4-Day Online Retreat: 2021 Mindfulness and Body/Mind Approaches for Clinical Practice: Facing the Challenges of a Post-COVID World

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Speaker

Mary NurrieStearns, MSW, LCSW, C-IAYT Related seminars and products

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Mary NurrieStearns, MSW, LCSW, C-IAYT, E-RYT 500, is a licensed clinical social worker with four decades of professional experience. She maintains a counseling practice in Tulsa, Oklahoma with a specialty in treating adults with histories of childhood trauma. She has thirty years of training in mindfulness, is a certified trauma-informed yoga therapist, and has trained in clinical applications of Emotional Freedom Technique. Mary is author of numerous articles on psycho-spiritual growth, co-author of Yoga for Anxiety, Yoga for Emotional Trauma, Yoga Mind, Peaceful Mind and co-editor of Soulful Living. She is the author of the book, Healing Anxiety, Depression and Unworthiness: 78 Brainchanging Mindfulness and Yoga Practice (2018). Mary teaches seminars to mental health professionals across the USA and along with her husband, conducts retreats on the transformative, mind-body healing practices of yoga and meditation. She credits mindfulness-based practices for significant healing in her own life.

 

Speaker Disclosure:

Financial: Mary NurrieStearns maintains a private practice. She receives compensation as a speaker, yoga, teacher, and published author. Ms. NurrieStearns receives a speaking honorarium, book royalties, and recording royalties from PESI, Inc. She has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.

Non-financial: Mary NurrieStearns has no relevant non-financial relationships.

Objectives

1. Investigate emotional motivation systems of the brain as they pertain to clients who have experienced trauma and mindfulness practices that improve treatment outcomes. 
2. Distinguish between the default network, salience network and central executive network and utilize this information for client psychoeducation. 
3. Evaluate negativity bias in the brain as it relates to clients who have experienced trauma and therapeutic mindfulness intervention. 
4. Assess the polyvagal theory and implications for resources for emotional regulation. 
5. Analyze the social brain and use of interpersonal neurobiology that activates the affiliation system of the brain to decrease sense of isolation and not being loved. 
6. Defend the necessity of including the body in emotional regulation and teach body-based clinical skills of breathing, body scan and body movement for regulation. 
7. Practice the use of Emotional Freedom Technique to help clients with emotional stabilization. 
8. Demonstrate components of mindful self-compassion for treating unworthiness and confronting the “inner critic.” 
9. Utilize mindfulness techniques for helping clients address negative thoughts regarding chronic pain. 
10. Demonstrate use of mindful awareness/movement to strengthen therapeutic relationship, build group cohesion, and for psychoeducation. 
11. Demonstrate techniques of body awareness and movement to alleviate the physical manifestations of shame. 
12. Practice specific mindfulness approaches for grief and loss related to adjusting to a post-pandemic environment.
13. Evaluate a mindful communications process for conflict resolution and emotional bonding. 
14. Utilize concentration, distancing, naming, and thought substitution in treating depression producing thoughts. 

Outline

Neuroscience and Practices Specific to Anxiety and Trauma Treatment

• Neuroplasticity—your brain’s ability to organize and learn
• The triune brain
• Primary emotional motivators
• Polyvagal nerve theory and clinical applications
• Negativity bias of your brain
• Savouring the good and affiliation system of the brain

Social Brain: Causes and Conditions

• Accessing beneficial memories
• Default mode network, salience network and central executive network of the brain
• Window of tolerance psychoeducation and clinical applications

EMOTIONAL STABILIZATION SKILLS—THE FIRST TASK IN TRAUMA TREATMENT

• Importance of including the body in stabilization
• Body scan and sensory input for stabilization
• Mindful breathing practices
• Emotional Freedom Technique
• Practice leading mindful breathing exercises and simple movement
• Clinical examples of emotional stabilization skills

Mindfulness-Based Interventions
Confronting Trauma-Based Negative Thoughts

• Nonjudgmental observing of thoughts
• Naming— write thoughts down
• Recognize, distance and dis-identify from narrative of self-identity
• Relate to the voice of the inner critic with mindful compassion and redirection
• Address negative thoughts regarding chronic pain
• Nourishing wholesome thoughts to undo thought patterns of trauma – repetition and concentration
• Habit tendencies and neuronal pathways
• Clinical examples of relating to thoughts therapeutically

Alleviating Distressing Emotions

• Approach, not avoid, emotions safely with mindfulness
• Be there for grief
• Comfort pose and self-love mantra
• Emotional Freedom Technique for client self-care
• Clinical examples of treating distress with mercy

Increasing Self-Compassion and Emotional Resilience for Trauma and Anxiety Resolution

• Recognize the power of inner voices
• Mindfulness interventions for developing self-compassion
• Who has seen your goodness? – restoring trust
• Teachers of compassion
• The voice of the inner friend
• Three-part self-compassion note
• Offering loving kindness to any inner aspect that feels not deserving
• Compassion for the inner critic
• Clinical examples of utilizing self-compassion

Treating Trauma-Based Shame

• Repair unworthiness with mindfulness-based interventions
• Impact of shame on the brain – default network and pain system
• The physiology of shame
• Differentiate among shame, defiance, and noble posture
• Narrative of unworthiness
• Create a new narrative of self
• Clinical examples of treating unworthiness and shame

Target Audience

• Counselors
• Social Workers
• Psychologists
• Marriage and Family Therapists
• Occupational Therapists
• Addiction Counselors
• Case Managers
• Therapists
• Nurses
• Other Mental Health Professionals