‘Becoming a Healing Presence in the World’ at Sept. 13 NAMI session at Central Hall

DOVER-FOXCROFT — Being a supportive presence to each other and experiencing safety in relationships are keys to healing our traumas and the traumas of others. Every day as we live and move through the challenges within our society, our embodied life-long traumas and effects of our personal histories, our experiences with natural disasters, with medical and physical traumas, poverty or intergenerational pain, we need to remember that we are all in some form of traumatic suffering.

Realizing our human connection to everything and everyone else in the world brings us to the point where we have the empathy needed for healing. This is a message from Bonnie Badenoch, PhD, in NAMI’s next Healing Trauma Summit video presentation called “Becoming a Healing Presence in the World” at 1 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 13 at The Commons at Central Hall.

Badenoch defines trauma in her 2017 book “The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships” as, “Any experience of fear and/or pain that doesn’t have the support it needs to be digested and integrated into the flow of our developing brains.”

She notes that as a species, we are wired to seek and develop warm relationships with others leading to safe, supportive human connections. These connections heal trauma through the use of compassion and empathy. We can use compassion and empathy developed through positive relational experiences to heal ourselves and beings.

With a deep understanding of neuroscience, embeddedness of traumas in our bodies, which still can influence our lives, will be explained. Badenoch’s talk will also include exploring the Stephen Porges’s polyvagal theory and the emotional safety that is so necessary for healing, how to foster a nonjudgmental presence with others, and using radical inclusiveness for every part of ourselves and others to become a therapeutic presence in the world.

Co-founder of the Center for Brain-Wise Living, a non-profit organization dedicated to fostering awareness of the brain, mind, and relationships, Badenoch is also a therapist, teacher, and author of several books. She offers training to professionals about her therapeutic approaches and techniques using science and compassion to help others as she has helped herself.

If you would like to attend this free, worthwhile program, please RSVP to nami.piscataquis@gmail.com or 924-7903.