A mind to body approach to Somatic Psychotherapy

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Firstly, for these exercises you do not need any experience at meditation or you may also have really struggled with meditation in the past too but don't worry this won't hinder you with the exercises, or your progress within the therapy.

Often with trauma in the body it can become very uncomfortable and cause sensations that can come out in a rather uncontrolled way.

When this happens it is about slowly and carefully starting to explore what's happening within the body and trying to gently and safely connect to these aspects so that some comfort can be found. Establishing a level of comfort and safety within the body means that we also have a good place to return to when working on some of the less comfortable aspects.

These aspects of the practice can then be used once you are ready and at a slow pace to start to explore what's going on whilst  gently beginning to notice sensations so that we can deal with and process them. Meaning that over time the sensations are either reduced or dispersed,  often with it naturally transforming. 

There are many exercises that can be utilised to achieve this, often using things like active imagination and creative imagery which allows the subconscious to turn the sensations into something you can start to understand or bring together to the conscious mind, in a similar way that dreams are believed to be fragments of memories and experiences that are processed by the subconscious and viewed by the conscious mind. However, unlike with dreams you will be in full control and I will be there to help support and guide you or we can take a break as needed. 

Alongside this, there are also more active practices that we can explore that use those sensations/memories/emotions not just by viewing them but by having 2 way interactions to help them to transform and pass. In this way by utilising the stored up emotional energy within the muscles and nerves that hold it, this can then help to start to disperse the build up which can allow the sensations to reduce.

There are many different types of practices like this we can bring into the session so it's about finding the right one that works for you. Some of them stem from studies of Buddhism and Daoism practices, others use a more systematic based approach like “parts work.” so we can explore different approaches to see what works and what doesn’t in order to find the most suitable approach.