What Is Body-Oriented Therapy and What Is Somatic Psychotherapy?
Have you ever wondered how body-oriented therapy is different from other therapy modalities? Today I’d like to provide some clarity around what I do in my practice, a form of somatic psychotherapy, and how that is similar and different from other somatic and therapeutic, mind/body work.
Spring boarding off a dance degree and a foundation of psychology classes, I continued my training as a dance/movement therapist in graduate school and went on to earn board certification in this discipline.
What Is Dance/Movement Therapy (DMT)?
DMT is a form of psychotherapy. The current definition from the American Dance Therapy Association is “the psychotherapeutic use of movement to promote emotional, social, cognitive and physical integration of the individual.”
I consider dance/movement therapy (DMT) to fall under a few categories of labels: body-oriented therapy, somatic therapy, and also creative arts or expressive arts therapy. In the psychotherapy/expressive arts therapy realm, dance/movement therapists are related to music and art therapists.
Body-Oriented Psychotherapy and Related Modalities
Outside the creative and expressive arts therapies, we have other psychotherapies that are body-focused: Somatic Experiencing, Hacomie, Sensorimotor; and I include EMDR as a cousin in this family.
MindBody Practices That Complement Body Oriented Therapy
Then we have many buckets of mind-body practices including yoga, qigong, breathwork, and Authentic Movement.
Yoga is an example of a practice that can float through many different categories depending on the intention of the work and who is leading it. Yoga therapy can be therapeutic, and yoga therapists are usually trauma informed, but depending on the leader/therapist, it may or may not directly be yoga psychotherapy work.
Additionally, there are somatic practices that are therapeutic but not psychotherapy. Examples are reiki, Rolfing Structural Integration, Alexander Technique, the Feldenkrais Method, etc.
Why Licensing Matters in Somatic Therapy
If you are looking for somatic work that includes the element of mental health therapy, look for a practitioner who is a licensed mental health counselor, social worker, Psy.D (doctorate in psychology) or Psychologist.
In my case, I am a masters level, Licensed Mental Health Counselor in the state of Massachusetts. This means I have training in mental health care specifically. I have the added benefit of doing the bulk of my training in an embodied, creative arts format, which means that the somatic work is not just an add-on but fully integrated into my mental health sessions.
Is Body-Oriented Therapy Right for You?
Does this sound like an approach you’d like to try to reconnect with your body as a way to process trauma, connect with your joy and purpose?
To start therapy with me using these somatic, body-oriented techniques to address anxiety, stress, depression and overwhelm, contact me for a free 15 minute phone consultation.
I am currently accepting new clients online and in person in my Be Moved Therapy practice in Boston, Massachusetts serving women from Boston, West Roxbury, Roslindale, Jamaica Plain, Newton, Chestnut Hill, Needham, Westwood, Norwood, Watertown, Brookline, Wellesley, and beyond.