Somatic Experiencing is a body-based trauma modality. It’s not yet well established in evidence-based research, but techniques from this approach have been very helpful for myself and for many of my clients. ‘Soma’ means body, so the goal is noticing our body and recognizing signs of safety, threat, hunger, danger, joy. How do we experience having a body?

Traumatic situations leading to PTSD can create strong physiological symptoms such as muscle tension, intense emotional reactions or shutdowns, etc., that last long after the situation has ended. You might be technically safe now, for example, but your body doesn’t seem to know it – you’re still super alert, can’t relax, and may overreact easily to triggers that others-maybe even you- would not think of as a big deal.

SE theory suggests that fight/flight/freeze responses can get ‘stuck’ when they aren’t able to complete their goal. For example, someone who survives being physically assaulted by shutting down but who felt too ashamed to tell anyone about it, might still feel very tense in their body, jumpy around certain situations that might remind them (consciously or not) of that situation- maybe their arm quickly comes up when they’re startled, as if they want to hit a coworker they didn’t notice coming around the corner, even though they don’t ever actually hit people. Perhaps during the assault the person survived, the assailant had a larger frame and thus the person went into a freeze state, and now they feel a heavy shame for having not tried to fight back.

SE takes all these small things- the quickly-raised arm, the perpetual muscle tension, the shame so heavy the person literally folds over when they recall the assault – and brings gentle, compassionate attention to them. What do those sensations need? To move, to open, to be still? SE helps you learn to identify what your FELT sense of your emotions is, track changes in our nervous system state, and lets the body do what it didn’t get to do then – like raise an arm to shield yourself.

SE doesn’t just work with the ick stuff, though – it also puts a lot of emphasis on noticing signs of neutral or pleasant mood & body states. What does ‘safe’ feel like, or ‘safe-enough’ in this moment? How do your shoulders feel when you realize that you’re in an okay place? Let your eyes look around the room and notice where they want to go. When we bring attention to things like that we often notice we’re actually holding a lot of tension in our body that isn’t needed, even when we’re not recalling a traumatic experience!

So to me, somatic experiencing is literally just about experiencing the body and how it’s affected by our emotions and experiences… and relearning (or learning for the first time) how to feel a little more at home in our own skin.

Learn more about Somatic Experiencing: https://traumahealing.org/se-101/