THE ESSENTIAL

SEQUENCE
Guide
How to release stored trauma
Even when we do the right things, but in the
wrong order, we don't achieve what is possible

D R . A I M I E A P I G I A N

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 Can we move past our trauma?
Trauma has been a hard topic in the past.
People haven't known what to do. We have tried a bit of this, a bit of that.
Sometimes people see results, sometimes they don't.

What if I told you according to biology there is a certain order we have to follow to
see results in our trauma work? It's true. If we do the right things but in the wrong
order, no progress happens. Without the very first step of this sequence, none of
the other steps will have the effect they could.

Knowing this is pretty exciting. Imagine being able to understand and release
what holds you back. To resolve the patterns you see and don't like but haven't
been able to break. To release and move forward to a life of presence, calmness,
connectedness, confidence, and joy.

That would be pretty incredible, right?

"This has just opened up a whole world of excitement,

joy, happiness that I've never had in my life." Gayle

What is trauma?
Enjoy your favourite food without going anywhere. Grilled
chicken combined with house special spicy. Scrumptious
Trauma is an experience
grilledofsausage
overwhelm. It topped
chunks is a feltwith
experience
our Fries of overwhelm in the
body. The combination of internal and external factors creates this felt experience
of overwhelm in the body.

Trauma is not an event. Although it might occur around an event, it is not about
the event. People can go through the same event, and one person walks away
traumatized and one person walks away totally fine, saying, "Wow, that was a lot,
but I'm okay."

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 Trauma is the experience your body had going through the event or period of
time. Trauma is anything that, for any reason, at that time overwhelmed you. It's
the biology of your nervous system. Trauma is our nervous system saying, "We
aren't going to make it." Just shutting down.

What causes us to experience overwhelm? Two things:

Too much too fast

Too little too long

The way we can identify trauma is through patterns. Patterns of numbing.

Patterns of managing emotions. Patterns of not being able to handle difficult
conversations. Do we emotionally check out? Mentally check out? What are our
patterns around food and eating? Is there emotional eating going on? That is a
part of the freeze response. Numbing different emotions is part of the freeze
response.

There are all these different ways in which we can see trauma, even though we
might not have recognized it as trauma. We recognize it as, "Oh, this is this is my
personality," or, "This is my attachment style." Always pushing people away to
protect our heart, or doing the opposite and latching on to people and never
letting them go, for example.

Trauma can look like feeling burned out. Feeling stressed. Feeling anxious. Not
being able to move through grief.

So what do we do?
When we understand our biology and the path our body takes that creates the
experience of overwhelm and stored trauma in our body, we can understand the
path out by reversing the process step-by-step.

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 Our way out of overwhelm and stress
There are 3 states of the nervous system, and these show us the way to reverse-engineer
overwhelm.

The graphic below shows the natural progression a body goes through when a trigger
occurs, through stress and anxiety and if overwhelmed, into the freeze. Our bodies move
out of the parasympathetic (relaxed state) into stress (sympathetic.) If given too little for
too long or too much too fast, it continues all the way into overwhelm or freeze (trauma.)
To release trauma, we have to follow this same sequence in reverse. First, we provide a
felt sense of safety. This, with time, allows a person to come out of the freeze, pushing
them into the sympathetic (stress and anxiety) response.

Next, we provide a felt sense of support so our bodies can leave the sympathetic (stress
and anxiety) response and return to a place of calm aliveness. This is the
parasympathetic state. This is where we can learn and grow and step into new places of
expansion, leading to the life we've always wanted.

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 Our path home
Here is how we walk this path directly backwards step-by-step:

Freeze response (trauma) - needs safety

Stress response - needs support
Parasympathetic - can step into expansion

If we don't follow the essential sequence for each of these, we can accidentally re-
traumatize ourselves, have flair-ups of our physical health, experience anxiety, see no
lasting change, feel like it's "too much," or get stuck.

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 The Essential Sequence shows us the right order and in right way to retrace the path
back to ourself.

This is the step-by-step process we need to follow, according to the Biology of

Trauma™:

#1: Creating A Felt Sense Of Safety

#2: Creating A Felt Sense Of Support
#3: Manageable Expansion

Following these steps will get us well on the way back home to the true you, for you
or your clients.

Ready for a next step? Learn more about the 21 Day

Journey here to start walking this sequence step-by-
step.

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 Stories of success following the
Essential Sequence
Maria - "Finding safety in my body... I couldn't believe such a big shift happened for me
so quickly. My body felt soft... usually it felt like a rock... Finding what I needed. That
missing piece for me." Listen To Maria's Story Here

Kelsey - "If I had started with this, I would have saved so much money and time starting
with this." Listen To Kelsey's Story Here

Pierette - "It got me instantaneously out of the mess that my head was going into. The
relax that I feel in my body, and the warmth in my back... It's like a miracle! I have control
over not spinning out of control." Listen To Pierette's Story Here

Robin - "I have done a lot of things and there is absolutely nothing that I have done or
experienced that is like this." Listen To Robin's Story Here

Jess - "It's helped me as a parent, as a mother, to understand my triggers better and

show up as a more balanced, regulated person for my family. It's also really helped me as
a practitioner..." Listen To Jess's Story Here

Deborah - "It wasn't until I began studying with Dr. Aimie Apigian that I saw monumental
changes. She has incredible educational and healing acumen. She has brought together
her life experiences and her tenacity and her research, and is able to share with us the
Biology of Trauma so that we can understand what causes these chronic problems that
we experience, as well as our clients." Listen To Deborah's Story Here

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