Mental Health Workshops

Offerings

• Workshops

• Presentations

These workshops weave in both professional, evidence based knowledge and skills, as well as my own stories.

I also invite participants to consider how their own stories have shaped them in how they make sense and navigate their relationships, work, and home.

My goal is for participants to have a better understanding of themselves, others, and ultimately so they can live with more authenticity and freedom at work, home, and in the world.

Topics I Speak About

For Corporations/Agencies

Trauma 101 (What is Trauma?)

Audience

• This workshop is for those who seek to learn the basics of trauma and PTSD

Outcomes

1. Participants will be able to define what trauma and Post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is

2. Participants will learn the different types of trauma (complex, single incident, little t, big t, shock, intergenerational, historical, racial)

3. Participants will learn the causes, signs, and risk factors for trauma and PTSD

4. Participants will learn how trauma and PTSD affects health and mental health outcomes

5. Participants will learn how the brain is altered as a result of trauma

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• This presentation is more didactic and less experiential, meaning the focus of the workshop is on providing education and theoretical knowledge.

• I include knowledge I’ve learned over 8 years of being a trauma therapist, in an easy to understand manner for non-clinicians.

• Knowledge and education will be adapted based on your organization’s preferences and needs.

• Sample practical knowledge I can offer include:

  • Framework shift from “What’s wrong with you?” to “What happened to you?” to “How did you get through this?”

  • Physical well being effects such as poorer health outcomes

  • Emotional well being effects such as emotional dsyregulation

  • Fight, Flight, Freeze, Fawn, Fright behavioral responses as an adaptation to trauma and survival

  • Trauma informed care AKA assume everyone may have a history of trauma, to prevent re-traumatization and create more safety

  • The trauma brain AKA amygdala

  • SAMHSA’s Six Guiding Principles

    • Safety

    • Trust & Transparency

    • Peer Support

    • Collaboration

    • Empowerment & Choice

    • Intersectional Identities

  • Organizational Self Care

    • Secondary and vicarious trauma

    • Boundaries to prevent burn out

  • Post traumatic growth

Compassion Fatigue, Vicarious & Secondary Trauma

Practical Individual Strategies & Skills For Management of Compassion Fatigue, Secondary & Vicarious Trauma

Audience

• This workshop is for direct service providers/clinicians who work with a population that has experienced trauma, which brings up “stuff” that can feel overwhelming, messy and confusing.

• Some participants may also have their own trauma history and experiences which will collude with their work and clients. This will also be addressed.

Outcomes

1. Participants will be able to define what compassion fatigue, secondary trauma, and vicarious trauma is

2. Participants will learn the causes, signs, and risk factors for compassion fatigue, vicarious and secondary trauma.

3. Participants will learn to how to increase their capacity and resilience for ongoing exposure to trauma

4. Participants will learn 3 somatic and experiential strategies to manage their symptoms of compassion fatigue, secondary trauma, and vicarious trauma

5. Participants will leave with a written plan that tracks what they need to do in order to intentionally take care of themselves in order to continue doing client facing work
   

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• Explore self-care techniques as well as strategies you can use to help ensure balance and self-care for those that you supervise or manage. Strategies can be adapted based on your organization’s preferences.

• This presentation is less didactic and more experiential, meaning I focus more on practical therapeutic strategies so participants can experience healing in real time.

  • About 30-minutes for didactic lecture (e.g. defining terms) and 60-minutes for practical self reflection, small group share, and somatic and experiential skills/strategies.

• Frameworks I incorporate include:

  • You and your trauma

    • Learning about trauma brings up our own trauma 

    • This helps us learn some of the things our clients might be experiencing 

    • It also gives us the opportunity to practice recognizing and containing our own trauma patterns and responses

  • What healing is ultimately about

    • Restoring capacity in the present moment (mindfulness)

    • Resilience & increased capacity to feel, think, and reflect vs. reacting in the moment

  • Healing from the impacts of compassion fatigue, secondary and vicarious trauma

    • Six levels (awareness, basic needs/support, emotional, physical, somatic, and ongoing practice)

    • Intentional self and community care

    • Boundaries (emotional, physical, and psychological)

    • Connections & social support 

• Strategies will be adapted based on your organization’s preferences.

• Usually 3-4 strategies can be provided in a 90-minute workshop.

• I include strategies I’ve learned over 8 years of being a trauma & grief therapist, in an easy to understand manner for non-clinicians. Sample practical therapeutic strategies I can offer include:

  • Skill #1: Interpersonal Neurobiology Skills. Click here to learn more.

    • Introduction to the Window of Tolerance

    • Understanding one’s Window of Tolerance

    • Creating/drawing one’s Window of Tolerance exercise

    • “Name it to tame it” and “feel it to heal it”

  • Skill #2: Types of Empathy & Boundary Setting Practices

    • The dangers of over empathizing

    • How to avoid over empathizing or merging with clients

    • Practices toward being empathic without merging

  • Skill #3: Mindful Self Compassion skills. Click here to learn more.

    • Common Humanity: Recognize that professional struggles, setbacks, and overwhelm are shared human experiences rather than personal failures.

    • Self-Kindness: Replace harsh internal self-criticism with encouraging, supportive language you would offer someone you care about.

    • The Self-Compassion Break: Pause during a tense workday to acknowledge distress ("This is a moment of stress"), remember it is normal ("Stress happens to everyone"), and place a soothing hand over your heart

    • What is your relationship to suffering?

      • Acceptance

      • Resistance

        • Attaching/Holding Onto/Grasping

        • Wanting/Shoulding/Never/Always

        • Fixing/Solving/Getting Rid Of

        • Blaming/Shaming

        • Distracting/Avoiding/Numbing

        • Wishing/Fantasizing

    • Metta or lovingkindness affirmations

  • Skill #4: Mind-body connection or nervous system regulation skills such as

    • Subjective Units of Distress (SUDs). Click here to learn more.

    • Co-Regulation: Create team spaces where people can talk, laugh, and connect openly, because human connection signals safety to the nervous system.

    • Resourcing, grounding, pendulating, titration, orienting, etc.

    • Butterfly hug

    • Container exercise. Click here to learn more.

    • Safer/calm/relaxing place. Click here to learn more.

    • Self soothing

  • Skill #5: Mindfulness skills such as

    • Decentering and acknowledging thoughts

    • Body scanning

    • Taking a real pause

    • Ways to anchor (breath, scent, body, touch, sight)

    • Progressive muscle relaxation

    • Breath work such as box breathing and belly breathing

  • Skill #6: Counter Transference Management. Click here to learn more.

    • Fancy word for how client facing work can activate our own past history/experiences or “stuff” leading us to feel anxious, overwhelmed, stressed, confused, irritable, angry, etc. This is a very normal and appropriate response and must be continually addressed to avoid us reacting/acting out.

    • Self reflection of one’s own triggers, wounds, growth edges/weaknesses, strengths, and how they show up in our life

    • Important to manage these feelings so they don’t impact our work and relationships

  • Skill #7: Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP) Plan. Click here for an example.

    • Creating our own plan for the following:

      • What I need to do for myself everyday to keep myself feeling as well as possible.

      • What I need to go regularly to maintain my overall wellness and sense of well being

      • Things I need to avoid (people, places, situations, triggers, habits, ways of thinking)  to stay well

      • What are the subtle signs letting you know you are beginning to feel worse?

      • How do I know if I am stressed, fatigued, and worn down?

      • Who can I reach out for support?

      • Where can I go?

      • What do I need to do? 

  • More skills such as

    • Creating one’s Tree of Life based on Narrative Therapy. Click here to learn more.

      • Goal is to have better awareness about our strengths, areas of growth, support system, where we come from, who we come from, etc.

    • Internal Family Systems (IFS)/parts work to better understand how one’s parts show up at work and protect you in maladaptive ways, and ultimately lead to compassion depletion and burn out. Click here to learn more.

      • Focus areas can include: legacy/intergenerational burdens (roles we’ve inherited and continue to do based on survival strategies from past generations) and personal burdens (roles we continue to do based on ways we’ve learned to survive in the world).

    • Integration exercises (e.g. reflective questioning, journaling, somatic exercises, etc.) for post-workshop learning, growth, and change.

      • Integration basically means understanding how a meaningful experience can be brought into daily life as part of ongoing personal growth and change.

      • Learning about something isn’t enough usually (e.g. education, awareness, insight). We need to integrate it in an ongoing manner for it to become a habit in our daily life.

        
        

Mindfulness 101

• Learn how mindfulness can be one tool/skill to manage stress

• Learn about the myths and realities of mindfulness

• Learn how to use mindfulness personally and professionally toward health and wellness

• This presentation is less didactic and more experiential, meaning I focus more on practical strategies and tools so participants can experience in real time.

• Strategies will be adapted based on your organization’s preferences and needs.

• I include strategies I’ve learned over 8 years of being a therapist as well as a meditator who has gone on multiple 7-day meditation silent retreats/courses, in an easy to understand manner for non-clinicians. Sample practical therapeutic strategies I can offer include:

  • Mindfulness and the power of the present moment without judgement

  • Mindfulness and emotional regulation

  • Mindfulness and distress tolerance or tolerating stress

  • Trauma informed mindfulness such as keeping eyes open, offering choices, adapting instructions, and starting small

  • Cognitive mindfulness skills such as:

    • Recognizing automatic pilot

    • Pleasant and unpleasant tracking

    • Decentering thoughts

    • Mindfulness of daily activities

    • Body scanning

  • Taking a real pause and one-minute mindfulness

  • Ways to anchor (breath, scent, body, touch, sight)

  • Guided meditations such as leaves on a stream, calm place visualization,

Custom workshop interweaving trauma, grief, and relationship issues

• We can work together to provide your organization a custom workshop for your organization's needs and wants

• This requires more time in advance and is a higher fee due to customization

For Therapy Group Practices

• Core Effective Skills for Therapy

  • Learn about the common factors and how they can be used no matter what modality you employ (CBT, DBT, ACT)

  • Learn 1-2 practical skills to build and sustain a strong therapeutic alliance to reduce client drop out and attrition

  • Help clients right at the beginning of therapy

• Working With Insecure Attachment

  • Learn about secure and insecure attachment styles

  • Learn how attachment styles show up in therapy and impacts treatment negatively (“resistance”, difficulty asking for help, difficulty relating, high levels of anxiety, people pleasing, withdrawing, shutting down)

  • Learn 1-2 practical skills to use with clients with insecure attachment strategies

  • Learn 1-2 practical skills to self manage/supervise your own insecure attachment strategies

Past clients include

• University of California

• University of Washington

• University of San Francisco

• Highline College

• Asian Mental Health Project

• Seattle University