YT40 | This trauma therapist explains how to heal our lives and level up businesses 

How does trauma influence our lives and business, and what can we do to reclaim our inner peace and power? Meet Natalia Rachel, a trauma-informed educator and the author of “Why Am I Like This?” Her work is all about helping us heal from trauma, step into service, and become part of the solution through small acts of relational intelligence.

Natalia shares her extensive experience in therapy and her motivations for writing a book aimed at helping a broader audience understand and heal from trauma. She discusses the nuanced challenges of introducing the concept of trauma in Asian contexts, particularly in Singapore, and reflects on how the global pandemic has shifted our collective approach to mental health and healing. Join us for a deep dive into the transformative power of understanding trauma!

Discussion Topics: This trauma therapist explains how to heal our lives and level up businesses

• What inspired Natalia to write ‘Why Am I Like This?’ Discover the motivations behind Natalia Rachel’s decision to share her decades of experience in trauma therapy through her book.
• How do you introduce the concept of trauma in a sensitive cultural context like Singapore? Learn about Natalia’s strategic approach to gently integrating trauma into the vocabulary in Asia, especially Singapore, and making it accessible and non-threatening.
• Why is trauma suddenly a global conversation, especially post-COVID? Explore the reasons why the COVID-19 pandemic has amplified discussions about trauma and its impacts on a global scale.
• How does healing from trauma today prepare future generations? Understand Natalia’s perspective on the generational importance of healing our traumas today to alleviate the burdens on future generations.
• How did moving to Asia shape Natalia’s personal and professional transformation? Hear how Natalia’s relocation to Asia played a crucial role in her personal healing and professional development.
• What has Natalia learned from years of helping others heal their trauma? Gain insights into what Natalia has learned about humanity and healing through her extensive career as a therapist.
• How can personal trauma affect your business leadership? Explore how unresolved personal trauma can influence leadership styles and business dynamics, affecting everything from team interactions to overall company culture.
• What does it mean to be trauma-informed? Understand the essential components of being trauma-informed, including recognizing how past experiences influence present behaviors and interactions.
• Wrapping up

Transcript: This trauma therapist explains how to heal our lives and level up businesses

Natalia: So back then, trauma was a dirty word, but fast forward nearly a decade, and everybody’s talking about trauma, and it’s been wonderful to see the arc of development, uh, not only in Singapore, but globally, we’re ready for this kind of healing and work right now.

Yana: Welcome to another episode of YanaTV. Today, our guest is Natalia Rachel, who is a trauma informed educator and a very popular author with her newest book, Why Am I Like That? Why Am I Like This? Uh, Am I Like This? What inspired you to write the book?

Natalia: I had been working as a therapist for a really long time supporting people to heal from trauma. And I soon realized as there was more and more demand for services that I needed to be able to help more people. And so writing the book was my way of sharing everything I’ve learned in 40 years with anybody who wishes to pick it up and read.

Yana: And when we talk about trauma and use the word trauma, it’s like such a big word and often very triggering for people.How did you manage to include this in the vocabulary of people in Asia and particularly in Singapore?

Natalia: You know, when I first started working in Singapore and built my health clinics here, which were essentially trauma clinics, we did not use the word trauma at all. It was too confronting. We were holistic clinics or alternative clinics, and we learned to speak about the nervous system first and foremost, and the experience of threat and safety and how that would manifest in the body and in the mind. But we didn’t use the word trauma. And it was actually softening the narrative and adapting the narrative that made it safe for people to start seeking kinds of care that perhaps they weren’t getting in a mainstream context.

And it’s also what made it safe for mainstream practitioners in healthcare and mental healthcare to begin to refer their clients to us. So back then, trauma was a dirty word, but fast forward nearly a decade, and everybody’s talking about trauma, and it’s been wonderful to see the arc of development, uh, not only in Singapore, but globally, we’re ready for this kind of healing and work right now.

Yana: Why do you think that particularly now, we could say probably after COVID 2020, when it’s become so acceptable and also even so popular to talk about it and to work on this, why do you think is that happening?

Natalia: I believe that covert was a global trauma trigger. It’s a form of collective trauma. And so many of us had been walking around without trauma, kind of all bundled up and compressed inside us just managing and coping and moving on with the world. But then. All of a sudden our world was taken away from us and our coping skills and adaptive strategies, our survival strategies were taken away from us. So it was almost as if we’re plunged back to ourselves, to our body, into the truth of the trauma that’s been waiting inside us to come up for healing and expression.

So I think this was some kind of intervention of kinds. And back then I was still in my role as a clinic director and we were flooded with people that had surges of anxiety, flashbacks coming up, all of the trauma rising into expression. And so I think from some kind of global spiritual perspective, it was time for us to heal.

Yana: I think you said earlier in one of our conversations, that it is the responsibility of our generation to heal ourselves from trauma. And I really like how you put it, so that the next generation can focus on something else.

Natalia: I think so many of us our age are focusing on our healing work. We are trying to be better humans, um, so that we can live a bit more of a peaceful and empowered life, and also to be better parents. And so this is what we pass down to the next generation, our healing.

Yana: Yes, absolutely. So when you look at the work that you’re doing, and I know that you work a lot with people in Asia, you, you work with people in us, right? You travel there and you yourself from Australia. So there’s this interesting combination of different cultures. Uh, have you noticed any differences, how people approach the subject, how they deal with this subject and how they heal? 

Natalia: It’s, fascinating working and teaching all over the globe, even just here in Singapore, I’m very blessed and grateful to be able to work with people from everywhere just to, this is a beautiful melting pot And I’ve noticed that there are different ways that the trauma manifests and different ways that we are trying to deal with it. But underneath all of it, the core experiences are the same. In the end, we all simply want to feel safe. We want to feel seen, we want to feel heard, and we want to belong. And so it’s interesting here in Asia, a lot of my work is about trying to make it safe enough for people to be vulnerable to trauma.

Speak up and to open their voice in the U. S. The groups that I’m working with, they’ve found their voice. It’s right out there. And my job is to actually make it safe to quiet down a little and to start listening not only to what’s going on around, but to our own voices, our own shadows and our own deep unconscious calls for healing. So we’re in different stages everywhere. But the path, the relational path to healing is exactly the same. It’s to give each other what’s often been missing, which is safe, compassionate, dynamic.

Yana: You were born in Australia. Why did you come to Asia?

Natalia: I initially came to Singapore as a trailing spouse. So I was back home in Australia and I was quite unwell at the time. I was a burnt out mum with two. And my ex husband, was told there was a job for him in Singapore. Um, and he was actually told that if we didn’t move here, he’d be made redundant. So it was kind of a

Yana: choice really.

Natalia: It wasn’t really a choice, but it was the best thing that could have ever happened to me and to my family. Because here in Asia, it’s where I found healing. It’s where I found It’s where I managed to create a net to hold me, uh, and keep me well. And it wasn’t long after I came here and I sort of had this huge life change, this transformation, that I then began to work and to set up my first company, The Clinics, and so the story continues.

Yana: Do you feel it was because the children were very small and that’s why you felt, you know, burnt out when you’re living in Australia, or because you were living in Australia, nothing wrong against Australia, but Asia just has different everything. So, and then when you come to Asia, so why did the healing happen here? 

Natalia: I think there are so many factors that contributed to my healing. One was being able to exit relationship systems and cultures. that didn’t truly see me, understand me or support me. And another was having access to a whole different philosophy of healthcare.

So moving from systems of the West to systems of the East. So here, not only is there a deep culture of care, but there’s a real understanding that the story of the body is really important. So I had access to acupuncture and to reflexology and all these holistic services that back then. weren’t really readily available in an Australian or a Western health care context.

And so I started doing Chinese medicine and acupuncture and reflexology. I also started being able to hop over to the beautiful cultures of Indonesia and Thailand. Again, where not only is the body championed as a place for healing to happen, but the beautiful gentle care that’s offered dynamically really made a difference. So there were so many factors, um, that allowed me to heal here that I didn’t have access to back there.

Yana: In all these years that you have been working with different people helping them to heal their traumas, what have you actually learned yourself?

Natalia: It’s interesting working as a therapist or facilitator because I’m always learning in the reflections of my clients or students. And I think what I’ve learned is that although we have such unique, different, Stories and perhaps different symptoms and manifestations underneath it all, regardless of our story and regardless of our culture and regardless of our position in the world. We are the same. Um, and the things that we need are the same.

And to me, this has been incredibly humbling. Another thing that really developed strongly through my work over the years is that just as trauma travels through relationships. So does healing and it’s that relational piece that is so important so we can get really stuck in diagnostics and labels and topical, I guess, solutions.

But often they don’t integrate. And what I have really learned and found is that it’s that reflective dynamic that’s the most important. And then looking at that for myself has unearthed so much of my relational world. So I call this stage relational recalibration. So when we understand that relationship can either harm or heal.

We become accountable for looking at every single relationship in our lives, whether it’s our home life and our personal life, whether it is our work life, what’s going on at work, whether it’s our love life. And so for me, this work has brought about this inquiry about how our relationships either serving or not. 

Yana: children, what age are they?

Natalia: My daughter is ten, nearly eleven, and my son is nine. Do they know what Miami is doing? They have a little bit of an idea. Um, my daughter is very, very empathetic. And so I can see that she carries some of the sensibilities and she knows very well that I’m a therapist. My son is more interested that I’m a creator, that I create content and share it, and that people are interested in what I’m saying. So they know to different degrees, but we don’t talk so much about trauma at home. We don’t talk about the clients I’m working with or my personal story, because I don’t believe it’s something that they yet really need to know.

Yana: And in your book, it’s a very personal book, right? It’s sort of, it’s your personal story and then you build your, your kind of philosophy and your understanding of how to heal trauma around it. And so I’m just curious now with two small children, so how do feel when they grow up and they read mommy’s book and they get to know a bit more, like, almost like an intimate details about your life?

Natalia: I hope that by the time they do read my book, which is I hope after they’re 18, uh, that they will have gone through enough development and healthy reflection to be able to understand it all with compassion. I was very careful in the way that I wrote the book, um, because I know that people in my world are going to read it.

And I wanted to make sure that the stories were shared delicately and elegantly. Um, it’s not a book where I’m trying to process my experiences. It’s where I’m using stories as a way to illustrate, I guess, philosophies for healing. So I hope that they can see that there’s nothing that’s too graphic in there.

Yana: I love that. You know, to me, every time when I see books, which are very personal, sometimes I do wonder when you look at the next generation. So how our kids going to perceive it, So Singapore, right? So you said that you came here also as a trailing spouse and it was like a while ago. Uh, what was your first impression of Singapore?

Natalia: I was terrified to come here. It felt very foreign to me. Where can I get my bread? Where can I get my milk? I can’t understand anything. I was most concerned about the different education system for my children. So I was very overwhelmed because I thought I would live and die in my nice house in Australia that I renovated to perfection. So it was like a different world. But of course it rapidly began to change once I started to experience experience and embody all of the gifts that this country has to offer.

Yana: And so what was, you feel the biggest gift besides healing, right? Healing of course for you personally, but just like life and living in Singapore.

Natalia: really feel that this is a culture of ease and a culture of care. So It’s quite easy to get anywhere or to get anything done. There’s not so much labor or efforting on a day to day basis. And as I mentioned before, there’s this culture of care where there’s access to various healing modalities. It’s also very common to have help in the home, uh, and to be living in a community, in a condominium where there are facilities right there for you. So there’s this ease and this care that kind of holds you. And I think that that’s very special and it’s something that I’m going to miss.

Yana: Um, trauma in business. This is also something that people often don’t talk about, or at least we’re talking about even less than personal traumas. But lately I have been seeing that there is even more interest. And especially when we talk about leadership, so there are now often leaders who understand that their personal traumas actually impact their leadership style. And there are companies who now also invest in this. So what is your experience?

Natalia: You know, we can’t separate ourselves from work self and home self. We are humans that if we have unresolved trauma, we’re bringing it wherever we go. And once we understand that trauma travels through dynamic, we understand it’s not just our one to one relationships, uh, it’s through the communities and the cultures that we’re creating.

So if a person or a people in power are traumatised and are leaking their trauma into the way they relate, into the way they create, into the way they lead, into the way they build, Um, it’s going to have a really horrible effect on everybody around them. And I think more and more people are starting to understand, and again, it’s through this, this COVID portal that we’ve been through, that when trauma leaks into the workplace, it creates a domino effect.

And people feel very hypervigilant. People feel more afraid to speak up. There’s no ability to be vulnerable and authentic. And people either shut down or they leave and that’s part of what the Great Resignation has been about. We’re sort of collectively saying we, we don’t want this anymore. We don’t want to be working in organizations or within communities or cultures where we’re not seen, we’re not heard, we’re not respected and people aren’t being accountable for what they put into the collective. So I believe trauma informed leadership is at the beginning. of a wave that’s going to span the next 30 years.

Yana: Wow, I love it. Trauma informed leadership. This is a beautiful way to put it. When we just started Let’s talk about traumas and when we look at people who are in the leadership position, I mean, honestly, everyone has some kind traumas. I mean, who doesn’t? So any human being would have they need to work on. And there’s things coaching, for example, we’re very popular and people were going through dates and maybe some went through therapy. So you know, trauma is like a very specific and the game could be quite triggery topic.

I mean, because I know even with coaching, some, you know, people in leadership positions would be, I’m fine, I don’t need coaching. And it’s for those people who need to be fixed, I don’t need to be fixed. So if we talk about trauma, this is definitely a person needs to realize, okay, well, there is something I need to work on, which requires quite a great level of self awareness.

Natalia: Trauma is a human issue. So whether we believe we have trauma or not, which as you said, most of us do to some degree. We’re relating with somebody who does. So if we are in a position of power, it is our duty to become trauma informed. And what’s so interesting is that to become truly trauma informed, we have to understand the way our past is decontextualizing.

within us. It’s very common for people to say, I don’t have trauma. That’s not a problem for me. I don’t need to go to therapy. I don’t need to look into this. Uh, but as they delve into the work in ways that are gentle and safe and non intrusive, usually there’s this gentle and illumination where we realize, Oh, I have been through things and they have altered the way I’m perceiving, expressing, relating, leading, loving.

Yana: And that is the trauma. So remember, trauma is not the thing that happened to us. It’s actually how we experience changes or altered experiences after the fact. So trauma is not what happened to us. It’s how we change and begin to disconnect from ourselves and everybody else. There are quite a people right now who teach in this area because it became so popular, right? Again, since COVID. Um, and there are different modalities, how to look at traumas and what to do. Do you have your own modality that you can share with us?

Natalia: I teach two very specific trauma informed programs. One is specific to therapists and coaches. who want to incorporate touch work into the way they’re working with their clients. And that’s called trauma informed relational somatics. The other is more geared toward leadership, and this is called human intelligence. And so this is the one where most of my attention is right now. And it’s really understanding how do I become a human who heals? by harnessing the power of the intelligence which exists inside all of us and delivering it through relationship dynamic. So the remedy is relational and this is my focus. 

Yana: uh, what it means to be trauma informed.

Natalia: There are many different pieces that we need to bring into awareness to be truly trauma informed. The per the first is to understand that when we are experiencing trauma, there’s this merging of the past and the present.

So, while there may be relative safety and belonging available here and now, what we are experiencing from the past is a lack of safety and belonging in the present. So we tend to project or transfer it and that causes all kinds of issues. So when we want to be trauma informed, we need to understand that the past and the present have merged and get very intelligent about helping the people that we’re supporting to unlink them.

Another really important piece about being trauma informed is to understand the experience of safety and threat. So when we are in a state of trauma, we’re experiencing threat where perhaps there is none. And if we want to be relationally intelligent, we need to know how to help people feel safer. And the way we do that is going to depend on a real number of complex factors.

Another really important piece of being trauma informed is that relational piece and understanding potential for re traumatization. And this is so important for anyone in a power position. So if we bring this into the workplace, if you are a leader or a manager, you are in a power position. It’s very common, uh, when we are in a power position and we’re working with someone that has experienced trauma and it’s laying unresolved, that we are more likely to re trigger.

or re traumatize the trauma if they have experienced harm through a relationship. And there are millions of people who are walking around with this unresolved trauma that day by day are being triggered. by people, by leaders, people in position of power that don’t really understand how to acknowledge that past trauma and how to get intelligent in the way they harness their power to empower.

And so this gets really, really complicated and you can see how to be trauma informed isn’t just something we can speak. It’s about doing this really deep work to understand our relational and dynamic self.

What do you like the most about your work? I really love my in person immersions the most, and getting to see people soften out of their survival self. So, so many of us are braced. We’re poised, primed to protect ourselves. And this is our trauma. And so when we get together and create a collective, co created safe space, it’s really common for the armour to come down, the mask to come down, and be safe. Softening to happen. And that’s the way intimacy is born. So I guess my favorite piece is seeing people become available for human connection and intimacy. 

Yana: I love it. It is so beautiful. Let’s say the final for today as we are heading into the future. And, uh, you’re just like any other human would have dreams and aspirations and hopes where you want to be going. So what would you like to create within maybe the next five to 10 years for yourself, which is important for you?

Natalia: And more, I realize that underneath all of my work is art, it’s words and experiences. And so I’m really looking forward to bringing that. more deeply into what I put into the world and in more creative ways. So I look forward to writing more books. I look forward to creating different hybrid multimedia experiences and making healing accessible to anybody, anywhere that really wants to go on the journey.

Yana: Thank you so much, Natalia. It was wonderful to have you in the studio today. And Natalia, I would love to hear from you guys in the comments. What have you been experiencing with healing? Do we have other healers? Do we have other trauma informed leaders, coaches, therapists, parents with us today? so much So let us know, we would like to connect and to hear from you. And we are so grateful to you studio for hosting Kiana TV. It is always a pleasure to here. Remember subscribe to the YouTube channel and share this episode with friend. I’m going to be seeing you next time. Today, our guest is Natalia Rachel, who is a trauma informed, and now I forgot what I

Natalia: informed

Yana: say. I was like, what was the word there? Yes. Trauma informed educator. And it’s Natalia, right? I also didn’t ask about pronunciation. Let’s do it again.