Ok. So you are just beginning to learn about the science of connection.
We're so happy that you are here.
Over the past 20 years there has begun an extraordinary evolution of both theory and praxis regarding the Autonomic Nervous System that has the potential to transform how we both understand and treat stress-related disorders, and to empower us to help our patients and clients activate wellbeing at its roots.
On the theoretical side, many of these advances have been made possible by the profound theoretical work of Stephen Porges, PhD, whose Polyvagal Theory is the most significant revision of our understanding of the ANS since Walter Cannon identified the fight/flight response more than 100 years ago.
This paradigm-shifting body of work is just beginning to be systematically implemented in the healing arts.
Because Dr. Porges is a research scientist, and because this field is still emerging, there has sometimes been a lag in the translation of the theory into simple actionable language.
In addition, because much of the discourse in the somatically-oriented healing arts over the past couple of decades has been focused on trauma, there has not been parallel deep attention paid to the mechanisms whereby humans can activate the neurobiology of connection.
This is a significant oversight, because our deep evolutionary history is one where, as social mammals, we relied on small bands and extended kin groups for social support.
Modernity has systematically undermined this sociality, to the degree that most of us have forgotten that our wellbeing is social in nature.
Since being documented in large-scale epidemiological studies in 2000 (the research that informed Bowling Alone), there has been a precipitous drop in social connectedness in society over the past 20+ years.
While proximate causes of this include most recently the COVID-19 pandemic, and over the past decades the rise of the internet and (anti) social media, this is also a reflection of the global movement away from embodied experiences of safety.
Restorative Practices Alliance, and our parent organization, Hearth Science, Inc.., are world-leading experts in the neurobiology of connection.
We have trained tens of thousands of wellness professionals around the world, including being asked to train the entire faculty of the Stanford University School of Medicine, and keynoting the national Academy of Integrative Health and Medicine conference. Our article on the the deep nervous system through the lens of water, in Psychology Today, has been read more than 30,000 times.
As you begin to learn about the 'science of safety' we encourage you to begin with yourself.
This work has the potential to transform your own wellbeing first, which is good in its own right, and which will increase your ability to be useful to your patients and clients.
It is for this reason that we are recommending the sequence of courses below.
You can, of course, decide that you wish to approach this material in a different order.
And someone from our team would be happy to have a conversation with you to discuss what might be the most sensible way for you to embark on this learning journey given what is important to you.
If you'd like to chat with us, send an email to our support team at support@restorativepractices.com and we can arrange to speak with you. We are old-school and analog about connection. We'd like to speak with you by phone or meet you on Zoom. We are happy to spend 15 minutes learning about your work, and how we might be able to support you and your work.
Alternatively, the progression below will begin with a polyvagally-informed lens on your own self-care, then progress to learning the Polyvagal Theory as articulated by Stephen Porges PhD, and then progress to the clinical and research innovations that we have made in our work that build upon it.
Our objective is to support you so that you in turn can help support others.
Thanks for your interest in our work.
This course will teach you a polvyagally-informed blueprint for approaching your own self-care so that you can be more present and attuned to patients and clients.
In our best-selling course, specifically created for health professionals and interested lay people, you will learn the foundations of the Polyvagal Theory, and a variety of Restorative Practices that you can engage personally, and/or utilize with patients/clients to support their well-being.
In our groundbreaking Autonomic Spectrum course, we'll share with you what we've learned in the past three years clinically-applying Polyvagal Theory with over 15,000 patients and clients in 50 countries. This work extends the Polyvagal Theory in useful and novel directions, and teaches it through the elemental languages of water and color theory.
You're like Wow, this is awesome. I want to go deeper in my learning journey. Alright, come along....
