Articles - Chele Yntema

On attachment in the therapeutic relationship: Attachment to your therapist

Posted on January 8, 2026January 8, 2026 by Chele Yntema

We do not grow out of our need for relationship; rather, we grow into ourselves through relationship. Bonnie Badenoch On attachment in the therapeutic relationship Have you ever wondered to yourself, why do I want to talk to my therapist so desperately? Am I too attached, am I becoming too...Read More

Cognitive Dissonance and Attachment in Coercive Control: A Relational, and Neurobiological Exploration

Posted on January 8, 2026January 8, 2026 by Chele Yntema

Integration is the linkage of differentiated parts into a coherent whole. Daniel Siegel Cognitive Dissonance and Coercive Control: A Relational and Neurobiological Exploration In the previous pieces, we stayed close to the lived experience of contradiction, exploring the fragmenting fog that can arise when care and fear coexist within relationship,...Read More

Cognitive Dissonance and Coercive Control: How We Protect Connection When Safety Is Uncertain

Posted on December 28, 2025January 8, 2026 by Chele Yntema

When relational experience is chronically unpredictable, the mind does not fail to integrate; it adapts by organising experience in ways that preserve attachment and emotional survival. Allan Schore Cognitive Dissonance and Coercive Control: How We Protect Connection when Safety is Uncertain In the previous piece, we explored the fragmenting fog...Read More

The Fragmenting Fog of Contradiction: How Coercive Control Disrupts Knowing and Protects Connection

Posted on November 30, 2025January 8, 2026 by Chele Yntema

Coercive control is a pattern of domination that works to erase a person’s freedom and sense of Self. Jess Hill The Fragmenting Fog of Contradiction: How Coercive Control Disrupts Knowing and Protects Connection There is a stirring within. A tension that moves quickly from the belly to the brain, a...Read More

Disgust: The Boundary Emotion

Posted on August 10, 2025August 10, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Disgust is a boundary psychology. Disgust marks objects as exterior and alien Richard Beck Disgust: The Boundary Emotion Disgust, it is the ick of the Self, the embodied cry of “This must not come near.” To be human is to know this sudden, deep, and visceral recoil; the way the...Read More

Why Your Brain Loves Curiosity

Posted on July 30, 2025July 30, 2025 by Chele Yntema

The SEEKING system is the grand architect of our emotional lives, propelling us toward everything we desire, including knowledge. Jaak Panksepp Why Your Brain Loves Curiosity. Curiosity is not a luxury. It is not something reserved for the intellectually inclined or the inquisitive few. It is a deeply embodied capacity...Read More

Emotional Flashbacks: Understanding the Push and Pull Inside.

Posted on July 29, 2025November 5, 2025 by Chele Yntema

When we are triggered, we do not regress, we return. Not to be punished, but to be met with what we did not receive the first time. Joanna Lindenbaum When Connection Feels Unsafe: The Push-Pull of Emotional Flashbacks A reflection on the quiet conflict between longing and fear, and how...Read More

Why We Seek Meaning: Exploring the Drive to Understand Self and Other

Posted on July 27, 2025July 28, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Rainer Maria Rilke Why we seek to know the knowing of the known: The quest to understand Self and Other What is it within us that drives us to know, to understand, to...Read More

The Rhythm of Attachment: How we come to be with Self, Other, and World.

Posted on July 13, 2025July 27, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Attachment is not only about relational patterns; it’s the interactive regulation of emotion and arousal between two minds and two bodies. Allan Schore The Rhythm of Attachment: How we come to be with Self, Other, and World. Attachment. It is the core of survival. The very mammalian dynamism that prompts...Read More

Embodied Relational Knowings

Posted on July 11, 2025August 9, 2025 by Chele Yntema

The body remembers what the mind forgets. It holds the story of love, of lack, of longing — not in words, but in gesture, in posture, in silence. Author Unknown Embodied Relational Knowings Have you ever reacted in a certain way with others that seemingly happens no matter how hard...Read More

Window of Capacity – In Brief

Posted on June 26, 2025July 27, 2025 by Chele Yntema

You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the softness of your body love what it loves. Mary Oliver, from Wild Geese What is the Window of Capacity? Also...Read More

The Unbeknownst of Shame Part Two: Cultivating Resolve by Bringing Clarity to Confusion and Trust to Doubt.

Posted on January 8, 2025February 2, 2025 by Chele Yntema

We cultivate love when we offer our most vulnerable selves, the selves that hold shame, to be deeply seen and known, and when we honor the spiritual connection that grows from that offering being met with trust, respect, kindness and affection. Love is not something we give or get; it...Read More

The Battle of Needs Negotiation: Boundaries

Posted on January 5, 2025January 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

At the heart of an integrated sense of Self with identity and belonging is the capacity to both differentiate and connect. Such differentiation and connection are founded in our ability to know our own inner worlds as unified yet unique with significance and worth. Chele Yntema Creating a Boundaried sense...Read More

The Unbeknownst of Shame Part One: What is Shame?

Posted on December 13, 2024July 3, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Alone and exposed. Exposed and alone. My very being unwanted as she was. Instead, misunderstood and abashed. Denigrated. Disparaged with blame… There was but a shadow of who I once knew. Alone and exposed. Exposed and alone. Hollowed, emptied of all that was left of me. There was nothing there...Read More

Window of Capacity

Posted on October 12, 2024June 27, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Breathing in, I calm body and mind. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment I know this is the only moment. Thich Nhat Hanh An Introduction: what do we mean by Capacity? Have you ever been introduced to the Window of Tolerance? It is a concept that was...Read More

What we never knew… Attachment and Orientation

Posted on October 4, 2024January 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Some consider our experience of the inner self to be a ‘Core Self’, with features of affectivity, agency, continuity, and coherence… We are, beginning in the first years of our life, filled with an emotional tone of the unfolding experience with which we live that can collectively be called ‘affectivity’. ...Read More

Co-dependency as an Emergent Response to Enmeshment

Posted on August 25, 2024January 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

We being life, as babies, needing connection for survival, and we take adaptations we've learned from those attachment experiences out into the world of interpersonal relationships. Learning to be a "we" in our personal family of origin may directly impact our experience of widening our lens of identity to embrace...Read More

Helpful (true) Guilt & Unhelpful (false) Guilt

Posted on June 16, 2024January 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Think about a time you felt guilty. What made you feel this guilt? What impact did guilt have on you? How did you respond? Probably, your description of the cause starts with an 'I….'. This is because guilt is linked not with an external event, but with our own behaviour,...Read More

The Value in Emotion – Processing

Posted on April 2, 2024April 17, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Integration leads to optimal regulation... In essence, "emotional regulation" is how we use our minds, bodies, and relational processes to enhance integration. To achieve regulation, an integrative state of coherence, in the moment and across time, the mind both monitors and modifies the flow of energy and information to differentiate...Read More

The Value in Emotion – Understanding

Posted on April 1, 2024January 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

The ability to involve conscious processing with something as fundamental as the creation of meaning, social relatedness, and perceptual processing certainly does give us an increase in the flexibility of our responses to the environment. Having a consciousness of emotions is especially important in the social environment.Without it, we are...Read More

Patterns of Self-Protection: Attachment vs Authenticity

Posted on February 17, 2024January 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Hope is not wishful thinking, but a realising of the possibilities beyond the actualities we now experience ... With hope we can find a path forward ... With hope we have courage ... Dr. Dan Siegel, 2023 An Introduction: A Confusion from Within Are there times in your life when you...Read More

Caring for the Young Carer

Posted on February 12, 2024February 15, 2024 by Chele Yntema

This post was originally written for an interview with Wellways - you can read their article here Years ago, as I began my career in mental health and well-being, I had never truly pondered on the significance of the developing mind, let alone on its paradoxical complexity. Yet, as we...Read More

Finding your Self in the Midst of Chaos

Posted on December 30, 2023January 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Breath is the bridge which connects life to consciousness, which unites your body to your thoughts. Whenever your mind becomes scattered, use your breath as the means to take hold of your mind again. Thich Nhat Hanh Amid the chaos of life, there may be moments of overwhelm - swirls...Read More

For the Invisible Ones

Posted on April 19, 2023April 19, 2023 by Chele Yntema

A beautiful composition that speaks with heart to the lasting impact of childhood neglect, and the courage of one woman to create change. For the Invisible Ones by Aven Harper "Emotional and relational absence in childhood takes many forms and has a wide range of impacts. This short film describes...Read More

Functional Fundamentals – Fundamental Nature of Self & Other Experiencing in the World

Posted on April 7, 2023March 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

MIND BODY CONNECTION & the Functional Fundamentals of Humanity Without a theory of human beings there can be no theory of psychotherapy. Lapworth & Sills, 2010 Fundamental Nature of Self & Other Experiencing in the World Whilst I share my fundamental belief in the Divine herein, I do not subscribe...Read More

Functional Fundamentals – Fundamental Constitution of Self

Posted on April 6, 2023January 8, 2026 by Chele Yntema

MIND BODY CONNECTION& the Functional Fundamentals of Humanity Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul. Oscar Wilde Fundamental Constitution of Self It is important to ground psychotherapies on a knowledge of affective processes and thereby to understand how to...Read More

Functional Fundamentals – Defining Wellbeing & Suffering

Posted on April 5, 2023June 26, 2025 by Chele Yntema

MIND BODY CONNECTION & the Functional Fundamentals of Humanity The attempt to escape from pain, is what creates more pain. Gabor Mate Defining Wellbeing and Suffering When we appreciate the fundamental nature of human experience and the fundamental constitution of Self as it relates to Other(s) and the World we...Read More

Co-regulation is the intentional and resonant modulation of the spatiotemporally-affected flow within and between two beings

Framework Fundamentals – Co-Regulated Connection

Posted on April 4, 2023March 8, 2025 by Chele Yntema

MIND BODY CONNECTION & the Therapeutic Fundamentals of Practice When we are held in safety by another’s non-judgmental receptivity, we naturally open to more awareness of sensation, feelings, and the thoughts that arise from and accompanying them. The stability of our joined windows of tolerance makes what was intolerable and...Read More

Framework Fundamentals – Compassionate Collaboration

Posted on April 3, 2023January 22, 2025 by Chele Yntema

MIND BODY CONNECTION & the Therapeutic Fundamentals of Practice Outcome is enhanced when the therapist uses modalities and defines goals consistent with the life experiences and cultural values of the client. No single approach is equally effective across all populations and life situations Collins & Arthur, 2010 Compassionate Collaboration Compassionate...Read More

Framework Fundamentals – Contextual Coherence

Posted on April 2, 2023January 22, 2025 by Chele Yntema

MIND BODY CONNECTION & the Therapeutic Fundamentals of Practice When a person is in a more coherent state there is a shift in the relative autonomic balance toward increased parasympathetic activity (vagal tone), increased heart-brain synchronization and entrainment between diverse physiological systems. In this mode, the body’s systems function with...Read More

The Embodied and Relational Self in Context

Posted on November 10, 2022May 25, 2024 by Chele Yntema

Who are we really? And what does it mean when we say, “this is me”? What is the “this” that we call “the self”? And why are so many studies revealing that in our modern life people are feeling ever more isolated even though they are more digitally connected? How...Read More

The Embodied and Relational Self in Professional Identity

Posted on June 14, 2022November 10, 2022 by Chele Yntema

What has happened to our ability to dwell in unknowing, to live inside a question and coexist with the tensions of uncertainty? Where is our willingness to incubate pain and let it birth something new? What has happened to patient unfolding, to endurance? These things are what form the ground...Read More

The Therapeutic Relationship and The Necessary and Sufficient Conditions of Therapeutic Change

Posted on December 26, 2021November 10, 2022 by Chele Yntema

There are certain emergent anthropological dynamics that often seem forgotten in our westernised society. Such might be, at least to me, the innate integrative capacity of the mind-body that emerges when we, as a human species, find ourselves in authentic, respectful, and reciprocal relationships (2 Corinthians 6; Cozolino, 2002; van...Read More

When vulnerability meets availability: A complex fractalated phenomenon that holds the potentiality of The Divine

Posted on October 30, 2021December 14, 2021 by Chele Yntema

Imagine various relationships you have with other people: sometimes we feel understood and our inner meanings of the mind are seen and respected. Other relationships may be more challenging, and the inner reality of our feelings and thoughts are unseen and disrespected. We send out communication to another person through...Read More

You Care too Much: The Nature of Caring in Counselling

Posted on October 30, 2021 by Chele Yntema

Nearly a year ago a professional I respected bellowed the words “You care too much!”, and as the dissonance I had been harbouring toward the role I was in came crashing down, I finally realised how important it was to me to care. Moreover, as I progress into reflective supervisory...Read More

Neuroception

Posted on April 28, 2021August 3, 2025 by Chele Yntema

Our bodies listen before we do — scanning the silence for threat or safety, shaping our way of being in the world before a single thought is formed. Deb Dana What is Neuroception? Neuroception is the silent, ceaseless song of survival – the body’s innate attunement to the dance of...Read More

Homeostasis

Posted on April 26, 2021May 24, 2024 by Chele Yntema

Though we may not always pay attention to it, within every living thing there is an inherent and adaptive awareness. It is an awareness that gives rise not only to the basic functionality of our living and being Self, but so too to the emergence of our sensing, perceiving, interpreting,...Read More

Resume Of Chele Yntema

Posted on March 27, 2021June 13, 2025 by Chele Yntema

WHO I AM PROFESSIONALLY Curriculum Vitae Of Chele Yntema Chele Yntema is a PACFA/CCAA Clinical Practitioner specialising in burnout, breakdown, and trauma. With a comprehensive background in Interpersonal and Affective Neurobiology alongside her psychotherapeutic work with presentations of complex trauma, Chele has begun to recognise and truly appreciate some of...Read More

Corrective Emotional Experience: The paradoxical line in my understanding

Posted on November 13, 2020June 28, 2021 by Chele Yntema

Under stress, Self found relentless fear and the need for a nourishing level of reception, connection, and protection. Under guilt, Self found deceptive disgust and the need for an adaptable level of difference, independence, and acceptance. Under shame, Self found unparallel grief and the need for an authentic level of...Read More

Transference: From past to present and into the future

Posted on November 12, 2020June 28, 2021 by Chele Yntema

Like an active vortex that sucks in atmospheric textures, swirls them around and spits out a reflection of our earliest years, transference is a felt sense within varied situational milieu that reflects a uniquely personal perceptual shaping of reality. This is a reality that matches early embedded emotional-motivational patterns of...Read More

Defence Mechanisms: In my Defence

Posted on November 11, 2020June 27, 2024 by Chele Yntema

As I read and as I sit here in preparation for writing my heart begins to race, my stomach fills with a tizzy of tension, my eyes open wide, I do not blink, and as I begin to hold my breath I grit my jaw and clench my body knowing...Read More

To Love and To Suffer

Posted on November 10, 2020June 27, 2024 by Chele Yntema

How is it that there can be a reckoning of the paradoxical questions that have plagued humanity for all of time? Questions of heartache and hopelessness, inequity and scarcity, disease and illness as they co-exist with questions of health and wellness, equitability and fruition, of faith, of hope, of love...Read More

Within the Window

Posted on November 8, 2020June 27, 2024 by Chele Yntema

Our nervous system’s window of tolerance – the intensity of feeling we can experience while still maintaining connection with another – is continually expanding and contracting. When we are physically alone, the continually fluctuating breadth of our window depends on the strength of the regulatory system built in relationship with...Read More

Containment and Non-Reactivity

Posted on November 6, 2020 by Chele Yntema

The therapist is comfortable sharing whatever emotions the client has and, in addition, wants to know the clients authentic experience more fully – as good or as bad as it actually is for them – without minimising or exaggerating it as others have often done. In attachment terms, this highly...Read More

Shame was always there

Posted on August 21, 2020August 21, 2020 by Chele Yntema

There is not a time where shame has not been present; not a time where I have not wondered “what is wrong with me”. I was never “normal”; never good enough: never smart enough, never fast enough, never slim enough, never fit enough, never pretty enough. Yet paradoxically I was...Read More

The Sociology of Culture and the Paradoxical Nature of Diversity. Culturally-Infused Practice in Counselling.

Posted on April 21, 2019 by Chele Yntema

Born from and into relationship, we are - the human race is, anything but an isolated species. Indeed, there is a universal reality that self-concept and identity are insurmountably enmeshed within ever evolving cultural contexts (Lago, 2005; Lott, 2010; Matsumoto & Juang, 2008; Siegel, 2012). Yet, it would be foolish...Read More

Are you in conflict or collaboration?

Posted on September 23, 2018August 10, 2020 by Chele Yntema

Are you in conflict or collaboration? . Even in the most dire situations I am coming to understanding the empowerment we offer by approaching others from a place of non judgmental listening. . At the same time, I am learning that for it to be collaboration, listening is not enough; though...Read More

Courage

Posted on September 23, 2018August 10, 2020 by Chele Yntema

To find the courage within us that enables us to see choice is to find and connect to our inherent heart. It is in our inherent heart that we hold the clarity, meaning, and poignancy the we need in lieu and in the light of any suffering we endure. So...Read More

Human Freedom

Posted on September 23, 2018August 10, 2020 by Chele Yntema

What is human freedom? I used to suffer daily worrying about my “what if’s”... torturing myself allowing my mind to become exhausted by thinking. It has been journey of learning to be mindful and seeking change by taking responsibility of my thoughts. And it would be naive of me not...Read More

Freedom

Posted on September 23, 2018August 10, 2020 by Chele Yntema

What is Freedom? We are tangible yet intangible creatures capable of the extraordinary if only we choose to seek depth and understanding of why what is, what it is. Without depth of knowledge, without truly investigating why we are who we are, how could we possibly fathom who we could...Read More