Profile: Cambridge Body Psychotherapy Centre

Part 2: About Our Work

Kathrin Stauffer

Introduction

The common ground of those who work at the Cambridge Body Psychotherapy Centre is our rootedness in the body, our belief that being embodied is a prerequisite for mental and emotional well-being, and that is a deep connection our-body, our and our spirituality. We try to emphasise a transpersonal understanding of the human soul without neglecting its intrapersonal and interpersonal aspects,

Within this common premise, we deliberately aim to be as inclusive, diverse and mindful of our differences as we can, in the belief that our different personalities can provide a fuller range of services to the community, We also share a commitment to the social and political context in which we and our clients work and live.

Training background

We identify ourselves as firmly embedded in the humanistic tradition. We have been trained at different institutions, among them the Gerda Boyesen Institute, the Chiron Centre for Body Psychotherapy, the Institute for Biosynthesis, and the Karuna Institute, We are all either accredited by UKCP or working towards that accreditation. The Centre provides high quality, in-depth, long-term psychotherapy for individuals, as well as training in body psychotherapy and biodynamic massage.

All of us have had previous careers in other professions and undergone big changes in professional orientation. This means that there are histories of great "quests' at the Centre, and that many of us experience the work we now do as a profound homecoming, a sense of having found something very precious, something that our souls needed, after a long, hard search. As a group, we like to attend to both the wounds that this has left in each of us, and also to the strengths that it gives us.

Theoretical lineage

As with all body psychotherapies, our founding father is Wilhelm Reich. From him, we can trace several strands that have developed more or less independently of each other, which contribute to our lineage. The common factor of all these approaches is the principle of functional identity between body and mind as postulated by Reich (Reich 1990), The different lineages range from cathartic and vigorous bodywork (Lowen 1958; Pierrakos 1987; Peris 1951; Rosenberg 1985) to more soft and allowing ways of melting secondary functioning (Boyesen 1981, 1982; Southwell 1988; Kurtz 1990), to the very subtle ways of encouraging movement of energy in the body and soul of the client (Boadella 1987; Sills 1999; Donington 1994), We are fortunate in that most of our teachers have been familiar with -a broad variety of these approaches, thus allowing each of us to find our own ways to work most comfortably and usefully, The one more separate strand that does not trace itself back to Reich but is important to most of us is analytical psychology, which some of us have learned through being in therapy with Jungian analysts.

Of course the lineages going back to Reich have not developed entirely separately, but body psychotherapists have for a long time influenced and cross-fertilised each others' thinking and work (see for example Staunton 2002). We therefore do not always separate clearly where a particular concept comes from but tend to see the body psychotherapy that we practice as a synthesis of the teaching of many different people.

We tend to think in terms of energy when we think about the functioning of the human organism. We make a distinction between "primary' and "secondary' functions, or energy movements. One very convenient way of thinking about this is to say that primary, spontaneous impulses tend to flow along the vertical body axis, and secondary, defensive or reflexive impulses tend to have a more horizontal direction (Southwell 1988). For example, if I have an impulse to cry (primary impulse), I will perceive that as arising out of my belly or chest, through my throat to my face along the vertical axis of my body. If I stop myself from crying (secondary impulse), I do that by tightening my diaphragm and my throat and the muscles in my face. These muscles lie more or less horizontally in the body. So I can say that the horizontal element serves to contain, modify, or block the vertical flow of energy, just as the more highly developed elements of the personality contain, modify, or block primitive impulses. As it happens, the horizontal element consists largely of skeletal muscle and can therefore more easily be identified with on a conscious level, while the vertical element is more associated with fluid movements that are less under voluntary control.

We also generally think in terms of developmental models if we try to describe particular secondary (or defence) mechanisms, and the Reichian character structures are a useful conceptual framework for this albeit not the only one (Eiden 2002). Our thinking is as much along the lines of developmental deficits as phase-specific conflicts.

Core elements of our work

In the most general terms, we can say that our aim in psychotherapy is to help our clients achieve a good balance and flexibility between vertical and horizontal energy flow, and to make them as aware as we possibly can of their inner aliveness, their spontaneous impulses. We therefore try to nurture and coax whatever strikes us as the most alive thing in any client at any given moment. We also see this as a part of our commitment to humanism.

All of us would identify as an important element of our work the concept of following process. In order to do this, we use multiple phenomenological 'tracking variables' ranging from visible and palpable energy flow in the client's body to breathing to the flow of words to our own felt sense of what is happening in the relationship. We regard it as essential that we can hold an awareness of a process on many different levels simultaneously, and also be available to the client on different levels.

We believe that to be body psychotherapists means to experience ourselves in our bodies. Our awareness of our own bodies is the sounding-board that continuously gives us a wealth of information about what is happening in this room, right now, what is happening in the client, in a way that complements emotional and mental resonance and empathy. This constant use of somatic resonance or somatic countertransference is perhaps the hallmark of all the training backgrounds that we bring together.

Another important point of this commitment to being embodied is our aim to always be in relationship with the client as bodies as well as minds. Particularly when we touch clients, we try to always be aware of our own physicality, and of the messages that our touch may give to the client, as well as of the messages that we receive through the touch. For many people it is a very difficult task to be in contact with another person and at the same time to be in contact with themselves. But it is also a very important skill, because it helps to sort out issues around boundaries, contact, relationships, sense of self, and reality testing for clients - whilst for therapists it is invaluable as a resource for engaging with a client and disengaging at the end of a session. This ability to engage as fully as possible and subsequently disengage as fully as possible helps to prevent ourselves from burning out. Body awareness is helpful in learning this skill for both client and therapist.

Being embodied also means that we pay a lot of attention to the physical environment of our work, from making sure that both client and therapist sit (or lie, or stand) comfortably to the atmosphere and comfort of the building and surrounding grounds. In fact, I've heard more than one client comment about how nice it feels to simply be here, and how much even the building holds a space for them to return to themselves.

Body awareness is a central concept for all of us, and simply encouraging clients to be aware of their body sensations and to let those develop, elaborate, and grow into anything from deeply regressed sounds and movements to creative fantasies or artistic work, is a 'staple' of our sessions. We have also more recently taken on board the various ways in which body awareness can be used as a tool for slowing down the process of clients who get overwhelmed by their feelings, particularly in states of post-traumatic stress (see for example Rothschild 2000).

Individual variations in approach

In order to allow for many different therapeutic approaches to be used, all the rooms at the Cambridge Body Psychotherapy Centre are equipped with two chairs, a mattress, lots of cushions, and a massage table. Many of us are trained to use biodynamic massage as part of our approach and make extensive use of it. This comes mostly out of our own experience as recipients of biodynamic massage and the resulting, directly embodied knowledge that it is a powerfully healing therapy. We also hold the knowledge that biodynamic massage opens a deeply spiritual place that allows both therapists and clients to hold and process our life experiences. At the same time the decision to use biodynamic massage is a personal preference that arises out of the sheer pleasure of working with our hands.

Other approaches that some of us use come out of the Gestalt tradition. The emphasis that Gestalt places on phenomenology is very useful and compatible with a more psychospiritual attitude of non-judgemental, compassionate attention. Equally, Gestalt teaches us to pay attention to the quality of contact that clients make with us. We are committed to engage as fully as we can in the relationship with each client in such a way as to empower the client to make more meaningful relationships in their life.

We also sometimes use our bodies as 'objects' for the client's use - objects to push against, to meet, to reach out to, to touch and be touched by. In this way we have a powerful tool for accessing material in the client that cannot easily be put into words, and provide our clients with ways of experiencing themselves as more embodied beings.

There are always writing and drawing materials available at the Centre for clients to express their dreams, visualisations and fantasies. Other means of expression that we might use involve movement, dance, 'cushions work', and using breath and voice. Occasionally we might encourage a client to use more cathartic means of expression.

One of the important concepts for many of us is breath. We may work with breathing patterns; or use breath as a tracking device to follow process; or as an agent to induce more charge in the client; or simply experience breathing together with another person in a of deep connectedness which reminds us that being is more important than doing.

Spirituality

Most of us have a personal spiritual practice, and we often start staff meetings and also teaching sessions with a breathing meditation to centre ourselves and still chattering minds. Our trainees get used to this and experience for themselves just how much easier it is to communicate with others from such a centred and spacious place.

We value pleasure as a healing principle (as opposed to pain), It feels important to clarify that by pleasure we mean something that goes a lot deeper than mere well-being, that is more sustained than momentary delight, and more embodied than bliss or joy. Unfortunately a freight of rather pejorative meanings have become attached to the term, such as a narrow focus on sexual orgasm, or overtones of cheap consumerist gratification. What we are talking about is, at its deepest, pleasure as a whole-body experience of opening to our aliveness and sustaining a charge of flowing and vibrant sensations and feelings.

Our work is permeated with the knowledge that psychotherapy is a profoundly spiritual process that both client and therapist end with a great enrichment in wisdom and understanding of themselves and the world in which they live. We know that there is a 'still place' in the depth of our soul, the place where true transformation can happen, and that to find that still place is a deeply healing experience. It is one of our greatest ambitions, as well as one of our greatest joys, to be able to simply be in that place with a client.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Sally By ford, Janet Croft, Jane Frances, Claudius Kokott, Gaye Langham, Alastair McNeilage and Gill Westland for their lively and creative contributions to this article.

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