Episode 72: Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: How To Be Aware In The Workplace With David Treleaven
In 2019, Amy Vetter interviewed trauma professional David Treleaven at Wisdom 2.0 on his perspective on trauma when practicing mindfulness. In today’s episode, let’s go back in time and relive the wisdom David imparted as you learn more about trauma-sensitive mindfulness from a leadership perspective. Follow along to this discussion and gain an understanding of how you can be more sensitive and aware of what people do versus what they say and how you can support them in the workplace.
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Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: How To Be Aware In The Workplace With David Treleaven
Welcome to this episode of Breaking Beliefs, where I interviewed David Treleaven, PhD, an educator, writer and somatic therapist working in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is the author of Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: Practices for Safe and Transformative Healing. In 2019, I was able to interview David at Wisdom 2.0 Live to talk about his perspective on trauma when practicing mindfulness. During this interview, you'll gain an understanding of how you can be more sensitive and aware of what people do versus what they say and how you can support them in the workplace. Definitely, stay tuned for our B3 breaks that are also offered through this show so you can start putting these mindfulness practices in place.
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I'm here with David Treleaven at the Wisdom 2.0 Conference. He has done a book on Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness and how when we get back to our trauma, through meditation and mindfulness, how when we help ourselves, we help others. I'm happy to have him. Do you want to talk a little bit about yourself first and then we'll get into it?
Sure. I'm from Canada. I grew up in Toronto. I've been living in the US. My main work is around, "Where does mindfulness meditation help people who are struggling with trauma or struggling with an overwhelmingly negative experience? Where could it possibly hinder them?" In my research, it was finding that some people benefit from doing mindfulness meditation. Actually, most people will. There will be a small number of people who will run into trouble. How can we as people who are offering mindfulness instruction do that well? What are the best practices that we can apply in order to make sure that no one is falling through the cracks?
A lot of times, we don't talk about this in the workplace and those of us who are running businesses and dealing with employee engagement. Sometimes the underlying cause of employees going off the rails can be their trauma that is their inner work to do. Do you have any suggestions for companies that may not realize that it's like ripping the Band-Aid off? What's under there that's creating more of the issue?
That's the main thing. I would say that people who are implementing mindfulness programs in a business is at a base level. Don't assume that it's going to work for everyone all the time. Mindfulness has a great reputation and for a good reason around research. There's emerging research that says, "There's going to be 5%, 10% of people who might end up having difficult experiences." An entry-level point is to try to temper your expectations and watch out for anyone who is running in trouble and doesn't come back to the groups because we don't want to lose them. The cost of that can be high.
Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: Practices for Safe and Transformative Healing
It's such an important point that those people who might drop out could be experiencing the least amount of engagement in the company because they don't want to handle whatever is going on for them. It's a way of self-identification. If those people tapped out of a mindfulness program that you put in the business, what kind of suggestions would you have to help them in their journey?
The most practical thing that business owners can do when they're implementing these programs is to have some checks and balances around tracking people, especially if they leave. I've worked with business owners who said, "How can I monitor that people are doing okay if they choose to opt out of the program?" As long as there are some basic protocols like a follow-up email or at least we're tracking attendance because people assume, "If they left, maybe they didn't like it." It could be that something came up that was difficult for them. It's helpful to have a one-to-one conversation.
A quick story, I was working with a business, someone who had lost their mother. It was a traumatic loss for them. They did the meditation. It felt like too much for them. No one checked in with her about why she didn't come back. They just assumed, "I guess she didn't like the meditation," but she was drowning in some hard feelings. She said, "If I had a one-to-one conversation, if someone had emailed me or my manager had checked in, it would have felt so much better for me personally and in the company." It's like be tracking people. I'll say that's the main instruction.
It's such a good thing to talk about because you might put this program in place and someone might rate it down for reasons that you don't even realize why when you put the survey out to the employees. You're not going one level deeper of what's working, what's not working, where can we put some coaches in and possibly help people in the way that worked for them more privately.
I was doing some work. I was working with a couple of different companies. There was a lot of pressure on the person bringing in the meditation program about the feedback that they were getting. They had scores that they had to meet. One of the things that we found bumped the scores up is if there was some tracking that was happening. Pre- and post-survey, "We knew we were going to have a conversation with you at the beginning and the end." That helped with engagement. That bumped the scores up, which is important for the bottom line.
It's important for organizations that if you're the team trying to push it in the organization, those metrics do matter. How can you help improve it? I'm switching gears because business owners, C-level executives, some of them might be coming to them saying, "This is something our business could use. I've read stuff that this helps the company overall from a profitability level and employee engagement." However, they might have the idea of like, "Do whatever you want." With a lot of the research, if the C-levels or owners are not practicing themselves or not leading by example, what would be some suggestions as far as from an owner-leadership perspective of how you get involved with this?
When I talk to C-level folks, my recommendation is at least to try the program before they offer it to employees. If they don't know that they haven't practiced, it doesn't create credibility inside the company. Also, we want them to know the terrain that they're asking people into. It's an expected answer, but at least have your own practice and experience with it before you jump in and offer it to your whole company.
Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: If you're going to bring mindfulness programs in, know why it would benefit people and have personal examples you can give about why it was useful and helpful.
Have you seen anything with the leadership teams that you've worked with where it's been a struggle for them?
One time I saw it was when there was an executive team meeting. They had implemented mindfulness meditation practices. It was clear that the person who was the CEO hadn't been doing any of the practices. Someone said, "What do you think of this practice? How should we do this?" You could tell the person didn't have the ground to answer the question. It's more that it broke trust inside the company. Again, if you're going to bring mindfulness programs in, know why it would benefit people and have personal examples that you can give about why was it useful and helpful.
Even what you struggled with, like when you can break down as a leader and say, "This was hard for me too, but I'm seeing this result," it's important. Anything else you want to offer up as far as ideas or information for people about this topic?
The one other thing I want to say is even though I'm doing work and research around meditation, mindfulness and trauma, I want people to know in no way I am saying that something bad is going to happen or there's any kind of fearmongering about, "Meditation is bad." I want to be clear because some people can think I'm going down that road. It's more to say, "It's an amazing practice, especially inside of companies." Let's have a wide view of the range of experiences that can happen. We're all more powerful when we do that. It's not a bad practice and we want to be cautious.
Thank you so much. I appreciate your time.
Thanks for having me.
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Now, for our Mindful Moments on my interview with David and his book about Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness. A lot of times, we talk about mindfulness as a one-size-fits-all and how therapeutic it can be, which it definitely is because what it does is create awareness for us. That's why I have a focus on this in the last few episodes of talking about how to incorporate this into the workplace and how programs can work and not work when mindfulness programs are put into place. What David was talking about during this interview is that with mindfulness, we become more aware, that's what it's supposed to do, and observe how we're feeling what's going on in our bodies and thoughts. Sometimes things that we push down come up for us because we're silent or because we give ourselves that space to observe what's going on for us, which can definitely be uncomfortable.
I always use the example with owning a yoga studio. People will come into yoga with a lot of excuses about why they can't do yoga or maybe they're not flexible. What ends up happening is they're more afraid to go to yoga than something like CrossFit because, in yoga, you're alone with your mind. Sometimes we run from our mind. When we start putting mindfulness programs in the workplace that people can start attending, things come up for us that maybe we aren't aware that's there.
His focus is very much on the things that come up for us that might hurt, be painful or be traumatic and rather than passing judgment on someone that might tap out of a program or walk away. When you're doing meditation, they don't close their eyes. They're fiddling around or not wanting to be a part of it. It's understanding and going that next step one-on-one with that person, asking what was going on for them, not assuming that they don't like it or don't want to be a part of it or so forth. It's that extra step of showing that you care. That's what becomes so important in the workplace is that we nurture people rather than trying to push everyone into the same round hole. That doesn't necessarily work if you're a square peg and things are coming up for you that you don't want to come up for you in the workplace.
What kind of pathways would you determine that person could go to if something comes up? I think this discussion becomes more and more important as mental health has surfaced as an issue for people with their work, home life and everything that we've gone through. You have other pathways. That's why it's important to have employee assistance programs that are anonymous and recommend if someone needs someone to talk to that they do go to a therapist. I do think there is a line between coaches and therapists. Therapists go to school to handle someone who is dealing with something very traumatic.
The thing about mindfulness practices, yoga and other philosophies similar to that is because if we allow that space, things come up for us, but it doesn't mean that coach has the training and ability to handle what comes up for a person. They can be present for the person and create the space for that person to share, but they aren't a doctor. Some are doctors, but many aren't that run these programs that they're trained as mindfulness coaches. It's important if you put these pathways in your workplace that are important for people in helping them to feel healthier, not just physically but internally, that you do have these pathways available for people as things come up for them.
When we're sitting in the muck of what comes up for us, sometimes we pass judgment ourselves or get hard on ourselves instead of realizing that we're supported, nurtured and that what we're going through is a similar path. Other people might not be a similar experience, but it's similar to the way that it feels in our bodies. There are people who are trained who can help us on that path. Never feel like it's a weakness to ask for help or that there's an inhibitor to you asking someone if they need help because that is what mindfulness is. It's not only being aware of ourselves but being aware of others and what they may need and not making assumptions and creating stories, but being present and compassionate for them in their experience at that present moment and finding the path that is right for them.
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About David Treleaven
David Treleaven, PhD, is an educator, writer, and somatic therapist working in the San Francisco Bay Area.
He is the author of the forthcoming book, Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: Practices for Safe and Transformative Healing (Norton, 2018).
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