Written by the clinical team at Taproot Therapy Collective, a Birmingham psychotherapy practice specializing in somatic and trauma-focused modalities. Our clinicians are trained in body-based approaches including Brainspotting, EMDR, and somatic trauma resolution.

Talk therapy changed your understanding of your trauma. But your body still holds it—the tight shoulders, the clenched jaw, the knot in your stomach that appears every time you think about that thing. That’s because trauma doesn’t live only in your memories. It lives in your muscles, your fascia, your nervous system. Here are three evidence-based techniques that work from the body up, not the mind down.

Why “Body-Up” Trauma Work Matters

Traditional talk therapy engages the prefrontal cortex—the thinking, reasoning brain. But trauma is stored subcortically, in regions like the amygdala and brainstem that don’t respond to logic or insight. You can understand exactly why you react a certain way and still be unable to stop reacting that way.

Somatic approaches bypass the thinking brain entirely. They work directly with the body’s stress responses, allowing completion of biological processes that got interrupted during trauma. The result isn’t just understanding your trauma—it’s no longer feeling it in your body.

Three techniques have emerged as particularly effective for self-regulation and clinical application: TRE (Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises), Havening, and Somatic Internal Family Systems.

TRE: Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises

What It Is

TRE is a body-based practice that uses seven specific exercises to induce neurogenic tremors—a natural shaking reflex that discharges tension held in the muscles and fascia. Developed by Dr. David Berceli, TRE is based on the observation that animals in the wild shake off stress hormones after escaping predators. Humans have this same biological reflex but culturally suppress it to “maintain composure.”

TRE turns that suppression off.

The Science: Why Shaking Works

The key target is the psoas muscle—sometimes called the “muscle of the soul.” The psoas connects your torso to your legs and is the primary muscle of the fight-or-flight response. When you curl into a protective ball, that’s your psoas contracting. Chronic stress keeps this muscle perpetually tight, maintaining your body in a state of defensive readiness even when no threat is present.

When the psoas and surrounding muscles are fatigued through specific exercises, they begin to tremor. This shaking:

• Releases chronic muscular tension patterns
• Discharges stored stress hormones
• Signals safety to the nervous system
• Completes the biological stress cycle that got interrupted

The 7-Step TRE Sequence: How To Do It

Important: The goal is gentle muscle fatigue, not a workout. Tremors should be painless and feel relieving, not distressing.

Step 1: Ankle Rocks
Stand with feet hip-width apart. Rock your weight slowly from heels to toes and back. Continue for 1-2 minutes. This wakes up the lower legs and feet.

Step 2: Calf Raises
Rise onto your toes, hold briefly, lower slowly. Repeat until you feel mild fatigue in your calves—typically 15-20 repetitions. Don’t push to exhaustion.

Step 3: Single Leg Stands
Stand on one leg for 1-2 minutes, then switch. This fatigues the stabilizer muscles. Use a wall for balance if needed.

Step 4: Standing Forward Fold
Bend forward from the hips, letting your head hang. Keep knees slightly bent. Hold 2-3 minutes. This stretches the hamstrings and begins to engage the psoas.

Step 5: Back Extension
Place hands on lower back and gently arch backward. Hold 30 seconds. This stretches the front of the psoas.

Step 6: Wall Sit (Critical Step)
Sit with your back against a wall as if in an invisible chair. Thighs parallel to floor, knees at 90 degrees. Hold until your quadriceps burn and begin to quiver—typically 2-5 minutes. This fatigue is what lowers the threshold for tremoring.

Step 7: Floor Sequence (Butterfly Position)
Lie on your back. Bring soles of feet together, knees wide (Butterfly pose). Lift hips into a bridge briefly to further fatigue muscles, then lower. Now slowly bring your knees together—about one inch per minute. As knees draw closer, tremors typically begin in the legs and move up into the pelvis and psoas. Allow the shaking for 10-15 minutes.

How to Stop the Tremors

Simply straighten your legs. This immediately turns off the tremor mechanism. Use this anytime you feel overwhelmed or need to end the session.

What You Might Experience

• Shaking that starts in the legs and moves through the body
• Warmth or tingling sensations
• Emotional release (tears, laughter, sighing)
• Deep relaxation afterward
• Improved sleep the night following practice

Safety and Contraindications

Stop immediately if you feel:

• Overwhelmed or flooded with emotion
• Dissociated or “leaving your body”
• Pain (tremors should be painless)
• Panic or loss of control

Do not practice TRE if you have:

• Recent surgery or fractures
• Epilepsy or seizure disorders
• Severe untreated psychosis
• Pregnancy (consult your doctor first due to pelvic involvement)

Best practice: Learn TRE initially with a certified provider who can help you regulate the intensity and duration of tremoring.

Havening: “CPR for the Amygdala”

What It Is

Havening is a psychosensory therapy that uses specific touch patterns to alter brain electrochemistry. Developed by Dr. Ronald Ruden, it’s based on the neuroscience of how traumatic memories become “stuck” in the amygdala—and how they can be permanently “unstuck” through a process called depotentiation.

Think of it as a reset button for your threat detection system.

The Science: How Touch Changes Memory

When you experience trauma, AMPA receptors on neuron surfaces encode the emotional charge of the memory. This is why certain memories don’t just remind you of something bad—they make you feel the badness in your body, sometimes decades later.

Havening touch generates delta waves (0.5-4 Hz)—the slow brain waves normally only present during deep sleep. When a traumatic memory is activated while delta waves are present, a chemical reaction occurs:

• AMPA receptors are pulled off the neuron surface
• The emotional charge of the memory is permanently reduced
• The memory remains, but the visceral reaction is silenced

This is called depotentiation. The memory doesn’t disappear—you still know what happened—but the body stops screaming about it.

The SNAP Protocol: Crisis Self-Regulation

When you’re activated—panicking, triggered, overwhelmed—use this sequence:

S – Sense
Identify what you’re feeling. Name the emotion. Notice where it lives in your body.

N – Notice
Rate your distress from 0-10 (Subjective Units of Distress scale). This creates a baseline to track change.

A – Apply Havening Touch
Begin one of the three touch patterns (detailed below). Continue for several minutes.

P – Preoccupy
While maintaining the touch, engage your thinking brain with a distraction task: count backward from 100 by 7s, name animals alphabetically, visualize walking through a familiar place. This forces working memory to release the emotional content.

The Three Havening Touches

Perform each touch firmly but gently, at a pace of about one stroke per second.

Arm Havening (Self-Hug)
Cross your arms over your chest. Stroke downward from the tops of your shoulders to your elbows. Repeat rhythmically. This simulates being held.

Palm Havening
Rub your palms together as if washing your hands under warm water. The friction and warmth are soothing to the nervous system.

Face Havening
Gently stroke your forehead, temples, and cheeks—or trace the outline of your face from forehead to jaw. This mimics the soothing touch a parent provides to a distressed child.

When to Use Havening

• During a panic attack or acute anxiety spike
• After a triggering event or flashback
• Before a stressful situation (preventive regulation)
• When intrusive memories surface
• During insomnia caused by racing thoughts

What You Might Experience

• Rapid decrease in distress (often within minutes)
• Yawning, sighing, or deep breathing
• Sense of calm or heaviness
• Sleepiness
• The triggering memory feeling “further away” or less charged

Somatic Internal Family Systems (Somatic IFS)

What It Is

Traditional Internal Family Systems therapy works with “parts”—the different aspects of your psyche that carry different roles, burdens, and protective functions. Somatic IFS, developed by Susan McConnell, extends this framework into the body: your parts don’t just exist mentally—they live physically.

That chronic tension headache might be a Manager part working overtime to keep you productive. The pit in your stomach might be an Exile carrying childhood shame. The numbness in your chest might be a Firefighter protecting you from overwhelming grief.

The Three Types of Parts

Managers: Proactive protectors that try to keep you safe by controlling your environment, relationships, and behavior. They often manifest as tension, hypervigilance, or chronic pain in “working” areas of the body (shoulders, jaw, forehead).

Firefighters: Reactive protectors that activate when Managers fail. They use extreme measures (numbing, dissociation, addictive behaviors) to extinguish emotional pain. They often manifest as numbness, disconnection, or absence of sensation.

Exiles: Young, wounded parts carrying pain, shame, fear, or grief from the past. Managers and Firefighters work to keep Exiles locked away. Exiles often manifest in the core body—stomach, chest, throat—as vulnerability, tightness, or “butterflies.”

The 5 Practices of Somatic IFS

1. Somatic Awareness
Instead of analyzing thoughts, scan your body for sensations: tightness, heat, cold, numbness, pressure, tingling. These sensations are the language parts use to communicate.

2. Conscious Breathing
Parts often control the breath. Notice: Are you holding your breath? Breathing shallowly? Sighing frequently? The breath is a bridge between conscious awareness and the internal system. Changing breathing patterns can shift which parts are active.

3. Radical Resonance
Allow yourself to feel what a part feels—not just intellectually understand it. If a part carries grief, let yourself feel the weight of that grief in your body. This validation often allows parts to soften.

4. Mindful Movement
Let a part express itself through movement. An angry part might need to push against a wall. A sad part might need to curl up. A frightened part might need to shake. Give permission for the body to do what it needs.

5. Attuned Touch
Offer comfort to a part through touch (physical or imagined). Place a hand on the area where a part lives. Imagine holding a young Exile the way a loving parent would hold a frightened child.

How to Locate a Part in Your Body

When you notice a strong emotion, reaction, or pattern, ask:

• “Where do I feel this in or around my body?”
• “What is its shape, size, color, or texture?”
• “Does it have a temperature? A weight?”
• “If this sensation had a voice, what would it sound like?”
• “How old does this part feel?”

These questions shift attention from story (what happened) to sensation (how it lives in the body now). This is where healing becomes possible.

The Unburdening Process

In Somatic IFS, releasing a burden isn’t just cognitive—it’s physical. After a part has been witnessed and understood, it can release what it’s been carrying. This might look like:

• Exhaling dark smoke or heaviness
• Shaking out energy through the hands
• Visualizing removing a heavy object from the body
• Allowing tears, sounds, or movement to release
• Feeling lightness or spaciousness where the burden lived

This physical release ensures the body updates alongside the mind—preventing the common experience of “knowing” you’ve healed but still feeling the old patterns in your body.

Choosing the Right Technique

Each approach has different strengths:

Use TRE when:

• You carry chronic physical tension
• You feel “stuck” in fight-or-flight
• You want a self-practice you can do independently
• You have difficulty accessing emotions verbally
• Your body feels armored or defended

Use Havening when:

• You’re in acute distress and need rapid relief
• You experience panic attacks or flashbacks
• You have specific memories with strong emotional charge
• You need a portable technique usable anywhere
• You want to reduce reactivity to known triggers

Use Somatic IFS when:

• You experience internal conflict or contradictory impulses
• You have parts that sabotage your goals
• You want to understand the protective function of your symptoms
• You’ve done talk therapy but your body still holds the trauma
• You’re ready for deep, sustained healing work (typically with a therapist)

Integrating These Practices

These techniques aren’t mutually exclusive. A comprehensive somatic approach might include:

• TRE weekly as a maintenance practice to discharge accumulated tension
• Havening as needed for acute activation or triggering events
• Somatic IFS with a therapist for deeper parts work and trauma processing

The goal isn’t to become dependent on techniques—it’s to restore your nervous system’s natural capacity for regulation so that you need the techniques less over time.

When to Seek Professional Support

While all three techniques have self-application components, professional guidance is recommended if:

• You have a history of complex trauma or PTSD
• Self-practice brings up overwhelming emotions
• You dissociate or “leave your body” during practice
• You have a trauma history that hasn’t been processed
• You want to go deeper than self-regulation into trauma resolution

A trained somatic therapist can titrate the intensity of the work, help you stay regulated, and guide you through material that would be destabilizing to approach alone.

Getting Started: Your First Week

Day 1-2: Practice Havening touch for 5 minutes while thinking of something mildly stressful (not your worst trauma). Notice the calming effect.

Day 3-4: Do a body scan using Somatic IFS questions. Where do you notice tension? What does it feel like? Don’t try to change anything—just notice.

Day 5-7: Try the TRE sequence. Start with just 5 minutes of tremoring. Notice how your body feels afterward and the next morning.

Build slowly. These practices work with your nervous system’s capacity, and that capacity increases over time.

Working With a Somatic Therapist

At Taproot Therapy Collective, our clinicians specialize in body-based trauma approaches. We integrate somatic techniques with advanced modalities including Brainspotting, EMDR, and depth-oriented psychotherapy to address trauma at multiple levels—cognitive, emotional, and physiological.

If you’ve done the insight work and understand your trauma intellectually but still feel it in your body, somatic therapy can help you complete the healing process.

→ Schedule a consultation

About This Article

This guide was written by the clinical team at Taproot Therapy Collective, a Birmingham-based psychotherapy practice specializing in complex trauma, somatic approaches, and depth-oriented therapy. We believe the body holds wisdom that talk alone cannot access.

Key Sources: Berceli, D. (2005). Trauma Releasing Exercises. Ruden, R. (2019). When the Past Is Always Present: Emotional Traumatization, Causes, and Cures. McConnell, S. (2020). Somatic Internal Family Systems Therapy.

Last updated: January 2026