Somatic Coaching Vs. Somatic Therapy: Working With Trauma

It’s common that people looking to resolve past trauma reach out to me. The field of somatics has gained popularity lately because it is a very effective way of working with trauma. We now know that trauma lives in the body and is deeply connected to the very real tissues of our bodies.

Am I a trauma therapist?

And so I often find myself reminding prospective clients I am not a therapist and I don’t work with trauma in the same way a therapist would. For therapists who focus on trauma, or for trauma specialists, resolving the trauma is often the centerpiece of the work they do with clients. This means that a person comes in with a stated mission to resolve some sort of past pain, and the therapist or specialist dedicate their sessions working to resolve that particular issue.

Somatic coaching is broader than trauma therapy

First and foremost I am a somatic coach and somatic bodyworker. This means that fundamentally my job is to help people learn to live in their bodies - to help people reconnect with their aliveness, a sense of ground, a sense of deep relaxation in their bodies. We do this through conversation, practices (both done during our sessions as well as take-home practices), and bodywork. In moving toward a more embodied way of being in the world, we inevitably bump up against past trauma, and when that happens, we work with it. Our past traumas, large or small, are often what make it difficult for us to live in our bodies in the first place.

Working through trauma is part of the process, not an end goal

This means that, while I am not a trauma specialist, I still support people in processing trauma. Sometimes this takes the form of somatic openings or large discharges of stored energy during bodywork sessions. Other times, it means helping clients find practices that help them move and speak from center, such that their past traumas are not what is driving them in the present day. As we learn to make contact with our past pain while staying connected to the present, the grip that trauma has on our lives begins to soften.

Working through trauma is different than learning to live in your body

Remember that somatic coaching is oriented around how it is you want to be different in the world. I don’t work with people simply to help them resolve their past pain; the work I do with people is to help them become a bigger container in their body so they can be more alive and hold more space for themselves and for others. The ultimate goal is to learn to extend out into the world in a way that supports the life you have declared for yourself.

In this work, we work through trauma to get to a felt sense of a new way of being in our bodies; not just for the sake of dealing with trauma. Somatic therapy is more about resolving past traumas that keep you from envisioning a new future; somatic coaching is more about how to be in a body that can support your new future. 

If somatic coaching sounds like the right fit for you, send me a message.