FREE EVENT: Somatic Practices: Doorway to Embodiment and Trauma Healing.... Embodied Dialogue Series
‘Ask Us Anything’
with Stephen Porges, Ph.D.
Thursday 11am-12pm ET on March 6, 2025
Free to join, all welcome.
***Please be aware that by participating in these community meetups via Zoom, your image and name may appear online, including in replay recordings and podcasts. Meetup events are livestreamed to social media channels.***
Welcome to an Exclusive Dialogue
How fortunate are we to have one hour with Dr. Stephen Porges, the esteemed creator of the Polyvagal Theory? Join me in welcoming Steve Porges back to Embodied Dialogues!
This session is particularly special as we celebrate the release of three groundbreaking Polyvagal books this winter:
- Twenty Embodied Practices for Healing Trauma and Addiction
A heartfelt thanks to Stephen Porges for writing the foreword to my book! - Somatic-Oriented Therapies
Edited by Herbert Grossmann, Maurizio Stupiggia, and Stephen Porges, this 32-chapter book is a monumental contribution to somatic therapy. I am honored to contribute Chapter 8 on the Felt Sense Polyvagal Model: The Embodied Assessment and Treatment Tool. - Polyvagal Perspectives: Interventions, Practices, and Strategies
By Stephen W. Porges.
Also coming up are the Community Practice Groups which are based on Jan’s new book mentioned above. Register to attend a free Author Talk and Info Session about this offering.
Join the Conversation
In this “Ask Us Anything” Dialogue, we invite your questions, comments, excitement, curiosity, frustrations, astonishment, joy, and sorrow. We aim to create a space for exploration and creation together.
One of the many qualities I admire about Steve Porges is his unwavering commitment to accessibility. As I become busier with a public lifestyle, I find myself challenged by the desire to reach out and the need to contain. Steve’s ability to stay connected, respond to emails, listen deeply, and maintain a safe presence amidst his growing popularity is truly inspiring.
One of the many qualities I admire about Steve Porges is his unwavering commitment to accessibility. As I become busier with a public lifestyle, I find myself challenged by the desire to reach out and the need to contain. Steve’s ability to stay connected, respond to emails, listen deeply, and maintain a safe presence amidst his growing popularity is truly inspiring.
Steve starts with opening up about his personal musings on cats and the unique ways they co-regulate with humans, offering insights that might just change the way you view your feline friends. We dive deep into the profound concepts of safety in the body and the transformative nature of feeling truly secure.
Among many other things we touch upon the significance of feedback loops in therapy and life, and how interoception—the awareness of our bodily states—plays a crucial role in healing trauma and addiction.
It’s a dialogue brimming with warmth, insight, and a little humor, inviting you to pause, reflect, and embrace the wisdom shared. Through Steve’s stories and reflections, I hope your understanding of polyvagal theory and its practical applications expands.
Chapter Overview
00:00 Nonverbal Communication in Music
03:30 Cat’s Early Morning Routine
08:53 Understanding Embodiment Through Interoception
11:13 “Evaluating Reactions Mindfully”
13:32 Polyvagal Theory and Emotions
18:29 Reflecting on Bold Paradigm Shifts
23:22 “Balancing Accessibility and Self-Time”
26:47 Evolving Academic Models Post-Pandemic
29:14 Impact of ACEs on Individuals
31:28 “Integrating Neuroscience and Subconscious Therapy”
37:03 Academic Crisis: Research Structure Doomed
40:32 Innovative Music Experience for Neurodivergents
43:07 Developing Scalable Health Products
46:06 Trust and Motivation in Leadership
49:47 Neglected Behavioral Solutions in Autism
53:04 Critique of Autism Research Focus
56:13 Autism Diagnosis and Hope
About Stephen Porges
Professor Stephen W. Porges, PhD, is Distinguished University Scientist at Indiana University, Professor of Psychiatry at the University of North Carolina, Courtesy Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Florida College of Medicine, and Professor Emeritus at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Maryland. He has published more than 400 peer-reviewed scientific papers that are cited in approximately 60,000 papers and holds several patents involved in monitoring and regulating autonomic state. He created the Polyvagal Theory and a music-based intervention, the Safe and Sound Protocol™ currently used by more than 4,000 therapists to improve spontaneous social engagement, to reduce hearing sensitivities, and to improve language processing, state regulation, and spontaneous social engagement. His books include The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation (Norton, 2011), The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory: The Transformative Power of Feeling Safe (Norton, 2017), and Polyvagal Safety (Norton, 2021), co-authored with Seth Porges of Our Polyvagal World: How Safety and Trauma Change Us (Norton, 2023), co-edited with Deb Dana Clinical Applications of the Polyvagal Theory: The Emergence of Polyvagal-Informed Therapies (Norton, 2018), Polyvagal Perspective (Norton, 2024) and co-edited with Herbert Grassmann and Maurizio Stupiggia Somatic-Oriented Therapies: Embodiment, Trauma, and Polyvagal Perspectives. Dr. Porges is a founder of the Polyvagal Institute and is co-creator with Anthony Gorry of Sonocea®, a technology that embeds acoustic signals in music to regulate the autonomic nervous system. This new technology is embedded in the Rest and Restore Protocol.
Visit
Website: https://www.stephenporges.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephen-porges-6514877b/
Join Jan Winhall's group on the PVI (Polyvagal Institute) Online Community Space for updates and discussion.
The Felt Sense Polyvagal Approach to Trauma & Addiction Group is a place for you to explore with others, through a polyvagal lens, the experiences of trauma and addiction. We are focusing on understanding addiction through the lens of the nervous system, as an adaptive response to maladaptive environments. Our group is growing in leaps and bounds indicating a hunger for change, for the kind of transformative change that polyvagal theory brings us. The group interacts online as part of the PVI (Polyvagal Institute) Online Community Space. Once a month the group meets live on Zoom for an hour of exploration and discussion with a guest presenter, in what we now call the Embodied Dialogue Series.
Free to join the group, all welcome!
PVI Community Member Guidelines
- We are cultivating cues of safety, so please be supportive.
- Encourage and support your colleagues – Remember criticism, cynicism, advice, or judgment may be signs of threat.
- Be courteous and assume the best intentions – respect all opinions, no hate speech.
- Share generously – Your stories and experiences may be what another person needs to hear today to solve a problem or seize an opportunity.
- Be constructive – We’re here to push each other forward and lift each other.
- Find ways to help each other find and create cues of safety and co-regulation, reframe challenges, and stay curious.
- Advertising, solicitation, personal or company promotion is not permitted. Those who don’t comply with the guidelines will be requested to leave the app.
Jan Winhall, M.S.W. P.I.F.O.T. is an author, teacher and seasoned trauma and addiction psychotherapist. She is an Educational Partner and Course Developer with the Polyvagal Institute where she offers a training program based on her book Treating Trauma and Addiction with the Felt Sense Polyvagal Model, Routledge 2021. Completion of all three levels leads students to become Felt Sense Polyvagal Model Facilitators. Her new book, 20 Embodied Practices for Healing Trauma and Addiction with the Felt Sense Polyvagal Model, published by Norton, is available for preorder and out in March 2025. She is an Adjunct Lecturer at the University of Toronto and a Certifying Co-Ordinator with the International Focusing Institute. Jan is Co-Director of the Borden Street Clinic where she supervises graduate students. She enjoys teaching all over the world.