Do You Want To Deepen Your Self-awareness and Function at a Higher Level?
Does it feel like something is missing in your life? Maybe you think you should be happy, but have a nagging sense that you could be more deeply fulfilled. Perhaps you feel anxious, overwhelmed by stress or have trouble sleeping. Have you experienced trauma, recently or in the past, that continues to affect your life in either subtle or painful ways? You may have the sense that if you could just get past certain obstacles you would feel more satisfied with your life and realize the potential that you feel within you.
Do you want to understand what is behind your discomfort? Do you wish you could deal more effectively with your emotions or find greater insight into your life? Maybe you've been seeking a personal growth journey and feel ready to understand yourself more deeply. Are you looking for an opportunity to delve deep into your mind and body?
Your Body and Your Mind Work as One
If you're experiencing low-level discomfort—a feeling that your life could be deeper and more satisfying—you are not alone.
Our society sends messages that tell us that if we achieve certain career, relationship and family goals, we will be happy. To meet these ends, you may never were encouraged to tap into your deeper emotional and physical experiences and ask yourself how you really feel. You may have also not really asked yourself why you may be unhappy or dissatisfied despite the fact that your life appears to be going well on the surface. You may believe that you can will yourself into happiness or that you can control your mood by thinking your way out of it. However, the body often holds just as many messages about our inner lives as our minds do. Tuning into the body can help you understand the source of difficult emotions.
Things like your posture can speak volumes about how you're feeling, revealing subtle emotional states that you may not even be aware of. Stress and negative emotions often express themselves in the body, so understanding the interconnections between mind and body can help heal both. Investigating areas of tension and pain can provide a connection to the emotional states underlying them. The good news is that with the help of an experienced therapist, you can learn to tap into both your mind and body and come to a deeper understanding of yourself.
Sensorimotor Therapy Can Help You Integrate Mind and Body
As a practicing mental health counselor, I can help you learn to listen to your body and mind and find the deep messages within that are not always so easy to notice. Sensorimotor therapy is interactive. It's not "you talk, I listen." Rather, we’ll create a back and forth process that involves mindfully investigating how you feel in the moment, and how those feelings connect with the past. In the safe space of the therapy session, we can slow down and look at what is happening in the body right now, and how physical sensations relate to thoughts and feelings. Your body and mind truly can provide information about one another.
In sensorimotor therapy sessions, we will work together and look to your body to explore how your past is showing up in the present. In addition to sharing our past, we can focus on how you feel in the moment, searching for pain and tension and listening to what it tells us. For example, if you come in experiencing neck pain, we might mindfully focus on the neck and check in with the emotional and physical sensations that arise as we do so.
The feeling that something is missing in your life can often be painful, but it's actually a wonderful opportunity to create positive change. Becoming curious about what is going on beneath the surface of your experience is the first step of a journey. Together, we can navigate your internal states and gain insight into your dreams, aspirations and inner world. Sensorimotor therapy is a process of self-discovery that can help you feel more connected to yourself and the world and live in a way that feels like an authentic expression of yourself. Through therapy, you can find deeper satisfaction, peace and well-being.
You may be interested in deepening your self-understanding, but still have some questions or concerns about Sensorimotor Therapy...
I'm afraid of slowing down and discovering the things I may be hiding from myself.
You may have been avoiding things for years. Many, if not most, of us do. Some people feel uncomfortable in their bodies, and you may be devoting a great deal of energy to stay out of your body. You may feel safer remaining on the surface of your mind, dealing with the day-to-day aspects of your life and working hard to ignore deep pain buried beneath. The idea of confronting pain may be frightening—so much so that you don't want to come to therapy. At the beginning, there may be only so much you can tolerate, and I am sensitive to how deep you are willing and able to go. We will work within your window of tolerance, widening it as time goes on. While you may occasionally feel uncomfortable as you begin to look at the things you've been avoiding, I take care to minimize feelings of overwhelm as much as possible. As old pain begins to loosen its hold, you can experience greater freedom and joy in your life.
I'm worried about being vulnerable with a stranger.
Therapy can be an intimate experience, and many people worry that their therapist will think they are weird, broken or unlovable. You may worry that therapy will confirm your worst fears about yourself. That said, I can tell you that you will not be shamed, judged or made to feel guilty in sessions with me. In sessions, you can be the person that you hide from the world and even from yourself. Through the process of self-discovery, you can see that your fears about yourself are unfounded and come to recognize your many strengths and resources.
What does sensorimotor therapy offer that traditional psychotherapy doesn't?
In my years as a physical therapist, I often noticed that when people were stressed, anxious or unhappy, their pain symptoms were worse. The body often serves as a metaphor for what is going on in the mind or emotions. When you relax and explore your body, an understanding of the mind opens up. You can learn to understand yourself in a deeper way when you integrate mind and body.
If you are ready to begin your personal growth journey, please call for afree 15-minute phone consultation. I’m happy to answer any questions you have about sensorimotor therapy and my practice.
