Developmental Somatic Psychotherapy (DSP)

The DSP-theory teaches a comprehensive system describing fundamental movement patterns. The theory provides the practitioner with a framework for observation, formulation, and therapeutic intervention – that is dialogic, phenomenological, field-sensitive, and experiential. Experience is at the heart of the training, and through movement experiments the learners are practicing to sensitise themselves to their kinesthetic experience and pay attention to micro movements in themselves and another. Developing a clear felt experience of one’s own moving body in relation supports the therapist to uncover that which is communicated nonverbally in sessions, and thus enhance their bodily knowing.

Contents

The first and second module attends to gestalt therapy as a phenomenological and aesthetic approach. The most central principles of the DSP-theory are introduced, in particular kinesthetic resonance and the sequence of the six fundamental movement patterns and their psychological functions. These modules highlight the importance of developing our kinesthetic awareness: the qualitative dynamics of moving. We specifically explore the fundamental movement patterns yielding-with (being-with), pushing-against and reaching for.

The third module attends to postural dynamics: the bodily dimensions and their implicit co-created meanings. We continue with the sequence of the six fundamental movements and their psychological functions, exploring grasping-onto, pulling-toward and releasing-from. The fourth module presents an aesthetic and phenomenological approach to psychopathology, and how we can analyse the emerging situation through movement. In particular the focus for this module is kinesthetic remembering: a somatic and developmental exploration of experienced time.

In the fifth module, we will apply the DSP- theory to examine the bodily roots of developmental trauma and traumatic attaching, from its origins in the infant-caregiver dyad. We will also attend to the re-traumatizing experiences that occur in psychotherapy – for both therapists and clients.

Developmental trauma happens when the caregiver is not able to respond to the child in such a way that the child feels satisfyingly met enough of the time. This workshop will consider the bi-directionality of attaching, and how both parent and child powerfully impact each other through movement dynamics. We will also attend to how unspoken stories and intergenerational trauma lives through the moving-feeling body.

The relational foundation that is set early in life surfaces in adult contacting and of course in psychotherapy sessions, and like in the caregiver-baby dyad therapists and clients can inevitably re-traumatize each other. In this workshop we will explore how these early patterns influence the unfolding therapeutic relationship, and how we can work through these habitual gestalts.