Most people who seek personal growth already know what they want. They want to feel less anxious and more confident. To build better relationships. Stop self-sabotaging. Create a life that feels genuinely fulfilling rather than just functional.
They have often tried many things to get there. Read the books. Done the courses. Set the goals. Made the vision boards. And still, something keeps getting in the way.
Not laziness. Not a lack of motivation. Not the wrong strategy. Something more confusing. Something that feels almost involuntary, like a force operating just beneath the surface of conscious intention, pulling you back every time you get close to change.
Understanding this unconscious force is where real personal growth begins.
What Is Trauma-Informed Coaching?
Trauma-informed coaching is an approach to personal development that recognises the role that past experiences, particularly painful, frightening, or overwhelming ones, play in shaping who we are today.
It is not therapy, and it is important to be clear about that distinction. Trauma-informed coaching does not diagnose, treat, or focus primarily on processing traumatic events. What it does is bring an understanding of how trauma operates in the nervous system into the coaching conversation, so that the work of growth is rooted in reality rather than willpower alone.
A conventional coaching approach might ask: what is your goal, and what steps will you take to reach it?
A trauma-informed coaching approach asks something more nuanced: what might be making those steps feel impossible, unsafe, or threatening, even when you consciously want to take them?
That shift in question changes everything.
Why Standard Personal Development Often Falls Short
There is nothing wrong with goal-setting, positive thinking, or accountability frameworks. These tools have genuine value. But they assume the main barrier to change is information, motivation, or strategy.
For many people, particularly those with a history of trauma, that assumption misses the mark entirely.
When the nervous system has been shaped by experiences of danger, unpredictability, criticism, abandonment, or overwhelm, it develops a set of protective strategies. These strategies were genuinely useful at the time. They helped you survive, adapt, and function in difficult circumstances.
The problem is that the nervous system does not automatically update those strategies when circumstances change. What once protected you can now limit you. And no amount of positive self-talk or five-step action plans will override a nervous system response that is operating below conscious awareness.
This is why people can know exactly what they need to do and still find themselves unable to do it. It is not a failure of character. It is the nervous system doing its job, just in the wrong context.
Trauma-informed coaching creates the conditions for that context to shift.
How Trauma-Informed Coaching Supports Personal Growth
It helps you understand your own patterns, not just change your behaviour
One of the most liberating aspects of trauma-informed coaching is the shift from self-blame to self-understanding. When you begin to see that your patterns of procrastination, people-pleasing, self-sabotage, or avoidance have roots in genuinely difficult experiences, shame starts to loosen its grip.
And when shame loosens, change becomes possible in a way it simply cannot be when you are judging yourself for struggling.
It works with the body, not just the mind
Trauma is not stored in thoughts. It is stored in the body, in the nervous system, in habitual patterns of tension, bracing, shutdown, and reactivity. Coaching approaches that incorporate somatic awareness, encouraging you to notice what is happening in your body as you work toward change, and creates deeper and more durable shifts than purely cognitive approaches.
At Tess Reilly-Browne Counselling, this understanding is woven into every aspect of the work. The Tapping into Relationships – eft² approach integrates neuroscience and somatic therapy precisely because lasting change requires working at the level where patterns are actually built and held.
It builds capacity before pushing for change
A trauma-informed approach does not simply set a goal and push harder when you resist. It recognises that the capacity to tolerate change, uncertainty, and growth needs to be built first.
This might look like learning to regulate your nervous system when you feel overwhelmed. Developing the ability to stay present with discomfort without shutting down or reacting. Building a felt sense of safety in your own body so moving forward feels genuinely possible rather than terrifying.
This may seem slower than traditional coaching in some respects. However, It is far more effective for people whose nervous systems have been shaped by adversity.
It reconnects you with your authentic values and desires
Trauma often teaches us to prioritise survival over authenticity. We learn to want what is safe, what others approve of, what will not lead to rejection or punishment. Over time, we can lose touch with what we actually value, what genuinely matters to us, what kind of life we want to build.
Trauma-informed coaching creates space to ask those questions again, gently and without pressure, and to begin moving toward answers that feel genuinely yours rather than inherited from fear.
Signs That Trauma-Informed Coaching Might Be Right for You
You do not need to have experienced a dramatic or obvious trauma to benefit from this approach. Developmental trauma, attachment wounds, chronic stress, emotional neglect, and repeated experiences of not feeling safe or valued are all forms of adversity that shape the nervous system and affect personal growth.
You might benefit from trauma-informed coaching if:
- You find yourself stuck in the same patterns despite genuinely wanting to change.
- You struggle with self-worth or chronic self-doubt that does not respond to logic or affirmation.
- You feel easily overwhelmed, emotionally flooded, or shut-down in situations that require you to show up fully.
- You have difficulty setting boundaries or consistently put others’ needs before your own
- You pursue growth intellectually, but feel a deep resistance in your body when it comes to actually doing the work.
- You have tried conventional personal development approaches and found them helpful, but not quite reaching the thing that really holds you back.
- You sense that something from your past is still influencing your present in ways you have not fully understood.
The Difference Between Trauma-Informed Coaching and Trauma Therapy
This distinction matters, and it is worth being clear about.
Trauma therapy, which includes approaches like EFT, EMDR, IDT, somatic re-experiencing, is clinical work. It is designed to process traumatic memories, resolve symptoms of PTSD or complex trauma, and work through experiences that require a therapeutic container and professional clinical training.
Trauma-informed coaching is not that. It does not process trauma directly. Instead, it uses an understanding of how trauma affects behaviour, nervous system regulation, and personal development to inform a coaching relationship focused on growth, goals, and forward movement.
For some people, trauma therapy is the right starting point. For others, particularly those who have done therapeutic trauma work and are ready to focus on building the life they want, trauma-informed coaching offers a powerful next step.
And for many people, both can happen concurrently, each supporting and deepening the other.
Personal Growth That Honours Where You Have Been
There is a version of personal growth that demands you leave your past behind. Push through. Think positive. Focus on the future.
And there is another version that says, “What you have been through matters.” It shaped you. And real growth does not happen by bypassing that shaping. It happens by understanding it, relaxing its hold on you, and gradually building something new from within it.
That second version is slower, more honest, and in the experience of the people who undertake it, profoundly more transformative. It is also the version that tends to last.
Personal growth that is built on a genuine understanding of your nervous system, your patterns, your history, and your authentic values does not collapse the first time life gets hard. It becomes part of who you are.
Ready to Grow in a Way That Actually Reaches the Root?
If you have spent years working on yourself and still feel like something fundamental is not shifting, it is not because you are not trying hard enough.
It is because growth that does not account for the nervous system, for the ways your past has shaped your present, can only go so far.
Tess Reilly-Browne brings deep expertise in attachment trauma, Adult ADHD, AuDHD, somatic therapy, and the Tapping into Relationships – eft2 approach to support individuals and couples who are ready for change that steps past superficial strategies.
Sessions are available face-to-face in Camberwell, Melbourne, Brisbane and online across Australia.
You can call Tess on 0427 220 052, visit Tess Counselling, or book a session directly online. Because you deserve growth that is built to last.
Frequently Asked Questions
No. Counselling and therapy are clinical services that focus on the problem and healing that or learning to better manage the issues, including the effects of trauma. Trauma-informed coaching draws on an understanding of trauma to support personal growth and goal achievement but is not a clinical or therapeutic service. If you are experiencing significant distress or symptoms related to trauma, counselling is the more appropriate first step and Tess can provide this.
Not at all. Trauma-informed coaching is relevant for anyone whose nervous system has been shaped by difficult experiences, which includes most of us in some form. You do not need a diagnosis or a dramatic backstory to benefit from an approach that understands how past experience shapes present behaviour.
Absolutely. Many of the patterns that affect personal growth, difficulty with trust, fear of conflict, people-pleasing, self-sabotage show up most acutely in relationships. Trauma-informed coaching can be particularly powerful for people wanting to change how they show up in their closest connections and Tess can incorporate this in your Relationship therapy.
Traditional life coaching focuses primarily on goals, strategies, and accountability. Trauma-informed coaching includes those elements but goes deeper, exploring the internal landscape of the nervous system, attachment patterns, and emotional regulation that determine whether behavioural change is actually sustainable.
Yes. Tess offers online sessions across Australia and many other countries, which makes trauma-informed coaching accessible wherever you are. Online sessions are particularly well-suited to clients who feel more at ease in their own environment, including many neurodiverse clients.