Somatic Experiencing in Boise, Idaho
Listening to What the Body Knows
Trauma and stress are not experienced only through our thoughts. They can also appear in the ways we breathe, brace, withdraw, become restless, shut down, or lose contact with ourselves. Sometimes we understand perfectly well why we feel or behave a certain way, yet insight alone does not seem to change the pattern.
What Is Somatic Experiencing?
Somatic Experiencing, or SE, is a body-oriented approach to working with trauma, stress, and the ways difficult experiences continue to affect us.
Somatic work does not require repeatedly reliving traumatic experiences. Instead, we often begin with what is happening now. As you talk about something, we might notice a tightening in the chest, a change in breathing, an impulse to turn away, a feeling of collapse, or perhaps an unexpected sensation of strength or relief.
We approach these experiences gradually and with curiosity. Sometimes seemingly small changes—a fuller breath, an impulse to move, the feeling of one’s feet on the ground, the ability to say no, or a moment of feeling more present—can begin to open possibilities where previously there seemed to be none.
The Body Is Not the Problem
Many of the responses we call symptoms began as attempts to protect us. Fight, flight, freezing, shutting down, becoming hypervigilant, or disconnecting from what we feel can all make sense in circumstances where there were few other choices.
The difficulty comes when these responses continue long after the circumstances that called for them have changed. The nervous system may respond to the present as though something from the past were still happening.
Somatic Experiencing approaches these patterns with respect rather than trying to force them away. We become curious about what the body has learned to do, what it may still be protecting against, and what new possibilities become available as greater safety, choice, and capacity develop.
My Experience with Somatic Experiencing
I began studying Somatic Experiencing and receiving personal SE sessions in 2008, and became a Somatic Experiencing Practitioner (SEP) in 2010. Since then, somatic work has remained a central part of my clinical practice.
My training has included workshops with Peter Levine, the founder of Somatic Experiencing, including the opportunity to work with him personally in two sessions. Those experiences contributed to my understanding of SE not simply as a set of techniques, but as a way of listening closely to the body and following what emerges in the therapeutic relationship.
Over the years, I have integrated SE with other approaches, particularly NARM and Jungian-oriented psychotherapy. Depending upon the person and what arises in a session, our work may move between bodily experience, emotion, relationship, dreams, images, and story.
Who Might Benefit from Somatic Experiencing?
Somatic Experiencing can be helpful for people who find that insight alone has not fully changed patterns that they understand intellectually. You may know why you become anxious, withdraw, shut down, become overwhelmed, or react strongly in certain situations, yet still find that your body responds before you have much choice.
I often work with people experiencing the effects of trauma, chronic stress, difficult early relationships, anxiety, emotional disconnection, or longstanding patterns of self-protection. Somatic work can also be useful for people who simply want to develop a deeper relationship with their own bodily experience, emotions, intuition, and sense of agency.
You do not need to arrive knowing how to “work somatically.” We begin with your experience as it is and pay attention together to what becomes meaningful.
Somatic Experiencing in Eagle and the Boise Area
I offer in-person psychotherapy in Eagle, serving the greater Boise area, as well as telehealth psychotherapy for clients throughout Idaho.
Somatic Experiencing may be used on its own or integrated with NARM, Jungian-oriented psychotherapy, dream work, and other approaches depending upon your interests and what emerges in our work together.
If you are interested in exploring whether this approach might be a good fit for you, you are welcome to contact me.