The life’s work of Dr. Peter Levine, Somatic Experiencing (SE) is a body-based therapy aimed at observing, experiencing and regulating the nervous system. During an SE session, there is discussion around current life stressors and triggers while we also acknowledge that the current state of events exists in the broader context of your lived experience up until this point.
The focus in an SE session is less on discussion and more on body-sensations. For example, when you begin to talk about a recently stressful event, or when you begin to even think about a recently stressful event, what do you notice happens in your body? Does your heart rate increase? Do you notice your shoulders tense? Are you aware of mental or physical fatigue or confusion? Perhaps you feel less and less sensation in your body as you think about current events, like you don’t have a body at all?
Together, we work to observe the trends and tendencies in your nervous system. We carve out time and we create space for your nervous system to complete some if its stress responses. Often it is the case in trauma or highly stressful situations, that there is no time to sufficiently process or to adequately respond to what is happening. With SE, we work to carefully and gently modulate the pace of past event(s) by processing the most bite-sized piece(s) of your physical and emotional experience. Sustainably, slowly and over time, we assist your nervous system in developing greater capacity to bolster your systemic resilience.