Break the Cycle

A Guide to Healing Intergenerational Trauma

By: Dr. Mariel Buqué

Narrated by: Dr. Mariel Buqué

***The Instant National Bestseller***

A Next Big Idea Club must-read title for January 2024

The definitive, paradigm-shifting guide to healing intergenerational trauma—weaving together scientific research with practical exercises and stories from the therapy room—from Dr. Mariel Buqué, PhD, a Columbia University-trained trauma-informed psychologist and practitioner of holistic healing

From Dr. Mariel Buqué, a leading trauma psychologist, comes this groundbreaking guide to transforming intergenerational pain into intergenerational abundance. With Break the Cycle, she delivers the definitive guide to healing inherited trauma. Weaving together scientific research with practical exercises and stories from the therapy room, Dr. Buqué teaches listeners how trauma is transmitted from one generation to the next and how they can break the cycle through tangible therapeutic practices, learning to pass down strength instead of pain to future generations.

When a physical wound is left unhealed, it continues to cause pain and can infect the whole body. When emotions are left unhealed, they similarly cause harm that spreads to other parts of our lives, hurting our family, friends, community members, and others. Eventually, this hurt can injure an entire lineage, metastasizing across years and generations. This is intergenerational trauma.

This trauma is why some of us become estranged from our families, why some of us are people pleasers, why some of us find ourselves in codependent relationships. This trauma can be rooted in the experiences of ancestors, who may have suffered due to unhealthy family dynamics, and it can be collective, the result of a shared experience like systemic oppression, or harmful ingrained behaviors in a culture like the acceptance of physical discipline of children, or even a natural disaster like a pandemic. These wounds are complex, impacting our minds, bodies, and spirits. Healing requires a holistic approach that has so far been absent from the field of psychology. Until now.

©2024 Dr. Mariel Buqué (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

“With all the family trauma we carry, Break the Cycle carries healing for us. With all the pain around us and fully ingrained in us, Dr. Mariel Buqué brings holistic and multidimensional healing for every part of us. What a timely, indispensable, and restorative book.”—Ibram X. Kendi, New York Times bestselling author of How to Be an Antiracist and Stamped from the Beginning

"Dr. Mariel Buqué’s work is filled with essential gems that help us understand the depths and layers of intergenerational trauma and equip learners of her work to master how to Break the Cycle. Her approach toward intergenerational healing practices is comprehensive, holistic, humanizing, and real. She helps us see how mental health practices can be accessible, culturally responsive, and applicable to people across the world who wish to internalize her healing techniques in ways that can produce sustainable effects in their lives and for future generations to come. This literary work has the capacity to shift the way we see the phenomenon of trauma and helps us to envision a world where emotional freedom from the grip of generational pain is indeed possible.”—Layla Saad, NYT bestselling author of Me and White Supremacy

"Dr. Mariel offers a comprehensive and groundbreaking approach to healing trauma at the root. With a method that is both empowering and a call to action, her work masterfully interweaves science, therapeutic practices, and ancestral wisdom; offering you restorative tools to disrupt generational patterns of trauma at the individual and collective level."—Resmaa Menakem MSW, LICSW, SEP, New York Times bestselling author of My Grandmother's Hands

Break new ground with Break the Cycle

As the author states “this book was cultivated out of the deep desire to see a generational shift on how we approach trauma healing”

this book offers a deeply nuanced, trans•generational take on trauma.

As someone who only learned the term C-PTSD in 2019, I have been looking for Dr. Mariel Buqué nuanced lens for 5 years.

The fact that it is set up to be a guided workbook based on 2024 science: nervous system & poly•vagal science … and a takes a social justice stance - makes it a complete work of healing art.
So grateful this book exists.

The most insightful book I have ever listened to

Dr. Mariel is so thorough! I have learned so much about myself and others after listening to and practicing the teachings in this book. I have a newfound passion to study trauma after listening to this book and I am currently in the process of changing my major. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with the world. I purchased the audiobook and now I’m purchasing the physical book to add to my library collection!

Healing for you & those in your heart

Author (who is also reading) is wise, comforting, and offers a practical, sustainable path to healing not only yourself, but the lives of all those you touch. Author is understanding.

A must read!

Loved everything about this book. It took me to my childhood memories. So much healing exercises. Very easy to understand and follow. Definitely buying to have an hand always.

Thoughtful & Relatable!!

Dr. Buque’s book provides a deep dive into intergenerational trauma, drawing on her personal experience, clinical prowess and knowledge of alternative healing practices. The book goes beyond mere inspiration, bringing consciousness and offering insightful explanation and practical guidance with a myriad of techniques to break the cycle of intergenerational trauma. Break the Cycle is a valuable resource for those prepared to embark on their own healing journey. Well done.

Outstanding

I’m barely on social media, but I came across her post and I immediately recognized that she knew on a deep level what she was talking about. As I listened to this book, I felt like I was listening to a fellow mystic. She talked like the science and research was just affirming what she already knew.

It’s the same thing with me, I work in finance and when I talk about behavioral finance, a relatively new field that combines traditional finance with psychology and neuroscience, people are blown away, but it’s because I meditate for hours everyday and have done deep self introspection vis psychedelics that I have so much insights into the human mind and nervous system. I feel the exact same way listening to this book, like she’s speaking from keen observation, intuitive knowledge and scientific research.

I have done soo much trauma healing work that the information in this book was so familiar to me, and I still learned so much. I felt seen and understood listening to this book. As a Haitian man, I’m so glad this mystical knowledge is deeply understood by Caribbean peoples. It’s badly needed.

Healing on heavy-rotation!

Could not stop listening!!

Dr. Buqué gave words to all of the movements and memories I was not equipped to define or have language for as a child and beyond. Her works and voice guides us to remove the layers of historical context that doesn’t belong to us as individuals and as a collective. Intergenerations of pain, shame, loyalty and other descriptors of what was deemed as weakness has given vulnerability a new level of strength and love. Radically. If you are also seeing a therapist, what a complimentary resource to guide us through those memories and moments that we didn’t have the courage to speak about or language to describe. Thank you for your time and seeing so many of us with your heart and mind, Dr. Mariel Buqué!

Get ready to take notes

I loved how intense it got and how it opens so much
In so little time totally reading 5 more times

Great healing book

I love this book getting the hard copy and I learned so much in f myself. I love the healing processes, activities and the soothing voice. Thank you!!!

You want this book!!!!

This is in depth therapy and solutions for intergenerational trauma. I found this book so helpful for healing many wounds.