Healing Trauma with Compassionate Inquiry - A Gentle Approach
Trauma is one of the most misunderstood words in our culture. When many people hear it, they think of extreme events, war, accidents, abuse. And while those experiences are certainly traumatic, they represent just one end of a wide spectrum.
Trauma, in the understanding that informs Compassionate Inquiry, is not defined by what happened to you. It's defined by what happened inside you as a result, and what you had to do to survive it.
What Is Trauma, Really?
Dr Gabor Maté, the physician and author whose work forms the foundation of Compassionate Inquiry, defines trauma not as an event but as a wound. It's the part of us that got hurt, that closed down, that decided certain feelings were too much to feel, or certain parts of ourselves were too much to be.
In this understanding, trauma can include:
Childhood experiences of emotional neglect or inconsistency, even in loving families
Growing up in an environment where it wasn't safe to feel, express, or need
Experiences of shame, abandonment, or not being seen as we truly are
Significant loss, rejection, or violation at any stage of life
The accumulation of smaller hurts that were never fully metabolised
What these experiences share is that they leave an imprint. The psyche adapts, often brilliantly, creatively, to manage what was too much. We disconnect from painful feelings, we develop beliefs about who we are and what we deserve, we build identities and behaviours around our wounds without realising it.
And then, decades later, we wonder why we keep repeating the same patterns.
What Is Compassionate Inquiry?
Compassionate Inquiry is a psychotherapeutic approach developed by Dr Gabor Maté. It's designed to help people access and explore the unconscious beliefs, images, and emotions that drive their present-day behaviour, not through analysis or advice, but through compassionate, curious questioning.
The approach is built on a simple but radical premise: that beneath every behavioural or emotional pattern, there is an emotional truth waiting to be seen. And that when we can bring genuine compassion and curiosity to what's hidden, it can shift, not because we fixed it, but because it finally got to be known.
In a Compassionate Inquiry session, we slow down. We follow what's present, a feeling, a body sensation, a moment of contraction or opening. We ask gently: What does this remind you of? When did you first feel this? What did you have to believe about yourself for this to make sense?
The questions aren't leading. They're an invitation to turn toward what's there, rather than away from it.
How Compassionate Inquiry Differs from Traditional Trauma Therapy
Many trauma approaches are primarily focused on reducing symptoms, calming the nervous system, challenging unhelpful thoughts, increasing distress tolerance. These things matter, and they help.
Compassionate Inquiry goes deeper. Rather than managing the symptoms of trauma, it's interested in the root, the core beliefs and emotional wounds that the symptoms are protecting.
Some of the distinctive features of Compassionate Inquiry:
It's body-inclusive. We don't just talk about the past, we pay attention to what's happening in the body right now, as a doorway into what's held beneath the surface.
It's compassion-led. There's no pushing, no forcing, no re-traumatisation. The pace is always set by what's tolerable and workable for the person in the room.
It goes to the root. We're not just working with what you're conscious of. Compassionate Inquiry is interested in the places where you don't yet have words, the assumptions you didn't know you were making, the beliefs you've been living inside of without knowing it.
It's relational. The healing doesn't happen despite the relationship between practitioner and client, it happens through it. The experience of being deeply seen, without judgement, is itself therapeutic.
What Healing Actually Looks Like
Many people who come to me have tried various forms of therapy and self-help. They're intelligent, self-aware, and genuinely committed to healing. And yet something has remained stuck.
What I often find is that the missing ingredient isn't more insight. It's safety, the felt sense of being able to be with what's there without being overwhelmed or judged, including by themselves.
Compassionate Inquiry creates that safety. Not by telling people they're okay, but by accompanying them into the places they've been afraid to go, and discovering that those places are survivable. That the wound, when finally met with compassion, doesn't destroy us. It releases us.
Healing doesn't mean the past didn't happen. It means it no longer runs you.
What Sessions Look Like With Me
I'm a certified Compassionate Inquiry practitioner trained through Dr Gabor Maté's programme. I work with clients in one-to-one sessions, in person in Ericeira, Portugal and online.
Sessions are 60–90 minutes. We begin wherever you are, with what's present today, with what feels important, with what's been showing up in your life. There's no agenda to follow, no story you need to have ready.
I also weave in energy healing and somatic awareness where it serves, because trauma is held in the body and the energetic field as much as in the mind, and working at multiple levels often creates more depth of shift.
Sessions are available as individual one-offs or as an ongoing series for deeper work. I also offer intensive retreat experiences for those who want to go further in a more immersive container.
Is Compassionate Inquiry Right for You?
You might feel drawn to this work if:
You sense that your current struggles have roots in earlier experiences, even if you can't fully see the connection
You've done other forms of therapy and feel like something is still unreached
You want to understand yourself at a deeper level, not just manage your symptoms
You're ready to bring compassion toward the parts of yourself you've found hardest to accept
You're looking for something that meets you where you are, without pressure or agenda
Compassionate Inquiry is gentle, but it isn't superficial. It asks something of you: your willingness to turn toward rather than away, even when that's uncomfortable. In return, it offers the possibility of real, lasting change.
Getting Started
If this resonates, I'd love to hear from you. Book a free discovery call here, a 30-minute conversation to explore what you're looking for and whether working together feels like a good fit.
There's no commitment required, and no experience of therapy or self-work is needed. Just curiosity, and a willingness to begin.
Jessi Galvin is a certified Compassionate Inquiry practitioner and energy healer based in Ericeira, Portugal. She works with clients navigating trauma, anxiety, emotional healing, and spiritual growth through one-to-one sessions and retreats.
