Trigger moments are some of the most potent moments of our lives.
Everything becomes louder.
Our defences rise, reactivity takes over, and we can feel pulled away from ourselves.
But precisely because so much is activated, these moments also hold an extraordinary opportunity.
What is usually quieter within us can become easier to hear.
Moving outward, or moving away
For some of us, activation moves outward. We move into judgement, blame, reaction, pushing away, trying to change what is happening outside of us.
For others, or for the same person in different situations, the movement is away. We withdraw. We disconnect. We move so far from the activation that we barely experience it.
Many of us learned very early that activation itself was dangerous. Perhaps there simply wasn't anyone there who could remain connected with us while strong feelings moved through our bodies. And so we learned to move away.
Not because there is something wrong with that response. It was an adaptation.
But it can mean that we never learned something very fundamental: how to experience activation and remain in connection at the same time.
Over two sessions, we explore
How to remain connected in moments of activation
01
How to listen beneath the reaction
02
How to recognise the layers unfolding in the body: sensation, emotion, interpretation, needs and impulses
03
Rather than trying to make the experience stop, we learn how to stay in relationship with ourselves while it is happening.
And what begins to change when, instead of only asking:
“How do I make this stop?”
we also begin asking:
“Can I stay with myself while this is happening?”
This is an experiential masterclass, with embodied practice and guided inquiry woven through both sessions.
This is one of the reasons my work has circled around pain for so many years. If we want to shift these patterns, not only manage them but change them at the root, we need to become able to meet what is activated.
Not to drown in it or become consumed by it, but to discover that activation and connection can exist at the same time.
Held By
Dana
Biechonski
Fernandes
Somatic Psychotherapist • Supervisor • Educator
Dana has worked for over fifteen years at the intersection of body, psyche, trauma and pain.
Her work is grounded in Bodynamic Analysis, the Danish school of somatic developmental psychology rooted in psychomotor research, alongside extensive training in fascia, the nervous system, developmental and shock trauma, movement and hands-on bodywork.
She has worked internationally with people living with pain syndromes, psychosomatic symptoms and complex patterns of tension and disconnection from the body, and today also supervises practitioners working somatically with others.
Her understanding of pain is personal as well as professional: Dana lived with chronic pain for fifteen years before somatic work fundamentally changed her relationship with her body and pain.
