What is Lifespan Integration?
Lifespan integration is a form of psychotherapy that works with the brain systems involved in memory and attachment to help move a client’s nervous system towards regulation.
This allows a person to experience a state of integration and harmony.
Lifespan Integration (LI) was developed by Peggy Pace in 2002 to treat trauma and dissociation.
Are you looking for an adjunctive or alternative modality than traditional talk therapy modalities?
Lifespan Integration (LI) is a form of psychotherapy that works with the brain systems involved in memory and attachment to help move a client’s nervous system towards regulation.
Lifespan Integration is a right-brained, bottom up approach which uses timelines in various forms to process and metabolize fragmented memories and/or ego states in order to help the client become unstuck.
LI relies on the innate ability of the body-mind to heal itself. Utilizing a variety of protocols, LI integrates past experiences with the resources from the present, proving to the client’s body-mind system that time has passed, and allowing the system to heal.
It is in this way that LI offers an alternate therapeutic approach than traditional talk therapy modalities.
How does Lifespan Integration work?
A) Turning time on
Traumatic experiences disrupt the brain's sense of time, leaving clients emotionally stuck in experiences that happened in the past. LI helps restore a chronological sense of self, allowing the nervous system to learn that the trauma is in the past and that life has continued forward.
B) Use of a timeline
Every session of LI uses a timeline of life events, created with the client. Various protocols are used depending on the client’s goals for therapy, all involving the use of the client’s timeline.
LI training teaches clinicians multiple ways to use timelines depending on the client's presenting concerns. Timelines are used for trauma processing, attachment repair, and resilience building.
Repetition of the timeline allows the client’s system to change the emotional valence of memories and allow for a sense of time passing, allowing for positive and neutral emotions to emerge.
C) Memory
Rather than focusing solely on insight or narrative, Lifespan Integration works directly with memory networks.
Timeline work helps clients update how traumatic and developmental memories are held in the nervous system.
What are the outcomes of LI therapy for clients?
Clients often report…
• A felt sense of the trauma being "over"
• Decreased "stuck-ness"
• Increased emotion regulation and stability
• Emergence of healthy coping & behaviours
• More appropriate and healthy relationships with increased self-compassion and self-love
• Increased quality of life
• Life feels more straightforward and less complicated
Ready to start your training?
