What is Body-centered Therapy?           

In my practice I use a variety of body-oriented therapeutic techniques, key among them are Core Energetics and Bio-Energetics. I also use Sensorimotor psychotherapy for the treatment of trauma. 

Core Energetics is a body-oriented technique for therapy and personal growth. Core Energetics was developped in the 1970s and 1980s by John Pierrakos (a student of Wilhelm Reich and co-founder with Alexander Lowen of Bio-Energetics) and Eva Pierrakos (founder of The Pathwork)..

As children we made trade offs. We cut off or denied certain of our own feelings - like hatred or love, anger or spite, excitement or fear- becuse we feared these would get us into trouble: we felt that we would not get the protection, care, love or support we needed if we expressed ourselves fully. We chose to cut off our feelings, to limit our being, in order to  preserve our relationshipn with the ones we depended on. For a child, this is an understandable strategy. But as adults, such trade-offs are no longer necessary. And yet each one of us often continues to inhibit our feelings, to hide from ourselves and from others who we are, what we want and feel. we then miss out on the intense pleasures and joys adult life might bring us if we only dared to be more authentic...

Core Energetics re-establishes your connection to yourself, allows you to feel again for yourself what you really want and need. You learn to recognize how you have been using your life energy against yourself: to block and defend yourself against your own feelings. You learn to let your energy work for you rather than against you, restoring a vitality, a joy and a creativity you might not have known since childhood. You learn to take responsibility for who you are and live with hope and passion.

What to expect ?

Every person's path to growth is different. And yet each of us must -at some point- deal with similar tasks. Core Energetics offers a specific description of the common tasks we encounter in personal growth. A client might come for guidance in all these tasks- or for support in dealing with only one or two of the tasks. The number of sessions required can therefore vary greatly.

Tasks of personal growth:

• to gain compassionate awareness of your childhood wounds, by investigating memories of the past and mindfully observing the corresponding sensations and blocks in your body;
• to become conscious of how these past experiences continue to influence present experiences and behavior;
• to learn how to distinguish the different feelings and impulses arising in you: which of these bring you consistently back to the past, to your old inhibitions, to your disconnection from yourself and from others; to identify and nurture those impulses that carry you forward, that open you up to a connection with yourself and with others in the here and now. 
• Core energetics encourages you to center in this place of mindful observation, compassionate awareness, grounded presence and openness to growth, in your 'Core'. For some clients, this is the spiritual dimension of their psychological journey. In practice, this means that the Core therapist establishes a relationship with the Core of the client, the part of the client which is intact, healthy and life-embracing; unlike most currents of psychology, the Core therapist does not focus on whatever might be 'wrong' or 'pathological' about the client. The quality of the relationship between client and therapist is a central focus of Core therapy.

How is Core Energetics 'body-oriented'?

I like to work with the client using relaxation techniques,breathing techniques, dynamic or sitting meditations, yoga, mindfulness, dance, shaking, qi gong, stretching, massage, wrestling, boxing, kicking or hitting pillows with wooden swords, batakas or sticks, sitting or lying down quietly...

Why are physical activities important for personal growth?

We inhibit ourselves by blocking our energy and our emotions in parts of our body. When the body is limp or tense, our energy is still and we stay in old patterns. By learning how to move the energy in our bodies, we become aware of how we are holding ourselves and our emotions back. With body movements, we learn to free our emotions and ourselves. When we losen our local blocks, our experience of ourselves changes and we become capable of living our lives differently. To change and grow, we need to move.

I use body techniques because I do not believe that psychological insight alone is enough to occasion significant change in the client. It is not enough to know why we act in certain ways, and not enough to talk about our experiences. By working with the body, we work with the deeply engrained ways in which we - our bodies too- enact old patterns. We learn to mindfully observe how our bodies - our posture, for example- affects our moods and predisposes us to repeat endlessly the same negative patterns. In body-oriented sessions, we see how a slight change of posture, or a breathing exercise or the right movement, can bring to us totally new experiences: when we extend our spine, open up our breathing and learn to contain more energy in our bodies, for example, we can let go of our old negative images of ourselves and gain a new experience of our own personal power. Working mindfully with the body -with breath, sensory experience and movement- is the key to personal development, to transformation.

In a body-oriented therapy sessions, just as in a 'talking' psychotherapy session, the client talks and has insights. A client talks when he or she tracks and explores his or her physical sensations, when mindfully describing the feelings that arise during an exercise. But talk is not the goal of the session. The goal of the session is to allow the client to become aware of the enduring (sensory, emotional, behavioral, cognitive) patterns engrained in her body, posture, movements and to allow the client to break through these patterns and learn new ones. Because the body is where our patterns are programmed into, because the body is also the place where new experiences emerge - the sessions give priority to the body and to what happens in the body. 

Is this body-oriented approach for you?

Core Energetics is a technique for therapy and personal growth. In particular it is useful for people who want :

• To create meaningful relationships. Core brings us awareness of how our early relationships (parents, siblings,...) can continue to influence how we relate to others today. Individual sessions, a workshop or an ongoing process group can be opportunities for individuals to investigate their issues with relationship and attachment.(Loneliness, conflict, attraction, insecurity...).
• To develop their capacity for love, intimacy and pleasure. Our capacity to love and enjoy life (including our own sexuality) is influenced by how as children our environment reacted to our spontaneous expressions of need, love and excitement. Core Energetics offers a safe place to investigate issues about relationship, vulnerability, intimacy, sexuality. Couple sessions are also available.
• To alleviate chronic tensions, pain or fatigue. This psychological approach is particularly useful for people who experience pain and limitations in their body. With this approach, the body will no longer be just a source of pain and of negative emotions. The body becomes a resource for pleasure and for psychological flexibility and resilience. Core is also useful for dealing with burn out and depression.
• To deal with trauma. Core Energetics - complemented by techniques drawn from Sensorimotor psychotherapy, specifically developped for trauma- allows the body to speak in its own voice, at its own tempo and can offer a safe place to support people dealing with the impact of a trauma.