personal relationships or it is a democracy, it depends on everyone having a voice. Patriarchy elevates the voices of fathers. So it elevates the voices of some men over other men and all men over women.” – Carol Gilligan

In A Different Voice (14:30)

Francesca and Carol explore Carol’s famous early work, “In A Different Voice.” Carol speaks about the deep traumas and issues that develop when we suppress aspects of our humanity by labeling them masculine and feminine.

“I wrote the essay ‘In A Different Voice’ in the 1970s. Between then and now, there has been a growing consensus that as humans we are relational responsive beings. Increasingly, across the human sciences, scientists are saying that is who we are as human. That was key to the survival as a species – our capacity to cooperate, care and be empathic. What is so interesting is, when did that get gendered feminine? That is where the word patriarchy comes in because this taking of human capacity and saying that, ‘reason is masculine and emotion is feminine,’ or ‘The self is masculine men because men are supposed to be autonomous and self-sufficient. Women are supposed to relational and emotional and responsive to other people – that we don’t really have a voice of our own.” – Carol Gilligan

What Do We Do Now? (35:50)

Carol looks at what everyone, across the gender spectrum, can do to sustain and further the current push back at the American patriarchy. She and Francesca talk about what those who have adopted the patriarchy have to benefit by shifting to a system centered around equality.

#ReRooted on Be Here Now Network: Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt

https://beherenownetwork.com/francesca-maxime-rerooted-ep-1-harville-hendrix-and-helen-lakelly-hunt/

video of interview: https://youtu.be/vfHhl4ZMGHg

Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt join Francesca Maximé on the premiere episode of the ReRooted podcast for a conversation around the ways that relationships operate in our culture and how we can heal and cultivate our inner life through healthy relationships.

Harville Hendrix Ph.D. and Helen LaKelly Hunt Ph.D. are internationally-respected couple’s therapists, educators, speakers, and New York Times bestselling authors. Together, they have written over 10 books with more than 4 million copies sold, including the timeless classic, Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples. Harville has also been a long time reoccurring guest on the Oprah Winfrey television program, sharing his and Hellen’s approach to healing and cultivating relationships. Learn more about Helen, Harville and their Imago approach to relationship therapy at harvilleandhelen.com.

Creating a Relational Culture

Helen and Harville talk about the idea of cultivating a relational culture. Can a change in cultural norms affect the way our relationships function?

“What we are currently engaged in and committed to is a movement in activities toward creating a relational culture. That is a radical shift from the culture we have grown up in in the Western world, at least for the past 200 years, which has been focused on singularity, on the individual, on the isolated person, on the self – without reference to context. Without reference to the fact that we do live in a culture. That we do live in a culture and that the culture is not just a container we live in, it permeates our thoughts and feelings. Every interaction we have with our partners in a relationship is unconsciously mediated by the values of the culture.” – Harville Hendrix

Relationships and the Spiritual Life (7:08)

How can relationships act as a portal to a deeper inner life? Harville takes a look at the way relationships can connect us closer to the essence of being. Helen talks about pursuing a marriage based on partners making a commitment towards healing one another within the relationship.

“There was the romantic phase (of marriage). You marry because you want to get what you want out of it – it’s about me. We think that we are on the cusp of a new kind of marriage, which is a healing partnership. Look at the divorce rate with that other kind of marriage. We think if two people can look at marriage with a new lens. That that both of them come to a marriage wounded and they make a commitment to healing each other’s wound. That is the marriage that endures.” – Helen LaKelly Hunt

Check out Ram Dass’s reflection on the yoga of relationships on Ep. 17 of the Here and Now Podcast

Healing Our Wounds (19: 35)

Do the unresolved wounds that we collect as children affect the way we function and relate in our adult relationships. Harville and Helen examine the importance of partners engaging each other in safe and structured dialog, A dialog that constructively and gently sheds truth on the ways our deep seeded wounds are affecting our current relationship.

Cooperation Required (37:45)

We close with a conversation around the need for cooperation in any relationship. Harville and Helen talk about the drastic shift that occurs when both partners make an equal commitment to a relationship.

Some BIG NEWS!!

In today's short #WiseGirl podcast, I explain that I'm rebranding #WiseGirl to the new name, #ReRooted, and moving this podcast to Ram Dass's Be Here Now Network beginning April 19, 2019 and it will air every two weeks on Fridays and can be found here: https://beherenownetwork.com/category/francesca-maxime/

They’ll still also be pushed out to iTunes https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rerooted-with-francesca-maxim%C3%A9/id1460164109

as well as other podcasting outlets like Stitcher and Spotify

Here is the first episode with Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt on wise relationships!

https://art19.com/shows/73cbceba-2c05-41e5-8f04-97524eef7368/episodes/732da7e0-6f17-4300-9ece-992211ac367b/embed

Some upcoming summer lineup/guests on #ReRooted include:

Resmaa Menakem on somatic experiencing and cultural/racial trauma

Shelly Harrell on racial trauma and joy

Pat Ogden on Sensorimotor Psychotherapy and white privilege

Percy Ballard and Katie Lindgren on IFS and implicit bias

Tim McCarthy, civil rights historian and professor at Harvard

Shawn Ginwright on Healing Centered versus Trauma Informed and racial healing

Patti Digh on white privilege

Carol Gilligan of NYU on patriarchy

Greg Snyder and Jozen on undoing patriarchy and oppression

Grammy-winning bassist Christian McBride on music and arts as healing tools in communities of color

Executive Editor of the New York Times Dean Baquet on truth and the state of the news and the storylines

Lama Rod Owens on black queer feminist theory practices and Buddhism and his book Radical Dharma

Terry Real on relationally, healing multigenerational trauma and undoing systemic patriarchy

Janina Fisher on trauma and disassociation/parts work

Peter Levine on trauma and spirituality

Diana Fosha on relationally and AEDP

I'm thrilled to be invited alongside esteemed teachers including my mentor Jack Kornfield, Tara Brach, Sharon Salzberg, Joseph Goldstein, and more.

On #ReRooted, we will continue to explore conversations around the issues of mindfulness, social justice, psychology, neuroscience, and the creative arts. So the type of content won't change but the location will! You can find the podcasts on the website above, my website www.maximeclarity.com, and on iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud, and all your favorite podcasting outlets.

I'll also still share the videos of the interviews here on Facebook at www.facebook.com/maximeclarity and YouTube at www.youtube.com/francescamaxime and the episodes will also be on the Be Here Now Network YouTube Page https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc1lvEoC5PZWm-MzgUfJQfg

Much metta to all,

Francesca

www.maximeclarity.com

In today's #WiseGirl video podcast, I speak with trauma expert Dr. Bessel Van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps The Score. He talks about the physiology behind what transforms trauma in the brain and body, how modalities like yoga can help transform trauma, self-awareness and curiosity about noticing what we're experiencing, how oppressive, systemic societal structures influence the degree of trauma people experience, how systems (housing, healthcare) that support greater wellbeing can help prevent trauma, and we also address who often does -- and doesn't -- have access to the kinds modalities often helpful for trauma healing.

***

http://besselvanderkolk.net/index.html

***

​Bessel van der Kolk MD has spent his career studying how children and adults adapt to traumatic experiences, and has translated emerging findings from neuroscience and attachment research to develop and study a range of potentially effective treatments for traumatic stress in children and adults.

In 1984, he set up one of the first clinical/research centers in the US dedicated to study and treatment of traumatic stress in civilian populations, which has trained numerous researchers and clinicians specializing in the study and treatment of traumatic stress, and which has been continually funded to research the impact of traumatic stress and effective treatment interventions. He did the first studies on the effects of SSRIs on PTSD; was a member of the first neuroimaging team to investigate how trauma changes brain processes, and did the first research linking BPD and deliberate self-injury to trauma and neglect in early childhood.

Much of his research has focused on how trauma has a different impact at different stages of development, and that disruptions in care-giving systems have additional deleterious effects that need to be addressed for effective intervention. In order to promote a deeper understanding of the impact of childhood trauma and to foster the development and execution of effective treatment interventions, he initiated the process that led to the establishment of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN), a Congressionally mandated initiative that now funds approximately 150 centers specializing in developing effective treatment interventions, and implementing them in a wide array of settings, from juvenile detention centers to tribal agencies, nationwide.

He has focused on studying treatments that stabilize physiology, increase executive functioning and help traumatized individuals to feel fully alert to the present. This has included an NIMH funded study on EMDR and NCCAM funded study of yoga, and, in recent years, the study of neurofeedback to investigate whether attentional and perceptual systems (and the neural tracks responsible for them) can be altered by changing EEG patterns.

​His efforts resulted in the establishment of Trauma Center that consist of a well-trained clinical team specializing in the treatment of children and adults with histories of child maltreatment, that applies treatment models that are widely taught and implemented nationwide, a research lab that studies the effects of neurofeedback and MDMA on behavior, mood, and executive functioning, and numerous trainings nationwide to a variety of mental health professional, educators, parent groups, policy makers, and law enforcement personnel.

In today's #WiseGirl podcast, I sit down with psychotherapist and dating and relationship expert Ken Page to discuss Mindful Dating. He walks us through a process of self-discovery of our "core gifts" and how opening to the very things about which we feel most vulnerable can lead to true connection and lasting love. Enjoy and Happy Valentine's Day!

***

www.deeperdating.com

www.deeperdatingpodcast.com

KEN PAGE, LCSW, is a renowned psychotherapist, leading Psychology Today blogger, Huffington Post blogger and author of the bestseller Deeper Dating: How to Drop the Games of Seduction and Discover the Power of Intimacy. He has been featured in O, The Oprah Magazine, The New York Times, Cosmopolitan, Fox News, WPIX-TV News and more. Page has led hundreds of workshops on intimacy and spirituality for thousands of participants. He has taught at Columbia University, the Omega Institute and the Garrison Institute. Before writing his book, Page founded Deeper Dating in 2004; an event in which trained facilitators shared the insights of Deeper Dating and then led participants in a series of fun and enriching exercises. The live events he led provided an alternative to the bar scene and superficial dating events and drew thousands of men and women of all ages, backgrounds and sexual orientations. His work has been highly acclaimed by numerous top thought leaders, including Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt, Arielle Ford, Edward Hallowell, MD, Chip Conley, and Judith Orloff, MD. Katherine Woodward Thomas, New York Times bestselling author of Calling in The One and Conscious Uncoupling says, “Ken Page is my new relationship guru!”

In today's #WiseGirl podcast, I have the privilege of interviewing psychiatrist Dr. Judith Herman, incest and trauma expert.

During our wide-ranging interview, Dr. Herman discusses how she first came to studying incest and trauma (believing her patients), Freud and psychiatry's history regarding women and incest, statistics around childhood sexual abuse, the importance of (survivors) being and feeling safe, what justice would ideally look like from the survivor/victim's perspective, and more.

What's more, we talk about individual and collective trauma, the #MeToo and #TimesUp, feminism, and the culture of silence and what bystanders -- especially men who want to be allies -- can do to help.

Dr. Herman is the author of Father-Daughter Incest; Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence--From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror; as well as her recent contribution to The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President, released in 2017.

More on Dr. Herman's work can be found here https://www.challiance.org/cha-services/victims-of-violence

Dr. Herman's books on group work with survivors, can be found here: https://www.guilford.com/author/Judith-Lewis-Herman

***

Dr. Herman's partial bio, excerpted from Wikipedia, is here: Judith Lewis Herman (born 1942) is an American psychiatrist, researcher, teacher, and author who has focused on the understanding and treatment of incestand traumatic stress.

Herman is Professor of clinical psychiatry at Harvard University Medical School and Director of Training at the Victims of Violence Program in the Department of Psychiatry at the Cambridge Health Alliance in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and a founding member of the Women's Mental Health Collective.