Trauma Release Exercises

I attended an introductory talk about TRE (Trauma release Exercise) with the aim of being trained as a TRE practitioner and ultimately a TRE trainer. Part of the recommendation of the process is to maintain a diary so I decided to keep track of this journey earlier rather than trying to do it later.

We were a massive group of fifteen anxious people gathering to hear what TRE is and how it will benefit us. In essence TRE is a process of addressing stress related conditions. The theory is that the body maintains a memory of each time it experienced stress and that TRE allows a natural manner for the body to detox it from stress memories. A specific muscle is designed for the purpose of shaking off the stress. TRE follows a process of six exercises designed to fatigue some muscles starting with the legs, working up to the core muscles in the back and the waste. Once the six exercises are done a particular body position is assumed that allows for the body to start to shake naturally.

I was particularly interested in the fact that it works on the leg muscles and the back in a similar fashion as Tai Chi. The facilitator confirmed that some of the exercises was borrowed from Tai Chi and later I discovered that all the exercises are done with the legs bent. The position that starts the shaking of the body is similar to a position I have done in Yoga as the yoga bridge pose. As with most other disciplines much is made of deep breathing.

We started the exercises by putting our left hand on our heart and breathing …through the hand. This was followed by standing on one leg and moving onto your toes, a position crunching down on one leg at a time, three positions of bending forward with the legs spread wide, a sitting against a wall exercise, a bending backwards exercise and finally doing the yoga bridge pose but with the souls of the feet touching. After this the buttocks are lowered to the ground but the soles are still touching. The knees are slowly raised to find the sweet spot where the body naturally begins to tremor.

The tremor I felt was slight but definite and I soon discovered that I cannot make the tremors happen but must relax and allow it to happen all by itself. The whole process was actually comforting and it was interesting to observe the involuntary processes taking over. After a while I was told to put my feet flat on the ground and experience the tremors from that position. We lied like that for ten minutes before being told to put our legs down and push our knees down into the ground like shut down process. Then we lied in any position to allow the body and mind some time to integrate the experience.

An interesting aspect of this process is that you do not need to face or know the cause of the stress but just follow the process. I felt aware and present during the debriefing process where people discussed how they experienced the process. Apparently it is a process of self discovery and some premium is placed on self awareness. This is why journalling is an integral part of the process.