Somatic Psychotherapy

Somatic psychotherapy brings awareness to our inner world.

It brings your felt sense of your body into therapy. We often talk about feeling happy, sad, angry, or anxious, but we rarely are taught to cultivate awareness of how these feelings show up and actually feel in our bodies.

In somatic psychotherapy, we bring mindful attention to the experiences living inside of us physically. A felt sense connects us to what is happening inside – to our emotions and our needs – and naturally guides us to a deeper understanding of ourselves when we listen to it.

Through the practice of being present with our bodily (somatic) experience, we tune into the physical sensation of experience. We feel into an understanding of what is present and what that emotion, sensation, or impulse is communicating to us. Practicing this kind of presence starts to help us understand the automatic reactions we have to things.

Do you ever wonder, “Why do I keep doing that?”… or find yourself thinking and dwelling on the same thoughts or experiences over and over?

When we tap into the thoughts and feelings behind these behaviors, we start connecting with the core of our experience. And when we tune in to what we’re feeling in our bodies, we gain perspective. We deepen our understanding and start to see our actions, feelings, and thoughts in a new, more connected way.

The result? Unconscious reactions become more conscious. And instead of getting lost in the fight-flight-freeze responses associated with fear, we can experience our feelings without being taken over by them.

The power of the mind-body connection…

When we do somatic psychotherapy, all parts of your experience are welcome. We’ll give mindful, compassionate attention to them that will give you a deeper, fuller, freer relationship with yourself.

As we talk, we start to get in touch with what’s challenging for you, how it impacts how you see yourself, and what may be missing for you that you need to move through it successfully. We’ll spend time turning inward, just noticing at first the feelings that arise inside, becoming aware of how those are experienced in your body. We practice allowing those sensations and feelings to just be there without turning away through judgment, avoidance, or fear.

We help you access supports and resources that enable you to do this without getting overwhelmed or overtaken by anything that might feel like too much. We do this by taking time, breathing in, and making contact with the felt sense in your body and what is needed to feel more grounded and anchored in yourself.

Austin* came to therapy feeling overwhelmed and anxious.

He’d been struggling for some time – balancing the stresses of work, the needs for his marriage, and the demands of being a new parent.

As we talked, we started noticing themes, patterns of response, and thinking that he tended to approach most situations with. We spent time with the feelings of stress and anxiety that accompanied these and helped him get in touch with a natural tendency to dismiss his own needs and focus on others.

By attending to what he was feeling in his body, it became clear to him that he wasn’t listening to himself. His feelings of anxiety were actually connected to him feeling isolated, burdened with a sense of responsibility for making everyone else happy.

By slowing down and feeling what was present for him, he started to see his automatic responses more clearly, and he made connections with where these came from. He connected with memories from childhood, about how his parents were so engrossed with taking care of his siblings with special needs that he ended up feeling like his own needs weren’t important.

He started to realize and understand his sense of worth, gaining the perspective that it wasn’t that he wasn’t worth it, but that his parents were doing the best they could within the limitations there when growing up. It wasn’t about him. It’s just the way it was.

By the end, Austin reported that he felt more deeply in touch with himself. He could listen to his body and understand his feelings and what they told him about what he needed in any given situation. He also expressed feeling more understanding toward himself and others in his life, as he wasn’t holding the judgments, fears, and stress that led him to feel irritable and uneasy. He felt more at ease, less burdened, could ask for what he needed, and felt connected to a sense of worth within himself that gave him a deep and lasting peace of mind.