What You'll Learn:

Through four powerful demonstration modules, you'll discover how to:

Module 1: Somatic Therapy for Processing Recent Traumatic Experience with Dr. Peter Levine

Establishing Safety and Context:

• Begin sessions by acknowledging context and establishing safety
• Mention scope of practice appropriately
• Invite participants to share what's important while emphasizing their agency
• Create containing space for trauma processing
• Honor participant's right to indicate if anything feels wrong

Working with Recent Trauma:

• Process recent traumatic experience (conflict with friend)
• Address long-standing patterns (people-pleasing, self-doubt)
• Use breathwork, vocalization, and imagery for release
• Access inner strength and resilience through the body

Somatic Awareness Techniques:

• Guide noticing of bodily sensations (tension in stomach and throat)
• Direct tension into objects (pillow) to facilitate release
• Associate physical sensations with affirmations ("you are enough," "I'm alive")
• Connect tingling and other sensations with empowering statements

Resourcing and Empowerment:

• Help participants connect with internal supports (breath, visualizations)
• Access external supports (ancestral connections)
• Foster feelings of strength, love, and safety
• Build resources to draw upon in moments of stress or trigger
• Establish healthy boundaries through embodied experience
• Support self-acceptance and empowerment

Module 2: Using Sensory Motor Psychotherapy to Complete Interrupted Defensive Responses with Dr. Pat Ogden and Jacqui Compton

Present-Moment Somatic Processing:

• Guide re-experiencing of traumatic memory through bodily sensations
• Focus on present-moment awareness rather than narrative alone
• Track physiological responses (tightening in chest, shoulders squeezing inward)
• Use step-by-step approach through difficult memory (molestation)

Completing Defensive Responses:

• Facilitate completion of interrupted defensive responses
• Support body's spontaneous initiation of protective movements
• Allow emergence of shaking and running motions
• Guide verbal and physical expression of "no" in relation to past trauma
• Trust body's impulses toward resolution

Participant Collaboration:

• Consistently check in with participant throughout
• Ask for consent to continue at each stage
• Inquire about comfort level with emerging sensations
• Invite participant to notice their body's wisdom
• Honor participant's choice and agency
• Support following body's impulses
• Guide toward increased aliveness and groundedness

Module 3: Working With Protective Mechanisms to Help Clients Communicate Needs with Staci K. Haines

Exploring Protective Patterns:

• Help participants identify protective mechanisms (withholding, dissociation)
• Understand these as strategies for staying safe
• Work with desire to stay embodied while communicating needs
• Address patterns rooted in not feeling safe or accepted

Blending With Protection:

• Acknowledge and affirm protective strategies
• Recognize withholding and dissociation as self-protection
• Explore wisdom and function of protective mechanisms
• Gently inquire what these strategies take care of and for whom
• Help participants understand purpose (protecting heart and dreams)

Centering Practice:

• Incorporate dimensions of length, width, depth, and purpose
• Help participants ground themselves
• Increase body awareness before deeper work
• Create foundation for embodied communication

Release and Freedom:

• Facilitate appreciation of protective mechanisms for their role

• Support release of tension through acknowledgment
• Foster greater sense of freedom
• Enable fuller connection with self and others
• Transform protective mechanisms into conscious choices

Module 4: Processing and Expressing Suppressed Emotions with Jessica Montgomery

Mindful Guidance for Embodiment:

• Use simple directives ("Feel the room around you")
• Guide toward present moment awareness
• Encourage full expression ("Let it take up as much space as it really needs")
• Support reconnection with suppressed authentic self

Connecting Somatic Experience and Emotion:

• Facilitate connections between sensations, energy, vibrations, and emotions
• Link specific feelings to body locations (tearfulness to chest and throat)
• Explore how present feelings relate to past experiences
• Work with emotions related to suppressing true self

Following the Body's Process:

• Track body's natural self-organizing process
• Observe spontaneous movements and sensations (shaking, reverberations)
• Verbalize and encourage emergent phenomena
• Avoid imposing specific agenda or interpretation
• Allow amplification of what naturally emerges

Reconnection and Authenticity:

• Support access to stored tension and its release
• Help participants reconnect with passions
• Foster sense of empowerment and authenticity
• Honor body's innate wisdom and capacity for self-healing
• Trust the body's intelligence to guide the process

Core Competencies Developed Across All Modules:

Working with Trauma Somatically:

• Process trauma through body rather than narrative alone
• Support completion of interrupted defensive responses
• Release stored tension through breath, sound, and movement
• Trust the body's natural impulse toward healing

Creating Safety for Deep Work:

• Establish containing therapeutic space
• Honor participant agency and choice throughout
• Check in frequently and adjust based on responses
• Build consent into every step of the process

Protective Mechanisms:

• Recognize and honor protective patterns
• Blend with rather than fight against protection
• Understand the wisdom in what appears as resistance
• Transform outdated strategies into conscious choices

Somatic Tracking:

• Notice and follow bodily sensations moment-to-moment
• Track physiological shifts as indicators of processing
• Observe spontaneous movements and their meaning
• Trust the body's self-organizing capacity

Resourcing and Empowerment:

• Build internal and external resources
• Connect with ancestral support and inner strength
• Foster self-acceptance through embodied experience
• Support healthy boundaries from the inside out

Expression and Release:

• Facilitate vocal expression (saying "no," making sounds)
• Support physical movements (pushing, shaking, running)
• Allow emotions to move through the body
• Trust that completion brings relief and integration

This course presents four distinct somatic healing sessions demonstrating the transformative power of somatic approaches. Witness a participant process trauma and address people-pleasing through breathwork and imagery, connecting with inner strength and healthy boundaries. Observe Pat Ogden guide a participant through sensory motor psychotherapy, re-experiencing trauma by attending to bodily sensations and completing interrupted defensive responses. Explore one participants journey of identifying and releasing a protective holding pattern, fostering embodied communication and a greater sense of freedom. Finally, see how one can access and express suppressed emotions through mindful guidance, reconnecting with the authentic self and the body's innate wisdom for healing.