Music is often quoted as being “a universal language” given its power to transmit ideas, stories, and feelings across cultures and people. The Healing with Harmony: Music Processing Group for Trauma at Sandoval Therapy harnesses the power of music and structured sound experiences as tools for expression, processing, connection, and coping for survivors of developmental and single-incident trauma (C-PTSD & PTSD).
The group encourages active, somatic processing and a focus on nervous system regulation and stabilization. Clients can expect to leave the group with dozens of tools for grounding, coping, processing, and healing.
This group is welcoming to clients 18+ of all gender identities & expressions. The group is limited to a total of 6 participants. All attendees must be residents of California and physically present in the state during the sessions.
The group meets Thursday mornings from 10-11:20 AM. It is an open group, accepting year-round referrals. New members are welcomed in at the beginning of each month once an opening crops up.
I am Danielle Palomares, an associate marriage and family trauma therapist at Sandoval Therapy in Pasadena, CA. I have been a private music educator since 2008 and a lifelong singer, holding a Masters Degree from UCLA in Music in addition to a second Masters degree in Marriage & Family Therapy.
My work as a musician is what brought me to psychotherapy. I have had the pleasure of witnessing the transformative power of music to serve as a conductor of emotional processing throughout my life, both personally and in my colleagues and students.
I envisioned and developed this group first at Peace Over Violence while an intern working with survivors of domestic violence and sexual trauma. The group was a huge success, and I am thrilled to be able to relaunch it.
The group runs for 80-minutes and is broken up roughly into three sections. We always begin with a group karaoke, check-in question & then a short psychoeducation presentation on the day’s theme.
We then move into the somatic & music-based interventions, such as: guided breath work to music, bilateral stimulation to music, entrainment or drumming work to music, performance analysis and discussion, listening and reflection, group or solo guided compositions, sing-alongs, expressive arts, guided singing, grounding exercises, improvisations, guided meditations and visualizations, stretching, tapping, and havening to music.
We always end with group talk therapy processing, discussing the interventions and what’s coming up emotionally for group members that week. Between sessions, we have collaborative Spotify playlists that align with the week’s theme, allowing us to stay connected through music between sessions.
As the group runs year-round, every week is centered on a different theme. Themes repeat occasionally, with different slides, interventions, and song selections for those groups. As the group is intimate and highly tailored, clients have the opportunity to request specific themes for future groups.
Definitely not! This group uses music as a tool to process emotions, and it is not a performance class where talent or skill matters. You just need to have a love of music, a willingness to try some of the exercises, and the courage to channel your creative side.
We will be doing four main types of interventions: improvisations, guided compositions, re-creative exercises (singing, playing, performing, sing-alongs), and receptive work (meditation, listening, movement to music, breath-work to music, combining listening with visual art, lyric discussion, unguided music imagery, to name a few.)
If you have an instrument, feel free to bring it to session. Otherwise, we will mostly be using the voice and our bodies. For some of the sessions, we may invite you to bring some basic art materials (paper & coloring tools). Most importantly, we strongly recommend attending on a larger laptop/ desktop computer instead of a small phone and use earphones. We also recommend creating a free Spotify account so that you can enjoy the weekly themed, collaborative playlists for the group!
This is a closed group, limited to 10 participants. This means that once we begin meeting on February 1st, we will not have new people coming and going.
We do not have sliding spots available for this February 2024 cohort as we are offering an introductory rate to everyone, however, future groups will be planned so that we can offer a limited number of sliding scale options. Feel free to enroll to get on my referral sheet to be contacted about future groups in Spring and Summer 2024.
If you’re interested in scheduling a 15-minute screening call to enroll in the group or being listed on my referral sheet for notification about upcoming music groups launching later in the year, please fill out the form below.
