Clinical
Counseling
Individual counseling for adults navigating trauma, anxiety, burnout, recovery, and the physiology beneath patterns that no longer serve them.
Hawaiʻi residents · Telehealth
Therapy · Education · Water
Work that brings the whole human back into the room.
Clinical support, coaching, professional education, and embodied experiences grounded in physiology, honest conversation, and the capacity to choose what comes next.
Licensed Clinical Social WorkerCertified Substance Abuse CounselorFreediving Instructor
Ways to work with Elaine
Different settings.
The same depth of care.
Choose the kind of support that fits the work in front of you. Services are clearly scoped so counseling, coaching, education, and water-based work remain distinct.
Coaching
Digital nomad coaching
Practical, nervous-system-aware coaching for people building a life across changing places, routines, identities, and demands.
Online · Available beyond Hawaiʻi
Oʻahu
Adaptive freediving
Fee-based, individualized water sessions designed around access, pacing, safety, capacity, and the person—not a depth target.
In person · Oʻahu
Oʻahu
Somatic Experiencing sessions
Fee-based, in-person support for working with stress physiology, protective responses, and the body’s capacity to return to choice.
In person · Oʻahu
Organizations
Speaking engagements
Keynotes, workshops, and facilitated conversations on trauma, recovery, nervous-system regulation, professional sustainability, and freediving.
Online or in person
Water work
Freediving collaborations
Collaborative instruction, adaptive support, retreats, and specialized experiences developed with freediving instructors and organizations.
Project-based
Continuing education
Education people can actually use on Monday morning.
Elaine develops and teaches continuing-education programs for CSACs, LCSWs, LSWs, supervisors, behavioral-health teams, and multidisciplinary organizations. Trainings combine current research, clinical judgment, embodied practice, and language that translates across roles.
Plan a trainingAvailable training areas
Nervous-system regulation and Polyvagal Theory
Trauma, addiction, and relapse prevention
Duty to protect, clinician safety, and post-crisis care
Burnout, compassion fatigue, and sustainable supervision
ASI administration, risk ratings, and treatment planning
Sleep, recovery, and applied self-regulation
CEU-ready development
Programs can be adapted for established continuing-education pathways, agency training, clinical teams, and conference audiences.
Selected speaking engagements
Across disciplines.
Across borders.
Elaine speaks where physiology, mental health, professional practice, and human performance meet—translating complex ideas without sanding off the nuance.
NSAOʻahu + virtual
Oʻahu, virtual, and Hoʻokele Summit · Invited educator
National Security Agency
Nervous System Reset: Real-Time Tools for Stress Recovery and Burnout Prevention · Polyvagal Theory in Practice, a two-hour applied workshop for the Hoʻokele Summit on February 26, 2026
International presenter · Multiple gatherings
Deep Week
Freediving, mental health, regulation, recovery, and trauma-informed instruction.
Invited guest speaker · 2025
DiveXpo Belgium
Nervous-system regulation, recovery, resilience, and Behind the Mask.
Colorado · February 2026 · Researcher
Front Range Freedivers Research Project
Interpreting the Body: Physiological Signal Interpretation and Psychological Safety in Freediving at a First-Time Competition at AltitudeRead the project deliverableFlow States for Problem Solving
TEDx speaker examining how flow can expand attention, flexibility, and problem-solving capacity.
MDR in Trauma Treatment
Presented for the mental-health workshop “Smart Technology Applications and Interventions in Mental Healthcare.”
University of Hawaiʻi SUPD
A sustained body of professional education.
Elaine has taught continuing-education programs through the University of Hawaiʻi Substance Use Professional Development program since 2024, serving substance-use counselors, clinical social workers, supervisors, case managers, and allied professionals.
2024
10 SUPD trainings
Polyvagal theory, recovery, sleep, crisis response, burnout, and body-based regulation
2025
7 SUPD trainings
Workforce burnout, duty to protect, ASI training, trauma, addiction, and clinical interpretation
2026
Current continuing education
Duty to Protect and Complex PTSD for CSAC, LCSW, LSW, and multidisciplinary audiences
Participant evaluations
Not just informative.
Useful.
Selected comments from anonymous University of Hawaiʻi SUPD continuing-education evaluations.
“Keep bringing Hicks back. She is great at presenting complex information.
“The presenter’s depth of research really shone through and provided a rich amount of information.
“Elaine Hicks is amazing. I have really enjoyed all of the trainings she has put together.
“All of it and especially the presenter’s style.
“Presenter was knowledgeable and added different learning styles to absorb information.
“This is the first webinar that provided so much information on both client and clinician protection.
About Elaine
Clinical depth meets real-world application.
Elaine Hicks, LCSW, CSAC, is a therapist, educator, author, research developer, and freediving instructor based on Oʻahu.
Her work sits at the intersection of trauma, recovery, nervous-system regulation, and embodied experience. Elaine is the author of Behind the Mask: A Freediver’s Guide to Nervous System Regulation, Recovery & Resilience and the developer of trauma-informed frameworks for divers, instructors, clinicians, and organizations.
Research-informed Trauma-aware Clinically grounded Human, direct, and practical
Begin here
Let’s identify the right container for the work.
Whether you are seeking individual support, an Oʻahu-based embodied session, a collaborative freediving project, or professional education for your organization, start with the service that best matches your goal.