Human beings have evolved to be highly adaptable creatures, psychologically and physiologically. From moment to moment we continually monitor the social and physical environment in order to assess opportunities or threats that lie ahead; and we change the face we present to the world accordingly.

In this talk I’ll explain how these adjustments to personality, mental and physical health can occur without our knowing it, as we respond instinctively to environmental cues. But of course we may sometimes get it wrong. We may be deceived by accidental or deliberate disinformation into forming a false picture of our prospects. Or we may be misled by information that – in evolutionary terms – is simply out of date. I’ll show how this explains not only the placebo effect, but much else about the misfit between human nature and the modern environment.

Ever wondered why identical twins become less alike as they age, even developing different diseases? Why are the cells of your skin so different from the cells of your kidneys, even though they contain exactly the same DNA? The answer lies in epigenetics, an extra layer of information on top of genes, that controls how the genetic script gets used. It’s the link between nature and nurture and it’s important in a huge range of biological processes. It explains why tortoiseshell cats are almost always female, and why global warming is leading to catastrophic skewing of the sex ratios in turtle populations.

Drug companies are investing billions of dollars in creating new therapies for cancer, using their knowledge of how epigenetic problems can drive this disease. Most weirdly of all, the epigenetic system can be a means by which responses to the environment get passed down through generations, without any change in DNA. It’s a wonderful, strange, fascinating and sometimes controversial science, and it affects us all.

The wiring of the brain, the neural pathways, are laid down during the crucial years of life when the infant is dependent on the primary caregiver. The past is encoded in the present. The degree of developmental trauma caused by adverse situations and by the relationship of mother and infant determines to a large extent the infant’s nervous system responses and the attachment styles adopted to ensure survival. These behaviour patterns laid down in the early years of development govern relationships and interactions as adults. From conception onwards memory is not subject to recall in the obvious ways, but is stored as implicit memory, held in the body out of conscious awareness.

Neuroscience confirms the brain’s plasticity which ensures that we can rewire the brain, changing the autonomic nervous system responses, and consequently shift our attachment behaviours and heal developmental trauma. In Bodydreaming we learn tools to enable affect regulation, to produce greater ease, flow and expansion in our systems. We focus on our sensing bodies through inner and outer attunement which has the effect of changing our default responses of fight, flight, freeze, the residue of early trauma and insecure attachment patterns. The quality of this relationship to the body lays down a new template for a secure attachment – this time round an attachment to an embodied core sense of self. The work creates the foundation stone for healing developmental trauma.