What happens in a Somatic therapy session?
This is a big question for people when they are maybe considering Somatic Therapy as an alternative to more traditional or clinical therapy. Quite often there is an assumption that somatic therapy is movement based or doesn’t involve talking and that can be true but it’s actually so much more than that. And in this article I am going to go a bit more in depth around what can happen within a Somatic Therapy session when working with me specifically but this will also apply to other therapists.
Language as the portal to relationship.
The main thing with somatic therapy is that it’s relational. Our bodies do not exist in isolation, we are a part of a wider community and ecosystem and our ancient, intelligent bodies are hardwired for connection. The separation from that belonging is the original wound for most of us (especially in the west) so the relationship in this form of therapy (and arguably all forms of therapy) is the most important part of anyone’s process.
And for most of us we build relationships through language.
The idea that talking isn’t somatic is incorrect.
Have you ever had the experience of being deeply listened to?
Have you ever felt another human body being fully present & attuned with your vulnerability?
If you have, can you remember what that felt like? How healing it was to be deeply witnessed and heard?
Being witnessed fully is one of the most healing experiences for a lot of people. I have also experienced this myself, firsthand both with a therapist and in group spaces.
Being listened to properly without someone trying to fix you or give solutions out of their own discomfort can create the space for the fullness of the grief & rage we have been keeping locked away to come forward and be moved through.
So you see words, language, talking, sharing, stories etc are powerful and deeply somatic.
This means that sessions will always have an element of talking alongside making space for the big things to be felt.
Somatic practice as invitation and resource.
Depending on how you arrive in a session, we will typically begin with some sort of somatic practice.
We will arrive on the call and say hello and I will check in to see if you would like to begin with practice or if you maybe need to share first. It’s always your choice and every single one of my clients are different. As our relationship and your awareness deepens, I will quite often ask you what you might find supportive to arrive together.
Somatic practice might look like a moment to connect to our breath, explore tension in our bodies, engaging active imagination, shaking, self massage, stretching, maybe some TRE exercises… the list is endless. I am trained in several modalities for movement and most through the lens of Body Mind Centring and embodied anatomy.
When we have a little practice at the beginning of a session, this can act as an invitation as well as a landing. Your body might make something known that we can explore like grief, rage or stories and memories. It’s also where our bodies can attune to one another.
Somatic practice is also an important resource during sessions. It’s for when we maybe come into contact with difficult material and emotions or when we experience a collapse during a session. We don’t want to shy away from the depth of this process but it is important that we support you in building the capacity to meet it. This requires pendulation and titration and this can be cultivated through practice.
Pendulation is where we gently oscillate between our different states. That might look like connecting with our anger and then using shaking for example to help you come back to a more relaxed state, then we might meet the anger again. Titration is meeting everything in small manageable chunks so we don’t overwhelm and re-traumatise ourselves. Both of these in practice creates more softening and resilience without bypassing the difficult stuff. These are the banks of the river to support you in being able to FEEL because what we can feel we can heal.
Our use of somatic practice in sessions is also the foundation for you to start integrating daily practice to tend and resource.
BTW I am big on dance as a portal to healing so you can expect some playlists I have put together to support this.
This is not one sided.
So many of my clients book me because of my lived experience. I have walked and I am still walking the paths of trauma healing, Autism, abuse survival and chronic illness. I also exist in a Queer and Non-Binary body. I am also human and navigating the same collective grief that’s alive for all of us. Our sessions are not a clinical space. This is human meeting human which means my lived experience is a potential resource that can support my clients.
Let’s be clear, this is always done from a place of deep care and attunement to my clients needs. And always consensual. If I think it might be helpful I will ask first before sharing.
And quite often my clients ask me about my own experiences. This can be really supportive because suddenly a struggle that has been keeping someone isolated or stuck in shame is shared. Suddenly we don’t feel so alone or that there is something wrong with us because someone else has also experienced this.
Somatic therapy is not a linear process.
And therefore should not be measured that way.
We want to view this as a spiral which means that we honour that the body is not on capitalistic linear time. Sometimes sessions will be going over old material and then the next week it might be something more present day. And then weeks later we will return to the older material.
Sessions will quite often begin with the inquiry of ‘What is alive for you today?’
Some sessions we will be diving deep into the depths of grief, while others might be more surface and I might teach some pretty amazing things about your body & nervous system.
The other thing to note is that therapy is not just about the pain. It’s also about celebration, creativity and can be really really enjoyable.
I laugh a lot with my clients.
And yes, there might be processing.
Processing is deeply helpful when we have capacity for it. When we don’t it can re-traumatise us. This is why it’s not something I offer people straightaway.
We need to build the banks first.
I mostly use parts work as a framework for processing, often blended with somatic processing & active imagination. I have found processing to be a deeply creative process and incredibly empowering and these modalities I have found give people the most agency in their process. And this is important because quite often it was our sense of powerlessness in the first place that contributed to the trauma.
And what is important to name is processing doesn’t equal healing.
No one’s healing will happen with one big ‘trauma release’. This is a lie.
Healing happens slowly, over time, quite often we don’t even notice it happening.
The body quietly & gently re-orientates itself as it starts to feel safer, wider and more capable of feeling.
This is where real change happens.
So there you have it, a small insight into what happens when we work together. Of course, this is not a fixed thing.
We can’t forget about the mystery and the playfulness that arises in therapeutic spaces because it’s ultimately about connection and every single person I meet brings their own magic & soul to the journey we take together.
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