Understanding trauma doesn't equate to change.

Understanding doesn’t equate to change. Someone might study all the major trauma psychology texts, accurately identify their attachment style, and still fall into the same behavioural patterns in work, relationships, or their inner life. This isn’t a matter of intelligence; it’s a structural issue, and structural challenges demand structural solutions.

A Field Manual to Healing Trauma
is based on a fundamental principle: healing needs more than just knowledge; it needs architecture. A coordinated set of tools, intentionally ordered, each enhancing the others. The book offers the blueprint, while the companion app provides the operational framework.

Three layers. Two gaps. One system to bridge them

Layer 1

Understanding

Using books, podcasts, and therapy to identify what happened and how it shaped you.

Layer 1.5

The blueprint

This represents the plan: translating understanding into a coordinated selection of therapies. It involves not just one method but a strategic combination of approaches aimed at building momentum.

Layer 2

Professional treatment

Techniques like therapy, EMDR, somatic work, neurofeedback, or psychedelic-assisted therapy.

Layer 2.5

The app

It gathers session data, offers AI-guided analysis, functions as a sparring partner, provides access to clinical resources and professional directories, and triggers actions to keep the plan ongoing. Its PDF export offers a structured summary for the therapist of what happened between sessions.

Layer 3

Integration

The patterns that previously dominated no longer control the process.

Orchestrating four engines into a plan

The system uses 4 „engines“, each supported byclinical data, that strengthen one another to be effective and avoid „therapy dips“.

Engine 1

Understanding the behavioural profile

A non-clinical behavioral profile based on six core inner needs: Significance, Approval, Acceptance, Intelligence, Pity, and Strength. Not personality traits. Need states shaped by early experience that continue to drive behavior in adulthood.

Engine 2

Multi-therapy coordination

Coordination framework for four evidence-supported modalities. Talk therapy. Neurofeedback. Somatic therapy. Psychedelic-assisted therapy.

Legal caveat: Psychedelic substances including psilocybin, MDMA, and ketamine are controlled or illegal in most jurisdictions. Any consideration must involve medical screening, legal verification, and professional supervision throughout. This is non-negotiable.

Engine 3

Doctrine and contra-doctrine

Doctrine

Doctrine is the set of beliefs about the self formed in childhood: through repetition, modelling, emotional experience, and the conclusions a developing mind draws from its environment. These are not conscious opinions. They are structural assumptions.

contra-doctrine

Contra-doctrine is not a new affirmation. It is a structured reversal: a precise counter-statement to a specific doctrine, designed to engage the same psychological mechanisms that installed the original belief.

It works through three principles: specificity (targeted to the precise situation the doctrine governs), commitment and consistency.

Engine 4

Creating your plan

12 structured exercises in Part 3 of the book: Creating your plan. Three movements: self-discovery, vision-setting, and plan construction. Each exercise has a corresponding flow in the companion app.

Full bibliography

Full bibliography mapped to engine. References span multiple engines where indicated.

Author

Work

Year

Engine(s)

Author

Work

Year

Engine(s)

Bandura, A.

Self-Efficacy. Freeman

1997

2

McClelland, D.C.

The Achieving Society. Free Press

1967

1

Beck, A.T.

Cognitive Therapy of Depression. Guilford

1979

2

Mitchell, J.M. et al.

MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD. Nature Medicine 27

2021

3

Bowlby, J.

Attachment and Loss. Basic Books

1969

2

Murray, H.A.

Explorations in Personality. Oxford

1938

1

Carhart-Harris, R. et al.

Psilocybin v escitalopram. NEJM 384

2021

3

Porges, S

The Polyvagal Theory. Norton

2011

3

Chase Hughes

The Ellipsis Manual

2024

1,4

Ryan, R. and Deci, E.

Self-determination theory. Psychological Review 107

2000

3

Cialdini, R.

Influence. Harper Business

2021

1,4

Schwartz, R.

No Bad Parts. Sounds True

2021

2,4

Dutton, D.

The Abusive Personality. Guilford

2007

4

Siegel, D.

Mindsight. Bantam

2010

3

Goffman, E.

The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life

1959

2

Skinner, B.F.

The Behavior of Organisms. Appleton

1938

4

Hayes, S.C.

ACT. Journal of Clinical Psychology 60(1)

2004

3,4

Van der Kolk, B.

The Body Keeps the Score. Viking

2014

2,4

Herman, J.

Trauma and Recovery. Basic Books

1992

1,2

Walker, P.

Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving

2013

1,2

Jung, C.G.

Aion. Princeton University Press

1951

2

Wolynn, M.

It Didn't Start with You. Viking

2016

1

Mate, G.

In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts. Knopf

2008

1,3

Young, J.

Schema Therapy. Guilford

1990

2,4

You do not need permission to heal

You need a plan, a set of tools, and the clarity to use them in the right order.

Book reviews

Daniela, 36, Graphic Designer

I have read every major trauma book published in the last decade. This is the first one that told me what to do on Monday morning, not in theory, but with a specific exercise and a clear reason to do it first.

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