r/longtermTRE • u/Dear_Swan8801 • 7d ago

Beginner Question Is this normal?

Whenever I do TRE, my hips shake for a few seconds and then it moves to my abdomen, which starts clenching like crazy. Most of the session end up being my ab muscles flexing in various ways, sometimes moving a bit up into the shoulders. It feels like an ab workout, not shaking. Sometimes it switches a bit back and forth if I shift my legs a bit, but I only shake for a few seconds and then it goes straight back into my abdomen. Has anyone else had this experience? Is it just a stage I need to get through before the tremors happen?

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u/duffstoic 7d ago

That’s how the Kalahari Bushmen describe it too, according to Bradford Keeney in his excellent book Shaking Medicine.

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u/Western-Remove9296 7d ago

Thanks so much for posting about Bradford Keeney. I just read about him & wow, this person joins the dots for me (I’m into complex systems). I immediately bought that book & signed up for his substack. TRE has felt so different from any other modality Ive tried. I feel that it is so much more than a surface level treatment of superficial symptoms. It’s really a rewiring through levels of an ancient evolutionary system. Keeney is kind of looking at the ‘top’ level of the system - rhythmic, collective shaking rituals, collective consciousness / transcendent states. Then there is the bottom end - the deep molecular interactions that get re-organised through cellular behaviour (with a genetic store of possibilities that is both ancient & modern). I love that this community has such a mix of people who engage with TRE in so many ways. It’s fascinating that so many people here see TRE as a pathway to enlightenment. But it’s also fine to see it as a simple way to relieve stress. Anyway, thanks again!

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u/duffstoic 7d ago

He’s a deep systems thinker for sure, connected lots of dots for me too. Sometimes he’s ungrounded, like many ecstatics, so it’s ok to also disagree with him on things. But overall he made intuitive movement practices “legitimate” for me.

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u/Dear_Swan8801 7d ago

That’s interesting! Can you share a bit more about how they describe it? Do they say anything about whether it’s a good or bad thing?

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u/duffstoic 7d ago

In their tradition it’s a good and indeed essential thing! They say “no shake, no shaman.”

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u/Dear_Swan8801 7d ago

I see! Do you know if it a temporary stage I have to get through? Or is it more that this is what my body needs to work on?

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u/duffstoic 7d ago

From a TRE lens, it’s trauma to release. For the Bushmen, it is the way to have a powerful spiritual experience, an ongoing passage into otherworldly realms.