Over time, these traumas and stresses build up in our central/nervous systems and change other body processes, and if we don’t do anything about them, they start to do serious damage, leading to mental at even physical health complications.  There are many analogies to describe this process of trauma and stress building up over time – a balloon filling with too much air at risk of popping, a water cooler filling with too much water at risk of overflowing.  As in the case of the balloon or the water cooler, where there are mechanisms to drain that “air” or “water,” so too can we drain the overabundance of trauma and stress that has built up in our systems and causes awful symptoms. While the above examples are oversimplifications for the purpose of visualizations, we can in fact ultimately rewire how stress affects us, and how we react to the emotional memories of negative experiences we have lived through.

 

Think of it this way – if you kept walking barefoot on a wooden patio, and continued to pick up splinters, would you allow these splinters to heal internally inside your skin, or would you remove them, so that you didn’t have to walk around in pain?  Why then don’t we treat emotional traumas and stresses the way we do physical ones?  To maintain or get back to a strong mental health baseline, it’s essential that we have practices that continually take out those emotional “splinters” and allow our “healing” to take place appropriately – hence Release and Rewiring. But, we call these exercises “active” exercises, because in the case of mental health, healing takes some work.  We can’t just wait for magic pills or procedures or tons of sleep to be our “savior.”  Our improvements are based on the work/exercises we take on.

 

The exercises discussed by our expert practitioners on our Alliance are a collection of STARR Exercises that (while each has its differences), all have the goal of allowing us to actively release and/or rewire the traumas and stresses we accumulate over our lives.  Their Practitioner Profiles are are meant to be used as a resource center for you to learn more.  We are not recommending any one over another.  Pick the one, two or more of the STARR Exercises that seem to work best for you, and make them part of your daily routine.  Don’t give up if you don’t see improvements immediately. Stick with your exercises, daily.  Your mental and physical health will thank you!

 

Some of the STARR Exercises highlighted in our Practitioner Alliance include: Integrative Psychiatry, Neurobiology & Occupational Therapy, Integrative Breathing Practices, Yoga for Mental Health, Qigong Meditation, Genomics, Aromatherapy, Nutrition and the Brain/Gut Connection, Tapping/EFT, Havening, EMDR, and Practices to Address Mental Health Complications Brought About by Traumatic Brain Injuries.  As new techniques are developed or discovered, they will be added to this section. Consider this a much needed resource center so that the need to go on those exhausting chases for treatment options is no longer necessary.

 

If you are a practitioner trained in any of the STARR therapies featured, and would like to be added to our growing database of recommended practitioners who are able to offer STARR therapies to their patients in their local markets, please fill out this form.