Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma: The Innate Capacity to Transform Overwhelming Experiences [Paperback]

Peter A. Levine (Author), Ann Frederick (Contributor)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 7, 1997

Nature's Lessons in Healing Trauma...

Waking the Tiger offers a new and hopeful vision of trauma. It views the human animal as a unique being, endowed with an instinctual capacity. It asks and answers an intriguing question: why are animals in the wild, though threatened routinely, rarely traumatized? By understanding the dynamics that make wild animals virtually immune to traumatic symptoms, the mystery of human trauma is revealed.

Waking the Tiger normalizes the symptoms of trauma and the steps needed to heal them. People are often traumatized by seemingly ordinary experiences. The reader is taken on a guided tour of the subtle, yet powerful impulses that govern our responses to overwhelming life events. To do this, it employs a series of exercises that help us focus on bodily sensations. Through heightened awareness of these sensations trauma can be healed.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Every life contains difficulties we are not prepared for. Read, learn, and be prepared for life and healing."
—Bernard S. Siegal, M.D., Author of Love, Medicine & Miracles and Peace, Love, and Healing

"Fascinating! Amazing! A revolutionary exploration of the effects and causes of trauma."
—Mira Rothenberg, Director Emeritus of Blueberry Treatment Centers for Disturbed Children, Author of Children With Emerald Eyes

"It is a most important book. Quite possibly a work of genius."
—Ron Kurtz, Author of Body Reveals and Body-Centered Psychotherapy

"Levine effectively argues that the body is healer and that psychological scars of trauma are reversible—but only if we listen to the voices of our body." 
—Stephen W. Porges, Ph.D., Professor of Human Development and Psychology, University of Maryland
 
"A vital contribution to the exciting emerging science of mind/body interaction in the treatment of disease."
—Robert C. Scaer, M.D., Neurology, Medical Director, Rehabilitation Services, Boulder Community Hospital

"Peter Levine’s work is visionary common sense, pure and simple."
—Laura Huxley, lifetime partner and collaborator of Aldous Huxley
 
“[Waking the Tiger] is an excellent resource for those who have been traumatized or know someone who suffers from trauma, like a soldier returning from war. Finally, there is help that doesn’t ask us to relive what happened and re-experience the pain. Instead, it follows the body’s wisdom in its search for renewal and healing.”
—Soaring Again

About the Author

Peter Levine, Ph.D. is the originator and developer of Somatic Experiencing® and the Director of the Foundation for Human Enrichment. He holds doctorate degrees in both Medical Biophysics and Psychology. During his thirty year study of stress and trauma, Dr. Levine has contributed to a variety of scientific, medical, and popular publications. His book, Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma is in its fifth printing and receiving wide international attention. Peter was a consultant for NASA during the development of the Space Shuttle, and has taught at hospitals and pain clinics in both Europe and the U.S., as well as at the Hopi Guidance Center in Arizona. He lives near Lyons, Colorado, on the banks of the St. Vrain River.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: North Atlantic Books; 1st Ed(AsSuch) edition (July 7, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 155643233X
• ISBN-13: 978-1556432330
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.8 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (64 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,525 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #3 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Mental Health > Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
  • #11 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Death & Grief
  • #15 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Personal Health > Stress > Stress Management

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

328 of 347 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma, October 7, 2000

By 

Barbara Davis-Thompson (NY, NY USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma: The Innate Capacity to Transform Overwhelming Experiences (Paperback)

This exciting, insightful book reinforces the wholeness of the human vehicle, that our body and triune brain of instinct, emotion and rationality are totally connected to the human experience and to our connection with all of life. The book explains why humans are often frozen in trauma, unlike animals who daily cope with the unpredictability of nature and man. For humans, as is true for animals, the potential for trauma exists from birth through death, with at least one major difference - that humans have a harder time releasing trauma and many carry it all of their lives, which causes major interference with health, peace of mind and the ability to live joyfully and creatively. When human trauma remains unhealed, the energy of the trauma and accompanying emotions will remain locked within the brain and held within the body's musculature, tissues and organs awaiting discharge. Like Sleeping Beauty awaiting her restoration to life once the poisoned apple is dislodged, those with deep psychological scars have disassociated the memory from their minds and are living in a numbed, tensed body awaiting its release so the body can return to wholeness and optimum mental and physical health. The author persuasively asserts that psychological wounds are reversible and that healing comes when the physical and mental letting go occurs, similar to the way the tiger experiences the coming and going of threat, tensing in response to danger, and as the threat passes, the tiger's muscles shake, twitch and let go right then and there the fear related energy which now is forever out of mind and body. So, too, Peter Levine states, can humans learn to release long-held and/or current trauma without return. The book is well-written, peppered with healing stories, and details step-by-step instructions on how to listen to the wisdom of the body to release trauma and heal. Consider this book as one great step forward to expanding the frontier of body/mind energy work that is emerging as the most comprehensive and effective wellness paradigm of the future.

203 of 214 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An excellent book about dealing with trauma, April 20, 2003

By 

Samuel Rafael - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma: The Innate Capacity to Transform Overwhelming Experiences (Paperback)

Peter Levine in "Waking the Tiger," postulates that trauma exists not in the event or in the story of the event, but is stored within the nervous system. Many common physical ailments are actually residues of thwarted trauma reactions incurred during such events as surgical procedures, falls, pre or perinatal stress and/or childhood accidents and traumas. The body has a natural, innate, and miraculous capacity to heal once these reactions are understood and guided.

Levine reinforces the holistic nature of the human being. Our bodies and brains connect instinct, emotion and rationality to our experience. Trauma may create damaging and often enduring symptoms. Human beings have a harder time than do animals in releasing trauma and may carry it throughout our lives. We often become frozen in trauma, unlike animals that can cope with the unpredictability of nature. This may provide a major interference with our health, peace of mind and the ability to live joyfully and creatively. When human trauma remains unhealed, the energy of the trauma and accompanying emotions remain locked within the brain and held within the body's musculature, tissues and organs, awaiting discharge.

The author writes about an oft-forgotten aspect of trauma, freezing or immobilization during a traumatic experience. Modern medicine/psychiatry emphasize the "flight or fight" response while often neglecting the freeze response. The concept of the freeze response in the face of overwhelming threat provides a missing link to symptoms such as dissociation that our old ideas of "fight or flight" fail to explain. Immobilization in the face of threat is an automatic biological response that is not voluntarily chosen by the victim. This provides redeeming message to trauma survivors.

Levine points out that our memories are not literal recordings of events, but rather, a complex of images that are influenced by arousal, emotional context, and prior experience. Memories may even transform over time as new experiences add layers of meaning to the images. While remembering the past can be an important aspect of therapy, appreciating the subjective quality of memories is crucial to integrating them appropriately into the healing process.

Those with deep psychological scars may have dissociated the memory from their minds and are living in a numbed, tensed body awaiting its release so the body can return to wholeness and optimum mental and physical health. The author asserts that psychological wounds are reversible and that healing comes when the physical and mental letting go occurs, similar to the way the tiger experiences the coming and going of threat, tensing in response to danger, and as the threat passes, the tiger's muscles shake, twitch and let go right then and there the fear related energy which now is forever out of mind and body. Trauma is stored energy that must be released.

94 of 96 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exciting and Promising Material for Trauma Healing, May 25, 2001

By 

Ariel Giarretto MS, LMFT (Berkeley, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma: The Innate Capacity to Transform Overwhelming Experiences (Paperback)

I just logged on to order yet another copy of "Waking the Tiger", a thoroughly invaluable book which I am constantly recommending to friends, colleagues and clients. This groundbreaking book that has permanently altered the way I approach therapy, trauma, and the body. "Waking the Tiger" completes an essential piece that has been missing in therapeutic and medical practices, namely that trauma is not in the event or the story, but in the nervous system. Dr Levine, through his research and vast clinical experience, has discovered how so many common physical ailments and so-called medically untreatable syndromes are actually residues of thwarted trauma reactions incurred during routine surgical procedures, falls, perinatal stress and other childhood accidents and traumas. He shows us how the body has a natural and innate, and seemingly miraculous, capacity to heal once these reactions are understood and guided. It is a very exciting and empowering book, and offers new hope and common sense explanations to people who have up to this time been unable to understand their symptoms or to find relief.