
Show Notes
Hosted by Matthew Green. Produced by J'aime Rothbard. Why do we beat ourselves up for getting pulled into the same old triggers? And how can we grow our capacity to observe our emotional reactions – rather than being hijacked by them? Pocket Project co-founder Thomas Hübl has devoted his life to helping as many people as possible to 'grow our cup' – his term for building a capacity to meet the trauma loops playing out inside of us with more awareness, spaciousness and compassion. In this episode, Thomas and Matthew go back to basics by exploring how we can tell when we're experiencing trauma reactions from the past – and what it means to gradually learn to respond to triggering situations, rather than react. By choosing to 'own' our triggers, we don't magically dissolve the legacy of past trauma, Thomas explains. But we do start to heal when we bring more awareness to the mechanisms behind our anger, sense of overwhelm, or impulse to withdraw — rather than pathologising these symptoms as signs that there's something wrong with us. "The cup that holds the trauma trigger is growing," Thomas says. "And it's important because some people say, 'Oh, the healing is only when the symptom disappears.' No: The healing is also when the cup grows." Thomas explores how groups oriented towards collective healing can serve as a 'social mirror' that can reveal more of our own unconscious patterns. And growing interest in building healing communities represents a reawakening of a latent human capacity to support one another to process collective and ancestral trauma that is now ripe to be recovered, Thomas believes. This conversation aims to inspire anyone seeking a deeper understanding of how we can loosen the grip of unprocessed trauma on our lives — whether we're new to collective healing work, or advanced practitioners. This conversation was first published on Thomas' Point of Relation podcast. A second installment from the dialogue will follow in the next episode of What Is Collective Healing? Further Resources: Point of Relation podcast (with Thomas Hübl) Thomas Hübl Thoms Hübls Instagram Pocket Project About Thomas Hübl: Thomas Hübl, PhD, is a renowned teacher, author, and international facilitator who works within the complexity of systems and cultural change, integrating the core insights of the great wisdom traditions and mysticism with the discoveries of science. Since the early 2000s, he has led large-scale events and courses on the healing of collective trauma. His new book, co-authored with Richard C. Schwartz, PhD, is called Releasing Our Burdens: A Guide to Healing Individual, Ancestral and Collective Trauma. Thomas is also the author of Attuned: Practicing Interdependence to Heal Our Trauma—and Our World and Healing Collective Trauma: A Process for Integrating Our Intergenerational and Cultural Wounds. He has served as an advisor and guest faculty for universities and organizations, as a coach for CEOs and organizational leaders, and is currently a visiting scholar at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University.
More from What is Collective Healing?
Hosted by Matthew Green. Produced by J'aime Rothbard. Register for the Community Call Building Islands of Coherence: Growing a Global Movement for Collective Healing on October 21 This week we're excited to dive deeper into the mystical dimension of collective healing with a much-anticipated, visionary dialogue with the teacher, mystic and award-winning poet Richard Rudd. Richard is best known for developing the Gene Keys, a grand synthesis of practical wisdom designed to guide you to a deeper understanding of yourself and your true potential. Richard has also won acclaim for his many books, including The Art of Contemplation: Expand Time, Transform Your Emotions And Unleash Your Natural Brilliance and the forthcoming The Sage: A Gene Keys I Ching for the Future Human. In this episode, Richard and Matthew explore the newest insights emerging from Richard's lifelong quest to liberate humanity's latent capacity for collective intelligence in service of personal and planetary healing. Richard believes that we're entering a new phase as we complete a 400-year cycle in the evolution of consciousness. As we near the end of this process, familiar political and economic structures are collapsing and the earth is experiencing climatic and environmental chaos. But Richard sees these distressing realities as the crucible for a deeper shift as more people begin to experience the possibility of inner freedom and activate collective forms of intelligence capable of opening radical new potentials. Just as a dragonfly can only assume its true form as an iridescent flying marvel after completing an incubation period trapped in brackish water, humanity is poised to make an equivalent leap beyond its current impasse, Richard says. "We can barely glimpse what's going to emerge," Richard tells Matthew. "If you've got your eye on the world that's crumbling, you're not going to notice it at all. But if you're looking inside, you will feel the new shoots, little nubs, that are just beginning to appear in our consciousness." Among the themes Richard and Matthew explore: Are we on the cusp of a new form of human consciousness?
Hosted by Matthew Green. Produced by J'aime Rothbard. Register for the Community Call Building Islands of Coherence: Growing a Global Movement for Collective Healing on October 21 When Gaye Donaldson first encountered Systemic Constellation Work in 1994, the revelation she experienced made new sense of her life up to that point — and propelled her onto an unexpected path. Gaye has since spent more than 30 years exploring the practice, also known as Family Constellations, in which a facilitator leads a group of people through a process aimed at mapping and resolving unconscious patterns shaping the lives of individuals, families or larger groups. Gaye continues to work with personal and family issues, in organisations, within the creative arts, and with the land. She has also been a teacher at the UK's Centre for Systemic Constellations for over two decades. In this episode, Gaye becomes the first guest to bring a Systemic Constellations lens to the question at the heart of What Is Collective Healing? — namely, how can we support people to integrate the collective and intergenerational trauma fuelling the world's interlocking crises? In her dialogue with Matthew, Gaye emphasises both the importance of discerning what is truly our work to do, and assuming the posture of "not knowing" that Constellation facilitators learn to hold. Their conversation covers topics including: Learning to ask: "What's mine and what's not mine?" How we get entangled in other people's stories Reawakening our right place in relationship to the planet A Systemic Constellation with a descendant of a Holocaust survivor Working in Kairos time Experiencing ancestral grief from World War Two Family stories: The compulsion to complete what is incomplete The Five Generational Imperative Working with victim-perpetrator dynamics in organisations When we tell the whole story, the system is complete A big part of the mission of What Is Collective Healing? is to provide a platform where practitioners of diverse approaches to trauma integration can come into generative dialogue. We loved our deep and inspiring dive with Gaye into Systemic Constellations, an increasingly influential approach that's already familiar to many in the Pocket Project community. If you enjoy exploring multiple approaches to trauma work, we recommend these previous episodes featuring other pioneering practitioners: Organic Intelligence®: Activating Self-Healing Through the Power of Pleasure and Joy, with Steven Hoskinson The Wholeness Work: A Precise Path to Freedom, with Connirae Andreas Further Resources: Gaye Donaldson (website) Centre for Systemic Constellations (website) Centre for Systemic Constellations (LinkedIn) Centre for Systemic Constellations (Facebook) Centre for Systemic Constellations (Instagram) Pocket Project: Pocket Project Global Social Witnessing Calls Pocket Project About Gaye Donaldson: Gaye Donaldson is a systemic constellations facilitator, trainer and consultant. She experienced Constellation Work for the first time in 1994 and it changed her life in a very personal way, but the experience of the work also made sense of her whole story up to that moment. Now, decades on from this revelation and opening, Gaye has continued to deepen her understanding of the philosophy and methodology, and she has been teaching the work to wonderfully diverse student groups for over 20 years through the Centre for Systemic Constellations, the first systemic Constellation school in the UK, which she heads up. Gaye uses the whole-system Constellation approach with personal and family issues, in organisations, within the creative arts, most particularly film and theatre, and also with the land. She is based in the South-West of England and has a herd of Icelandic horses who teach and restore her. She is a mother to five grown-ups, and grand-mother to a further five children. Her joy is to see the work expand into where it is needed and to evolve n
Hosted by Kosha Joubert Produced by J'aime Rothbard. Register for the community call Mapping the Conditions for Collective Trauma – From Data to Deeper Awareness on October 8 Lots of people talk about 'healing Earth'. But what if we need Earth to heal us? Could we learn to see beyond a narrowly scientific worldview to embrace more of nature's mystery? In this episode, we welcome Tiókasin Ghosthorse, a musician, activist, and author most recently of Earth Mind, which is due to be published in May. A citizen of the Cheyenne River Lakota Nation of South Dakota, who hosted the longest-running Indigenous affairs radio show in the United States, Tiókasin has long been a leading voice sharing how Indigenous wisdom can cast our personal and planetary challenges in a new light. Tiókasin speaks with Kosha about how we can learn to transcend a mindset based on separation from nature to come into deeper resonance with the more-than-human world. It's this process of recognising our essential oneness with life that can open new pathways to wholeness. The dialogue covers topics including: Understanding that nature understands us How modern psychology can separate us from Earth Experiencing resonance with nature through the body Returning to a more intuitive culture Ancestors as guides to the 'ancient future' Addressing the legacy of colonial perpetration Mycelial consciousness Awe and wonder as nature's "original language" We hope you enjoy this nourishing dialogue and also offer you these previous episodes featuring carriers of Indigenous wisdom: Tending Wounded Places With Furious Love, with Hāweatea Holly Bryson "How Can We Listen in a World That Is on Fire?," with Joshua Konkankoh Restoring Relationships with the More-Than-Human-World, with J Dallas Gudgell The Prayers of Our Ancestors, with Solea Anani Pocket Project: Pocket Project Global Social Witnessing Calls Pocket Project About Tiókasin Ghosthorse Tiókasin Ghosthorse is a citizen of the Cheyenne River Lakota Nation — Oceti Sakowin — Oyate Itazipčola-Mnikȟówožu Lakȟota — Mníša tióšpaye na Četáŋǧi thiwáhe, paternal band of Without Bows, of the Red Water Clan from the extended family Yellow Hawk and maternal band of Plants By The Water. He hosted First Voices Radio National/International from 1992 until the show's final broadcast in 2025, one of the longest-running Indigenous-produced radio programs in the United States, broadcasting weekly from Pacifica Radio Affiliates-WBAI in New York and centering Indigenous perspectives on ecology, culture, and "original wisdom." He carries the name Oyáte TȟokáheyA Wičhákiye (Places Nations First) and Tiókasin (Spirit Coming In). He considers himself a perfectly flawed human being. He founded Akantu Intelligence, an institute dedicated to contextualizing Indigenous wisdom for contemporary crises, and has spoken internationally, including at United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues gatherings, on the relational worldview of Indigenous peoples toward water, land, animals and one another. He was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2016 for his global advocacy and peace education. He co-authored Butterfly Against the Wind in 2017 and Earth Mind, to be released in May 2027.
You are warmly invited to join Kosha and Adrian Wagner of the Pocket Project's research team, who has been deeply involved in the Conditions for Collective Trauma Map, for a live presentation: Register for the community call Mapping the Conditions for Collective Trauma – From Data to Deeper Awareness on October 8 Hosted by Kosha Joubert Produced by J'aime Rothbard. We're joined by Pocket Project co-founder Thomas Hübl and technologist, facilitator and researcher Max Roth to explore the new Conditions for Collective Trauma Map, which goes live on October 8. Please sign up for an event introducing the map here. Developed by the Pocket Project in collaboration with Max's organisation Connecting Intelligence, this three-dimensional visualisation draws on dozens of datasets to make the conditions associated with collective trauma – such as conflict, interpersonal violence, environmental degradation and forced migration — more visible. The map also points to societal resilience by representing factors such as democracy, peace, gender equality and wellbeing. The aim is to support a wide range of actors — from policymakers, researchers and philanthropists to governments, international organisations and relief agencies — to locate their work in a wider landscape, and recognise the need for integrated approaches. A wealth of data embedded in the map can also be used to support public dialogue on how to address the lasting legacy of collective trauma fields like colonialism, slavery and resource extraction. As Thomas and Max explain, the Conditions for Collective Trauma Map does not attempt to measure how traumatised a society is: It offers a landscape for inquiry, intended as a starting point for asking deeper questions. Their conversation with Kosha explores themes including: Genesis of the vision for the map
Register for the Pocket Project Community Call, Neuroinclusive Approaches: Cultivating Spaces Where We Can All Belong on September 23 Hosted by Kosha Joubert. Produced by J'aime Rothbard. Rick Hanson, Ph.D., is a psychologist, Senior Fellow at UC Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center, founder of the Global Compassion Coalition, and New York Times best-selling author. His seven books have been published in 33 languages — with a million copies sold in English alone. He's lectured at NASA, Google, Oxford, and Harvard, and taught in meditation centers worldwide. An expert on positive neuroplasticity, he is co-host of the Being Well podcast, now downloaded 30 million times. In this cutting-edge conversation, Rick and Kosha explore a question at the core of the Pocket Project's mission: How can we draw on what we now know about neurobiology, cultural evolution and trauma-informed practice to build social movements capable of tackling global crises? Rick draws on his work on Restoring Healthy Human Politics at the Global Compassion Coalition to share his vision of how a species that spent 99 percent of its history as hunter-gatherers can leverage mechanisms that retained social cohesion in groups of 30 to 50 people to deliver transformation at a planetary scale. "I'm very interested in fostering structures and frameworks so what worked in our bands of 50 people can be scaled up to eight billion people," Rick tells Kosha. "That's why I love the idea of the Pocket Project, because you're creating cells of sanity inside the larger body of humanity." Themes Rick and Kosha discuss include: Our naturally whole and healthy state of being How early experiences structure our nervous system Cultivating compassion and self-responsibility Evolutionary origins of our 'negativity bias' Three ways to practice: 'Let be, let go, let in' Need for larger-scale groups to impact systems Addressing past injustices and present harms Toxicity of 'helpless outrage' How human culture is grounded in our tribal nature How to scale up the mechanisms that maintained balance in hunter-gatherer bands for global impact Opportunities to build up the cellular structure of civil society Need for deeper coordination among nonprofits Using the power of compassion to mobilise collective action This conversation will be a source of insight for anyone interested in how the work we do as individuals and groups to integrate collective and inter-generational trauma can form a foundation to address systemic challenges. This episode also sounds a clarion call for individuals, networks and organisations to embrace the depth of collaboration needed to address inequality, social fragmentation and injustice at a global scale. For more on these themes, please see these previous episodes: Relational Resourcing Before Repair: The Missing Foundation of Systems Change, with John Kania Walking the Talk: How Organisations and Non-Profit Cultures Can Truly Become Trauma-Informed, with Maria Leister Impacting Systemic Injustice & Collective Healing, with Karen Simms More From Dr Rick Hanson: Global Compassion Coalition Global Compassion Coalition: Restoring Healthy Human Politics Learning to Learn from Positive Experiences (Journal of Positive Psychology) Dr Rick Hanson on Social Media: Instagram Facebook LinkedIn Pocket Project Links: Register for the Pocket Project Community Call, Neuroinclusive Approaches: Cultivating Spaces Where We Can All Belong on September 23 Pocket Project Global Social Witnessing Calls Pocket Project About Rick Hanson: Rick Hanson, Ph.D., is a psychologist, Senior Fellow at UC Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center, and New York Times best-selling author. His seven books have been published in 33 languages and include Making Great Relationships, Neurodharma, Resilient, Hardwiring Happiness, Just One Thing, Buddha's Brain, and Mother Nurture –- with over a million copies in English alone. He's the founder of the Glob