Traditionally, therapies have attempted to change perceptions of the world by means of reason and insight, with conditioning and behavior modification, or with drugs and medications. However, perceptions remain fundamentally unchanged until the internal experience of the body changes.  Even after the death of a loved one, physical injury, a rape or assault, survivors can learn to have new bodily experiences, can heal, can accept what has happened and then create new lives and new communities.   

The trauma response is a set of defensive bodily reactions that people initially mobilize in order to protect themselves, both from threat, and then later, against feeling the crushing totality of their horror, helplessness and pain. However, as time goes on, this avoidance keeps them frozen and stuck in the past, unable to be fully present, in the here and now, and unable to go forward in life.

Fixed in the defensive trauma response, the shame, defeat and humiliation, associated with the original event replays itself over and over again in the body; detached from history, but intruding into the present.
Together, we will explore the implications of Body-oriented psychotherapy and recent findings in the neurosciences, on how the brain and body deals with emotional information, while also providing an understanding of effective therapeutic action.

This training is geared for psychotherapists of all types, as well as for physicians, nurses, physiotherapists, bodyworkers, and educators.

Peter A Levine, PhD– is the developer of Somatic Experiencing®, a naturalistic, approach to healing. He has received the Lifetime Achievement award from the United States Association for Body Psychotherapy, as well as the Reiss-Davis Chair for his lifetime contribution to infant and child psychiatry. Dr. Levine served as a Stress consultant for NASA’s space shuttle development program.

He is the author of several best-selling books on trauma, including Waking the Tiger, Healing Trauma (published in 24 languages), In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness and his latest book, Trauma and Memory.