TRE Oxford: Tension & Stress Release Exercise
TRE has been described as a massage from the inside…or your own personal natural reboot.
TRE is a safe & effective self-care technique, which teaches us to deliberately use our normal physiological shaking response in a controlled way.
Animals instinctively know what to do: watch a dog in a thunderstorm tremble, their muscles involuntarily shaking off tension, or an impala after surviving a leopard attack – they shudder and then move on with life.
TRE:Tension & Stress Release Exercise
TRE has been described as a massage from the inside…or your own personal natural reboot. TRE is a safe & effective self-care technique, which teaches us to deliberately use our normal physiological shaking response in a controlled way. Animals instinctively know what to do: watch a dog in a thunderstorm tremble, their muscles involuntarily shaking off tension, or an impala after surviving a leopard attack – they shudder and then move on with life.Is this you or someone you know?
- Longing to feel more relaxed, have a decent night’s sleep or just feel better about life & work?
- Struggle with health issues, pain, anxiety, mental wellness or trauma?
- Desire to effortlessly unwind or shift stubborn muscular tension patterns or pain, to move with more ease & freedom in your everyday activities/exercise/sport?
- Seeking a technique that does not require you to talk about or analyse your situation, to confront painful experiences or feel overwhelmed with your emotions?
What is TRE?
In essence, simple exercises safely induce your natural, physiological, involuntary shaking reflex helping to release held tension & stress, reboot & calm the nervous system, restoring us to a clearer, peaceful, balanced, resilient state….and to move with ease & flow.How does TRE work? “Shake it off” and “Re-awaken the body.”
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Simple exercises, devised by Dr David Berceli, safely induce your normal physiological shaking mechanism, an innate, involuntary reflex in all mammals, including humans.
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We frequently see animals shaking after a perceived or real threat, or excitement, to discharge the stress chemicals that have been released to cope with the experience. However, as humans, we have learned to suppress these natural, genetically -encoded tremors… and may even perceive tremoring as a sign of weakness.
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Watch a dog in a thunderstorm tremble, their muscles involuntarily shaking off tension, or a deer after surviving an attack by a lion, they tremor…. and then just move on with their lives Watch this video to see an impala tremoring
Why use TRE? An amazing, safe, simple, self -care tool to help you manage your “Issues in the tissues.”
- Stress not only affects your psychology or mind, but also affects your body’s physiology.
- Accumulated stress gets stored & stuck in the body as tension in the muscles & tissues, altering our emotional responses & creating problematic neural pathways…& can wreak havoc on all our mind & body systems, including our guts, heart, breathing, mood and pain pathways.
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If we are holding muscular tension, our body and mind tend to always be on high alert.
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TRE is a safe, simple, efficient, self-help tool to naturally and literally “shake off ” your everyday or accumulated tension, stress or trauma and rebalance the nervous system.
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In TRE, the body does the talking! There is no need to talk about or analyse your situation, to confront painful experiences or feel overwhelmed with your emotions. One of the great benefits of TRE is that we can gently and slowly process overwhelming events from our body/mind system. It doesn’t matter what happened and we don’t need to re-tell the story.
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Once you have safely learned TRE and self-regulation, you will always have an accessible and cost- free self-help tool for the rest of your life.
“Shaking is some of the oldest medicine on earth.”
Who can benefit? Since shaking is part of our natural human behaviour, everyone can benefit*.
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You may be struggling with chronic illness, chronic pain, anxiety or mental wellbeing.
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Long to feel more relaxed or have a decent night’s sleep.
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Desire to shift stubborn muscular pain & tension, seeking greater freedom, flexibility & ease of movement in your desired daily activity/exercise/sport.
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Keen to feel more robust from the accumulated stresses of daily life or specific difficult circumstances.
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Someone living with stress or trauma from your work or past, or a victim of violence or an accident.
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Want to help yourself & your colleagues at work build more resilience to improve teamwork & performance
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Or just someone wanting to have more flow & feel better about life and work.
TRE as a stand-alone practice, in combination with other therapies, or an enhancement to your regular exercise/sport or activity?
- TRE can be a stand-alone practice to help prevent or manage tension, stress & build future resilience to help you thrive.
- TRE can be used a part of a wider therapeutic approach, including talking therapies.*
- TRE can also be used to complement your exercise routines, sport, or daily activity, freeing stubborn, hard to reach tension, to help create more efficient, flowing & flexible movement.
- TRE partners effectively with Pilates & other forms of exercise, to help create more efficient and flexible movement.Working from the inside, TRE can thus help reach parts of the body that may be tense or “stuck,” working on the fascia as well as the muscles, to promote greater flow & freedom in body & mind.
How can I learn and practice TRE in Oxford?
Individual or group sessions…with a certified TRE Practitioner.
- Its usually best to learn how to reawaken this tremoring reflex in a controlled, safe environment…and most importantly learn how to readily self-regulate too.
- Depending on your personal history*, many people only need 1- 3 sessions with a certified Practitioner…and then feel confident to start to practice & self-regulate safely at home.
- Guidelines for personal practice are around 10-15 mins, with pauses, 2- 3 times per week. Having learned to self-regulate, you can apply self -regulation to your personal practice, always aiming to avoid any overwhelm and decrease the timings accordingly.
- You can learn and practice individually or with a group and this may be determined by your background, history and personal needs.
- Depending on your history, it may be advisable to have a personal session, or series of sessions, before joining a group session.
- For some, it feels safer and more comfortable to shake in a personal private session.
- Participating with a Certified TRE Provider can further enhance the experience. Having your process held and witnessed in safety can be deeply healing and also specific interventions, designed just for your body, can be used by a certified Practitioner.
- When attending a TRE group, the energy and release is shared and it may be often comforting to be with others and discuss and witness their process – and to realise we are all the same as our bodies unwind.
- TRE for All, the global TRE website, lists certified providers. Find me on this site.