Mastering Change | The trauma, mental health & wellbeing podcast

We’re living through a loneliness epidemic – and it’s not for lack of connection. 
On this episode of Mastering Change, Francesca Tighinean explores why, despite being more digitally connected than ever, so many people feel increasingly isolated and unsure how to build real relationships. 
She points to a deeper shift. 
With constant exposure to social media, global events and information, many people – particularly younger generations – no longer feel safe enough to take the risks that connection requires. Instead, self-protection takes over. 
Increasingly, people are avoiding discomfort altogether – cutting others off rather than working through conflict. Francesca challenges this directly, discussing what it actually takes to build connection today – and why it’s often less comfortable than we’d like. 
She also touches on a quieter, underlying issue: purpose. 
We explore 
Why connection feels harder in the modern world  
The shift towards avoidance in relationships  
Why nuance matters more than ever  
What community really requires  
A quieter, underlying issue: purpose. 
This episode is a timely reflection on how we relate and what it might take to reconnect. 
Moment of Care: This episode discusses sensitive episodes related to trauma, mental health and distressing experiences. If you feel triggered at any point, please take a moment to check in with yourself and seek support. 
Watch this episode on Youtube: https://tinyurl.com/masteringchangepodcast
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Flow state is a rapidly growing topic in media – trending across social platforms, as well as in professional, self-development and wellbeing spaces. 
This week on Mastering Change, we speak with Josh Dickson, psychotherapist and founder of Resurface, who is exploring how flow can be used to support therapeutic change. 
‘Flow is an optimal state of consciousness where you feel and perform at your best.’  
Josh explains that activities like surfing are not the intervention itself, but a way of creating the conditions for it. Because when those conditions are right, something shifts – attention sharpens, distractions fall away, and people become more open to the work that follows. 
We discuss: 
What flow actually is – beyond the trend  
The conditions required to access it  
Why modern life disrupts our ability to focus  
How flow can prepare the brain for therapeutic work  
The risks of chasing the state itself  
This conversation offers a different lens on flow – not as a productivity tool, but as a state that may help create the conditions for meaningful change. 
Moment of Care: This episode discusses sensitive episodes related to trauma, mental health and distressing experiences. If you feel triggered at any point, please take a moment to check in with yourself and seek support. 
See Josh Dickson at Transform Trauma Oxford 2026 – Get your Early Bird Tickets here. 
Watch this episode on Youtube: https://tinyurl.com/masteringchangepodcast
Follow us on instagram: www.instagram.com/masterseventsltd
Visit mastersevents.com/oxford-2026 for more details.

On this episode of Mastering Change, we explore one of the most rapidly evolving and widely discussed areas in mental health: psychedelic-assisted therapy. 
Neuropsychopharmacologist Rayyan Zafar joins us to explain how new treatments – particularly psychedelics – are changing how we understand trauma and addiction. 
Rayyan’s work focuses on neuroplasticity – and he challenges a common assumption: more plasticity isn’t always better. In addiction and trauma, the brain can become stuck in deeply reinforced patterns that are difficult to shift through conventional approaches. 
Psychedelics, he explains, appear to do something different. 
Rather than simply managing symptoms, they may temporarily disrupt rigid brain networks, opening a window for change and healing. What makes this especially significant is that this window of plasticity can endure after a single dose – something not seen in other areas of medicine. 
We explore 
What neuroplasticity actually is – and why it can be helpful or harmful  
How psychedelics may interrupt rigid trauma and addiction patterns  
Why a single dose can create an enduring window for change  
What hormesis teaches us about stress and resilience  
Why integration remains an open scientific question  
How precision mental health could reshape treatment 
Moment of Care: This episode discusses sensitive episodes related to trauma, mental health and distressing experiences. If you feel triggered at any point, please take a moment to check in with yourself and seek support. 
See Rayyan Zafar at Transform Trauma Oxford 2026 – Get your Early Bird Tickets here. 
Watch this episode on Youtube: https://tinyurl.com/masteringchangepodcast
Follow us on instagram: www.instagram.com/masterseventsltd
Visit mastersevents.com/oxford-2026 for more details.

Anxiety doesn’t begin in your thoughts – it begins in your nervous system. 
In this episode of Mastering Change, breathwork educator Jamie Clements explains how conscious breathing can directly regulate the autonomic nervous system and help shift anxiety at its root. 
Jamie shares how breathwork became central to his own recovery from panic attacks, and why he now teaches a structured approach that distinguishes between micro regulation practices and macro transformational work, including Conscious Connected Breathing. 
He explains how deeper breathwork can intentionally create safe “prediction error” experiences – moments where the body learns it is safe in situations it once perceived as threatening – allowing new neural pathways to form. 
But this isn’t about intensity for its own sake. Jamie emphasises preparation, containment and integration as essential parts of the process. 
We explore: 
How breath influences the autonomic nervous system 
Why anxiety is often a conditioned physiological response 
The role of Conscious Connected Breathing in deeper healing 
The difference between daily grounding and expanded-state work 
Why integration matters as much as the experience itself 
Moment of Care: This episode discusses sensitive episodes related to trauma, mental health and distressing experiences. If you feel triggered at any point, please take a moment to check in with yourself and seek support. 
See Jamie Clements at Transform Trauma Oxford 2026 – Get your Early Bird Tickets here.
Watch this episode on Youtube: https://tinyurl.com/masteringchangepodcast
Follow us on instagram: www.instagram.com/masterseventsltd
Visit mastersevents.com/oxford-2026 for more details.

Trauma doesn’t only create fear – it often creates isolation. 
In this episode of Mastering Change, Lucas Casanova explores trauma as a fundamental rupture in safety and belonging. A Buddhist and transpersonal therapist, Lucas integrates secular Buddhist practices with neuroscience and embodied therapy to help people reconnect – not just cognitively, but physically and relationally. 
He explains that belonging and safety are biological needs. When trauma disrupts them, thinking alone cannot restore them. The body must feel safe first. 
“Trauma makes you lose your faith and trauma makes you feel disconnected.” 
Lucas differentiates spirituality from religion – framing spirituality as lived experience rather than belief – and introduces the concept of spiritual safety: the felt sense of belonging to something larger than ourselves. 
Drawing on his work with refugees and displaced communities, he describes how meditation, breath and embodied practices can rebuild connection from the inside out. 
We explore: 
Trauma as disconnection from body, community and self 
Why safety must be embodied before cognitive healing begins 
Spirituality versus religion in therapeutic practice 
Secular Buddhist practices as tools for regulation and reconnection 
Belonging as a core human need 
A powerful conversation about rebuilding safety where trauma once fractured it. 
Watch this episode on Youtube: https://tinyurl.com/masteringchangepodcast
Follow us on instagram: www.instagram.com/masterseventsltd
Visit mastersevents.com/oxford-2026 for more details.