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Embodied approaches to therapy support you in bringing attention and intention to your body systems, mind states and movement to bring greater coherence to your full self. Bringing awareness to your movement, sense perceptions, sense of energy, and orientation to the ground and space helps cultivate a 'bottom up' (body-to-mind) way of relating and reponding to your needs, impulses and desires. As you learn to safely attend and respond to what your system is communicating at the body level you can experience greater ease, integration and vitality, even in the face of pain or discomfort. In your body, each and every occurance of thought, feeling, emotion, memory, action and belief involves changes in patterns of movement, shifts in awareness in the body, and countless transformative processes within your bodies’ systems. How you experience painful feeling states depends upon how you relate to these states. As you learn to expand your awareness to include patterns of micromovements in the body in order to work directly with your feeling states, you alleviate suffering at the site of the experiencing body. You can change your relationship to pain, learn to cultivate and experience ease moment-to-moment and day-to-day. The two primary somatically oriented modalities that inform my work as a Body-oriented psychotherapist and as a somatic movement therapist & educator are Body-Mind Centering® and UZAZU Embodied Intelligence.

I offer sessions in somatic therapy, distinct from psychotherapy. You might choose to work with me in this way if: You are interested in focusing specifically on body or movement issues; You want to explore or deepen embodiment and movement-based practices for your growth, evolution or wellbeing; You want to work with me using UZAZU or Body-Mind Centering as a primary approach, without a need for ongoing psychotherapy or counseling per se; For some other reason it is a better fit to engage with somatic movement therapy rather than psychotherapy. In an initial session we'll talk about your somatic, movement, dance or life goals as well as any related physical mental and emotional issues. I'll share with you some options for how we can work and what I can offer. We may meet for one session at a time as desired, or we might contract for a number of somatic sessions. My approaches to somatic work include: UZAZU Embodied Intelligence; Body-Mind Centering®; resource development and visualizations; ego state work; Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT); and polyvagal-theory/nervous system-informed frameworks for understanding movement and embodiment as an expression Self. Somatic work might be done seated, lying down, standing, or with a physioball; or we might move around a bunch. We might work with visualization and internal resourcing, where we attend to your beliefs, emotions and feeling states while working imaginally. We also do talk- not only is it allowed-- it is an important part of helping to identify as well as integrate the changes you are seeking! If you are working with me in person (rather than online) we might use props such as yoga straps or blankets and bolsters. I might ask you to move and offer verbal or hands on guidance. I might offer touch to help you locate or experience an aspect of your body's anatomy or physiology or to help you to integrate your experience. My extensive training and background in improvisational dance and yoga also deeply informs the embodiment work I offer, when appropriate. My fees are the same for somatic movement therapy as they are for psychotherapy. A session may be active and engaging or quiet and restorative, depending on your needs. Sessions are typically 60-75 minutes. I charge $145 per hour.

Over the past six years I have been bringing UZAZU Embodied Intelligence --a powerful and uniquely effective somatic movement modality-- to my work with clients, as a psychotherapist and somatic movement therapist as well as in the context of consultation/mentoring for helping professionals. In an UZAZU session we attend to states of being that feel over-activated, balanced, or blocked. Using guided or exploratory movement, body posture, and awareness of spatial dimensions, I support you in making powerful or needed shifts that lead to greater capacities and easefulness in your system. UZAZU helps people to: get clear on underlying patterns of behavior that contribute to life challenges; work psychophysically with the changes they'd like to make; and implement clear and effective body-mind awareness-based ways of integrating the changes with daily life. Working in this way is intuitive yet powerful--I highly recommend you try it. If UZAZU is a central modality we are using in our work together, I will also invite you to take the UZAZU Embodied Intelligence Self-Assessment, and/or the UZAZU 8 Life Areas Self-Assessment at the beginning of our work, and then occasionally in order to track changes or re-assess what we are targeting. We can also use these Self-Assessments in a more precise or focused way to get clear on a particular aspect of your experience. As a core member of the UZAZU team, I work closely with founder Dylan Newcomb in his organization as a co-trainer & clinical consultant, and as a primary collaborator on curriculum and content development. To learn more about this modality you can go to UZAZU.org .

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a psychotherapy modality which has been found to be helpful for significantly reducing pain or discomfort related to past experiences or traumas. It is also helpful for reducing anticipatory anxiety, fear or other discomfort about upcoming, actual, or imagined future events. EMDR utilizes bilateral stimulation (auditory, kinesthetic or visual stimulation alternating between left and right sides of the body) within a structured protocol. This helps to change how information is stored in the brain about that event. The EMDR trauma processing protocol can help to transform disturbing images, beliefs, emotions and sensations associated with past experiences. Over time this results in positive change in the present, with a sense of relief about past events and new beliefs about the future. EMDR resource development can help to harness the strengths or qualities that you already possess or would like to develop, in order to put them to use for specific situations for which you feel they are most needed. An excellent framework for treatment, I continue to use EMDR as one of my primary practice modalities.I consider myself fortunate to have received training in EMDR early in my work as a therapist, and have presented workshops both locally and nationally for EMDR International Association conferences.

The polyvagal theory is a theory about how the autonomic nervous system functions that can be used as a framework for psychotherapy and other healing work. Learning the theory in easy-to-understand concepts can help you better understand the physiological states that influence and even control your feelings, behaviors, and ways of relating to yourself and others. The theory helps you understand what you are doing and why you might be doing it-- at the level of the nervous system. In my work with clients (whether as psychotherapist or somatic movement therapist) I often introduce this theory, and together we explore its relevance to your life and experience. We then can reference this understanding throughout our work to help re-pattern how you perceive your experiences and to support state shifting, a key component of recovery and transformational work. I also teach body-based movements and methods that bring greater coherence to your nervous system by helping activate the 'safety & connection' branch of the vagus nerve. These simple exercises can help you move more quickly and effectively out of states of distress, helping you to land back into your sense of feeling safe and connected. In my work as a trainer and workshop leader I bring my expertise in the polyvagal theory to help other professionals learn how to bring this lens to their work, as well as to support dancers and movers in deepening their embodied psychophysical experience. See (link) for more details.

Ego State Work: Whether as a psychotherapist, or in my work as a somatic movement therapist & educator, I often offer a 'parts of self' perspective and exploration, which can be a practical yet powerful way to engage with parts of ourselves that we might otherwise have difficulty integrating within our whole self. The two approaches to ego state work that strongly influence my approaches are Internal Family Systems and the Model of Structural Dissociation. Deep Brain Reorienting: This method helps alleviate trauma & distress patterns. It involves attending to the defense impulses encoded at the 'deep brain' level of the body. We work with subtle awareness and movements of the head on the neck, including (but not limited to) facial expression, neck, and shoulder activity. The work is gentle and safe, and integrates well with the modalities I use in my practice. Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT, 'Tapping'): I offer and teach EFT to clients as well when needed or desired. This energy psychology technique is also sometimes referred to as "tapping" and can be used between sessions a powerful self-help method. I often incorporate Henry Grayson's EFT-A, a modified ("A" for adapted) version of EFT which focuses specifically on processing emotions.