Trauma, Illness, & Healing in a Toxic Culture
If you spend any time studying health and wellness you will have come across Gabor Mate. He is an incredible fountain of knowledge based on his huge experience as medical doctor but perhaps more importantly, in his experience afterwards in trying to work out why the medical system is failing so many people.
He explores how “small T’ trauma, such as coping with modern life can have just as big an impact on someone’s wellbeing as the more widely understood”big T” trauma, such as an adverse childhood event.
This book gives us agency in helping to understand that it is how we respond to trauma, not the actual trauma itself that leads to our ailments. 
He re-affirms the classic wisdom that if we close off to our feelings and sensations, then those bodily responses will continue to cause us harm, just without us realising it. Whereas the secret is to practice tuning into our physical and emotional body, however painful that might be, to ensure we release and deal with any past patterns stored in our system – of course that’s where we can help at the retreat 🙂
Can’t recommend this book enough!
Paul x