A wide knowledge base is the first Pillar of Sanctuary. The process of “Creating Sanctuary” begins with getting everyone on the same page – surfacing, sharing, arguing about, and finally agreeing on the basic values, beliefs, guiding principles and philosophical principles that are to guide our decisions, decision-making processes, conflict resolution skills and behavior. There are no shortcuts here. Becoming "trauma-informed" is not just about "training". It is really a process of re-education. 

Trauma-informed change requires a change in the basic mental models upon which thought and action is based and without such change, treatment is bound to fall unnecessarily short of full recovery or fail entirely. This change in mental models must occur on the part of the clients, their families, the staff, and the leaders of the organization. Mental models exist at the level of very basic assumptions, far below conscious awareness and everyday function and yet they guide and determine what we can and cannot think about and act upon.

The Sanctuary Model is structured around a philosophy of belief and practice informed by the scientific study of attachment and child development and the impact of adversity, toxic stress and trauma on individuals and on groups. Attachment between parent and child results in the human operating system, while toxic stress disrupts that operating system. Human beings and human organizations are living systems that adapt to changing conditions in complex ways. From these scientific findings new mental models for how we view human problems is beginning to emerge. 

Because human groups have dynamics that effect individuals within the group but cannot be entirely understood by understanding individuals, we believe that the study of group dynamics and systems theory is vitally important if a system is to become not just "trauma-informed" but also "trauma-responsive". We use the notion of parallel processes as part of the Sanctuary Model to explain what trauma-informed and trauma-responsive systems are all about.

On this website we have divided the knowledge base for the Sanctuary Model into six key domains:

• Knowledge about people
• Knowledge about people under stress
• Knowledge about healing and recovery for people
• Knowledge about groups
• Knowledge about groups under stress
• Knowledge about healing and recovery for groups

These summaries are only a beginning of the emergence of a truly integrated framework for understanding human beings, how we have evolved, how to understand the problems we present for ourselves and the planet we live upon, and pointed to potential solutions. We are always a "work-in-progress".