333 Grand Avenue #206, Saint Paul, MN 55102
Making "Somatic" Make Sense
"Somatic bodywork? "Somatic therapy?" "Somatic Massage?"
Somatic Bodywork...it's a catch phrase. Somatic therapy...there's another one. But the root word itself, "soma", means "body" in Greek. And that can refer to your physical body, but also the entirety of an organism, or the entirety of a cell. So when you are looking for some kind of therapeutic support for your body, that includes the whole of your Self.
Psychotherapists are becoming more aware of the need to address not only the "psyche", but how our mind relates and interconnects with our bodies. So experienced bodyworkers, like myself, trained in various techniques and systems of listening to and supporting change in the body, are in high demand.
Our culture does not really foster an environment where we get to be in our bodies with a lot of ease. Rather, thinking cognitively is prized, and getting sucked into our devices makes it too easy to disconnect from sensation and movement. Your mind is overloaded - and you know it!
You may even know that you have experienced trauma, and that even though you've "done the work" in therapy, your whole body aches, literally, to release those old responses that don't fit with who you really want to be. So your seeking some sort of way to "release the trauma" from the body...enter: the trauma-informed bodyworker.
Contraction must find expansion, and what expands must contract, with purpose and precision.
Somatic Experiencing...is that Trauma-informed massage?
Not exactly. Trauma-informed massage therapists and craniosacral therapists are practiced in the act of "being with" a body where it's at - meaning that all that a body has been through IS that body. So elements like space, proximity, speed, pressure, even the act of touching become key in someone's understanding of how their body responds in real time to changes in its environment, and in relationship to another's body. And our environment (this world!!) is not one that fosters body-authenticity very successfully, so we have to seek out the way our individual body expresses itself, safely. Our body needs to know that it's safe to activate with purpose and success, or relax when it doesn't need to do anything.
Somatic Experiencing® is a form of somatic therapy that fosters exactly that, especially as a support for PTSD and other traumatic impacts to the nervous system. It works directly with the nervous system and your body. It is practiced by psychotherapists and other mental health practitioners to enhance their support of their clients, but they may not have a background in touch-work. My background as a massage therapist gives me a fine-tuned ability to resonate with your body's needs on a very subtle level, such that my use of touch also has to be subtle and very specific. I used to provide traditional massage therapy, but with more attunement to the body, I became aware that just "moving the muscles around" wasn't really making long-lasting, whole-bodied changes at an integral level. My own journey with Somatic Experiencing and my own release of trauma led me to become a Somatic Experiencing Practitioner so that my ability to support clients could be more subtle, deeper, and more effective. I've seen people's lives change as a result of developing a relationship with their bodies that give them the ability to form a relationship with the world around them that feels easy, safe and expansive.
How the world inside you moves affects how you move through the world.