The Healing Connection Between Breath, Sensation Tracking, and Trauma Release

In the realm of personal healing, there's a profound and often overlooked connection between our breath, body sensations, and the rapid release of trauma. This blog aims to delve into this connection, providing actionable insights that could assist you in your journey towards trauma relief.

To begin, let's align on what trauma means in this context: it consists of experiences that embed fear into our nervous system, becoming stuck if not properly processed. It’s crucial to understand trauma as a biological issue at its core, rather than just a series of past events. Our biology is communicating to us and there is a language to pay attention to. Our breath can access these memories and release them without years of therapy or processing.

Trauma manifests as stuck energy that desperately needs to move to provide relief. When we experience trauma, the body’s natural stress response—fight, flight, or freeze—can become trapped, especially if the experience was too overwhelming to process at the time. This unresolved energy becomes embedded in the body, showing up as tension, pain, or even chronic illnesses. Our nervous system, designed to help us return to balance after stress, struggles to do so when trauma remains unprocessed. This creates a state of dysregulation, where the body oscillates between hyperarousal (anxiety, agitation) and hypoarousal (numbness, dissociation), making it difficult to achieve homeostasis or a sense of inner peace.

Until we address these trapped energies, they will continue to influence our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors, often without us realizing it. Trauma acts like a filter, coloring how we perceive and interact with the world—a phenomenon often referred to as the "trauma lens." Through this lens, neutral or even positive situations can feel threatening, relationships may become sources of conflict, and self-perception can be skewed toward feelings of inadequacy or shame. For instance, a minor disagreement with a loved one might trigger an outsized emotional reaction rooted in past experiences of rejection or abandonment. Without conscious effort to release this stuck energy, it continues to drive our actions and reactions in ways that often feel out of our control.

Healing trauma involves helping the body and mind move this stuck energy so we can reconnect with a sense of safety and balance. Somatic therapies, mindfulness practices, and trauma-focused interventions like somatic experiencing or EMDR are particularly effective in this regard. These approaches aim to gently release the trapped energy by allowing the body to complete its stress response cycle, restoring the nervous system to a state of regulation. As the trauma lens begins to clear, individuals can experience a profound shift in how they see themselves and the world around them. This movement toward homeostasis not only provides relief but also opens the door to a more grounded and fulfilling life, free from the shadows of the past.

When trauma is left unresolved, it can subtly and profoundly impact the mind-body-spirit connection, shaping how we perceive ourselves and the world around us. The lingering effects of trauma often give rise to false beliefs, such as "I am not enough" or "The world is not safe," which become deeply embedded in our psyche. These distorted beliefs can influence decision-making, relationships, and even how we interpret daily events. For example, someone carrying the belief that they are unworthy of love may unconsciously sabotage relationships or gravitate toward situations that reinforce their sense of inadequacy. Similarly, unresolved trauma can lead to an overactive stress response, where the nervous system remains stuck in a state of hypervigilance or numbing, further disconnecting individuals from their sense of inner balance and spiritual well-being (Van der Kolk, 2014).

These false beliefs and distortions often operate beneath conscious awareness, making them difficult to recognize and address. When trauma influences behavior at an unconscious level, individuals may find themselves caught in patterns that lead to poor outcomes, such as strained relationships, unfulfilled goals, or self-sabotage. For instance, repeated experiences of rejection or failure might not just be circumstantial but could indicate underlying trauma shaping the person's perceptions and reactions. According to Levine (2010), unresolved trauma causes individuals to unconsciously "recreate" their traumatic experiences, often as an attempt to gain mastery over them, but this only perpetuates harmful cycles. Recognizing these patterns is key to breaking free from them and restoring alignment within the mind-body-spirit connection.

The mind-body-spirit connection is central to healing trauma, as these false beliefs and distorted values are not merely intellectual but are often deeply felt in the body and spirit. Practices like mindfulness, somatic therapy, and breathwork can help individuals reconnect with their inner selves and begin to release the trauma stored in the body. Additionally, engaging in reflective or spiritual practices, such as journaling, meditation, or connecting with a higher purpose, can help challenge and reframe the false narratives that trauma has imposed. By addressing trauma at all levels—mind, body, and spirit—individuals can create space for new, empowering beliefs to take root, fostering a deeper sense of self-awareness, peace, and purpose.

The journey towards trauma relief involves a delicate balance of activating the trauma to bring in new, healing information. This process must be managed carefully to ensure it doesn’t trigger coping mechanisms that could hinder healing. To bring in new information, we must proceed slowly when triggers occur and train ourselves to take in new information from the environment that disconfirms danger. 

Trauma can manifest in various forms, often surfacing as physical symptoms or emotional responses. Our goal is to offer a technique that the brain and body will respond to favorably. Examples of the opposite would be staying defensive, taking on the victim or blame position, or walling off. Instead, we want to acknowledge our feelings, be tender to ourselves, breathe, be curious, and learn techniques to unravel the intense emotions that are linked up with the trigger.

By consciously using our breath and tracking bodily sensations, we can enable 'do-overs' that help release trapped trauma energy. This approach allows us to shift from an analytical mindset to an experiential one, facilitating deeper healing. Do-overs are my favorite practice because you can do them at any time to promote healing. As you get better at articulating your wants and needs and checking out assumptions being made, you move through triggers at a faster pace leaving them behind so they stop repeating. The key message here is, your brain needs a new experience to change the meaning that got assigned originally.

Many years ago I was training with Gay & Kathlyn Hendricks at the Hendricks Institute. Gay taught a concept called "One breath phrases." The idea behind one breath phrases is this: We often get caught up in the analytical side of the stories we come up with about any given emotional experience. This stops us from actually resolving the issue. Instead, when we use a one breath phrase that tells a truth we link up our analytical side with our emotional intelligence. As we make the statements, we pause and ask, "does that feel true?" If yes, we pause and see the impact it has on our body. If needed we wait for the mind-body to process the emotions that can come up when we tell these "microscopic" truths. Often the meaning we make out of things that happen to us gives the memory an emotional charge. When we question the meaning, we can untangle the intensity of the emotions. 

You can try this practice right now. Think of something difficult between you and another person. Imagine them in front of you. Make a one breath statement of what is true for you. Say it out loud. Watch their expression. Then say out loud the meaning you made out of their expression. An example: "When I just said I was angry about X, you looked angry back." Wait until you can sense their response. "Im thinking right now you are angry because Y is that true?" 

In time, if two people can use one breath - non-blame - statements with a sense of curiosity, they will eventually see the threads of the past causing the meaning making and emotional charge. You goal in using one breath statements and "Do-overs" is to get to the deeper issue that is causing the problem. As Gay used to say, "we are never upset for the thing we think we are upset about."

But don't take my word for it. Practice is a lot and watch what starts happening.

Consider a young individual who experienced sudden anxiety, seemingly out of nowhere. Upon exploring these sensations and their origins through breathwork and using one-breath statements, he traced them back to a specific unsettling memory. By breathing into this experience, and expressing what he wanted back then, he found calm and eventually disconnected the anxiety from his present reality.

Here’s a simple exercise you can try: identify an issue that consistently bothers you and notice how your body reacts. Reflect on an early memory associated with this sensation and breathe into it, allowing any emotions to surface and dissipate naturally. If needed, put the person in front of you. Say what needs to be said. Notice their response. Repeat out loud what you are thinking as you respond to their message. Again, watch their response. Keep repeating this until you exhaust the thread. At some point you may draw several conclusions: you now have new information you didn't realize during the original event, that you made some incorrect assumptions, or that your gut was right and you now have to practice accepting reality.

Practicing these “do-overs” using one-breath-no-blame phrases can enhance clarity and self-awareness. With repeated efforts, you might find it easier to identify unconscious patterns and articulate emotions without speculation.

As you engage in this practice, consider keeping a journal. Documenting your experiences can deepen your understanding and offer a record of your healing journey.

Embrace the techniques of breath and sensation tracking as vital tools for self-healing. If, at any point, you find yourself needing support, don't hesitate to reach out and explore these practices more thoroughly.

As you embark on this healing path, may you find courage and tranquility. Infinite blessings to you in your journey.

For those seeking personalized coaching support, feel free to connect through Ed’s Calendar for guidance tailored to your unique needs.

References

Levine, P. A. (2010). In an unspoken voice: How the body releases trauma and restores goodness. North Atlantic Books.

Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W. W. Norton & Company.

Rothschild, B. (2000). The body remembers: The psychophysiology of trauma and trauma treatment. W. W. Norton & Company.

Van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. Viking.

Siegel, D. J. (2010). The mindful therapist: A clinician's guide to mindsight and neural integration. W. W. Norton & Company.