Multiple Trauma Vortex (1)
“What is it?” The client asked me this as she felt her head, all on its own, turn gently to the right — as if about to look at something over there. Her question meant, “What past trauma is this experience related to?” So, here’s the fundamental problem. Even in somatic psychotherapy circles we still […]
The Yin & Yang of Being & Doing in Therapy
“When you’re falling — Dive!” —Joseph Campbell “You are here to manifest your innate enlightenment.” —Morihei Ueshiba (Founder of Aikido) “What do you do when you bump up against the client’s resistance? You say ‘Excuse me!’” —Milton Trager The zen master slapped the fan into his palm, “How do you experience this sound?” It was 1982 […]
Revival: Somatic Methodism & My Departure from the SE Trauma Institute
In 1999, months after the birth of my first child Jacob, I boarded a plane to New York to support the first Somatic Experiencing® training in New York City. Little did I realize it was an embarkation onto “the circuit” — professional teachers and trainers who, like itinerant preachers of not so long ago, travel […]
What is Resilience? (OI Tenet #3)
Resilience is the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties. In the world of positive psychology, resilience is the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or significant sources of stress, such as family and relationship problems, serious health problems, or workplace and financial stressors. Resilience, in that context, means bouncing […]
It’s a Universal Language
Isn’t it wonderful when you speak, think or do something and everything around you seems to just “get it?” It’s as if all beings were somehow related, that they were connected. But what if they really are? What if there is a universal language, and that we are all just a part of one organism, […]
Organic Intelligence & Parenting: How Far We Have Come
When I was asked to write about Organic Intelligence® and Parenting I got very excited. As both a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and a mother I have been exploring how to create healthy parent-child relationships for clients as well as between my own daughter and me. For those who are not yet parents, it […]
Yoga Through The Lens Of Organic Intelligence
Yoga is often talked about as both the means and the end. It refers to both a scientific system of practices and to a state that is the result of these practices. Steve’s Organic Intelligence® model (OI) has helped clarify some things that I have noticed in my 20+ years of experience with yoga, about […]
Finding Resources In Working With Adolescents
I remember my teenage years as unbelievably fun, adventurous, traumatic, disorienting, scary, exciting, disappointing; basically an emotional roller-coaster which in retrospect appears to highlight the polarity and pendulation concepts I’ve come to understand through Somatic Experiencing® (SE™) and Organic Intelligence® (OI). Adolescents: Emerging Nervous Systems As a clinician at an adolescent inpatient/outpatient treatment program in […]
Using Organic Intelligence To Help Pediatric Hospital Patients
My work with children using an Organic Intelligence® approach began in a pediatric hospital setting. While the child’s journey toward healing didn’t end with our time together, the hope I held, and continue to hold, is that their system received what it needed in those first moments to allow for processing and integration with greater […]
Orientation: A Way To Come Back
“To come into the present is to stop the war.” — Jack Kornfield This is a personal account of my direct experiences with Orientation, as an incredible gift to ourselves, and to those who come to us seeking relief and solace from their inner storms. When I was in my last year of training with […]
