Grounding In Nature Guided Meditation • Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness by David Treleaven

A guided meditation by David Treleaven on appreciating the body.

In this solo episode, David speaks about the reasons he’s stepping back from TSM and three of the most important lessons he learned over the years: the importance of practicality, the inability to meet everyone’s needs, and the pros and cons of focusing on safety in trauma-sensitive work. David also shares his gratitude for the community and his visions for the future.

In this episode David speaks with Meena Srinivasan, an expert in the field of mindful education and Social-Emotional Learning (SEL). They discuss the relationship between SEL and mindful education, the mental-health crisis of Covid and the particular forms of stress that educators are facing in school systems, the difference between mindfulness as a path versus mindfulness as a tool in education, and the relationship between identity, SEL, and traumatic stress.

In this episode, David speaks with Joe Flanders and Andrew Rose, two leaders in the field of psychedelic-assisted treatment. They discuss the current movement around psychedelic treatment, conditions that support healing and transformation in psychedelic therapy (including mindfulness), working with “stuckness” in psychedelic treatments, and the relationship between mindful awareness, traumatic activation, and psychedelics.

In this episode David speaks with Katherine Metzelaar about the relationship between mindfulness, trauma, and disordered eating. They discuss the prevalence of eating disorders, the ways undernourishment can impact our capacity to be mindful, how the spectrum of eating disorders connects to trauma, cultural assumptions around thinness and fatness, and why a trauma-informed lens is so powerful in any work around nutrition.

In this episode, David speaks with Simon Whitesman about mindfulness and trauma in the context of South Africa. They discuss how mindfulness practice can increase the capacity to face historical trauma, the importance of elderhood in contemplative and trauma-healing spaces, the power of non-judgemental awareness in clinical work, and the reason trauma-sensitive mindfulness is so important in a South African context.

In this episode David speaks with Willoughby Britton and Jared Lindahl, co-authors of the Varieties of Contemplative Experience (VCE) study—a landmark investigation into the nature of meditation-related difficulties, including trauma. They are two of the world’s experts in studying the difficulties people can encounter in meditation, as well as the factors that contribute to these experiences.

In this episode, David speaks with Anjuli Sherin, author of the book Joyous Resilience: A Path to Individual Healing and Collective Thriving in an Inequitable World. They discuss the relationship between trauma and resilience in clinical and contemplative practice, the way resilience can be a counter-balance to over-focusing on traumatic stimuli in meditation, and cultural aspects of resilience.

In this episode David speaks with mindfulness author, speaker, and educator Diana Winston. Diana is Director of Mindfulness Education at UCLA's Mindful Awareness Research Center, founding board member of the International Mindfulness Teachers Association, and teaches meditation worldwide. They discuss the relationship between mindfulness research and practice, the professionalisation and standardization of mindfulness teaching (and how this relates to trauma), and Diana’s advice for aspiring mindfulness teachers.

In this episode, David speaks with writer and educator Dan Siegel. Dan is Professor of Psychiatry at the UCLA Medical School, founding co-director of the Mindful Awareness Research Center at UCLA, and author of a number of books including The Developing Mind and The Mindful Brain. They discuss mindfulness practices for COVID-19, the relationship between “monitoring” and “modifying” in meditation (including how this relates to trauma), and the three empirical pillars of mindfulness practice.