Somatic Experience is a therapy studied and developed almost 40 years ago by the American Peter Levine, trained in medical biophysics and psychology.
It is a body-oriented therapy, based on neurophysiological studies carried out on the body-brain-mind interconnection, based on the most recent knowledge in neuroscience.
This revolutionary method is based on the principle that all human beings have the innate ability to overcome and heal the symptoms of post-traumatic (chronic) stress and other symptoms related to trauma and illness, if given proper support.
The individual returns to a greater ability to function, as well as a higher level of health and well-being, which makes Somatic Experience a highly effective therapy in the treatment of trauma.
Rute Maló
In a Somatic Experience session, it is the body that tells the story. We dispense with everything that thought has already elaborated! That recapped front to back and back to front. We ignore the thoughts that rush in, ruminating, that add nothing but guilt, suffering, and weariness.
What this somatic approach invites is to be in touch with what the body brings to each session and listen to the story that the body wants to tell us!
Supported by a therapeutic relationship and “empowered” by the resources it has discovered in itself, the body feels safe to revisit places of pain!
Emotions can arise that finally had space to be felt, motor responses that could be completed, fragments of images that were lost in the midst of such strong emotions!
It's a little bit of us that is rescued! We left more whole at the end of each session and therefore stronger!
Therapy teaches us to get in touch with emotion without letting ourselves be swamped by it!
We can get in touch with sadness, without being sadness! With anger, with fear..
“Getting in touch” contains this possibility of observation by the individual himself, of something that happens in him. It is as if we establish a “connection” between us and the emotion, with the possibility of modulating the intensity of what is being felt.
The therapist's role is to facilitate this modulation of intensity of everything that is being experienced, teaching the system to go to its points of support, whenever necessary, thus being able to self-regulate.
The therapist himself is a point of support. It is in this relationship with the other that the possibility of accessing memories opens, which otherwise would not be possible.
It is thus within the reach of the individual to reach a place of fragility and vulnerability, but without fear, without feeling threatened.
It is in these corners of our Being that we keep what hurts us the most and that often prevents us from moving on with our life.
Being able to revisit these places, giving them a new meaning, represents for the individual a new opportunity to start over.
These registers are lived in the body, through them, the individual rescues the impulses of escape and fights with those that were frozen.
As these responses are completed, the paralysis left in the system dissipates and the individual returns not only to an ability to function, but to a higher level of health and well being.
It is an invitation for a dialogue with our body, our sensations, our resources and possibilities.
Rute Maló
All of us at some point in our lives, had to deal with an impactful situation! Something that proves to be bigger than us! Bigger than what our physical, psychic and emotional structure was prepared to receive. But apart from that, life goes on, with demands, with expectations of others in relation to us and ours in relation to ourselves.
In these moments you have to "hold"!
Where on my body do I hold on to something shocking? Where do I tension? What structures in my body do I contract to support the load of something that came unexpectedly, quickly or intensely?
Como é que eu me relaciono com o mundo, quando preciso de segurar todas as emoções, que não puderam ser sentidas? Como é que eu carrego isso na minha linguagem corporal?
Through the combination of several techniques, within a somatic approach, it is possible to build a sense of territory in the body, which allows a new construction of the body schema, which affects the way I allow myself to relate to others and to the world.
Rute Maló
Rescue of the body's wisdom
We were educated not to feel!
All of us as children hear things like: “don’t cry”, “it’s over”, “that was nothing”, “big girls don’t cry!” and the boys even less, because “crying is for girls”!?
Reflecting on these expressions, which are part of the collective consciousness of all of us, we can easily see how the “not feeling” was reinforced as we grew up.
A belief that was nurtured between the lines, confirmed by attitudes and supported whenever the child sees the disapproval of the parents, when he behaves in a more emotional way.
We grew up without learning to deal with emotions. Ours and others! We are experts at suppressing them, thus allowing them to express themselves at a deeper level of our Being!
I would venture to say that there is an embarrassment in witnessing another's suffering. Hence such exploitation is discouraged. But the body always finds a way to be heard!
How can we get in touch with emotions without it being threatening?
Why can emotional pain manifest in the form of physical pain?
The greatest battles are fought within each of us! There are pains that come from a silence screamed by the body, which, in the absence of a voice, expresses itself in the way it can.
Because every memory is engraved in every muscle, in every joint, in every cell, in every viscera. It's all there...
Rute Maló
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