about Somatic Experiencing®
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Somatic Experiencing® (SE™)
A naturalistic, and neurobiological, body-oriented approach to healing trauma and other stress-related disorders; restoring the authentic self with self-regulation, relaxation, wholeness, and aliveness.
“Trauma is a fact of life. It does not have to be a life sentence. ”
SE™
is support
The SE™ Approach
The Somatic Experiencing® method is a body-oriented approach to healing trauma and other stress disorders. It is the life’s work of Peter A. Levine, PhD, resulting from his multidisciplinary study of stress physiology, ethology, biology, neuroscience, psychology, and indigenous healing practices, together with over 50 years of successful clinical application. The SE™ approach releases traumatic shock and restores connection, which is key to transforming PTSD and the wounds of emotional and early developmental attachment trauma. It offers a framework to assess where a person is “stuck” in the fight, flight or freeze responses and provides clinical tools to resolve these fixated physiological states.
Somatic Experiencing® (SE™) training programs are designed to be accessible to Psychologists, Psychotherapists, Psychoanalysts, Psychiatrists, Social Workers, Counselors, Addiction Treatment Specialists, Body Workers, Osteopaths, Occupational Therapists, Physical Therapists, Medical Doctors, Nurses, Acupuncturists, Dentists, Yoga Teachers, Meditation Teachers, Art Therapists, Equine Therapists, Life Coaches, First Responders, Corrections Officers, Educators, Clergy, Spiritual Advisors, and support providers for children and those with special needs.
The Science
Trauma may begin as acute stress from a perceived life-threat or as the end product of cumulative stress. Both types of stress can seriously impair a person’s ability to function with resilience and ease, and live in the here-and-now. Trauma may result from a wide variety of stressors such as accidents, invasive medical procedures, sexual or physical assault, emotional abuse, neglect, war, racial discrimination, oppression, natural disasters, loss, birth trauma, or the corrosive stressors of ongoing fear, conflict, and chronic shaming.
“You don’t have to know the facts of your story to be able to reprogram the symptoms or the outcomes.”
The Science
OF SE™
How it Works
Human beings have an innate ability to overcome the effects of diverse traumas. The SE™ approach facilitates the completion of self-protective motoric responses and the release of thwarted survival energy bound in the body and nervous system, thus addressing the root cause of trauma symptoms. This is approached by gently guiding clients to develop increasing tolerance for difficult bodily sensations and suppressed emotions, building their capacity for containment and resilience.
Nature's Lesson
Beginning in the 1970’s, Peter’s explorations into how animals deal with threat led to the development of the Somatic Experiencing® method (SE™), a method that is highly effective in dealing with the effects of overwhelm on our nervous system. SE™ is a clinical methodology based upon an appreciation of why animals in the wild are not traumatized by routine threats to their lives, while humans, on the other hand, are readily overwhelmed and often subject to long-lasting traumatic symptoms of hyperarousal, shutdown, and dysregulation.
How Animals Discharge Shock
Dr. Levine was inspired to study stress on the nervous system when he realized that animals in the wild are constantly under threat of death from predation, yet rarely show symptoms of trauma. He discovered that deep trauma has to do with the third survival response to perceived life threat, which is freeze and collapse. When fight and flight are not options, both animals in the wild and humans freeze and immobilize, like “playing dead.” This makes them less of a target. The freeze and collapse response is time-limited; in other words, it needs to run its course and allow the massive energy that was prepared for fight or flight to discharge through spontaneous gentle inner shaking and trembling. If the immobility phase does not complete, then that charge stays trapped, and, from the body’s perspective, is still under threat and often continues to perceive the world from that perspective. Somatic Experiencing® works to release this stored energy and turn off this threat alarm that causes dysregulation and dissociation.
Wild Animals
DISCHARGE SHOCK
Don't Re-live, Renegotiate
Dr. Levine believes that the traumatic event isn’t what causes long-lasting trauma, it is the overwhelming trapped response to the perceived life-threat that is causing an imbalanced nervous system. Somatic Experiencing’s aim is to help one access the body memory (procedural memory) of the event, not the story. It is not necessary to share the details of your trauma history to do SE™. The objective is to diffuse the power of the narrative and remap the body memory to regain aliveness and flow.
Take your Time
Titration is the slow release of compressed survival energy. Somatic Experiencing® operates in cycles, where you sense your way through the normal oscillations of internal sensation – contraction/expansion, pleasure/pain, warmth/cold – but only at the level that you can handle without becoming overwhelmed. This repeated, rhythmic process helps you to develop a greater capacity to handle stress and stay in the present moment, where you belong.
“Taking time is very important—as body time is much slower than cognitive time or emotional time.”
Bottom Up Processing
Like other somatic psychology approaches, Somatic Experiencing® is a body first approach to dealing with the problematic (and oftentimes physical) symptoms of trauma. It helps individuals create new experiences in their bodies; ones that contradict those of tension and overwhelming helplessness. This means that healing isn’t about reclaiming memories or changing our thoughts and beliefs about how we feel, it’s about exploring the sensations that lie underneath our feelings and beliefs, as well as our habitual behavior patterns.
Pendulation
Pendulation is a term coined by Dr. Levine to describe the natural oscillation between opposing forces of contraction and expansion. Somatic Experiencing® utilizes this philosophy to help a client experience a sense of flow.
Here is a video of Dr. Levine showing an example of pendulation using a Hoberman’s Sphere.
SE™ is Bottom Up
A THERAPEUTIC PROCESSING APPROACH THAT DIFFERS FROM THE MORE TRADITIONAL TOP DOWN.
“When a person is exposed to overwhelming stress, threat or injury, they develop a procedural memory. Trauma occurs when these implicit procedures are not neutralized. The failure to restore homeostasis is at the basis for the maladaptive and debilitating symptoms of trauma.”
How SE Began
The imaginary image of the tiger was invoked by Peter A. Levine, PhD in 1969 during a session with a young woman named Nancy, who suffered from an array of physical and anxiety symptoms, in an event that would define and shape his career.
Without warning, Nancy suddenly froze, her pulse skyrocketing and then abruptly plummeting as she began revisiting the moments of a traumatic childhood surgery, including being bound and anesthetized with ether. “I’m going to die! Please don’t let me die!” she repeated, helplessly. Amidst this chaos, Dr. Levine was compelled, by a seemingly prescient vision of a charging tiger, to say: "Nancy, you're being chased by a tiger. Run! Run and climb those rocks to safety!" It was at this moment, as Nancy began moving her legs, that Dr. Levine first witnessed the human animal’s innate ability to heal from shock and terror, by completing the instinctual, self-protective act that had been overwhelmed and frozen into her body and nervous system, over 20 years earlier. On repeated follow up, this single session had a dramatic impact on Nancy's life, including the dissolution of her panic attacks, agoraphobia, cessation of her migraines, and a renewed, sustained vigor in living.
The Tiger awakened has become a symbol of our aliveness and our innate nature.
“Animals do not view freezing as a sign of inadequacy or weakness, nor should we.”
— Peter A Levine, PhD
The Roots of SE™
In my current book, “An Autobiography of Trauma,” in progress, I speak of the deepest taproots that have informed my work as well as my personal development. Here are various segments of my notes from the ongoing manuscript:
“People have sometimes described me as an almost mystical, shamanic healer. While I have been gratefully influenced by cross-cultural studies about shamanic healing and had opportunities to meet with various shamans and indigenous healers throughout the world, it still has been my lifetime task to prove this assumption wrong. Said in another way, for many years I desired to demonstrate that the methods I was developing were transferable in western secular society. Now that SE is widely accepted as a scientifically based approach, I feel freer to acknowledge its deep roots in shamanistic traditions.”
I am also less shy to talk about Life Energy or Elan Vital. For these I am grateful to the work of Wilhelm Reich.
Carl G. Jung defined the Self this way: “The Self, he said, is “the purposiveness of the organism, the teleological intention of becoming itself as fully as it can.” I would add that …. this drive is to reconnect to our authentically born familiar Self.
In Psychological Types, Jung wrote that: “all experiences are represented which have happened on this planet since primeval times. The more frequent, and the more intense they were, the more clearly focused they become in the archetype.”
“I continued to emulate the great ethologists I had come to admire so deeply; particularly, Nikolas Tinbergen who shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology. From 1974—1978, I corresponded with Tinbergen (then at Oxford University), by “snail mail” and by phone via the new transcontinental underwater cables. This precious communication cost me much of my monthly graduate student stipend (this was long before there was the internet). I was struggling with the doubt that I might just be “imagining” my observations and their meanings in health, stress, and dis-ease. With Tinbergen’s generous support and encouragement, I continued to explore my observations, vision, and theoretical conclusions; this despite my many apprehensions and insecurities. I thank you, Professor Tinbergen, beyond measure.“*
“Hans Selye (the originator of the physiological concept of Stress) had the grace and humility to correspond with me, even though I argued against much of his basic theory, at least with regards to the capacity for resilience as an antidote to the wear and tear of stress.”*
“I once spoke with a Tibetan Lama, about whether the work that I had been developing (in the 1970’s), might have some correspondence with Tibetan Buddhist traditions. The Lama listened attentively, poured another cup of tea for the two of us, and nodded gently. When he finally spoke, he said something like, “what you described has much correspondence with the Kum Nye tradition in Tibetan Buddhism.” He went on to explain that the principles that I had outlined to him were more universal than one single tradition and had evolved from many healing traditions throughout the world, and over the ages.” He added this one last thought: that this enduring wisdom probably originally derived from Celtic stone age religions.”
More to come…
SE™ Practitioners
Somatic Experiencing Practitioners (SEP) are devoted to bottom-up somatic-based processing as they begin their client’s healing journey. They have backgrounds in a variety of different modalities/psychotherapies so you can find one that specializes in other treatments of interest, like CBT, Psychiatry, Craniosacral, Bodywork, or Equine Therapy to name a few. SEPs who’ve taken our training, integrate SE work into their other practices to create a well-rounded healing experience. To take the training you must be approved by presenting what other healing modalities you use in your practice.
Remember, no two SE Practitioners are the same and our nervous systems are not all the same. We recommend that you experience a few and see who you resonate with the best. You can find a database of practitioners by clicking here. If you can’t find one in your area you can also search online using keywords: SEP, SE Practitioner, Somatic Experiencing Practitioner.
Do SE Practitioners practice online or offer sliding-scale services?
Yes many do, and in the age of Covid-19 most do. In the SEP, database you can do a customized search using keywords online or sliding-scale.
"I have patients who are off all of their medications…who no longer suffer from panic attacks…who are no longer haunted by traumatic visions. I am trained in other techniques…SE is the only method I have found that consistently helps people reorganize their nervous system and greatly reduce, if not completely erase, their trauma symptoms. Although I understand that the SE techniques are grounded in biology, the results are nothing short of miraculous."
- Shirley Impellizzeri, PhD, Psychologist, SEP, Author, Talk show host, SEP
"As a healer, it has always been essential for me to be the change I want to see in others. The practice of SE has allowed me to heal emotional and physical traumas that I'd thought were untouchable. It allows me to be available for the same kinds of miraculous shifts within myself as those I witness in my clients."
- SE Professional Training Graduate, LMFT
"From my first encounter with Somatic Experiencing, my life's journey shifted profoundly. Not only did I undergo deep healing, but I also became rejoined with my body to truly experience life to its fullest. Somatic Experiencing has opened a new world where science, the psyche, and spiritual growth come together. Though I came to this wonderful work later in life, it has gifted me a life with meaning and authentic purpose.
As a Trauma Therapist, Somatic Experiencing has been essential in supporting my patients' healing journey, who have been able to free themselves from the straightjacket of overwhelm. Their movement away from collapse to aliveness has resulted in a profound experience of being alive.
Indeed, Somatic Experiencing supported their inborn life energy to arrive at healing and a return to wellbeing and lasting resilience.
I can, with great confidence, say: Anxiety and Depression are not a life sentence, but temporary discomfort. Healing is not only possible but inevitable."
Sergio is a member of the Somatic Experiencing International Board of Directors.
“Somatic Experiencing has been a super effective tool for transformation. Clients connect deeply with their own aliveness and find the creativity and flow within. There is a joy in feeling these emerging states while working as a therapist. SE is a model that empowers clients to develop a relationship to parts of their neurology that regulate, balance, and bring them into a sense of their potential. Unhealthy thought patterns and behaviors change over time, by working through their corresponding patterns in the body. It has been a most remarkable journey to learn and practice Somatic Experiencing, and to follow up with the many rich Master Classes developed by Peter Levine.”
