TRE® for Grief: When Grief Lives in the Body
By: Sarah Giencke
Grief isn’t just something we think or feel - it’s something we experience in our bodies. Loss can leave us carrying tension, exhaustion, restlessness or numbness. Because grief can repeatedly remind the brain of what has been lost, the nervous system may continue receiving signals of threat, keeping the body in a state of stress or survival. This is one reason grief can feel so physically exhausting.
TRE® (Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises) offers a different way to work with grief: through the body. TRE® uses a series of simple exercises to activate the body’s natural tremoring mechanism. These involuntary tremors help reduce muscular tension and support nervous system regulation and relaxation.
The goal isn't to “shake away” grief or make it disappear. Grief is a natural response to loss, and there is no right way to move through it. Instead, TRE® is one of many tools we can use to get out of our heads and back into our bodies: slowing down, reconnecting with ourselves, and giving the nervous system another pathway for settling and finding balance.
That's why HeartLight & Riset Resiliency have partnered up to offer a three-part TRE® & grief series. We’ll explore grief through the lens of the nervous system, and most importantly, through the tremor. You’ll learn the TRE® process, experience it for yourself, and have space to notice what your body needs along the way.
You don’t have to talk your way through grief; sometimes, your body has something to say.
To learn more about Riset Resilience & TRE®, click here. To listen to a podcast on TRE® & Grief, click here.
Sarah Giencke is a Resilience Coach who is Certified in TRE® (Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises) and is the Founder of Riset Resiliency. At Riset (reset), she helps people reclaim power and balance over their nervous systems so that they can live less stressful and more peaceful lives. Sarah offers these sessions to empower individuals to improve their well-being and to help organizations drive culture change at scale. Learn more at https://www.risetresiliency.com/
