Reframing Trauma: The Big Lie?
45sChallenges a common therapeutic approach, sparking curiosity and debate.
▶ Play Clip"Delivers on the promised contrast between reframing and TRG, though slightly overstates 'nobody tells you' as the concept is known in trauma circles."
This video challenges the common psychological approach of 'reframing' trauma by arguing that it only works on the neocortex, whereas trauma resides in the reptilian brain. The presenter explains the triune brain model and contrasts the methods of traditional therapy with TRG, a technique that restructures the pain itself rather than changing its meaning.
Many believe the main goal of TRG is to reframe trauma, but reframing is a tool used by psychology and psychoanalysis, not TRG.
Paul MacLean's model divides the brain into three parts: reptilian (instinct), limbic (emotion), and neocortex (reasoning).
Therapists use language to help clients see trauma differently, but this only engages the neocortex, not the deeper trauma storage.
TRG asserts that trauma settles in the reptilian brain, which does not understand language or reasoning, making reframing ineffective at the root.
The speaker references Peter Levine, who argues trauma is stored in the body, and animals naturally shake off trauma through physical release.
TRG uses breathing and sequential cycles to modify the structure of pain, leading to a natural change in perception without conscious reframing.
In TRG, the person still remembers the trauma factually, but it no longer causes emotional pain, unlike reframing which aims to change interpretation.
TRG offers a distinct alternative to traditional talk therapy by directly addressing trauma at the physical level in the reptilian brain, rather than attempting to change its meaning through cognitive reframing.
What are the three parts of the triune brain according to Paul MacLean?
Reptilian (instinct), limbic (emotion), and neocortex (reasoning).
01:34
Which brain part is responsible for complex reasoning and planning?
The neocortex.
02:02
Why does reframing not work on the reptilian brain?
The reptilian brain does not understand language or reasoning; it controls instinct and the autonomic nervous system.
05:52
What example does Peter Levine give to explain trauma release in animals?
A deer that escapes a predator shakes its entire body to release the trauma and complete the cycle.
06:47
How does TRG claim to transform trauma without reframing?
By using breathing and sequential cycles to restructure the pain itself, so the person no longer feels emotional pain even while remembering the event.
07:44
What is the key difference between psychoanalysis and TRG according to the speaker?
Psychoanalysis uses language to change the meaning of pain, while TRG modifies the physical structure of pain in the reptilian brain.
09:05
Triune Brain Theory Explained
Provides the foundational neuroscience for understanding where trauma is stored and why reframing may be insufficient.
01:19Reframing's Limitation
Clearly illustrates the difference between cognitive reinterpretation and direct trauma restructuring.
04:26Animal Trauma Release
Uses Peter Levine's animal analogy to show that trauma release is a physical, not cognitive, process.
06:20Pain Without Meaning Change
Highlights that TRG can remove emotional charge without changing the factual interpretation of the event.
08:52[00:03] question. The main point of TRG is to reprocess trauma. Trauma or emotional scars, OK? Reprocessing means helping the person to reframe that trauma to the point where they see it in a different light. No, that's not it. This is a
[00:20] very common misconception or question. Hey guys, let's go . Come on, let's look at the logic behind it all, because if something is logical, it's easy to understand, easy to explain, and you'll never forget it. Let's go. What does it mean to give new meaning? Reframing is a
[00:36] tool that is widely used not only by us at TRG, but also by psychology, psychological and therapeutic methods, and psychoanalysis. Why is
[00:49] that? Because, look, let's say you went through a trauma, a went through a trauma, a major abandonment. And so the role of the therapist, of forgiveness, of the psychologist who uses one of these approaches, is to help you cope
[01:04] help you cope better with the situation, he will help you to have a different understanding of it, a more appropriate understanding so that you can endure it, live with it without so much weight, so much pain. So, what
[01:19] tool does he use? Speech. OK. Let's review the first lessons OK. Let's review the first lessons of TRG. In your brain, we divide the brain into three parts, which is Paul McLin's triune brain theory, in which
[01:34] he separates it into three parts. The bulbar part here, which is the most instinctive part. Then we have the mesial part, which is this middle part here, responsible for the emotional area.
[01:49] That's where your midgut is, it's the limbic part, OK? And we have the most recent part that was developed only in the human race, and it allows for
[02:02] complex reasoning. No other species on Earth, besides humans, possesses the characteristic, the capacity, of complex reasoning. Furthermore, besides
[02:16] humans, no one has the capacity to plan for the future, to think about what they will do in 1 year, 2 years, 3 years. In other words, in 1 year, 2 years, 3 years. In other words, this part is the neocortex.
[02:31] What is the neocortex? Neo means new. Cortex layer of the new layer, this outer layer that gives the brain its appearance. Actually, I have a brain here, folks, look! This is the brain. It would be like this
[02:48] , seeing it this way. This bulbous part here, you see this bulb here? This part here is the nape of the neck. OK? Let me open it up here
[03:00] to make it clearer for understanding. Oh, you see? This part here is the back. Let me show you this side. Oh no, I can't see it . And that. This part here is the reptilian part of the brain, look. This is the part
[03:13] here, OK? Right here in the middle is where the amygdala is located, the limbic part of the brain, okay? Here. And this layer, this outer part,
[03:26] Here. And this layer, this outer part, this rough part here, see, rough, is precisely the neocortex, the neocortex layer. So, language is in this neocortex layer. So, language is in this part here and thought is in this
[03:39] whole area here, complex thought. Why did I explain all of this? Because a psychologist or psychoanalyst, in how they deal with words, they deal with everything that's being said here, and they help the person create a
[03:54] different image, because this part of the neocortex is the part that takes care of image creation, reasoning, the meaning that you understand, that you reason, that you apply something. When you learn from
[04:11] a book or a class, you use the neocortex to reason, to piece together the reasoning, to understand the logic. So you use this part to form images, to associate an image with learning. So if you suffered
[04:26] abandonment, for example, if your father left home when you were 10 years old and never came back. The therapist, the psychologist who uses the language of speech therapy, basically only has this tool: to help
[04:40] you see things differently, to make you give them a different meaning. Okay, so your father left. Well, but consider the other side of the situation.
[04:52] Well, but consider the other side of the situation. Perhaps this means that he gave you the as you have grown. It was painful. But consider the other side. There's another side to are. So the person tries to
[05:06] reason about it differently, that is, to look at the same thing and have a different image of it, a different perception of it. But all this work is done based on reasoning, on logical reasoning. And who
[05:23] is responsible for logical reasoning? It's the neocortex. This part here, we at TRG don't redefine anything. It's not that. The basis is
[05:37] different. We don't work with neocortex reasoning. neocortex reasoning. We work in the deepest area where the trauma settles in the reptilian part of the brain. So, in this part
[05:52] here, the reptilian brain, it's no use talking to it, look closely, look at it another way, try to give it another meaning, reframe this trauma, it's no use, because the reptilian brain doesn't have the
[06:07] language of speech. Remember when I use analogies, comparisons? The reptilian brain, also known as the instinctive brain, is the brain that controls your entire sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system. He controls his entire
[06:20] parasympathetic nervous system. He controls his entire body. There is even a theorist who works with and discusses trauma, Peter Livine. In the psychosomatics course, we talk a lot about Peter Livine. And Peter Livine says
[06:32] that the trauma remains in the body. In the body. He even cites the case of an animal that, when the animal runs, let's say a deer, a lion tries to catch the deer, it runs, runs, runs, runs and then the lion tries to catch it, tries to catch it, tries to catch it.
[06:47] If he escapes, if that deer, that moose, he escapes, do you know what he does? The moment he realizes he's free from danger, from the jaguar, the leopard, the lion attack, that he's escaped, that he's alive, his whole body trembles. Any
[07:03] [clearing throat] uh uh documentary about the animal world, you see that. His whole body is trembling. This technique of shaking the whole body removes the trauma; in other words, it's a physical part that serves as the closing of a cycle for the animal.
[07:18] Understand, the trauma would be instilled in the physical body. The physical body is controlled by the reptilian brain. The reptilian brain doesn't engage in conversation, it doesn't engage in chatter, it doesn't reinterpret, it doesn't imagine that it imagines the brain and the
[07:31] neocortical brain. So, while psychoanalysis, for example, works with the tool of re-signifying, of giving another meaning, we don't work with that. We work with the brain's tools from the
[07:44] brain's tools from the deepest unconscious, which, through the aid of deepest unconscious, which, through the aid of breathing combined with a sequential, concatenated methodology of cycle reprocessing, allows the
[07:59] person to begin to experience a complete modification in the structure of their pain. When he modifies the structure of the pain, obviously the perception he has is a
[08:11] different derivative, not a way of looking at it differently in order to change it, it 's not the other way around. Here, pain is transformed, the structure of trauma is transformed. And then we have a different interpretation. And this
[08:27] different interpretation doesn't necessarily reach the neocortical brain. In other words, people don't always just come up and say, "Yeah, I think
[08:39] he wanted me to grow up." That father who abandoned me, he gave me the opportunity to grow. No, the person simply looks and says, "OK, he's gone , but it doesn't bother me anymore." In other words, the person still knows that the
[08:52] father abandoned them, that the father left, that he never spoke to them again; they see things as they were, they don't give them another meaning, but what has changed in them? It changed so much that it doesn't hurt anymore. So, understand that while psychoanalysis, and other theoretical lines
[09:05] of psychology, use a tool to give a different meaning to pain so that the person can live with it, in TRG (Reeducação Postural Global - Global Reeducation Therapy), we are not concerned with changing the image of that pain, with giving it a different meaning, not at all
[09:20] . What we do is restructure all of the person's pain. When the pain vector disappears, the entire structure of that event, of that situation, is reconfigured, and from then on the person continues to see things in exactly the same way they always have.
[09:37] It's still abandonment, nothing has changed . But the difference now is that it doesn't hurt me at all. I was clear, everyone, I managed to clarify things, to clear up any doubts once and for all. So we don't work with re-signification. This is superficial
[09:50] because it works on the neocortex layer, and we work on the structure neocortex layer, and we work on the structure of pain. It's completely different.
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