Somatic Therapy: Is it for me?
Maybe you’ve tried talk therapy and traditional psychotherapy and you’ve still been struggling.
Somatic Therapy (we use this term interchangeably with ‘Somatic Experiencing’ to mean body, sensation, or physical) is often sought after other approaches didn’t work.
Perhaps talking about the issue has been difficult or maybe even too painful. Or, you are someone who processes stress through your body (or want to get in touch with the mind/body connection), so it makes sense to take another approach to your healing.
Somatic Experiencing was created by Dr. Peter Levine, and is a leading method of healing trauma, dissociation and emotional dysregulation in the mental health industry today.
Departing from traditional talk therapy, Somatic Therapy offers you a cutting edge approach to gently, yet effectively overcome your difficulties.
Somatic therapy helps with:
- Anxiety
- Trauma
- Chronic Stress
- Emotional regulation
- Addiction Issues
- Anger
- Depression
- Grief & Loss
- And more
If traditional talk therapy methods were triggering, Somatic Experiencing was designed for you! Somatic therapy is often used with clients who have a history of trauma, and can help uncover deeply rooted belief patterns, physical pain, and suppressed emotions that can be stored in your body after a traumatic event has occurred.
Somatic Experiencing can also be used even if you don’t a history of trauma, but you are looking to deepen your connection with yourself. It is useful if you are looking to become more aware of dysregulation cues that your body may be trying to communicate.
“This was my first experience with a counsellor and I had a bit of a wrong notion about it… it felt like talking to a friend, a very reasonable and smart friend” ATHENA
“What was most helpful was learning different approaches to engage with my unwanted thoughts, rather than avoid or fear them” – ELLIE
What does a somatic therapy session look like?
Instead of focusing solely on understanding your issues from a cognitive sense (traditional talk therapy), your Somatic therapist will guide you to pay attention to what physical sensations may be arising in your body while thinking about certain issues.
As your therapist assists you in noticing and following these sensations, Somatic Experiencing will allow you to address and heal what’s showing up in a safe and supported way. Your mind/body connection will strengthen, allowing you to identify and process problems more efficiently on your own after therapy is over.
Your somatic therapist may use a variety of physical techniques to help you process and work through these sensations as they arise. As you become more aware of what physical sensations are arising in your body, you will learn tools and strategies for helping yourself process them.
Breathing exercises
Guided visualizations
Gentle movement
Grounding exercises
Other specialized exercizes and tools
The goal of somatic therapy is for you to cultivate a feeling of safety and trust in your body, thereby processing trauma or stuckness with more ease. This will allow you to listen to your body in order to better care for yourself emotionally, mentally and physically.
What is somatic Experiencing / Somatic Therapy?
Somatic therapy is a type of psychotherapy that uses your body as a resource to help explore deeper emotions, sensations, and belief systems that may be more difficult to access using traditional cognitive based approaches. Somatic therapy focuses on how suppressed emotions and traumatic experiences can manifest as physical sensations in your body.
Your somatic therapist will work with you by helping you bring awareness, curiosity, and acceptance to these sensations. Somatic Experiencing also guides you through different somatic practices to help you process and release suppressed emotions and traumatic stress that may be preventing you from moving forward in life.
“She is a very good listener, very well educated and understanding. She is kind and patient which makes the process very enjoyable” – KARY
