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Knowing yourself
is the beginning
of all wisdom.

Aristotle

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chele_yntema

I offer psychotherapy for Burnout, Breakdown, & Trauma. Connection, Compassion, & Clarity that moves you toward a life of joyous wonder & hope.

Repost from @awakenwithally • What helps your ne

Repost from @awakenwithally
•
What helps your nervous system to grow its capacity for life, healing and truth:

1. Your nervous system needs to regulate your joy, goodness, and genius just as much as it needs to regulate your pain, grief, and discomfort.

Healing isn’t just about feeling hard things. It’s about building capacity for what’s life-giving, too.

You don’t grow nervous system resilience by only staying in pain. You grow it by letting your system become familiar with safety, ease, warmth, and trust with experiences that were once missing or foreign.

This is how you expand beyond your past: not just by processing what hurt, but by allowing what’s never had space to come into life enough.

2. You need to allow your experience to be as it is (permission), just as much as you need tools that ask for changing it.

Both are necessary.

If you only use tools to fix, shift, or “feel better,” healing becomes another form of control.
Your emotions become tasks instead of experiences. And your system doesn’t learn how to simply be with itself.

That’s why permission matters. Even just two seconds of full allowing, of letting the moment be what it is, builds capacity. It tells your nervous system: “This is safe. You don’t have to fight this.”

But here’s the other side: only staying in permission, especially early on, can feel too much.
It can lead to overwhelm or collapse if there’s no containment or direction.

So, your nervous system also needs tools for support.

When you ask your system to change without permission first, you often reinforce the very survival patterns you’re trying to heal: the pressure to be different. The belief you’re not okay as you are. The feeling of never being fully met.

Ally.

Repost from @theeqschool • If you live from a pl

Repost from @theeqschool
•
If you live from a place of worry, of fear that something bad is going to happen,
if your primary focus is always on what could go wrong,
if you spend most of your time trying to account for every possible thing that could hurt so that you can be prepared for it —

You likely have an unresolved wound living in your body.

Some moment that broke your trust with yourself (which often happens through our relationships with other significant people).
An experience or (or many) that taught you that you aren’t safe.

That other people can’t be trusted,
or that you can’t be trusted to handle the discomfort if it arises in the moment.

It may have happened at a moment in time where you felt overwhelmed, but were unable to safely process your response to this thing that happened.

Where you didn’t receive support.

Where you didn’t feel seen, safe, attuned to, or valued for who you are.

Where you learned that it wasn’t safe to be present to your own emotional experience.

And there is no shame in this.

This happens/has happened to so many of us.

But that fear, that modern day vigilance & anxiety is there to protect the wound.

It’s so afraid that that thing is going to happen again.

But when you feel safe enough to allow yourself to process,
to safely be present to the pain of that experience,
you help that scared, lonely, and abandoned part begin to heal.

To mature emotionally.

To come into the present moment.

Because you are trustworthy.

You are capable, resourceful, and whole.

You just have to practice coming back to yourself again and again.

Learning to love our Self’s might be the hardest

Learning to love our Self’s might be the hardest request of us… to first see and acknowledge our own worth, our own intrinsic value.

Repost from @insideparenting
•
We think we’re protecting our children when we push them to be more, do more, achieve more — but often, it’s our own unhealed belief that we are not enough driving that urgency.

They are born whole, loving themselves fully. Without realising it, we pass down our self-doubt, measuring their worth through the lens of our own.

The hardest part of parenting might not be about them — it’s about us.

To raise children who stand in their worth, we have to confront the parts of ourselves that still question our own...

Loving them is instinctual. Learning to love ourselves again is the transformation. ❤️

So very true… we need a roadmap to security- som

So very true… we need a roadmap to security- sometimes no matter how hard we try, we simply cannot do it alone.

Repost from @anxiously_coupled
•
Something I see all the time in my sessions is people saying they try to regulate, and it might help for a minute but when the anxiety creeps back in they end up in full panic mode again.

And honestly, that makes total sense. Because real, lasting regulation doesn’t happen just in your head. You can’t think your way into safety. If your body doesn’t feel safe, your thoughts won’t either. Cognitive tools only really work after your nervous system has started to settle.

#trauma #hope #connection #compassion

Ohhh so good… Repost from @nadiaaddesi • I ma

Ohhh so good…

Repost from @nadiaaddesi
•
I made this guide to help you understand the way you show up in arguments and the way the people around you do too.

Not everyone reacts the same when things get hard. Some people shut down. Some push to fix. Some get loud. Some go quiet. And it’s not always about the moment, it’s about what their nervous system learned to expect a long time ago.

This guide is something I use with clients all the time. It helps make sense of those reactions so you’re not just labeling them, but actually understanding them. Where they come from. What they’re trying to do. And what might help in the moment, not to be perfect, but to feel a little more present and a little less stuck.

Note: some of these reactions are tied to deep, protective trauma responses. If that’s true for you, shifting them might take more than awareness or tips. But understanding them and being able to name what’s happening, is often the first step to interrupting the pattern, and finding your way back to yourself ❤️

Repost from @awakenwithally • Neglect isn’t he

Repost from @awakenwithally
•
Neglect isn’t healed by endlessly tending to the pain of what didn’t happen or losing yoruself into longing. It heals by bringing into lived experience what never had the chance to develop.

By awakening the embodied pathways to feel, to need, to rest, to receive, to express, to exist, fully, safely, and organically, in your body and your life.

Here are four core pathways of healing:

1. Soften the pressure to already know YOU.

“I don’t know what I need.”
“I don’t know how to feel safe.”
“I don’t know how to be with myself.” or “I don’t know who I am.”

If these feel familiar, it’s the imprint of neglect. You weren’t mirrored or nurtured in your basic needs and self, so how could you know?

You’re not broken. You’re unpracticed. Give yourself permission to learn YOU again. From the place your development paused. Be ok with not knowing.

2. Practice YOU/Discover YOU.

The primary pathway of healing neglect is self-discovery and self-practice.

Neglect freezes parts of you. Healing happens through felt and embodied experience, of bringing supressed pathways back to life:

- body & body instincts and impulses (hunger, rest, movement...)
- emotions & emotional needs (self-validation, comfort, needs meeting)
- sensitivity (as wisdom, not weakness)
- creativity, voice, play, truth
- soul gifts, essence, boundaries, preferences

3. Give anger space.

At some point, anger surfaces: “ Why me?” “It’s not fair.” “I shouldn’t have to do this.”

And you’re right. It’s not fair. You shouldn’t have had to raise yourself. This anger is so real and validating. Give it space.

4. Tend to and grieve the pain neglect has left behind

Neglect leaves a grief with no clear story or memories. It’s mostly pre-verbal.

A longing for what was never there. Allow that ache. Gently. Without fixing or rushing.

Ally.

Repost from @hollyhatamillustration • Remember y

Repost from @hollyhatamillustration
•
Remember your S’s for the days you feel stuck, scared, or small.

Stillness:
Because sometimes the bravest thing you can do… is be still.
No fixing. No running. Just letting yourself be.

Soften:
You don’t have to be tough all the time.
Let yourself melt.
Let yourself feel.

Surrender:
Stop fighting the hard thing.
Feel it. Name it. Let it pass through.
That’s how you move through pain without becoming it.

Strength:
You don’t have to feel strong to be strong.
Strength is standing up again—
even when everything in you wants to stay down.

Shadow:
There are parts of you you’ve hidden away.
They’re not bad. They’re just waiting to be seen.
Your shadow needs love too.

Small:
Small wins. Small steps. Small hopes.
They all matter.

Repost from @frank_andersonmd • We live in a wor

Repost from @frank_andersonmd
•
We live in a world that teaches us to move on quickly. To push through. To stay productive.
To smile, even when we’re hurting.

Maybe you learned early on that there wasn’t room for your pain.That it made others uncomfortable. That it got dismissed, punished, or ignored.

So you adapted.
You shut it down.
You got really good at surviving.

But over time, those survival strategies—numbing, avoiding, over-functioning, pretending—can become prisons.

Maybe overachieving once kept you safe—but now you can’t rest without guilt.

Maybe shutting down helped you survive chaos—but now you feel numb even in moments that should bring joy.

Maybe people-pleasing kept the peace growing up—but now you don’t know what you want or need.

Here’s what I’ve seen again and again: Unattended pain doesn’t disappear.

It burrows deeper—into the body, the nervous system, the way we relate.

It leaks out sideways as anxiety, chronic tension, irritability, disconnection.

It begins to shape how we see ourselves, how we love, and how safe we feel in our own skin—and in the world.

And yet—slowing down to feel can feel terrifying. Especially if no one ever taught you how to feel without judgment or shame.

That’s why curiosity is such a powerful—and radical—act of healing. Curiosity says: “I don’t have to fear this pain. I can learn from it.”

It invites us to sit beside the part of us that’s hurting, rather than trying to silence it.

It might sound like:
✨ “What is this emotion trying to tell me?”
✨ “Where have I felt this before?”
✨ “What part of me is showing up right now?”
✨ “How did this reaction once keep me safe?”

This is the heart of what I guide people through in integrative trauma therapy. Not just symptom relief, but reconnection.

Because when pain finally feels heard, it doesn’t have to build walls. It begins to soften.

And that moment of listening? That’s where healing begins.

It’s not always fast or easy. But it’s honest and real. And it ultimately leads to transformation that lasts.

To be believed - there is nothing more significant

To be believed - there is nothing more significant than another truly acknowledging and recognising ones experience as real.

Repost from @beautyafterbruises
•
Disclosing trauma for the first time can be one of the most terrifying, vulnerable, and courageous things a survivor ever does—possibly only second to surviving it the first time. When that heroic feat is met with judgment, shock, or, worse, silence, survivors may walk away feeling more shattered and shamed than before.
.
But survivors are NOT the crimes that have been done to them. They are not too much, too damaged, or too dirty. Their stories are not too heavy to hold.
.
As professionals, but also loved ones and even strangers, our presence matters. Listening with compassion, belief, and attuned emotion—not blank detachment or abject horror—can help survivors write new endings to the stories they’ve been telling themselves for so long.
.
Therapy services haven’t, historically, always been safe rooms for complex trauma survivors to simply exist exactly as they are.

The right support can reduce compound injuries and provide the kind of care trauma survivors always deserved.

One that proves they were right to speak...and even helps them increase the volume.
..

💙💛🧡
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#trauma #validation #hope #authentic #listen

Repost from @famimind_ • “I’m just a bad par

Repost from @famimind_
•
“I’m just a bad parent, then…”
No. That’s not accountability.
That’s emotional control dressed in guilt.

Because the moment you open your mouth and speak your truth,
they crumble into a self-pity spiral.
Not to make things right —
but to make you stop talking.

Suddenly you’re the villain.
They’re the victim.
And your pain gets buried under their need to be comforted.

That’s not remorse.
That’s manipulation.
That’s how the cycle survives.

You weren’t asking for shame.
You were asking for change.

But when people would rather be pitied than responsible,
they’ll guilt you for bleeding out loud
instead of asking why you had to bleed at all.

So let me remind you:

You’re not wrong for speaking the truth.

You’re not too much for needing peace.

You’re not cruel for choosing distance over chaos.

You’re healing in a way they never dared to.
And that takes courage most people will never understand.

👏🏽👏🏽❤️‍🩹

Love,
Anaishe Rose 🌹

Small thing matter… Repost from @primaltrust_of

Small thing matter…

Repost from @primaltrust_official
•
You don’t need to change everything overnight in order to begin your healing journey. Sometimes the most profound transformations begin with the smallest and quietest “yes” to yourself. It might be the gentle inhale you take before responding to stress, the slow stretch you offer your body before starting the day, or the moment you allow yourself to pause and simply be.

These small choices may seem insignificant, but they are powerful signals to your nervous system that it is safe to soften, safe to be present, and safe to begin again. Healing is not always about grand gestures or massive shifts. More often, it is found in the tiny acts of self-honoring that no one else sees.

Give yourself permission to start small. Let one breath, one pause, one compassionate decision be enough for today. Over time, those small yeses will lead you back home to yourself.

Repost from @mindfulmft • This is the aim. To ha

Repost from @mindfulmft
•
This is the aim. To have enough safety and security and trust in your relationship where you can bring things forward, where you can trust the struggle, where you believe in your (and their) ability to reconnect, reunite, reflect, and make it through to the other side.

Of course we want this in our romantic relationships, but it’s also at the core of our friendships, our parent/child relationships, really our dynamic with any intimate relationship in our lives. It’s at the core of secure attachment.

Today I ask you to reflect on whether you are that person for others. Can people bring things up to you and can they trust that it’s okay to do it.

Can they offer you feedback that you’re willing to reflect on?

Can they trust that you can go through a hard thing and come out the other side okay?

Repost from @angelldeer.sacredpaths • What’s b

Repost from @angelldeer.sacredpaths
•
What’s breaking in the world right now isn’t just politics, markets, or wars. It’s the failure of the oversized. The empire-sized. The disconnected machines we were never meant to trust.

Humans were made for the village.

For the small circle.,
For the land we can walk barefoot.
For the people we know by name.
For relationships where we are known, not followed, not marketed to, but truly seen, in all our raw, messy authenticity.

Maybe that’s why, all over the world, people are quietly gathering again.
Around fires. In community gardens. At farmers’ markets. In circles under ancient trees.
In prayer, in song, in silence.

I see it in so many of the spaces I am blessed to sit in; the conversations where greater vulnerability emerges, where raw honesty breaks through the surface, where performances drop, and something real begins to breathe again. I see it when we gather in person when people come not to be given answers but to meet the living mystery inside themselves, to receive the direct revelation of their own truth, their own medicine.

Small gatherings, where wisdom is shared hand to hand, breath to breath.
Where grief is witnessed. Where joy is not performed but lived.
Where no algorithm decides who gets to be heard and what needs to be seen.

It may not make headlines. But I genuinely believe and feel in my bones this is how the world is being woven back together.

Big systems are breaking.
But the village is remembering.

Angell Deer

This matters… Repost from @hora.z.sar • As we

This matters…

Repost from @hora.z.sar
•
As we walk through the known terrains of the self,
we pass by headstones — unmarked, unnamed,
graves without funerals, losses without language.

Each one holds a fragment:
a vanished street, a silenced voice,
a ritual we forgot how to perform,
a homeland that exists only in memory’s tense.

We do not stop long.

The map offers no legend for these shadows.

But we feel their pull. These ghosts of meaning, buried but unburied,
asking to be restored...

#ambiguousloss #healing #war #homeland #grief

Repost from @risingwoman • You are not here to

Repost from @risingwoman
•

You are not here to pour yourself out endlessly into others — relationships are a reciprocal dance of giving and receiving, the ebbs and flows of love and authentic connection leave room for your needs to be honoured too.

If you’re afraid to speak up, to set a boundary, to ask for more - know this - it’s ok to be afraid, but do it anyways. Practice taking up space and making your truth a priority.

The right people will want this for you, and it can only strengthen your relationships. The ones that fall away weren’t meant to stay. People don’t leave you for taking up space unless they were only around to take from you to begin with and those are the relationships we want to prune away.

Repost from @the.trauma.educator • Yes, of cours

Repost from @the.trauma.educator
•
Yes, of course, there are times when we might make unreasonable requests. Times when we’re acting from a place of demand or entitlement. This post isn’t about those moments.

This is about the reality that for people with complex trauma any need, boundary or request of theirs can feel too much.

Because they were taught through abandonment, anger, or punishing silence that being human was something to hide.

Healing doesn’t mean you stop feeling afraid when you speak up.

It means learning to feel that fear without collapsing into it.

And it means offering your body a new story where your needs are allowed, your voice is welcome, and your presence doesn’t require overexplaining.

Have you ever experienced a moment when you made a reasonable request from someone, and your nervous system instantly expected that they would get really angry at you or shame you for it?

Effie 🦋

The body will scream what the voice can only whisp

The body will scream what the voice can only whisper… “slow down, please slow down.”

Repost from @nicolajanehobbs
•
No wonder we’re exhausted.

We try so hard to live up to expectations that are simply impossible to meet, stretched thin by systems that tell us to be ‘good girls’ — small and silent and self-sacrificing — at the same time as expecting us to be strong, independent women who are ambitious and high-achieving and chasing our dreams and breaking glass ceilings.

These are the narratives I discovered as I was researching and writing The Relaxed Woman, expectations that keep us feeling stressed, exhausted and unworthy, stories that we’ve internalised so deeply they feel like truths.

But we can find freedom from them. We can unlearn the lies that relaxing is lazy, that slowing down is selfish, that stillness means we’re falling behind. And as we do, we can rediscover our values, return to the natural rhythm of our nervous system and reclaim our time, our worth, our body, our joy, our lives.

I explore this more deeply in The Relaxed Woman which is out next week!! Your pre-orders mean the world ♥️

Healing doesn’t happen with the ah-ha… it happ

Healing doesn’t happen with the ah-ha… it happens gradually over time with space for safety, support, and softening to the waves of our most authentic Self.

Repost from @awakenwithally
•
What I wish I knew earlier about Healing:

1. The most profound healing comes from meeting ourselves.

Healing doesn’t come from fixing, intellectually understanding or analyzing. These might offer temporary relief to the mind, but they don’t reach the deeper layers of experience that offer integration.

The healing we long for, begins when we learn to meet ourselves in the very places we’ve never been met before. In our rawness and insecurity.

Healing begins when we uncouple the patterns and states we want to heal from 5 things:

- control: the urge to fix or do something about it to change
- judgement: labeling the pattern as good, bad, or inappropriate
- shame: believing you’re wrong or inadequate for experiencing the pattern
- fear: that is unsafe to be felt or experienced
- meaning: assigning stories like “ This means I’m broken.”

2. Healing happens little by little.

Healing isn’t a one-time a-ha or experience. It’s a slow, gradual process of creating space for your system to feel safe, supported and heard.

Every time I met my patterns with less control, shame, judgment, meaning or fear, something shifted, 0.1%.

A bit more perspective. A bit more capacity to hold discomfort. A bit less reactivity, shame or control. A bit more space for “You”. A bit more permission to feel… to stay… to be with what is.

Over time, these small shifts add up. Patterns that once felt overwhelming become softened, easier to navigate, or even fully integrated.

3. I don’t have to know how to heal.

This was one of the most freeing lessons for me. Healing isn’t something I need to know how to do. It’s something I allow.

When you meet yourself, you create the internal conditions for healing to unfold in its own time and order it chooses. In a way that feels safe.

#trauma #safe #slow #enough #hope #support #soft

Repost from @amythelifecoach • You can logically

Repost from @amythelifecoach
•
You can logically know someone cares. You can hear their apology, understand their explanation, even believe their intention was good.

And still… what if your body still doesn’t feel safe?

That’s because your nervous system doesn’t anchor to words. It looks for patterns.

It learns safety from what’s predictable, not just what’s promised.

So when someone’s care is inconsistent towards you- when their words say one thing and their behavior says another. Your body doesn’t know what to expect.

And that uncertainty feels like danger, especially if you grew up in an environment, where love was confusing, conditional, or had to be earned.

What feels like you being extra sensitive, is how your nervous system learned to survive emotional inconsistency.

Rebuilding safety starts with learning how to trust your own read on the situation. And that involves watching their behavior so you can stop overriding your instincts just because someone says the right things.

This is where you begin rebuilding self-trust and trust in the relationship.

Truly, a helpful way of understanding our anger ❤️

Repost from @ifstherapy_annavincentz
•
Anger is not the problem. Anxiety is.
Let me explain:

As children growing up with parents who have issues with anger, for instance not allowing children to get angry, say no and have their boundaries, or the parent being either explosive with rage or suppressing their own anger, we learn that anger is not safe and that we are not allowed to be angry at the people we love. Enter anxiety.

Anger is a very calm emotion. It can be firm (as in boundaries), it can stand tall (as in dignity) and it can cut clear as steel.

Rage on the other hand (and suppressed anger which is the flipside of that) is not calm, does not respect boundaries and is a storm ball of energy. This is not about anger, this is about the anxiety it has been infused with. It is fear.

And it is your inner fear and anxiety that needs your loving connection, so that your Self-led anger can shine through and protect your boundaries calmly and help you clearly show up in the world.

#boundaries #protection #connection #anger #rage #fear #anxiety

Repost from @emmylou.seaman • Many people think

Repost from @emmylou.seaman
•
Many people think childhood trauma only comes from big events, abuse, violence, or major losses.⁣
⁣
But trauma can also come from small, everyday moments that made you feel unsafe, unseen, or unloved.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
Why?⁣⁣⁣
⁣
Because while the adult version of you might now understand why something happened, the child you once were didn’t have that context.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
Let me share why that matters 👇⁣⁣⁣
⁣
In childhood, any experience that threatens a child’s need for connection, safety, or emotional security can feel deeply distressing, even if it doesn’t look traumatic on the outside.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
Especially in the early years (before age 7), children don’t have the ability to think logically or understand another person’s perspective.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
They interpret the world through emotion and sensation.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
So when something painful or confusing happens—like being scolded, ignored, blamed, or compared children often internalize it.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
They might not say it out loud, but inside, they form beliefs like: “I’m not good enough.” Something is wrong with me. I must be too much.” I don’t matter.”⁣⁣⁣
⁣
As we grow up, we try to make sense of it all. We explain it away: “My parents were stressed, they didn’t know better, It was a different time, I get it now.”⁣⁣⁣
⁣
And while the adult part of you might truly understand, the wounded child within you still holds the emotional imprint.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
That’s why something today, like a partner’s cold tone, a friend canceling plans, or a boss’s feedback, can trigger a deep reaction.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
Because the part of you that learned to survive by staying small or quiet is still waiting to feel safe, loved, and chosen.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
Healing begins when you stop gaslighting your younger self and start offering her what she never received.⁣⁣⁣
⁣
✨ You don’t need to have a dramatic past to justify your pain.⁣
✨ Your inner world deserves compassion.⁣
✨ And your triggers are messengers, not flaws.⁣
⁣

Repost from rebelthriver • You don’t have to r

Repost from @sarahbcoaching • Because our nervou

Repost from @sarahbcoaching
•
Because our nervous system is shaped by our past experiences, what we learn in childhood, we often repeat in adulthood – especially in our relationships.

Your earliest relationships taught your system what to expect from love.

💔If you had to hide parts of yourself to feel accepted…
💔If you were praised for shrinking, sacrificing, or staying silent…
💔If connection meant contorting yourself to meet someone else’s needs…

Then it makes so much sense that, as an adult, you might feel drawn to relationships that reflect those same dynamics, even if they no longer serve you.

And unless we bring awareness to these patterns, our nervous system will keep choosing what’s familiar, not necessarily what’s safe or fulfilling.

This is why healing happens at the level of the nervous system. Because it’s not just about thinking differently, it’s about feeling differently in our body.

The work of healing isn’t to shame those patterns, it’s to honor how adaptive they were.

And then, slowly, with compassion, show your system what’s possible now.

The more we begin to gently attune to those young parts of us and learn to create safety within, the more we build capacity to choose connection that honors our wholeness – not just our survival.

In kindness and belief in your healing,
Sarah

Repost from @the_therapist_parent • Sometimes th

Repost from @the_therapist_parent
•
Sometimes the most powerful thing we can do as parents is pause.

Not to fix.
Not to react.
Just to be.

That pause helps us regulate — and when we’re regulated, we can think more clearly.
We can look behind the behaviour instead of just reacting to it.

We can choose connection over control.

This is the work of raising emotionally safe kids — not perfect moments, but intentional ones.

Repost from @mindfulmft • Okay…disclaimers fir

Repost from @mindfulmft
•
Okay…disclaimers first. Very often we are contributing to the problem at hand, so it’s important that we stay self reflective and open to feedback. I am not suggesting that this is true always and in every case, but I do want us to begin to recognize the dynamics where there’s an emphasis on you with no or very little emphasis on them. Okay? That’s what we’re examining here.

The relationships that make you the problem.

Because making you the problem serves something.

If you’re the problem then they don’t have to look at themselves. If you’re the problem they don’t have to reflect. If you’re the problem they don’t have to change. If you’re the problem they don’t have to grow. If you’re the problem then people can feel sorry for them. If you’re the problem then they’re not. You see how that goes?

Sometimes people must make you the problem, the energy, the villain in the story to protect them or help them avoid facing a part of themselves that they’re not quite ready to face or part ways with. Oof indeed.

Being on the receiving end of that is no fun. It’s not easy to hang out in that space, so I want you to try a few things.

1. Identify what your contribution is and own it. Acknowledge it for yourself. Identify where your growth opportunities are.
2. See their part too. Get clear with it even if they can’t.
3. Consider what making you the problem protects or helps them avoid.
4. Decide how you want to engage with someone who needs to hold in this position at the expense of you.
5. Work on releasing needing to control the narrative. What does it look like to allow them to see you as the problem or convince others of this too (double oof).
6. Remind yourself that the story another believes or tells doesn’t make it true.
7. Remind yourself of what you know to be true.

Rinse. Wash. Repeat. Over and over and over again.

Ever feel like you’re holding it together on the

Ever feel like you’re holding it together on the outside but fraying on the inside?

What if noticing your capacity wasn’t a sign of failure—but a sign of wisdom?

When you notice yourself moving out of your capacity — try pausing for a moment of CARE.

This is a gentle way to return to your Self, without judgment.

C – Compassion
Can you soften toward what you’re feeling, even if it’s uncomfortable?

A – Attention
Where is this showing up in your body? Is your breath shallow? Jaw tight?

R – Reflection
What might have contributed to this moment? Is this familiar? Is something old being stirred?

E – Embodied Action
What does your system need now? A breath? A step outside? A boundary?

✨ You don’t need to force regulation.
Rather, relate to your capacity with care.

#CAREMoment #NervousSystemSupport #TraumaInformedCare #SomaticTherapy #SelfCompassion #Psychoeducation

#WindowOfCapacity #EmbodiedHealing #RelationalNeurobiology #BurnoutRecovery #TraumaHealing #WindowofTolerance

Repost from @janetlansbury • A parent asked: “

Repost from @janetlansbury
•
A parent asked: “Do you have suggestions for meditative practices, mantras, etc. to help parents center and calm themselves while in the heat of the moment?”

My mantra for parents is also one of our biggest challenges: Let feelings be. Accept tantrums, meltdowns, whines, neediness, disappointments, sadness, major and minor complaints without judgment. Our children’s feelings and desires are involuntary and do not belong to us. Managing, calming, or otherwise “fixing” them is not our responsibility, nor is it helpful to them.

So, rather than trying to respond “properly” and risk becoming affected by our children’s moods, focus on letting feelings be. Our children’s emotional expressions (no matter how unreasonable, ridiculous or unfair they might seem) need to be okay with us as is, for as long as they last. Our acceptance is what allows them to be expressed in a healthy manner.

When we let feelings be, we let go of reacting and, instead, stay anchored, accepting ups and downs, letting life flow.

Remember that our reasonable limits don’t cause our children’s feelings, but rather provide children the opportunity to release feelings that are already there. Trust this process.

Your child wants you to keep playing, but you need to do something else. You let his feelings be by staying calm and moving on. “You are holding onto me. I feel that, but I’m going to remove your hands so I can get our dinner ready. You’re upset about that.”

Letting feelings be doesn’t mean being permissive or giving in to our child’s demands or wishes. In fact, acceptance usually requires we do the exact opposite. Holding firmly to our boundary or position gives children the message that their disagreements and disappointments are perfectly acceptable.

I honour you. Your courage. Your hope. Your persev

I honour you. Your courage. Your hope. Your perseverance despite the exhaustion.

You matter. And I honour you for simply being here today - in this moment together in this breath. 🙏🏻

Repost from @vexking
•
We’re often told, “You don’t have to go through it alone.” And in an ideal world, that would be true. Healing would be accessible, community would be safe, and support would show up right when we need it most. But sometimes, the resources just aren’t there.

Therapy is expensive. And even when it’s affordable, it can be unfamiliar or outside your comfort zone. The people around you might not understand what you’re carrying, or worse, might dismiss it. You might fear being seen as dramatic, weak, or burdensome. And sometimes the struggle is so basic—so raw—that no one can step in. No one can pay the bills. No one can shoulder your responsibilities. You’re the only one holding it all.

So during your tough season, maybe you stayed quiet. The pain was real, but the options felt few, and the risks of reaching out felt too high. The energy required to translate your internal world into words simply felt like more than you could give. So, you learned to navigate your storms without the lighthouse of someone else’s understanding.

And still, you made it through. Maybe not all the way. Maybe you’re still navigating it. But you’re here. And that counts for something.

The world may not have seen the late nights, the silent cries, the sheer grit it took just to keep going. But you did. And that deserves recognition.

That’s a kind of bravery we don’t talk about enough. The kind that gets dressed, answers emails, feeds the kids, shows up to work—all while carrying the weight of a heart quietly mending.

You are proof that survival isn’t always loud. Sometimes, it looks like quiet perseverance. Sometimes, it’s choosing to face another day without applause, support, or certainty.

Though the world may never fully know what you carried, your resilience is worthy of honour. And your story, even in silence, is sacred.

Repost from @amythelifecoach • If you lose acces

Repost from @amythelifecoach
•
If you lose access to your own emotions the moment someone else is upset, you’re most likely protecting yourself the only way your nervous system knew how.

Because when safety depended on staying ahead of someone else’s mood, self-attunement got replaced with hyper-attunement.

🧠 Here’s how you can begin shifting that pattern:

Next time you feel yourself slipping into fix-it mode or emotionally disappearing, pause and ask yourself:

“What am I feeling right now?”
“What would it look like to stay with what I’m feeling and honor it - even if it’s invisible to everyone else?”

You don’t need to fix anything to be safe in a healthy relationship.
You don’t need to disappear to stay connected.
You just need to stay with you - that’s what builds safety within you.

Start by noticing your inner cues.
Then practice honoring them - even quietly, so your body can learn:
“My feelings matter, too.”🤍

When the emotional flooding washes you off your fe

When the emotional flooding washes you off your feet it can be hard to remain connected to safety… You don’t have to spiral and drown. And whilst learning takes time in the presence of a therapist- it is possible.

Repost from @frank_andersonmd
•
I’ve talked a lot about this idea of being with your trauma, not reliving it. But for many people - especially those who get flooded with memories - it can feel a bit abstract.

Because when a painful memory surfaces, it can feel like there’s no middle ground. You’re either totally numb, or overwhelmed and spiraling.

But here’s the truth: - You can learn to stay connected to yourself without being consumed. - You can feel without falling apart.

And it doesn’t mean forcing yourself to revisit trauma before you’re ready.

The tools in this post are about learning how to keep one foot in the memory, and one foot in the present - so you can begin to respond differently when trauma shows up uninvited. 
There are many ways to safely process trauma—and what works for one person may not work for another. 
The key is finding what helps you stay present when the past shows up.

Repost from @amythelifecoach • If you’ve ever

Repost from @amythelifecoach
•
If you’ve ever lost touch with your own feelings, the moment someone else got upset..

And found yourself trying to fix what was never yours to hold. You were trained to keep the peace, even at the cost of yourself.

And your work now? Relearning what is and is not your emotional responsibility. Learning that you’re allowed to stay with you, even when someone else is dysregulated.

Repost from @frank_andersonmd • Some of the most

Repost from @frank_andersonmd
•
Some of the most resilient people I meet in trauma therapy don’t look like they’re struggling at all.

They’re highly capable. Driven. Empathetic. They hold it together in public, take care of everyone else, and have mastered the art of “pushing through.”

But here’s the thing:
Functioning isn’t the same as healing.
Adapting to pain isn’t the same as moving beyond it.

Our minds and bodies are incredibly smart when it comes to survival. We learn to cope in ways that help us keep our pain at bay - like staying overly independent, avoiding conflict, overachieving, or putting everyone else’s needs first.

These patterns often start as protection. And they work - until they start getting in the way of what we actually need.

While you might look fine on the outside, your body might still be bracing. Your relationships might still feel distant. Your joy might still feel like something you have to earn.

Healing is what happens when we stop just performing wellness and start tending to the parts of us that never got the chance to feel safe, held, or whole.

It’s slower. It’s messier. It’s deeper.

And it doesn’t mean erasing the ways you adapted. It means understanding them, honoring them - and slowly giving your system permission to live beyond them.

Not perfectly. Not all at once. But in ways that let you feel more present, more connected, and more at home in your own life.

Repost from @theeqschool • Why does it matter th

Repost from @theeqschool
•
Why does it matter that you struggle to receive compliments?

Because they’re an opportunity to connect with others, to receive mirroring, and to know ourselves more deeply. They can help us better understand our strengths, learn about what someone else values, and to see how we impact the world around us.

Receiving compliments can feel really vulnerable, especially when they hit on something that feels true. And if we didn’t grow up in a system where we often got to feel seen for the good little people that we were, it’s possible we never got used to that sort of vulnerability; that safe self-exposure.

Unfortunately, we live in a society where we conflate humility with this sort of insecure inability to own our inherent goodness, and we often shame people for liking or believing in themselves (what? it’s so weird). But humility is actually quiet confidence; it’s knowing and believing in your abilities, worth, & inherent goodness. And we can increase this confidence by being open to receiving input from others.

Additionally, this habit, this practice of denying and running away from anyone’s mirroring of our positive attributes separates us from people. Dodging compliments doesn’t allow us to feel fully seen by (and connected to!) other people, and it stops them from vulnerably sharing how we’ve impacted them.

And it makes sense that it can feel vulnerable - compliments can bring up feelings around being seen that can feel threatening or touch on deeper, tender unmet needs.

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Chele Yntema is a Registered Clinical Counsellor and Trauma Specialist.

In the spirit of reconciliation I acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. I pay my respect to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today. I am committed to inclusion across race, culture, ethnicity, gender, sex, sexuality, religion, and ability. I recognise that people from diverse communities face systemic barriers and seek to challenge the current system and strive for change that makes mental health and wellbeing accessible to and inclusive for all.

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