Benjamin Fry

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Benjamin Fry

Benjamin Fry is a psychotherapist, author, and founder of Khiron Clinics. He wrote The Invisible Lion and founded Televagal, a tech platform for therapists.

He specialises in trauma and relationships, combining lived experience and clinical training.

18/11/2025

We often admire independence. The ability to stand on our own, to support ourselves, to need little from others and to be self-sufficient. These qualities are seen as signs of maturity and strength. But sometimes what looks like independence is actually armour, the body remembering that to need is to be hurt.

Independence becomes a fortress, and within its walls, the nervous system never truly rests. From a trauma perspective, withdrawal is a survival strategy: when closeness in the past led to pain or rejection, the body adapts by keeping distance. Even when there is no present danger, intimacy can trigger tension, anxiety, or shutdown. Outwardly, avoidantly attached adults may appear competent, strong, and self-reliant, but inside, loneliness and longing persist. The nervous system is caught in a loop, craving connection while fearing vulnerability.

Through safe, supportive relationships and nervous system regulation, it becomes possible to gradually allow closeness without fear. Independence can transform from a fortress into a foundation for trust and connection.

17/11/2025

𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐚𝐬 𝐚 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐈 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐮𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐥𝐲 𝐛𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐝 𝐈 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝𝐧’𝐭 𝐛𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩𝐞𝐝.

In this conversation with my friend and colleague Janina Fisher, I talk about what happened when my life fell apart, the treatment that completely missed the point, and what it was like to sit in a top psychiatric hospital where nobody said, “he has a trauma history.”

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐮𝐦𝐚 𝐰𝐚𝐬 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐝, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐬𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐚𝐥𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐦𝐞 𝐦𝐲 𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲.

We explore why real healing begins only when the whole story is seen, why safety matters more than insight, and how simple everyday moments like cooking or sitting together can reshape a nervous system.
If you want the full story, the episode is in the bio. It is one of the most personal conversations I have ever had.

15/11/2025

When life becomes overwhelming, we try to think our way through it. But the body moves first. Our nervous system decides what feels safe long before the mind can make sense of anything. Stress, trauma, and old hurts can keep us stuck in defence, even when life looks calm. Healing begins not with analysing but with listening to breath, sensations, and the quiet signals of safety. Connection helps us return home to ourselves. One steady presence, one shared breath, one moment of staying close when it’s hard. This is how the body learns to trust again.

Read more in my most recent blog: https://bit.ly/4oPXziY

14/11/2025

Most relationship advice starts with tactics: better talking, rules for arguing, lists to follow. But at the heart of the RePair approach is something less flashy and far more powerful: establishing felt‑safety first. When you feel safe with your partner, emotionally, physically, and in the nervous system, you don’t need to perform. You don’t need to fix or win, follow all the rules, or be the best at all the strategies; you need presence.

In practice, this means noticing the pauses, the micro‑responses, the silences and the gazes between you. It also means recognising when past relational patterns and baggage are running the show, making us feel defensive, afraid, resentful and or ‘checked out’. Only when perceived relational safety is on solid ground do strategies for growth, repair, and expansion become useful.

Invest in presence. That makes all the difference.

🔗 https://bit.ly/4n4AbMV

13/11/2025

The moment you feel yourself spiraling in an argument, whether you’re exploding or going numb, that’s your cue to pause. Not to punish the other person, but to give your nervous system time to come back online.

You can’t solve a relationship problem from a survival state.
You can only solve it from the part of you that remembers you’re on the same team.

Stop first, regulate second, reconnect third — then the conversation has a chance.

11/11/2025

I just recently had the pleasure of working with Esther Perel at her retreat, Erotic Intelligence: Cultivating Desire and Aliveness in Your Relationships, and it reminded me of something she often says: ‘The quality of your relationships determines the quality of your life.’

Every connection we have, whether with a partner, friend, or colleague, shapes how we feel, grow, and experience the world. Investing in relationships isn’t just about avoiding conflict; it’s about building understanding, trust, and resilience.

Grateful for the chance to learn from Esther and bring these insights into my own work and life.

Every relationship we nurture has the power to transform us.

07/11/2025

The moment you feel yourself spiralling in an argument, whether you’re exploding or going numb, that’s your cue to pause. Not to punish the other person, but to give your nervous system time to come back online.

𝐘𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐚𝐧’𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐥𝐯𝐞 𝐚 𝐫𝐞𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐛𝐥𝐞𝐦 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐚 𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐯𝐚𝐥 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐞.

You can only solve it from the part of you that remembers you’re on the same team.

Stop first, regulate second, reconnect third, then the conversation has a chance.

06/11/2025

Sometimes the patterns we judge most harshly are the ones that once protected us. Healing begins when we stop pathologising our defences and start understanding them.

The nervous system learned to respond in ways that once kept us alive, even if those same strategies now hold us back.

Avoidance, control, overthinking, and people-pleasing. These are not signs of weakness, but traces of the body’s past negotiations with danger. Healing doesn’t mean erasing them, but updating them. As our body and mind learn that safety exists in the present, and the old patterns no longer need to run the show.

Real change happens not through judgment or force, but through awareness and compassion. When we meet our patterns with curiosity, the body receives a new message: you’re safe now. From there, regulation, connection, and authenticity can begin to emerge.

04/11/2025

Every nervous system carries its own “invisible lion”; the unseen imprint of past fear that still shapes how we respond to life today. It’s not imagination; it’s physiology. We may call it anxiety, avoidance, or control, but beneath it is the same survival instinct trying to keep us safe.

We might think we’re overreacting, but the body is simply doing its job, keeping us safe from a threat that it feels imminent, but the origin could be decades old.

Recovery isn’t about fighting that instinct or silencing it with willpower or thoughts; it’s about learning to notice it, to feel the tension in the body, and to bring it into the present moment where safety can finally be felt. When the nervous system recognises that the threat is no longer here, the lion can rest, and so can we.

🔗 https://bit.ly/4gf3fPY

03/11/2025

The stories we inherit shape how we move through the world. Patterns of survival, passed down, whispered, repeated, create scripts we don’t always see.

Fear, avoidance, and constant alertness shape how we act, how we hesitate, and how we connect with others.

Working through them means noticing these patterns, understanding where they come from, and slowly learning new ways to respond. It means recognising the narratives that no longer serve us and discovering the ones that do.

Healing happens in small steps. We notice patterns, try new ways, stumble, and try again, but the stories we tell ourselves can change, and the patterns we’ve inherited can, too.

01/11/2025

We often praise independence, but sometimes it is armour. For the avoidantly attached person, intimacy may trigger survival responses even in the absence of actual danger. Their system remembers that closeness once meant risk.

The result is a life lived at arm’s length, where self-reliance is celebrated outwardly but isolation gnaws inwardly.

Healing isn’t forcing connection; it’s slowly teaching the body that safety can exist in closeness. Through co-regulation, repair, and trust, independence softens into connection. True strength isn’t needing no one; it’s learning that we can need and still be safe.

Read more in my most recent blog here:
https://bit.ly/435C1pH

31/10/2025

Safety and expansion can feel like opposites, one asks us to stay still, the other to move. But in truth, they depend on each other. Without safety, growth feels dangerous. Without expansion, safety becomes a cage.

Real connection happens in the space between the two, when we can protect what feels vulnerable while still allowing ourselves to open, explore, and change.

Learn more about strategies to find safety and expansion in The Invisible Lion: https://bit.ly/4gf3fPY

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