Do I Have To Relive My Memories/Trauma, To Heal?
- Kerry Hampton
- Jun 19
- 8 min read
Exploring the Trifasic Model, Peter A. Levine’s Cheetah–Gazelle Story, and Bottom-Up/Top-Down Regulation
One of the biggest myths about trauma work is that you must know and relive, every single detail to heal. In reality, less is often more. Here’s why:
The Body Remembers the Essentials - Your nervous system holds the core sensations, tightness, tremors, heat, collapse, not the full script of what happened. By tuning into those sensory fragments, we trigger exactly the amount of survival energy needed to complete its natural cycle, without burdening you with every narrative twist.
Titration Over Overload - In Phase 2 (Processing & Integration), we practice titration, introducing just enough of the memory to spark that old fight-flight or freeze response, then returning to safety. Flooding yourself with every detail can overwhelm your system, small “doses” allow your body to digest and discharge the energy in manageable bites.
Top-Down Makes Sense of Bottom-Up (Read further down) - When you mindfully name or imagine a cue, start by feeling exactly where it lives in your body, say that tight band across your chest or flutter in your gut. Use “felt-sense” words like “a heavy stone” rather than abstract labels, and rest a hand there as you breathe into it. That gentle touch and breath keep you grounded in the actual sensation, so your mind-first cue guides the feeling toward safety without floating above or shutting it out.
Integration Beats Repetition - The goal isn’t a perfect play-by-play reconstruction, it’s integration, weaving the strongest emotional and physical threads of the past into your present tapestry. You reclaim choice over what you bring forward, gradually transforming what once held you captive into a source of newfound resilience.
By focusing on the charged kernels of your experience, those bodily cues and brief narrative anchors, you enable your nervous system to finish its natural rhythm. You never need to replay the whole movie, you only need to feel and complete exactly what your body still needs to release.
Who Is Peter A. Levine?
Peter A. Levine, PhD, founded Somatic Experiencing®, a body-focused approach to trauma healing. He’s shown how unmet survival energy lodges in the body and how natural discharge (like a gazelle’s shake) frees us from chronic fight-flight-freeze patterns.
The Cheetah–Gazelle Story: Nature’s Trauma Release
Peter A. Levine, PhD, founder of Somatic Experiencing® and author of Waking the Tiger, draws on decades of observing wild animals to show how trauma is naturally discharged in the body. When a gazelle narrowly escapes a cheetah, its entire nervous system surges with adrenaline and cortisol, then, once safe, the gazelle trembles and shakes, physically “shaking off” that life-saving energy. Only after this biological discharge does it return to grazing in calm.
Humans, by contrast, live in social environments where such shaking is often suppressed, “hold it together,” “keep calm and carry on,” or simply “there’s no time to stop.” As a result, the survival energy never completes its cycle and becomes trapped in our tissues and nervous system.
Levine terms this “thwarted trauma.” Over weeks, months or years, the undischarged charge shows up as chronic muscle tension, hypervigilance, exhaustion, intrusive memories or sudden emotional flooding, our bodies desperately trying to finish the shake that never happened.
In Levine’s Somatic Experiencing® work, we relearn the gazelle’s natural rhythm in micro-movements, tiny tremors, sighs, soft vocalizations and shifts in posture that mimic the wild animal’s shake. By carefully titrating these micro-discharges, never overwhelming the system, we give the nervous system permission to complete what it started in that moment of threat. Over time, these small, guided releases help restore balance, turning the legacy of thwarted trauma into a renewed capacity for safety and regulation.
Peter Levine highlights one more key difference, wild animals don’t overthink their shake. A gazelle doesn’t pause to analyse or narrate its trembling, it simply discharges the surge of energy in the moment. Humans, by contrast, layer on meaning (“Why did this happen to me?”), stories (“I should’ve done something differently”) and cultural rules (“Don’t show weakness”), all of which interrupt the body’s natural release.
Somatic Experiencing® invites us to drop the commentary, just as the gazelle does and allow tiny tremors, sighs or shifts in posture to finish the survival cycle, without getting tangled in the mind’s narratives.
Our brains are wired to spin events into stories for survival and meaning. Narratives help us:
Predict what might happen next (“If I slow down, something bad might follow”).
Make sense of chaos by linking cause and effect (“I’m anxious because of that accident”).
Protect ourselves through planning (“Next time I’ll watch my speed”).
Build a coherent identity (“I’m the kind of person who can’t handle surprises”).
But in trauma, this story-making can hijack the body’s natural shake-it-off reflex, our mind loops on “why” and “what if,” blocking the simple discharge of stored energy. Recognising that narrative impulse is the first step: you can honour your mind’s need for meaning while guiding your body to finish its work, moment by moment, until the felt-sense no longer needs a story to feel safe.
Here’s a real-life snapshot echoing the gazelle’s shake:
Sara was driving home when another car braked hard in front of her. Her chest slammed tight, breath rushed, fingers clenched the wheel, adrenaline flooding like the gazelle’s flight from a cheetah.
In that moment, her body was primed to react, but she couldn’t swerve or shout, she was stuck in her seat with all that survival energy trapped inside.
Pulling over, she remembered her somatic work: “I can shake this out.” Sara loosened her grip on the wheel and let her arms drop. They began to tremble, first a quiver in her hands, then a full-body ripple, like the gazelle’s tremor when it’s safe again.
She rocked side to side, exhaling in long, slow breaths, naming in her head, “I’m safe now.”
As the shaking subsided, her heart slowed. She felt the tight knot in her throat soften. In just a few minutes of that micro-discharge (bottom-up), paired with gentle self-talk (“I’m okay, I can continue”), Sara’s system completed its survival response.
When she climbed back into the car, she wasn’t carrying the raw charge of the near-miss, she was grounded, alert, and ready to drive on, much more settled then if she hadn't of discharged.
Like the gazelle that literally shakes off the chase before grazing, Sara’s body needed that physical release and her mind needed the reassurance to return to calm. That’s the essence of somatic healing, we don’t replay the trauma, we simply give our nervous system permission to finish its natural rhythm.
Here’s a human example showing how our natural “shake-it-off” can get cut short and why the survival energy remains stuck or fragmented:
Imagine Alex on the motorway, a car suddenly swerves into their lane. Their heart hammers, muscles coil, breath catches, just like the gazelle fleeing the cheetah. But before Alex can pull over and tremble it out, a co-worker calls on the phone. Alex masks the panic, drives on to work, then sits at their desk in a stiff, “I’m fine” stance all morning.
With no chance to discharge, no tremble, no deep exhale, that fight-flight surge stays locked in Alex’s body. Later, they can’t even connect “racing heart” to the accident, they just feel tightness in their chest any time they hear a sudden horn.
The memory is fragmented, bits of fear, a flash of metal, a pounding pulse, but no coherent story to help them finish processing.
Why it gets stuck/fragmented:
No safe pause: Rushing back into action cuts off the body’s release reflex.
Social cues: “Keep calm and carry on” teaches us to swallow the shake.
Overwhelm: The intensity of the surge feels too big to meet, so we dissociate or push it away.
Lack of resources: Without grounding tools or support, the nervous system can’t safely complete its cycle.
In therapy, we recreate that missing “safe moment” we slow down, notice the chest tightness, invite a tiny tremble or breath-release, then gently weave the pieces of the memory back together so Alex’s body and mind can finish what was once frozen.
The Three Phases of Healing (Trifasic Model)
Safety & Stabilization
Goal: Build internal/external resources to contain your nervous system.
Tools: Grounding anchors, safe-place imagery, co-regulation with your therapist.
Processing & Integration
Titration: Approach just enough of the memory to activate survival energy, then return to calm.
Pendulation: Alternate between activation (brief memory access) and rest (return to safety).
Micro-Discharges: Tiny shakes, sighs, soft vocalizations, like a mini-gazelle shake.
Reconnection & Meaning
Goal: Reclaim choice and reconnect with self, others, and your values.
Practices: Embodiment exercises, creative expression, values-driven action.
Bottom-Up vs. Top-Down Regulation
Bottom-Up Regulation (Body-First)
Lives below your neck, in your chest, belly, muscles, and skin.
Chest: racing heart, tightness
Belly: knots, butterflies
Limbs/Skin: trembling, goose-bumps
When these areas “speak,” they’re telling you something’s happening in your body.
Top-Down Regulation (Mind-First)
Lives in your head, in your inner voice and thinking brain.
Forehead area: self-talk (“I’m safe”)
Temples/Inner awareness: naming sensations (“That’s anxiety”)
When you use words or mental images, you guide your body from up here.
Why Both Matter
Only top-down? You might “know” you’re safe but still feel your heart racing.
Only bottom-up? You can calm the racing but stay stuck in old narratives.
Together? You close the loop: body signals → mind puts them into words → body relaxes. That two-way feedback resets your system and builds lasting resilience.
Gentle Integration, Not Reliving
Healing isn’t about reliving every detail. It’s about gently approaching the memories that matter and transforming how they impact you now. Therapy creates a safe container where your body can discharge stuck energy and your mind can re-story the past on your terms, without re-opening old wounds and helping the nervous system to recalibrate.
Learning a New Dance
Think of trauma work like learning a dance whose steps once felt paralyzing. At first, movements are awkward. With practice and support, tension eases and the choreography shifts. You don’t force a return to the past, you create a safe space where memories meet compassion, curiosity, and the tools you need to feel secure.
Therapy as Collaboration
You bring your lived experience, bodily signals, and readiness for change.
Your therapist offers containment, attunement, and somatic/cognitive strategies. Together, you co-create a field of safety where your nervous system can finish its survival response and where your memories no longer have the final say in your life.
For you, you don't need to know all the methods, theory etc...we just track what you need. Take it at your pace. Piece by piece.
Moving at Your Own Pace
You deserve a pace that honours your journey. If approaching a memory feels overwhelming, start small, journal a moment when you felt a flicker of safety or control. Those micro-wins prove you can be with your past without being consumed by it.
Reflection Prompts
Pick one or two to explore in a journal or session:
Which small body sensation arises when I recall a difficult memory?
What resource (person, place, or practice) helps me return to safety?
Can I remember a time I naturally “shook off” stress? How might I invite that now?
How would my life change if I believed healing is completing what was frozen, not reliving it?
Healing from trauma is about integration, acceptance, and reclaiming your story, not about being forced to relive events over and over. With the trifasic model, Levine’s cheetah–gazelle insight, and a balanced bottom-up/top-down approach, you can discharge what once held you in survival and move toward renewed safety, connection, and choice.
Disclaimer
Please note: The ideas discussed in this blog are intended for informational and reflective purposes only and are not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
If you are experiencing any mental health concerns, please consult a qualified healthcare provider or a licensed mental health professional.
These ideas reflect our current understanding, and much research continues to expand our knowledge. While one size does not fit all, and many tools and approaches can help you reach your destination, each journey is unique. Collaboration between you, your healthcare professionals, and your support network is crucial.
This is the way I see my work: I honour each individual’s unique journey and offer perspectives designed to empower you on your own healing path. This blog does not recommend discontinuing or altering any prescribed medications or treatment plans; always make decisions regarding your health in consultation with a trusted healthcare professional.
