“You’re not cognitively holding onto that unsafety. It’s your body that’s holding the unsafety.”
In this episode, Nick speaks with Cecile Tucker about the complexities of trauma, exploring its various forms and impacts on individuals. They discuss the importance of understanding trauma beyond major life events, the daily chaos that can contribute to trauma, and the significance of experiential counseling in bridging the gap between awareness and action. Cecile emphasizes the need for reprogramming the subconscious to heal trauma, the effects of generational trauma, and the importance of integration in applying learned insights.
“Trauma is just being in your sympathetic and not being able to step back into the parasympathetic. The difference between trauma and non-trauma is can you choose to flow between, or are you stuck in the sympathetic?”
“When we let go of understanding it and we simply work with what is, our body helps us transform that trauma when we give it the space to do so.”
“When each person heals, we reach this point where we then want to help others heal. The healthier we become, the healthier our communities become, our systems become.”
Cecile Tucker is not just a trauma clinician but also the proud owner of WellMind Counselling, a trauma counseling agency. Cecile is passionate and somewhat nerdy about her love for understanding trauma and trauma healing. She aims to equip others with the tools and insights needed to navigate the complexities of trauma care, both for themselves and others.
Check out these other episodes about trauma.
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Click To View The Episode Transcript
Nick (00:01.257)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show, we have Cecile Tucker. Cecile, how you doing today?
Cecile (she/her) (00:11.948)
I’m doing so well. Thanks. How are you doing?
Nick (00:13.417)
I’m good, I’m excited. We’re gonna get into a lot of things about trauma, which those of you who listen to this podcast often know that that’s kind of where most of these things go, because there’s a lot of trauma that is in most people’s lives. One of the things we’re gonna get into is how some people have a lot of trauma just the first fucking thing in the morning. Like they wake up and it’s almost instant trauma. So I’m excited to talk about that stuff, but why don’t you kick us off? Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre?
Cecile (she/her) (00:18.222)
Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (00:31.48)
you
Cecile (she/her) (00:42.592)
Mm-hmm. So I am a clinical counselor. So I live up in Canada in BC, so on the West Coast. And I am a trauma counselor and I also own a trauma counseling agency. So Well Mind Counseling is my agency and we’re all trauma clinicians here. So, so excited to talk about trauma because it is my bread and butter and I’m super like passionate about it, like nerdy passionate. So I love whenever I can meet someone. And that would be my fun fact about me. That’s kind of weird or bizarre is.
how excited I am to learn about trauma. Like I recognize that for many people it’s this like heavy, big subject, but I’m so nerdy about it and I love learning about it and digging into it. I’m like reading these books for fun that are all about like, this is what happens to trauma in your brain and this is how your body is responding and all these pieces that other people are like, what the heck? But I just find it so fascinating to understand that connection between our biology and then our psychology and how those two things feed back and forth and kind of create these
systems or these loops that can be really positive loops that we can use to go on the right track or they can be these loops that kind of dig us deeper and deeper down and that make it more entrenched and more ingrained in our system. So there’s my fun fact.
Nick (01:54.844)
So your fun fact is you’re nerdy about your own type of company because people have problems I don’t know if it’s fucked up or not But like you are in great company here because this is this is kind of what we do I mean shit even part of what we do with choose your calling and helping people with their purpose is uncovering trauma Figuring out how trauma and systems and all of that are at play and everything that we do you and I were talking about the trauma factor
Cecile (she/her) (01:59.31)
Yes. Yes, sure.
Cecile (she/her) (02:14.765)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (02:23.284)
of just how things happen too quick, too fast, too soon, all at once, everything, and how it can sometimes be the morning for everybody, for like Monday through Friday, getting the kids ready for school or getting up and getting ready and getting dressed and going to do your thing. Remember when I was in my early twenties, I wore it as a little bit of a badge of honor, being like, well, I was hammered the night before. I think I got two hours of sleep. I threw all my clothes on, got into the office and I still did these things. And it’s like, really?
Cecile (she/her) (02:32.407)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (02:51.597)
Yeah.
Nick (02:52.368)
putting your body through so much trauma. But I want to be able to expand on trauma because when we talk about trauma is specifically on this podcast, we talk about a lot of childhood trauma, really tragic, crazy, huge situations that happen like somebody got into an accident or something that was super traumatic. But I think there’s so many layers to it. It’s literally like an onion, like there’s not just one bit of trauma.
Cecile (she/her) (03:04.503)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (03:12.461)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (03:19.154)
but you can see trauma from an outside perspective, you can see trauma from being that person that had it happen to you. So why don’t you give us a little bit of how you see it and how you work with clients about it.
Cecile (she/her) (03:19.757)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (03:31.373)
And I think this is such a great question because so often clients come into my office and they have traumatic responses and they’re asking me like why Cecile I haven’t had trauma because what they think trauma count says is going to war being in a car crash or being sexually assaulted they’re like that is trauma and I haven’t had one of those three and So a lot of the work that I do in the beginning with people is exactly what you’re asking, right? How can we maybe broaden our definition and our understanding of trauma?
so that you can understand why you’re having the responses you do. Because when we have that understanding, it’s actually really helpful to then figure out, what do I want to do next? And so what I often talk about with folks is that in the most basic sense, we have two branches to our nervous system. We have the parasympathetic and we have the sympathetic. And the parasympathetic is this rest and digest, calm down. That’s where we all dream of being all the time. The sympathetic branch is the fight, flight, freeze, fawn response.
Cecile (she/her) (04:25.119)
This is when I have to do something in order to protect myself, in order to continue surviving. And I probably have the loosest definition of trauma ever because trauma is just being in your sympathetic and not being able to step back into the parasympathetic. We all go into the sympathetic. That’s normal. The difference between trauma and non-trauma is can you choose to flow between or are you stuck in the sympathetic? So when you’re talking about that morning routine,
Cecile (she/her) (04:51.821)
People don’t seem to have the ability. They’re stuck in it. It’s happening. It’s go, go, go. And I don’t have the ability to stop, step out of it and move into a calmer place. I am stuck in the sympathetic and we know that that has impacts on our body. We know that has impacts on our psyche. And so when we, I think when we look at trauma from this really broad definition, it allows us to recognize that many things are traumatic. And that doesn’t mean that they have to have a long-term impact, but in that moment it is traumatic for our system.
and do need to treat it as such.
Nick (05:23.182)
be so difficult though, you know, just like any morning, some things can happen. Even if you have to run around, do some errands and stuff like that. And we were talking a little bit before we hit record that often look at the energetics of people, how they relate to things, how they work with things, even the people who are the generators of the world, like we get fresh energy every single day. Our job is to expel all of that energy. There are other people that have to wait literally like two weeks, three weeks, four weeks.
to feel into something and work through things. Then let’s take somebody driving to the office. They get up, they do their morning things, they get on the road, they’re instantly in traffic, they’re dealing with all this shit, they try to get their coffee, it’s too hot or they spill it or all these things are happening and there’s just a lot of overload but we just see it as normal. And then you’ll go into the office and you’ll attack somebody or you’re a kid in high school and you just fought with your parents.
Cecile (she/her) (06:09.005)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (06:13.783)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Nick (06:19.78)
or just everybody’s trying to get the fuck out of the house because it’s the morning and then you get into first period and it’s crazy. You go back further, middle school or grade school, all that stuff happens, but we get so used to it from such a younger age. I, did you have, do you have siblings?
Cecile (she/her) (06:26.913)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (06:32.823)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
I do, I one older sister.
Nick (06:39.863)
Okay, cool. I have a brother and a sister, my brother’s five years younger, and my sister’s eight years younger. So we were at vastly different stages at points like I was in high school, the other one was close enough to it. The other one was like basically just getting into grade school. But having us all get out of the house in the morning, I remember there’d be times I’d look around and it would just be like fucking chaos. And then we’d all get into school and the teachers would be like, you need to calm down. We’re getting day started.
Cecile (she/her) (06:48.919)
Yeah, yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (07:01.153)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (07:06.438)
didn’t hit me till my late thirties. Like, wow, that was a lot of trauma that we just really didn’t know how to handle. So to ask people slow down, take a step back in that time where you’re doing these things. Just take a little bit of a step back. I can’t help but think somebody’s thinking like, fuck off. I can’t even. Yeah. Like what do you do at that point?
Cecile (she/her) (07:10.957)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (07:23.332)
Absolutely, yeah, yeah, and here’s the thing. Part of your system craves that. Part of your system wants that because it’s normal. Whatever our system is used to, even if it’s not desirable, our system wants sameness because I know that it’s safe. Even though I might not like my chaotic morning where I spill coffee on myself every day and I’m honking my horn and trying to, you know, I might not like that, but it is what I am used to. And my system says, whether I like it or not, I’m gonna survive it. I know because I’ve done this.
Cecile (she/her) (07:52.535)
And so what I’m saying, you know, just take a moment and step back. Well, of course you can’t because your system is saying, I don’t know if that option is safe. I don’t know if I can be safe having a slow calm morning where I’m peaceful. I’ve never done it. Is it safe? We think about danger as like going skydiving, but you know what? Having a calm morning is just as dangerous to your system if it’s never had a calm morning before. So it’s really about rewiring our brain and teaching our brain a new definition of safety.
Cecile (she/her) (08:21.631)
a new definition of this is okay and we can’t just leap into it. We need to gradually build this ability for our brain to know what safety is. If you have, let’s say, 35 years of your morning being chaotic every morning, it is not gonna be tomorrow that you can be like, and today I am calm and peaceful, right? It takes time because you are literally rewiring your brain. What’s really cool is we know that we can do it. Our brains are plastic. They can rewire, but they don’t rewire overnight.
Nick (08:51.79)
Yeah. And I think about those, those times when you’re working with somebody, you’re kind of in a safe space where you go and talk to me about these things, what’s going on, but you’re not in that heightened space. So sometimes it’s difficult for those people to take what has even been talked about or worked on. And I experienced this in different times with, with some mentoring clients, even just talking with friends at times. They’re like, man, I hear it I get it, but when I’m in that spot, it’s difficult to do. So then
Cecile (she/her) (09:01.72)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (09:07.786)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (09:18.221)
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Nick (09:20.078)
bridging that gap, how do you bridge that for people to help them be able to actually take that quick second? Because sometimes, for the most part, it is often just that one little beat where if you just take a pause. But we think all this chaos and all this craziness won’t allow for that pause, where in all reality, that’s the length of the pause, just to be able to pause and take a step back. But it’s different because you can’t
Cecile (she/her) (09:30.167)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (09:45.156)
Like I’ve heard different people talk about like in sports or even as musicians, like you want to practice the way that you would play. You want to go full out. You want to do all of that. They can’t really do that with you in a session where they’re like, well, if my normal morning I’d be throwing shit around cursing like a fucking sailor and do all these things. But how do you then get them to really be able to anchor into it? Sematically so that when they’re in that spot, they go, here we are.
Cecile (she/her) (09:51.382)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (09:57.347)
Mm.
Cecile (she/her) (10:02.925)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (10:06.829)
Yeah. Yeah.
Mm-hmm. I love this question. And so I actually define myself as a counselor, but as an experiential counselor. And what I mean by that is that if you don’t experience something new in my room, you’re not going to go experience something new out there. You have to have the experience here with me when it is safe, when you do have time and space to experience these things. It has to happen here so that you can then go learn how to do it out there. If I just tell you, go do this.
Of course you’re going to come back and be like, I don’t know how Cecile. So I love this question because I do believe that we actually have to create a re-experiencing but a controlled and a safe. And so I like to lean on Peter Levine’s Sabam model. And so Peter Levine says that we have five parts to any experience. We have the sensations that we experience in our body. We have images. This might be an image of like your chaotic morning, or it might be a metaphorical representation of that. So it might be an image that’s metaphorical in nature.
Cecile (she/her) (11:06.482)
You have the behaviors, what your body wants to do. I want to hurl things, I want to swear, I want to curse, whatever it is. We have the affect or the emotion that you’re feeling in any given moment, and you have the meaning. What does this mean to me? And so you’re right that we probably can’t recreate all five of those, right? Without being in the car in the urgency of it, we’re not going to recreate all five. What we can do is tune into at least a couple of them. And generally, when we can tune into, okay, I feel a…
Cecile (she/her) (11:35.858)
in my chest and I feel a tension in my shoulders, the affect or the emotion that I’m experiencing is anger and urgency and the behavior that I want to do is I want to push everyone away. I just want to like get rid of everything in my world. If we can tune into that would be three out of the five of the experience. If we can tune into those and then allow your body to move through those in a healthy way, we can actually discharge some of the energy that’s been built up in your system around this trauma.
So if I can have you close your eyes, if I can have you move into this experience and do those pieces in my office while experiencing it to some degree, it’s much more likely that the next morning you now have a bit of a pathway built in your brain that says, here’s how I do this. this is, whoop, and this is what it looks like.
Nick (12:23.201)
Yeah, it’s reprogramming the subconscious. You know, we talk about that often where it’s like the subconscious job is just to keep you alive. That’s it. So anything it’s doing, it’s like, well, this could be crazy shit, you should probably stop because we want to keep you alive. So we’re going to go this route. But being able to reprogram that and work through it, something that I think is really, really important. We can talk all the stuff about doing the work and being able to work through those things and
Cecile (she/her) (12:27.601)
Absolutely.
Cecile (she/her) (12:33.553)
Yes.
Nick (12:52.269)
being able to reframe it in your mind, subconsciously working through those things and getting it into your cells and semantically, but that’s a thing that I think a lot of people will miss out on, that they don’t understand that it’s in your cells. I think of the Bessel van der Kerk, trauma, what is it? Trauma keeps a score or the body keeps a score. Yeah, because it just literally lives in your cells. So in that aspect, what do you do to be able to help people to reprogram their subconscious?
Cecile (she/her) (13:07.514)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (13:12.219)
The body keeps the score, yeah.
Nick (13:21.133)
to get that stuff out of their cells. Do you get into deeper subconscious processing with them?
Cecile (she/her) (13:21.733)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (13:26.348)
Absolutely, I’m gonna add just another layer as well that the trauma might not even be yours potentially. That we know through epigenetic study that you might actually have the generational trauma. So you might be holding someone’s trauma that’s not your own. And you might have all the responses of it, but no cognitive understanding of that trauma. So you might have responses, you might have sensations in the body that you cannot understand at all. And…
Nick (13:31.501)
Ha ha ha. Generational. Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (13:52.063)
Sometimes people need to understand in order to process that just depends on the individual, but often we can’t. And so often the work is actually accepting that you might never understand it because if it is not your own, if it has been something that you’ve owned and then maybe your own experiences have built onto that, you might never understand it. And I actually believe sometimes it’s fruitless and harmful to search for the why. Sometimes we, you know, if you don’t have access to your ancestors, to your, you know, parents potentially,
Cecile (she/her) (14:21.72)
depending on your story, you might not find that and you’re gonna go on this wild goose chase trying to understand it and you never actually can. We can get maybe glimpses little moments but we’ll never understand it. Of course, if someone needs that, that might be what they need and we can work with that. But when we can actually bypass that, when we can accept that we don’t understand it, that’s huge. When we do that, we can then start to work with what our body is telling us in a metaphorical way.
So for example, someone’s trauma might feel like ice that’s crushing through their chest. We don’t have to understand why it’s ice, why it’s in their chest. We don’t need to understand what led to that. But what we need to do is go, okay, there’s ice in your chest and it’s crushing you. How do we work with this ice in your chest? And I mean that quite literally of can we move into that ice in our chest? Can we start to interact with the ice in the chest? And I come from the belief that our bodies want us to heal and they know how to heal, but our cognitive brain blocks that.
Cecile (she/her) (15:21.057)
It’s like, that’d be stupid to do that. Like, why the hell would I do that? And so we block ourselves. But when we can feel enough safety to move into these sensations, our body tells us what it needs to do. So maybe we start working with that ice and maybe for one person it’s about turning that ice into something beautiful and they transform it. Or maybe one person it’s about melting the ice away. One person burns it. And I’m actually still being quite literal with my metaphor of ice. It doesn’t even have to be as literal as I’ve made it.
Cecile (she/her) (15:48.546)
But when we let go of understanding it and we simply work with what is, our body helps us transform that trauma when we give it the space to do so.
Nick (15:58.371)
It’s, an interesting thing to think about. There are a lot of people that really want to know the answer of things like they’re those informational type people. Then there are others like, I need to understand the why. And if I understand the why enough, then I don’t need the rest of the details. Like, that’s fine. I’ll just move along. Understanding how that person is how they look at things, and helping him get to that could be easier or harder, whatever, whatever that situation is. But generational trauma is a thing.
Cecile (she/her) (16:04.51)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (16:13.505)
Sure. Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (16:23.703)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (16:26.005)
And I’m glad you took it right from there because I’m talking about it being in your cells. And you’re like, well, let me take it even fucking further back because not only is it in our cells, but it’s been passed along to us. I had an experience that I think a lot of people, if they, if they can go down this path could and should, we’re understanding how we were brought into this world and what the context of and how our parents were at that moment and what was going on. I did some processing maybe a year and a half ago.
Cecile (she/her) (16:33.173)
Yeah, yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (16:49.482)
Yup. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Nick (16:56.158)
And it was specifically about getting back to being pretty much an embryo and being in the womb and then understanding what was going on. And then I was challenged by the coach I was working with to then go ask my mom. My parents are still alive. They were never together. It was basically like they went out to a party nine months later. Here I came. So there was nothing there, but there was a bunch of strife and just craziness that was going on. So then I asked my mom, like, how was life when
Cecile (she/her) (17:01.77)
Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (17:15.658)
Mm-hmm. Right.
Nick (17:25.556)
when you were pregnant with me. And it was traumatic. So all of that lived within her cells. Even her mom pushed her away and all this other stuff and like all these things were then forced into her, literally fed to me. And then I came out and it was more trauma. But that’s not something we can do anything with. So to understand those things can be helpful, but to understand like you’re saying,
Cecile (she/her) (17:36.788)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (17:52.628)
We don’t actually have any parts of that. It’s like understanding that anything that happened to you wasn’t your fault, but you get to do something with it.
Cecile (she/her) (17:58.997)
I wanna see if I can take it back though, cause that’s a great example, but the egg that you were born into, so the embryo that your mom was carrying, that was actually developed in your grandma. So your grandma was carrying your mom while that embryo was being developed that then became you. So what was happening for grandma, right? Like that’s how far back we need to take it.
Nick (18:19.528)
even worse shit.
Cecile (she/her) (18:21.427)
Right? Exactly. And I think that we look at our present day life and we go like, hey, things aren’t so bad for us. Like, even when I was born and whatever year it was, like, the world wasn’t too bad a place. Yeah, but the embryo that you were conceived in was conceived when grandma was pregnant with mom, right? And so we do need to go far back. And that’s where you’re right. We often can’t understand. Like, that’s what I mean, that it’s…
Cecile (she/her) (18:44.6)
fruitless and a lot of ways to search for that. That we might have the answers to like, what was happening for grandma at the time when mom, that she was pregnant with mom and how did that impact mom’s biology, who then all the way to me. But what we can do is we can work with what your body knows. We can work with the responses that your body is holding to help your body learn that it is safe now. That regardless of the strife, regardless of what might be happening for those people, your body is now safe. And we can teach it these pieces.
Cecile (she/her) (19:14.014)
but we can’t do that cognitively. I can’t tell you you’re safe because it wasn’t you who questioned if you were safe. Your mom was questioning, am I safe because my mom just pushed me away and I’m pregnant with this kid and how am gonna pay the bills and blah, blah, You’re actually healing mom’s trauma in your body. So you can’t do it cognitively because you’re not cognitively holding onto that unsafety. It’s your body that’s holding the unsafety.
Nick (19:37.31)
I want to keep going a little further back with this because this is something I’ve been having a lot of conversations with, some on the podcast, but some with clients and some with some specific groups that I’m part of, systemic issues. If we really go back a few generations, there were some really, really difficult things. We’ll run with the mom thing for right now. My mom was a tiny little redhead who got her ass kicked a bunch of times, got in fights and all of that because she was Irish.
Cecile (she/her) (19:40.339)
Yeah!
Cecile (she/her) (19:49.788)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (19:58.355)
Sure, yeah.
Nick (20:05.822)
when she would get into fights with Italians or black people. And all of those had trauma that goes back specifically here in the States when people got here in a port and they were all told, well, you go this way, you go that way. There’s racism, there’s segmentation, there are all these things. And we have to keep going back and back and back and back and back. But I wonder what’s there with that. We’re like, yeah, I hear you. And I’m right there with you. like, we can’t really
Cecile (she/her) (20:06.02)
Hmm… Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (20:28.263)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (20:35.008)
fucking do anything about that. But we can do something with what we have now. Like you can only be responsible for yourself, only hold yourself accountable. But how do we then go back and actually break those things so that anything going forward isn’t actually perpetuated? And you can change that where even if I don’t know, let’s let’s say you want to have kids in 1015 years, your parents may have been great, your grandparents may have been great, but their parents before them.
Cecile (she/her) (20:37.638)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (20:59.706)
Sure.
Nick (21:03.456)
may have just gotten to the country, or there have been different things that happened to them, that’s still going through your body. So at some point, can we actually break that chain of trauma? And can you be that person that does that? Or is it just almost like how genetics will break off and break off and break off and break off and break off and you get like a diluted version of it? Are we just then hoping for delusion? Or, you know,
Cecile (she/her) (21:11.247)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (21:16.271)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (21:28.069)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (21:32.4)
Mm-hmm. That’s such a great question. I don’t have an answer, right? Because, yeah, yeah, because I think that it’s so, you’re right, when is it? And I like how you’re talking about it dilution, because that’s often how I think about it, of how much can I dilute for the next person? And how can I also spread that dilution outside of myself, outside of my family? And so for example, in the work that I’m doing, can I support people in doing that for themselves?
Nick (21:36.628)
Yeah, I don’t expect you to have an answer. This is a conversation.
Cecile (she/her) (21:58.883)
Because I think when each person heals, we reach this point where we then want to help others heal. I’ve noticed that in everyone, that when we heal, we then want to help others heal as well. In whatever way that might mean or look like for the individual, I believe we have a purpose or a drive to support and to help other people. And the healthier we become, the healthier our communities become, our systems become, and it bleeds in a fantastic way, it spreads. So I think for me, it’s also knowing that…
I might not be able to do all that healing for my family, like my generations, my lines, but can I do a little bit for the person next to me who in turn is going to do that back for me? And it goes around creating more safety because as we heal, now we’re also dismantling structures that are creating harm and perpetuating more oppression and harm to other people. So we can spread it more broadly so that then the next generation, if we shifted the systems that are causing harm, they might not have to live under those systems. And now they might be able to heal.
more deeply because they don’t have to, you know, as you were talking about like the morning routine, something that was coming up for me was capitalism. Well, of course you have to rush to work because we live in a capitalistic society and you have to earn. So can we shift these systems that are actually perpetuating this trauma so that then as we shift those systems, well, now I don’t have to rush to work because maybe I, maybe all of us in like this ideal utopia, we can live for purpose and we don’t have to worry about what time we get there. It’s more how can I live from this place of purpose, right?
Nick (23:26.022)
there’s so many pieces of that when we look at the systems of it and all. I’ve had a conversation and I think I brought this up on some podcast episodes. It’s happened recently where somebody was so proud and excited that they were like, I wake up at four o’clock in the morning now. And I have hours to do things before the rest of the world is awake and before like light even comes up. And I learned that from this group. And then the guy turned it to me and was like, what time do you get up? And I was like, well, I’ll often go to bed, maybe about an hour before you wake up. And then I’ll wake up like,
Cecile (she/her) (23:27.885)
Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (23:53.811)
Right. Yeah.
Nick (23:55.26)
10ish because that’s how I operate. That’s how my energetics work. But that took me a bit. Literally, I had to have a conversation with my partner where she’s like, you’re a grown ass man. We own a business. You do what feels right for you. And I remember being like, what do you mean? But the systems of the world told me I have to be on fucking meetings at nine o’clock in the morning. And I’m like, OK. But I think we the collective we the people who are doing the work now.
Cecile (she/her) (24:15.925)
Yes, yes.
Nick (24:23.58)
are making those changes were also an example of what you’re talking about. Where that change has happened, if you think about parents, parents that became parents in the 80s, there was a shift that happened because their parents became parents in the 50s or 60s. And then the 80s happened and now there are kids from the 80s that had kids in the early 2000s, 2010s.
Cecile (she/her) (24:27.628)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (24:50.052)
And those kids are then going to make changes in the thirties and forties, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So we’re seeing these like chunks, but it’s hard to not want to help and change everything like now, you know, and kind of fix it all.
Cecile (she/her) (24:54.646)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (25:04.469)
But I think, you know, I have to say, think you are by fighting and waking up at 10 a.m. because that’s what works for you. I know it seems, think we all, myself included, have these grandiose ideas of how we’re gonna create change, but you saying I wake up at 10 because that’s the time that works best for my system is so permission giving. And now who are you in the world that would be different than the 6 a.m. wake or upper, right? I think who you are, I’m gonna take some guesses.
Cecile (she/her) (25:30.512)
is probably a more compassionate person, you’re probably more patient, you’re probably more giving, simply from giving yourself permission and working through that resistance that you had. Cause your system said, I will be more accepted, I will belong if I wake up at 9 a.m. That’s what I’m supposed to do. Or sorry, if I wake up at six, so can be ready for nine, whatever. I’ll fit in better, I’ll belong more, I’ll be safer if I follow social conventions. And you said, I’m gonna test that, I’m gonna see if that’s true for me. Can I be just as safe waking up at 10 a.m. and starting my day at?
Cecile (she/her) (26:00.284)
noon or whatever time you really get going. That work that you did to be able to push through that to then go out and live a life that hopefully feels more authentic, more aligned, you’re less likely to traumatize other people because you are taking care of yourself. And so I know it seems like a small shift, but I just think of all the ripples that those small shifts create for us and then how we show up in the world differently and create ripples for others who are creating ripples that are creating ripples and how that can all build
Cecile (she/her) (26:29.865)
that we don’t have to change the world. We wake up at 10 a.m. instead, and that is making that shift.
Nick (26:35.738)
Yeah, and it ties into purpose. You know, I talk about purpose so many times with people and when we get into conversations with clients that are trying to figure out what is my purpose, what am I supposed to do on this planet, when you actually get into conversation about purpose for the most part, they think it has to be Walt Disney level, Steve Jobs level, something like that where it’s like this big, huge thing. Like if they’re not Oprah, if they’re not Steve Jobs, what’s the point? And really your purpose can be as
Cecile (she/her) (26:39.56)
Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (27:02.579)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (27:04.996)
huge as just being the best person that you can be in your community, making those small shifts and stuff like that. I also really nerd out about the shit similarly to like you do where like I like to test myself and feel it and understand like, well, why I feel weird like the first two weeks of doing it. I was like, this is strange and I don’t know what the hell’s going on, but I feel better. And I’m also really deeply confused. Let me do the work. Let me understand it. And I get that that
Cecile (she/her) (27:30.023)
Yeah, yes, yeah.
Nick (27:34.192)
We as people will do what we can based on systems, but we don’t understand that we’re then trying to buck the system most times, but we don’t know how to do it because we’re stuck in that system. So then we’re back to basic trauma with people, the traumas that happen throughout the day that we just consider to be normal. So when you’re working with clients and they’re like, look, I go through all these things and I haven’t hit, you know, I’ve been raped and I haven’t had a crazy car accident, like.
Cecile (she/her) (27:49.015)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Nick (28:03.664)
Haven’t watched 18 people die in front of me or whatever really traumatic situation. But when they have that realization, what do you do with them from that point to help them solidify it? When it’s like, well, these things, these small things that are traumatic can really compound and become a deeper thing. And once they’re aware of that, as we talked about with the self-awareness before, like that aha moment, how do you then solidify that with them and help them to be able to move from there in a healthy way without driving themselves crazy?
Cecile (she/her) (28:07.42)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (28:21.382)
Mm.
Cecile (she/her) (28:33.08)
Mm-hmm. Well, I often think about trauma as really broadly having three phases of of trauma work First is safety building and awareness. So that’s really what we’ve been talking about Like how do I build the awareness that maybe I have been traumatized. Maybe these things are impacting me. Maybe I am struggling Maybe it’s not about my boss and maybe it’s actually about this deep childhood stuff and my boss reminds me of this right building the awareness is phase one
Cecile (she/her) (29:01.306)
Phase two is the processing, is where we’ve kind of alluded to of moving into our system and allowing our sympathetic nervous system to learn that we’re safe so that we can return to the parasympathetic. And then the last phase is what we call integration, which is I think what you’re now talking about, which is how do I integrate and take all of this learning and apply it? And what I find most fascinating about integration is that it happens naturally if you remove the blocks that stop people from doing it. So
When we are in a place where we can integrate, where we have enough safety, we try things, we figure it out, we keep doing, we learn what feels right for us and we trust that, we listen to that. What tends to happen though is people go, I’m gonna use yours, it’s such a simple example and such a great one. What would be right for me is sleeping until 10 a.m. And then we go, no, I’m not allowed. And we push it down. And it’s not about teaching you that you needed to sleep until 10. Your system knew that. It’s about removing the block.
Cecile (she/her) (29:55.577)
that says I’m not allowed to do that or I’ll be bad or I won’t be cared for. Whatever stories you were telling yourself, the integration phase once we’ve worked through the trauma is about pulling those blocks back to say, well, I’m safe enough to try. I can at least do it for a couple of weeks and I can sit with the confusion messiness of all this of, my gosh, am I okay? What’s happening? People are judging me. Can I sit with those feelings? Is there enough safety to sit with it to see what happens? So I think
The simple answer is that I think in integration, it’s more about allowing ourselves to do it, that we know what to do, but how do we stop ourselves? How do we stop what stops us from doing what our system already knows that it wants to do?
Nick (30:37.601)
Yeah. I appreciate you kind of recapping that we’ve organically moved through that. So thank you for recapping that for people because we have to go through those pieces to then to be able to integrate. And sometimes, sometimes you kind of have to just fuck around and find out, like try it. And if it doesn’t work, okay, move along and try something else. It’s, but that ties into something else. People have a fear of failure and people also have a fear of success. Like, well, what if I do it and it’s successful?
Cecile (she/her) (30:43.699)
Right, yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (30:54.177)
Absolutely.
Cecile (she/her) (31:02.371)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (31:05.805)
There are times where I have conversations with people and they go, well, what if I do this and everything has to change? It’s like, well, yeah, fuck that’s heavy, but what if? And, just being able to sit with that. And even at that point to go, well, what if, okay, well, what if? And then being able to move in that direction. There’s, yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (31:15.427)
Yeah. Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (31:26.102)
And I would say, if I can jump in there, I would say that if you can’t try, if you can’t give it a go, if it’s truly so debilitating, then you probably need to go back and do a little bit more trauma processing. Because if the fear of, let’s say, failure is so strong that I’m not even willing to try, my guess is that there’s some underlying pieces that we still haven’t figured out. So that’s where I’m talking about, like if you’re truly stuck and you cannot move out, that’s trauma. Let’s do some processing. Because when you’re in that integration stage,
It should be scary, it should be hard, but it shouldn’t be impossible. And if it’s at that impossible, it just means we missed something. And we’re also kind of making it seem like it’s like a linear you go through once you’re done. The reality is when you do it one time, you know how deeper access to doing it a second time and deeper access to doing it the hundredth time, the 200th time. The more that you process and integrate, the more that you can build safety process and integrate and round and round we go.
Nick (32:03.769)
Not at all.
Nick (32:19.639)
You literally just took the next thing I was going to say was so many people will think, well, I’ve done this. Like, I’ve had conversations with clients where they’re like, look, I’ve talked to people before I’ve done therapy. It’s like, cool. We’ve been talking since we were little kids. Like this is fucking how this is, but that’s, that’s one piece of it. That’s oftentimes just the step to get you into other modalities. Like I’ve said to different people, that I knew weren’t ready, but like just testing the waters with them.
Cecile (she/her) (32:22.553)
Yeah.
Cecile (she/her) (32:33.249)
Yeah, I’m at once, I’m done! Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Nick (32:49.421)
Like, well, I do subconscious processing sessions that can range from two to four or five hours long. And at the end of that, I’ll schedule another session in a few weeks. And they’ll look at me like, what the fuck? Like, I couldn’t even imagine doing that. Other people like you, you’re like, great, beautiful. How did the 10 sessions go with that? And what did you learn from that? Because the more that we do, the more that we’re able to do. And the more that we do, the more that we understand, like even getting into subconscious processing sessions.
Cecile (she/her) (32:56.096)
Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (33:02.182)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (33:10.272)
Mm-hmm.
Nick (33:17.856)
I know I’ve done this personally where I’m like, this is the thing I want to talk about. You get in and you’re like, how the fuck did we get all the way over here? And it’s something totally different because we need to work through it and need to do all of that. Let’s tie this up though. So for the people that are on their path towards self mastery, what sort of advice would you give them as they start to really, or they want to continue to dive deeper into their trauma?
Cecile (she/her) (33:31.22)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Cecile (she/her) (33:42.535)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Lots of different thoughts, but based on our conversation today, I would say understand where you’re at in the process because what you do in each step is different. I can’t remember the URL, but I actually have a quiz that can help you identify which stage you’re in if you’re not sure. If you go to my website, wellmind.ca, it’s on there somewhere. Can’t be too hard to find, I’m sure. Because if you know what stage you’re at, you can do the appropriate work.
So if you’re at the building awareness, what you’re gonna be wanting to do is understanding, where did my trauma come from? Don’t try and understand the trauma, don’t get too into it, but like, how are these things connected and how might I be impacted by the generations before me? If you’re in the processing, then it is going to be those pieces that you’re talking about. When you’re ready for it, when you have enough safety, can I start to move into them and can I move through them? And then if you’re in the integration, it becomes, how can I challenge myself to try things that my system hasn’t done, so therefore, Deans is like a problem.
but I actually recognize cognitively that I probably can give it a try and see what happens. So identify what stage you’re at and then match what you’re trying to do to that. Because if you’re still in the building awareness and you’re like, have to have this strict routine and try these things, but your system truly is stuck in the sympathetic, it’s not going to be able to do that and you’re gonna fail over and over again. And then it’s gonna reinforce this message that I’m a failure because I wasn’t able to stick to this routine. But if instead you can recognize,
I’m still in my processing and I need to do more of that. Of course, I’m not able to do this next step. I’m not there yet. I think when we recognize our stage, we build compassion towards that and then we can actually meet our needs in that stage, which helps us move to the next stage sooner and faster.
Nick (35:23.531)
Back to self-awareness with that, being able to be aware. Yeah, for real, always being able to be aware, but also being real and honest with yourself. And I think for the people that are listening to this, if you’re struggling with that, you don’t have to just out yourself to somebody, but out yourself to yourself and say, I am in this spot. Okay, so if I’m in that spot, what do I do from there? How do I do this? And I think this has been a great conversation. We’ve gotten really deep, kind of wide with certain things, but there is the…
Cecile (she/her) (35:26.104)
Always, Yeah.
Nick (35:53.877)
the stretch that you need to go through and also understanding where you are at each phase of it. So I really appreciate that you’ve been on to talk about this stuff. Before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you?
Cecile (she/her) (36:05.775)
Yeah, so on Instagram and TikTok, at Cecile Tucker Counseling is the best way to find me. And then from there, actually, now that I think about it, there’s a link in bio on those two, a couple of different quizzes that folks can take that help them build that awareness. And then they’re attached to free workbooks that you can download to kind of build some of your awareness, work through some different pieces. So one of them is about what stage of trauma therapy are you at? And then one of them is about understanding how trauma might’ve impacted your relationships and how you respond in relationships because of your trauma.
and little quizzes to help you maybe understand yourself better. So I would say check those out. Go to atceciletuckercounseling. if you are looking for counseling services in certain provinces within Canada, it gets complicated in terms of regulation, but I have a whole team here of awesome therapists and we can be found at wellmind.ca.
Nick (36:51.446)
That’s awesome. Well, it’s been great having you on. I appreciate you spending time with us. Thank you so much.
Cecile (she/her) (36:54.489)
down.
Yeah, thanks so much for having me. It’s been great fun.
https://youtu.be/DE5gKAWHU0k
