Trauma Informed Mindfulness

Mindfulness is a practice that involves paying attention to the present moment with non-judgmental awareness. It can help you cultivate a deeper connection with your inner self, others, and the world around you. It is widely touted for its mental health benefits — but for those who have endured trauma, it has the potential to cause harm.

Sometimes meditation will be helpful for someone who’s traumatized, and other times it’ll exacerbate that person’s pain

Trauma-informed mindfulness is a mindfulness practice that’s adapted to the unique needs of trauma survivors. Traditional mindfulness practices assume that everyone has the capacity to engage in any mindfulness activity and also benefit from it. But a trauma-informed approach acknowledges that some aspects of mindfulness can be activating for trauma survivors.

The goal of trauma-informed mindfulness is to help people befriend physical sensations, improve self-regulation, ease their experiences of trauma, and cultivate mindfulness. Trauma-informed work involves learning what someone might need in their meditation to get the most out of practice.

As a trauma-informed mindfulness coach,  I will work with you to facilitate healing in a safe and supportive environment while taking into consideration certain triggers. For instance, paying attention to the breath is often a starting point for a meditation practice, as it helps bring stability to the mind. But  the breath may not be the best place for trauma survivors to begin a meditation practice. Our respiratory system connects to our sympathetic nervous system, which is often out of balance for traumatized people. Trauma-informed mindfulness might involve choosing a different place to focus attention, say, on the sensations of the feet on the ground, or sound.