Body-oriented psychotherapy is a way of getting rid of emotional experiences through interaction with the body. Everything we experience is reflected in our body. Negative and traumatic experiences are recorded in the body in the form of clamps and tensions.
A body therapist helps you pay attention to tense points in the body, and through them, identify the experiences that caused them. Having understood the reason, you can already work with it - learn to free yourself from the past and its constraining influence.
Thus, the goal of body therapy is to get rid of the influence of negative experiences experienced in the past on the present.
The founder of body therapy is Wilhelm Reich. He was a student of S. Freud, but concentrated his attention on studying the effects on the body. His work was continued by many scientists in different countries of the world. Today, body-oriented psychotherapy has many directions and continues to actively develop.
Advantages of the method:
- The main advantage of body-oriented psychotherapy is its high efficiency .
- This type of therapy allows you to interact with the unconscious. 90% of our subconscious manifests itself non-verbally, that is, not through speech, but through the body. Bodily clamps are a reflection of negative experiences, conflicts that have not received a way out and are “fixed” in the body.
- A bodily psychotherapist reads these signals, helps to reveal their causes, release negative emotions from the soul, and, as a result, free the body from clamps.
- Body psychotherapy can prevent the development of psychosomatic diseases , which are caused precisely by internal conflicts and negative experiences that have not received an outlet.
Sometimes tightness and lack of contact with one’s body reaches the point that a person loses the ability to grasp his true feelings. In this case, feelings are replaced by consciousness - it “tells” a person in which situation one should experience admiration, interest, sympathy, and in which - rejection. At the same time, a person’s true feelings may be completely different from those that consciousness imposes on him. Such a contradiction can cause serious internal conflict. Therefore, it is important to work with your body and respond to its silent signals.
Oksana Barkova, psychotherapist, Gestalt psychologist:
In my work, I always pay attention to the Body, since it is impossible to work through any emotional or psychological difficulty without removing the bodily block.
Any difficulty has an imprint on the body, creating a kind of physical and emotional “shell”, not allowing you to more fully experience and realize your emotions, distorting them.
The body remembers everything from the moment of birth: emotions, situations, memories, so through the body you can work with any human experience.
Working through muscle tension, which is the basis of psychological difficulty, allows you not only to solve the problem, but also to move on to correct bodily regulation and rely on the body’s resources. This is the main difference and advantage of body therapy over other psychotherapeutic methods.
Integrative approach
In the modern world, many psychotherapists do not adhere to any one school, using different techniques depending on the situation, if this helps to progress in working with the problem. This is called an integrative approach. As one practitioner noted: “Therapy for me is something like soup. Depending on how much of each ingredient you use, the flavor and aroma will change.”
This approach is quite reasonable. In the end, schools of psychotherapy speak in different words about the same phenomena and, most likely, sooner or later they will come to a single concept - as has already happened, for example, with psychiatry.
In what cases will body therapy help?
This type of psychotherapy can be recommended in a number of cases, such as:
- severe stress (loss, divorce, separation and other life situations);
- conflicts in couples and in the family;
- difficulties in your career: difficulties in relationships with colleagues and superiors, inability to defend and defend your opinion, lack of satisfaction from work;
- constant bad mood, apathy, restless sleep, tearfulness, depression;
- loss of meaning in life;
- fear, obsessive anxious thoughts;
- aggression, irritability;
- frequent colds, long-term illnesses.
It is important to note that body-oriented psychotherapy is not a replacement for conservative or surgical treatment of diseases, but serves as its complement.
Why is working with the body important?
A person experiences reality only through the body. When the connection between soul and body is broken, a person feels the world of his own experiences and illusions more realistically than the surrounding reality. As a result, the brightness and fullness of feelings and emotions is lost, nothing brings pleasure, and something is constantly missing in life. Some characterize this state as follows: “I live like a zombie,” “Like in a dream,” “Like frozen.”
In order to “return” to the real world again, to fully experience it, you must first free your body. Muscle “armor” makes it very difficult not only to enjoy life, but even to breathe and walk. Imagine that they put two sheepskin coats on you and put on heavy felt boots with galoshes. And you live 24 hours a day, even sleep, in such clothing. Now take and throw off this burden, remaining in light summer clothes. It's better, right? But no external conditions have changed, only your body has gotten rid of heaviness. Therefore, body-oriented therapy, working with muscle tension and returning the body to its original, harmonious state, helps solve psychological problems.
Comment from a SELF center specialist:
A man came for a consultation, his name was Ivan, 32 years old, with a request about his relationship with his wife - there had been an affair. During the meeting, the man, describing his situation, lowered his head down, breathed shallowly and periodically clenched his jaw. I drew his attention to how his body behaved when he described his difficulty. It turned out that for several months now his right shoulder has been hurting, constantly, nothing helps, the pain radiates to the shoulder blade and spreads along the spine.
We began to explore this pain and its connection with what the man was experiencing and thinking.
– What word is associated with pain?
- Sharp, sharp, furious.
At the same time, Ivan began to clench and unclench his fists, his breathing became more “heavy.”
“What emotion is asking to be noticed?” – I asked. The man, restraining himself, replied that it was anger, rage, a desire to break something and hit someone.
Then I asked: “What are these emotions trying to protect, what feeling or image?” The man answered with tears in his eyes that this was powerlessness, despair and the inability to return to his previous relationship with his wife.
After these words and allowing himself to be with the feelings of sadness, powerlessness, anger, despair, he was surprised to notice that the muscles relaxed and the pain went away. The emotional tension created by this feeling affected the muscles, causing them to spasm, blocking natural movement. And they immediately relaxed as soon as the emotion was identified and lived.
Exercises by Alexander Lowen
Exercises by A. Lowen
Exercise 1. Basic (basic) grounding and vibration
Stand with your feet about 25 centimeters apart and your toes turned inward to lightly stretch your gluteal muscles. Lean forward and touch the floor with the fingers of both hands, as shown in the figure.
Knees slightly bent.
The entire weight of the body should be on the feet, do not transfer it to the hands.
Body position during the basic grounding and vibration experience
Relax your neck as much as possible and let your head hang freely.
Breathe freely and deeply through your mouth. Watch your breathing carefully. For the duration of the experiment, forget about breathing through your nose.
Allow your body weight to flow forward so that it rests on the front of your feet. The heels can lift off the floor a little, but only a little.
Gently straighten your legs until your hamstrings are stretched. The legs, however, should not be fully straightened, nor should they be locked.
Hold this position for about a minute.
• Are you breathing freely or is something obstructing your breathing? If breathing is controlled, vibrations will not occur.
• Do you feel vibrational activity in your legs? If not, try bending your knees slightly and then straightening them back to the starting position. Repeat this action to give your leg muscles a chance to relax.
Lowen. Exercise 2. Knee bending
Stand as you are used to standing, with your feet apart about 20 centimeters. Pay attention to whether the knees are locked or bent, how the feet are parallel or turned to the sides, how the body weight is placed - whether it is transferred to the front of the feet or shifted back to the heels.
Now bend your knees slightly. Place your feet strictly parallel. Without lifting your heels off the floor, shift your weight forward so that it rests on the front of your feet. Slowly bend and straighten your knees six times, then hold the bent-knee position for about thirty seconds while monitoring your breathing. It should be light and calm.
• Did this pose seem unnatural? If yes, then you were standing wrong.
• Did your legs feel a tremor? Did they seem unreliable?
• Did you feel like your feet were on the ground?
• Do you realize that flexibility in the knees occurs only when they are not locked or tight?
Lowen. Exercise 3. Letting go of the belly
A loose belly destroys most people’s ideas about correct posture and good appearance. Many people have too firmly grasped the rule about proper posture: “tuck up your stomach, turn your shoulders, and make your chest look like a wheel.” Perhaps this position is suitable for a soldier who must work like an automaton, but in itself it is the embodiment of rigidity. This posture denies human autonomy, spontaneity and sexuality. A pinched (retracted) stomach makes abdominal breathing extremely difficult and forces a person to fill his chest with air when inhaling. Chronically full chest is one of the factors contributing to the development of emphysema. By drawing your stomach in and raising your shoulders up and to the sides, you spend a lot of energy fighting your animal nature. This does not add success, and is also very tiring.
Rice. 1. Normal abdomen Fig. 2. Convex Fig. 3. Belly
Stand with your feet about 20 centimeters apart and your legs straight as much as possible. Slowly bend your knees. Without lifting your heels off the floor, lean your body forward so that your weight rests on the front of your feet. Make sure your body is straight, but not rigid (see Fig. 1). Now release your belly (lower part) as much as you can. Breathe calmly and easily for one minute.
The purpose of this experience is to allow you to feel the tense areas in your lower abdomen.
• Can you let go of your belly?
• Does it remain released after the experience or is it pulled back in again?
• Does this condition make you feel “sloppy” or “down”?
» Do you feel trembling in your legs? Is there a fear that they might not be able to stand you?
• Do the respiratory movements reach the lower abdominal cavity? Do you breathe with your belly?
Lowen. Exercise 4. “Arch” or “arc”
This experience is similar to the previous one. The difference is that it forces the body, under the influence of stress, to open its breath and put more strain on the legs. Its correct implementation helps to get rid of tension in the abdomen, which is what creates the belly. The same exercise is performed by those who practice Tai Chi.
Stand with your feet about 50 centimeters apart, with your toes slightly turned inward.
Now press your fists into your lower back so that your thumb knuckles are turned up.
Without lifting your heels off the floor, bend both knees as far as you can.
Bend back, without removing your fists from your lower back, but as if on top of them. Be sure to keep your weight forward and on the front of your feet.
Breathe deeply, engaging your stomach.
• Do you feel some “tightness” in your lower back? If so, this means that there is quite a lot of tension in that part of the body.
• Is there pain or tension in the base of your hips or knees? If your legs are relaxed, you won't feel tight anywhere except your ankles and feet, which support your body weight.
"Arch" or "arc"
• Do your legs begin to vibrate?
• Are you able to maintain a maximally arched posture? Is your butt laid back or brought forward? In both cases, you have broken the bend of the “arch”, and energy and feelings cannot flow unhindered into the feet.
Repeating Experience 1 - Basic Grounding and Vibration Experience
All experiences that cause a person to bend back tend to end in the same grounding experience of bending forward. This not only relieves stress and increases the flexibility of the body, but also discharges the excitement that arose during previous experiences. The vibration in the legs is precisely this very release.
Repeat experiment 1.
Breathe deeply and freely.
Maintain this body position for about a minute.
• Do you feel your legs vibrating?
• Do you think your legs have become stronger compared to the vibrations experienced during the previous experience?
Take a standing position, keeping your knees slightly bent. Relax as you did in previous experiences in this series, letting go of your stomach.
Do you still feel vibrations in your legs?
• Pay attention to how your feet feel the floor. Do you feel that they are in closer contact with the floor surface, or, as it is called in bioenergetics, better grounded?
• Have you become more aware of your own legs and feet? Do your feet feel like they are “right” where they are?
Grounding is the key to bioenergetic work. If you are well grounded, the body will be more harmonious, natural, balanced, strengthened and upright. The flow of energy will not encounter obstacles on its way. In addition, you will notice that your vision has improved and your eyes have become clearer.
Exercise 5. Belly breathing
Lie on the floor with a mat or blanket. Bend your knees. Place your feet about 45 centimeters apart, with your feet slightly turned out to the sides. Tilt your head back to widen your throat, but still feel comfortable. Place both hands on your stomach in the pubic area to feel the abdominal movements. Breathe calmly through your open mouth for a minute, using your stomach.
• Did you feel your stomach rise with each inhalation and fall with each exhalation?
Did the chest move in harmony with the abdominal cavity or was it rigid? Try to let her follow the movements of her belly.
• Did you feel any stiffness or something dense in your throat?
Now rock your lower back slightly, moving your pelvis back with each inhalation and bringing it forward with each exhalation.
Inhale - the stomach protrudes, the pelvis moves back
Exhale - the pelvis moves forward, the stomach falls
Breathe this way for about a minute.
• Did you feel that the movements of the lower back increase the depth of inspiration and the range of abdominal movements?
You may find that breathing this way causes tingling in your arms or other parts of your body. Arm cramps may also occur. Both symptoms indicate hyperventilation. If they become increasingly stronger, stop the experience and they will immediately disappear. These phenomena are not dangerous, but can cause spasms in the hands, which can sometimes be quite painful. Hyperventilation is the oversaturation of the body with oxygen. You
inhaled and received more air than usual at rest. In terms of bioenergy, we will say that the body has received an excess charge. After some time from the start of classes, you will notice that exactly the same volume of air no longer causes similar symptoms. As the body adjusts to deeper breathing, the overcharge is no longer felt.
As soon as you allow some emotion to break through - cry, for example, the tingling, numbness will immediately stop, since a discharge of excitement will occur.
Exhalation
This option will help you feel how fully you can exhale. Allowing the air to escape is the same as “letting go” of yourself.
While lying in the same position, make a soft sound, something between “ah-ah” and “ah-ah”, and maintain it for as long as possible without straining. When the sound stops, breathe quietly a little and repeat again. Do this experiment four to five times and see if you can maintain the sound longer and longer each time.
Be careful not to force the sound and breathing, as this will only compress the throat and create tension.
Towards the end of the sound, you can notice that the voice begins to tremble. You may burst into tears. This is completely normal. If you want it and can easily do it, cry properly. Tears will do more for breathing than any other experience.
Lowen. Exercise 6. Breathing and vibration
This is another exercise that will help make your breathing more spontaneous. Lying on your back on the floor, lift your legs up. Your knees should be slightly bent, with your toes pointing towards you. Now imagine that there is a ceiling directly above your raised legs. “Rest” your feet against it without straightening your knees. Start pressing your heels on the “ceiling”.
Your legs will begin to vibrate.
Continuing to push the ceiling with your heels, maintain vibration in your legs.
Notice that the breathing becomes deeper.
• Did you feel that your stomach was compressed? Could you let him go? You can do this by keeping your buttocks pressed to the floor.
• Notice that the vibrations of the legs promoted breathing.
• After about a minute, return your feet to the floor in a resting position. What was your breathing like?
Notice how relaxed you feel through the breathing experience. Do them every time you feel the need to “come down to earth” or relax. They will take no more than five minutes.
The importance of breathing cannot be overestimated. Any disruption of natural breathing originates in unconscious adherence to vicious patterns or muscle tension. Because of the fear of screaming, you are unable to breathe completely. If this problem is familiar to you, find a secluded place and scream, let the scream break free. A car on the highway is a great place to scream; no one will be able to hear him. Screaming is an ancient way of relieving tension, which women of the Victorian era knew very well about. And it still works flawlessly.
Lowen. Exercise 7: Hip Rotation
You may want to try a simple experiment to test your sexual responsiveness and feel the tension in your pelvic area.
Place your feet about 25 centimeters apart, with your feet firmly planted. Feet are parallel to each other. The knees are slightly bent, the body weight is shifted to the front of the feet. The shoulders are lowered down, the chest is relaxed, the stomach is released forward. Place your hands on your thighs. In this position, try to slowly rotate your hips in a circle from right to left. The movement should mainly be carried out by the pelvis, with the torso and legs only slightly helping it.
After performing a certain number of circular movements in this direction, change the direction of rotation and repeat the same movements in the opposite direction, that is, from right to left.
• What happened to breathing? Didn't you hold him back? Try to maintain your breathing as you perform the movements.
• Is the belly tucked in? If he is tight and cruel, you are cutting off your own sexual feelings. Try to let go of the abdominal wall and relax it.
• Were you able to keep your knees bent?
• Was it possible to support the weight of the body on the front parts of the feet, or did they come off the supporting surface?
» Did you feel pain or tension in your lower back or hips? These areas of the body are very tense for most people.
We do not want to say that if you can easily complete this exercise, then you are completely free from sexual tension or problems. Just the opposite is true. If you can't complete this experience with ease, you have these problems. In it, as in others, an important criterion is how grounded a person is. If grounding is insufficient, the pelvic pendulum lacks emotional tone. To understand what we are talking about, imagine a guitar string stretched on only one side. You can make it move, but it will not make musical sounds. Music can only be heard when the string is secured at both ends and properly tensioned.
Lowen. Exercise 8. Arching the back and moving the pelvis
This sexual experience can help you become aware of how tight your pelvis and lower back are.
Lie down on the floor. The knees are bent, the feet are parallel and firmly planted on the floor. Bend your lower back and press your buttocks onto the floor surface. When you do this, inhale, release your stomach as much as possible. It should “puff up with air.” Then exhale while pushing your pelvis forward, lightly pressing your feet into the floor and slightly lifting your pelvis above the supporting surface. Perform this action twenty times, remembering to breathe slowly and move in time with your breathing.
• When your pelvis moved forward, did your stomach tense? If so, then you are lifting your pelvis with your abdominal muscles. Instead of using your feet and hips.
• Did you tuck your butt in when your pelvis moved forward? If so, then the sensations in the buttocks were cut off. Try to keep them relaxed.
• Did you always feel your feet standing on the floor? If the feet lose contact with the floor, the pelvis does not move freely.
• Were you able to feel how the breathing movements cover the pelvic area? Achieving coordinated pelvic and breathing movements is not easy at all!
• Did you feel any shame or embarrassment while performing this sexual experience? This is a good opportunity to clarify your own attitude towards sex. Despite all sexual enlightenment, most people experience deep shame, realizing their own sexuality in these soft, exciting movements of the pelvis.
Because of the prevalence of deep-seated passivity and tension in the lower back, people often pull or push the pelvis forward rather than allowing it to swing freely. This tightening of the pelvis is carried out by contraction of the abdominal muscles, and pelvic thrusts are carried out due to the “tucked in butt”. Both reduce sexual sensations and block involuntary pelvic movements that appear at the highest point of sexual interaction.
Lowen. Exercise 9. Kicking the couch
Lie down on a couch, mat, or firm mattress. Stretch your legs. Relax them, your knees should be straight but not tense. Begin to lift your legs one at a time and hit them on the mat or couch. The ankles are not tense, the blow is delivered by the heel and calf. At first the blows should be quite light, but gradually their strength and tempo increase. At the end of the experiment, holding the edges of the mat or couch with your hands, you should hit it with your feet as hard and fast as possible.
Vibration of raised legs
This experience is like the crack of a whip. If the body is coordinated, then the head will sway with each blow. If you are afraid of losing your head by “letting yourself go,” then the movements will be mechanical.
• How did you stop: abruptly or gradually? A sudden stop resembles a convulsive turn of the brake lever and speaks of fear of the natural course of movement.
• Perhaps the knees were bent so that only the heels struck? This indicates excessive tension in the muscles on the back of the legs.
• Of course, you're out of breath by the end of the exercise. It expresses anger. Perhaps you experienced panic and lost your breath? Maybe your head is spinning? Both panic and dizziness will pass if you establish breathing again.
Exclamation "No!" in the process of kicking the couch
To enhance this experience, try saying “No!” as your feet hit the surface of the couch or mat. The exclamation should sound as long and loud as possible: “No-e-e-t!” - and repeat several times during a series of blows. Now you are expressing a very strong protest.
• How did the voice sound: was it strong or weak and scared?
Using your voice requires more coordination. Has the experience become more.difficult?
• Have you been scared by the sound of your own voice?
* When was the last time you hit the floor or bed with your feet like that?
If you are too impressed by such an experience, do not repeat it immediately. You need to prepare for it by strengthening your coordination and expression so that you can move more easily and freely. We recommend performing this experiment regularly, but not straining, monitoring the rhythm of the movements.
Increasing the power of kicks
Do the same experiment, but do not use your voice, but vary the intensity. Do fifty kicks and see how smoothly and rhythmically you move.
If your legs are tired or you're out of breath before the punches are made (count them in your head), start with twenty-five or thirty.
Every day, try to add five or ten beats until you reach one hundred.
When the number of strikes reaches one hundred, try to increase their number to one hundred and fifty, and then to two hundred. By performing two hundred kicks on the couch every day, you can consider that you have increased your level of coordination and strength.
If you continue with this experience, you will find that you gain a greater degree of freedom in your lower body. You have mastered those parts of it that were previously “out of reach.”
Lowen. Exercise 10. Back arching
This simple experience will help you feel parts of the body that are usually ignored. We can assume that you are sitting in a chair while reading this book. Raise your arms and bend back, leaning over the back of the chair. Bend over well and hold this body position for about thirty seconds. Breathe easily and deeply through your mouth. Look at the picture
* Did you feel your back pressing on the back of the chair? Do you feel that she is tense? Or maybe relaxed? Do you experience pain? Is it possible to breathe easily in this position?
» When you raise and lower your arms, do you feel tension in your shoulders?
• Once you return to the starting position, try to become aware of the tendency to bend forward. Do you feel the need to bend back again, breaking the habitual position of hunching or slouching? Do the experiment again and feel how much easier it is to do it the second time? By stretching your back muscles, you relax them.
It is difficult to overestimate the importance of staying in contact with your own back and the back of your body. Without this, it is difficult to maintain or maintain the position of the body in space. It is not enough to have a spine (our anatomical structure provides us with this), a person needs to feel it. He must feel when the spine is too hard and rigid, and when it is too pliable and soft. If he is excessively cruel, then the person is not able to easily bend in a situation that requires exactly this. If the spine is too soft, then it does not provide sufficient rigidity to support oneself under stress. Excessive stiffness occurs due to chronic muscle tension in the long back muscles. Excessive plasticity appears when muscle tone is reduced, and there is also spasticity of the small muscles located in the spine. In both cases, the back turns out to be “not quite lively” and cannot provide the aggressive actions that are necessary in life. A rigid person cannot bend, that is, retreat during a confrontation, while a too pliable person cannot withstand a difficult situation and gives up.
Most people suffer from tension in both areas and complain of pain. To help them release muscle tension and allow the body to move freely, we use a series of practical experiences that are performed using a bioenergy chair. The design itself and the possibilities of its use are described in Chapter 10. The idea of creating such a chair arose during the experiment just described.
Returning to the issue of being in contact: since most people cannot be in contact with their body and rarely use it as anything other than a mechanism for moving through space, at first bioenergetic experiences seem strange and difficult. The body positions we suggest may look unnatural and may make you feel awkward and painful. However, there is no doubt that you will begin to experience your body differently than before, and as time passes you will understand and feel that you have established a closer and more extensive contact with it.
Being in contact is a process of feeling rigidity and tension that blocks the flow of excitement and feeling. Only by feeling the tension can you release it. Every tension is chronic muscle spasticity or contraction. Such “tightness” is characteristic of both superficial muscles that move voluntarily, and those that are located deep under the surface of the body and work involuntarily. For example, the muscles of the trachea and bronchi, intestines and vascular system.
It should be noted here that we are not talking about tension in the nervous system, which has nothing to do with chronic spasticity of the muscles. Many people perceive it this way. They call it nervous tension because they do not maintain contact with the muscular tension of the body. They cannot feel the tightness of their throat or the stiffness of their back or neck, nor how tight and stiff their shoulder girdle is, how spastic their diaphragm is, or how “knotty” their leg muscles are. Due to the lack of such sensations, people cannot free themselves from muscle tension and are forced to resort to pills in the hope of reducing neurotic stress. This is, of course, easier, but no better than purposefully working out muscle tension in order to regain a state of relaxation.
If a person feels tense, relaxation is achieved by mobilizing the contracted muscles through stretching and expressive movements. By slowly stretching contracted muscles, we often allow them to release and stretch. Once the tension is released, the muscles begin to shake or vibrate like a spring surging. Expressive movements such as kicking or kicking serve the same purpose by mobilizing contracted musculature. Emotional release, such as crying, often relaxes internal tensions.
Relaxation is an expanded state of the body as opposed to a compressed, rigid state. Therefore, it requires energy and can only happen if we breathe openly, freely and deeply while performing our experiments. The person feels that all parts of the body are relaxed, focusing on a feeling of warmth and a change in skin color, since blood flow improves with relaxation. The contracted parts of the body remain cold and contact with them is imperceptible. We describe them as “dead” zones, meaning that a person is not in contact with them.
The process of being in contact with the body never ends. As you continue to perform our experiments, you can deepen it, gradually learning to feel individual parts of the body, mastering new postures and movements. Your self-control and self-expression will progress.
Being in contact with the body does not mean superiority. It means to be animated. No matter how long a person works with his body, there is always some kind of tension in it. This is not a reason to be disappointed in our offers. If you want to stay in touch with your body, do the recommended experiences regularly. We need to understand that we do not live in a body-oriented culture like primitive people. Our culture, so to speak, is “anti-corporeal,” and therefore “anti-life.” Machines do a lot of work that our bodies could do, but while they make our lives easier, they do not necessarily make our lives more interesting and enjoyable. The speed of our lives is increasing. We move faster, but we have less and less time. In fact, the pace of our lives is so fast that we literally have no time to breathe normally. In addition, we are experiencing abnormal social and competitive pressures in our culture, and it is now abundantly clear that unless this is counteracted by a positive program of bodily activity, we have no hope of increasing the sense of body life that is the basis of truly vibrant health.
Lowen. Exercise 11. Basic orientation position
If you are studying in a group, you should stand in a circle. Each group member stands facing the center of the circle, with their feet positioned strictly parallel to each other at a width of about 20 centimeters.
Move your body forward so that your weight rests on the front of your feet. The knees are slightly bent, the pelvis is free and slightly pulled back, the upper body is straight and relaxed.
Release your belly, allow it to calmly push forward, take four to five deep breaths, engage your abdominal cavity. Release your pelvic floor; your sensations should be similar to those you experience when you are about to urinate or have a bowel movement. If you are concerned about embarrassment, visit the restroom immediately before class. You'll likely find that the anxiety associated with the possibility of embarrassment is independent of how much you actually need to go to the toilet.
Now breathe freely and easily, trying to feel how much you are able to “pass” and “lower” down into your legs and feet.
• How do you breathe? Calm, easy, deep or not? Can you feel your breathing?
movements in the abdominal cavity? Can you breathe with sound?
• Are your knees bent and are your feet parallel? Were you able to keep your legs in this position throughout the entire experiment?
• Is the pelvis retracted and not tense? Can you feel tension in your buttocks or pelvic floor muscles?
• Did you feel the weight of your own body in the front of your feet?
If all your body weight is on the front of your feet, there is no need to strain extra muscles to keep your body upright. Your shoulders and chest will relax. The pelvis should swing freely in time with breathing back and forth. Unfortunately, this is not so easy to do. We are unconsciously afraid to relax, to let ourselves go, and therefore we tense many parts of the body. These tensions play a cruel joke on us. We tense our shoulders and lift them up because we can’t feel our feet on the ground, we clench our jaws because we’re afraid to cry. We are afraid to let go of the anus for fear of public embarrassment, and therefore we hold the pelvis by moving it too far back and squeezing the gluteal muscles. By being aware of these tensions and carrying out practical experiments, we can achieve a different state of affairs when we are able to feel the legs and feet standing on the ground and holding a light and flexible body in an upright position.
Lowen. Exercise 12. “Joy of Life”
Take a basic position. Stretch your arms forward, lift them up, and then, spreading them to the sides, slowly lower them, keeping your palms slightly turned to the sides relative to the middle of the torso line. Extend your arms slowly, coordinating this movement with your breathing. When your arms are extended forward, you should exhale with a sound. The next exhalation is when the arms are raised up, then when the arms are spread to the sides, and then when the arms have already dropped down.
Repeat everything several times.
Orientation in bioenergy helps to place the feet firmly and steadily on the floor or ground. At the same time, you need to stretch up towards the sky. Thus, we are directed both up and down at the same time. If the first exercise “grounds” us, then the second one pulls us up. When you extend your arms forward or upward. Under no circumstances should your feet lose contact with the surface; do not strain them, and do not push your pelvis forward or lift it up. Stretching your arms should stretch, not strain!
Lowen. Exercise 13. “WARMING” EXPERIMENTS
This category usually precedes more focused and intensive work with the body. You can do them all, or you can limit yourself to a couple of them.
"Liberating Shake"
Take the basic orienting position: your feet are parallel at a distance of about 20 centimeters from each other, your knees are slightly bent, your body weight is shifted forward, your back is straight. The arms are relaxed and swing freely.
Quickly bend and straighten your knees, pushing as if you were jumping, but do not lift your feet off the ground.
These movements should shake the whole body and cause sounds similar to the barking of a dog as you exhale.
Continue this exercise for about a minute and then stop with your knees slightly bent and breathe easily and freely.
• Did your whole body shake?
• Were you able to harmonize your breathing and movements?
* Did your upper body lean backward, “pushing” you off your feet, even though your knees were bent?
"Slow Jumps"
Take the same starting position, but now slowly bounce in place, slightly lifting your toes off the floor. Each jump should take at least a second.
Perform this action until your legs get tired. Then rest by returning to the starting position, bending your knees, shifting your weight forward and straightening your back.
• Is your breathing short? Do your legs vibrate? If so, then everything is fine.
When performing this experiment, most people, who do it insufficiently accurately, feel a failure of breathing. Try to breathe freely.
Bounce lightly on each leg. The rhythm is: one, two - change of foot, one, two - change of foot. This is a lighter version of the previous exercise.
Jump or stomp around the room, preferably while moving in a circle. The arms dangle and sway.
"Jumping rope"
In group classes in Leslie Loewen's class, jumping rope is an option. When people come to class, they jump to “warm up” and release excess tension. Not every floor can support jumping of a large group, so bouncing can be practiced while observing the order.
Rocking on your feet
Once in your basic orientation position, rock slightly back and forth on your feet. Do this slowly, lifting your heels slightly off the floor as your body moves forward and your toes off the floor as it moves backward. Keep your knees slightly bent and your pelvis rocking freely.
Lowen. Exercise 14. Standing
The goal of this series is to mobilize the sensations in your legs and feet so that you feel your feet planting on the floor. Performing these experiments causes a strong vibration in the legs, which gradually rises, covering the pelvis and upper half of the body. The vibration releases tension and helps you feel your own legs.
Supporting body weight on one leg
Take a basic orienting position: your feet are parallel to each other, about 20 centimeters wide, your body weight is shifted forward, your pelvis is released and slightly pulled back. the stomach is calmly protruded, the body is straight and relaxed.
Release your pelvic floor. Bend your left knee and slowly shift your weight so that it rests on your left foot.
The right foot does not leave the floor! Breathe freely and deeply. Maintain this position until you feel noticeable discomfort.
Shift your body weight to your right leg, slowly bending your right knee. Maintain your position as long as you can.
Repeat again and then return to the starting position.
Standing position with body weight shifted to one leg. The foot of the other leg does not leave the floor
• Did you manage to “drip” into your left and right feet, or did you feel like one or both knees were “stiff”?
• Did you hold your breath?
• Did your legs vibrate a lot?
When they begin to vibrate, a lot of fear and tension is released!
• Were you afraid that your knees would “give” under the weight of your body and you would fall?
This fear, called “fear of falling,” is the cause of stiffness and tension in the knees due to excessive ligament tension. “Fear of falling” can be worked out by referring to the experiments from the “Falling” section
This is a more difficult version of the previous one. Shift your body weight to your left leg and foot, and bend your knee more than in the previous case. Now lift your right leg, but keep your toes lightly touching the floor so as not to lose your balance. In this position, the left leg will vibrate much more strongly, giving you more intense sensation. Maintain the position until it becomes too painful.
Make sure your pelvis is slightly pushed back and not locked, and remember to release your pelvic floor.
Breathe freely and deeply.
Repeat everything, transferring your body weight to your right leg.
As you gain experience, you can turn to a much tougher option. One leg moves forward, the knee bends quite strongly, and the entire weight of the body shifts to that leg.
The other leg leaves the ground. The body leans forward so that the hands, barely touching the floor, help maintain balance. The pelvis is laid back.
Standing position with body weight shifted to one leg. Foot of the other leg
torn off the floor
This exercise should be performed by first placing something soft or elastic under the knee so that you can safely lower yourself or even fall on this mat when the tension in the ligaments becomes too strong.
Repeat the experiment, standing on the other leg and lowering yourself back onto the mat when the pain becomes too severe.
Repeat the experiments again.
Return to the basic orienting position.
These experiences bring an abundance of sensations to the feet. Returning to the orientation position (weight slightly forward on the front of the feet, knees slightly bent, pelvis slightly back, pelvic floor relaxed), you should find your legs vibrating intensely. Is it so?
Body-oriented therapy techniques:
There are different methods of body therapy:
- massage,
- breath,
- various exercises that can be done standing, sitting, lying down.
The purpose of the techniques is not to “fix” the body. They are aimed, first of all, at realizing the body and restoring connection with it.
Often a “side effect” of body-oriented therapy is an improved figure.
The fact is that drooping shoulders, incorrect posture, and sunken chests are often associated not with poor physical fitness, but with psychological problems. Unfulfilled desires, driven-in fears, complexes, worries, emotions that cannot find a way out accumulate in our body, causing it to bend and become ossified. When negative energy is released during therapy, the body straightens, becomes flexible and relaxed.
How do body therapy sessions work?
The first task of a body therapist is to determine what internal problems prevent you from fully enjoying life and freely controlling your body. To do this, he identifies a problem area - an area of the body where the muscles are constantly and unnaturally tense, and there is pain. This is an indicator that allows you to understand what is troubling a person - after all, this is the reason that caused the muscle tension. When it is possible to determine the cause, a physical psychologist offers special exercises that help to re-experience the condition that caused stress in order to let it go forever. A sign that the old problem has really been released will be the body - it will relax, getting rid of tensions.
Physical contact during communication between the therapist and the patient is not necessary - its presence or absence depends on the wishes of the patient. The work can also be done verbally, without touching.
It is worth noting that touch has a high psychotherapeutic effect, but only if the patient is disposed to this form of communication with the therapist.
Fundamentals and objectives of cognitive behavioral psychotherapy
Cognition is a person’s ability to perceive and mentally process external events in accordance with their beliefs.
From childhood, a person acquires a number of rules and habits - both healthy and harmful, which interfere with life. Cognitive behavioral therapy is a branch of psychology based on the principle that thinking and behavior depend on a person’s habitual response. What does it mean? A certain person subconsciously reacts to external stimuli in a certain way that is unique to him.
How do we usually react to a disturbing event? We worry, are afraid, or feel unable to influence the situation. If you are under the influence of such negative emotions for a long time, this will inevitably lead to mental disorder. But you can give up such a “bad habit” by learning to perceive events differently in order to more easily cope with difficulties and avoid stress.
The main task of the CBT psychologist will be to teach the patient how to correctly work with his thoughts and a new attitude towards difficult situations that arise. This therapy is carried out in several stages and gradually forms life-affirming stereotypes of consciousness. Ultimately, the patient masters techniques aimed at reducing the level of anxiety and overcomes situations that frighten him without the usual panics and fears.
CBT will help:
- identify disturbing thoughts that contribute to the emergence of fears, depression, phobias, panic attacks;
- review your lifestyle and transform it into a healthy norm (for example, avoid overload, change your daily routine, get rid of bad habits);
- consolidate new thinking and correctly confront emerging negative situations in the future;
- overcome shame for your weaknesses and anxieties, learn to share problems with loved ones and gratefully use their support.
How to choose a body therapist?
To choose “your” body therapist, pay attention to the following points:
- Techniques used by the specialist. Everyone has their own preferred techniques of body-oriented psychotherapy. Some people work with breathing, others use massage. Choose a therapist who knows the technique that will be comfortable for you.
- Where do therapy sessions take place? It is important that the room is cozy, that it has a comfortable temperature, good, but not too bright lighting. These are necessary conditions in order to relax and concentrate on your feelings.
- Subjective impressions. The specialist you will work with should evoke positive emotions in you. Don’t try to analyze your feelings - just feel whether you want to go to this therapist or not. A positive attitude is the basis for building the trust that is necessary for effective therapy.
