Lichaamsgerichte therapie (psychotherapie & traumatherapie) in Amsterdam / somatic traumatherapy

Bodymind Integrated Psychotherapy

02.11.2025 Psychotherapy, somatic therapy, somatic traumatherapy, therapy, Trauma

Bodymind Integrated Psychotherapy (IP) uses the body as a entrance for psychotherapeutic exploration. This adds a lot; the body speaks direct and answers clear. IP sessions bring insight into your physical, mental, and emotional blockages, and you develop concrete tools to experience more vitality and opportunities for self-expression in your daily life. It teaches you to recognize strategies that you use in daily contact to be loved, but which can also stand in the way of deeper contact. It s based on the framework of Reich and Lowen’s character styles.

 

An important element of this 4-year training is the dynamics around distance and closeness. What feels too close for one person, another experiences as too far away. By exploring the narcissistic and co-dependent layer of your own character, you can better place yourself on this spectrum. This helps you to guide these difficult dynamics in your interactions.

 

The curriculum includes group dynamics, bioenergetics, body drama, breathwork, and body-oriented communication. In addition, there is a lot of focus on the fundaments and importance of the therapeutic relationship and the therapists contribution to it.

 

Photo: Arno Senoner

NARM™

02.11.2025 Mindfulness, Psychotherapy, somatic therapy, somatic traumatherapy, therapy, Trauma

“Paradoxically, the more we try to change ourselves, the more we prevent change. On the other hand, the more we allow ourselves to fully experience who we are, the greater the possibility of change.”

~Dr. Laurence Heller, grondlegger NARM

 

 

NARM, the NeuroAffective Relational Model, is a form of trauma therapy that focuses on healing relational, attachment, and complex developmental trauma (C-PTSD). In NARM sessions, we work with survival patterns that cause lifelong difficulties in connecting with ourselves and others. These early unconscious patterns get in the way of connection and are associated with all kinds of psychobiological symptoms.

 

The patterns arise around five life themes that we all encounter in our development: connection, attunement, trust, autonomy, and love-sexuality. NARM places less emphasis on why someone is the way they are and more on how their survival style distorts what they experience in the present moment. The here-and-now way of working is based on somatic mindfulness and increases our capacity for self-regulation. In this way, we create more capacity to be present with ourselves and with others.

 

 

Photo: Tehzeeb Kazmi

Somatic Experiencing (SE)®

02.11.2025 Psychotherapy, somatic therapy, somatic traumatherapy, therapy, Trauma

“Trauma is not what happens to us, but what we hold inside in the absence of an empathetic witness.”

~Peter Levine, founder of SE

 

Somatic Experiencing is a form of body-oriented trauma therapy and a scientifically based method for working with physical and psychological symptoms of stress, shock, and trauma (PTSD). SE is based on Stephen Porges’ Polyvagal Theory.

 

SE focuses on completing the natural responses to traumatic events and making feelings of powerlessness and despair understandable. Unprocessed traumatic experiences disrupt the natural rhythm and regulation of the nervous system. This reduces resilience and can lead to all kinds of physical, emotional, and psychological complaints. By integrating that stored survival energy, you restore your original vitality and resilience. In SE sessions, the body’s natural self-regulating systems are addressed by, among other things, increasing somatic awareness, slowing down, processing major experiences in small steps, and finding resources.

 

In SE sessions, we observe how the body’s physiology has remembered the story of what happened, so that with that information, the story as it was can be given a new sequel.

 

Photo: Eric Combeau

collective trauma & the cultural crisis

02.11.2025 Mindfulness, Psychotherapy, somatic therapy, somatic traumatherapy, therapy, Trauma

“Of all the dangers we face, from climate chaos to permanent war, none is so great as this deadening of our response.”

~Joanna Macy

 

Trauma occurs where vitality has come to a standstill. Trauma is not an individual problem; it is a social problem and it is systemic. It does not belong to an individual, but is relational and always occurs within a context.

 

Collective trauma occurs when groups of people dominate and others are excluded, when human rights are violated. Think of racism, colonialism, and sexism. The consequences lie like a layer of permafrost in the history of humanity (Thomas Hübl).

 

Many indigenous peoples see the interconnectedness. In modern Western culture, we have come to believe in the illusion of separateness and hyper-individualism. This culture lies at the roots of the climate and ecological crisis. This crisis is about injustice that is so interwoven in our culture that we hardly see it.

 

The people who contribute most to exacerbating the crisis are the least affected by its consequences. Climate disruption hits those who contribute the least the hardest, such as people in the global south, young people, people who are not even born yet, and species other than our own. We in the West live a life of privilege, which brings with it a responsibility to address injustice and do the right thing. Standing up against injustice stems from our concern for others.

 

If there is one thing that the climate and ecological crisis makes abundantly clear, it is that we are all connected. All life on Earth breathes the same air. All life is physically connected to and therefore also by the Earth. And everything that every human being contributes makes a difference. Healing collective trauma is everyone’s responsibility. We heal this when we can see and feel the other in ourselves.

 

Photo: Simon Berger

state of the world stress & emotions

02.11.2025 Psychotherapy, somatic therapy, somatic traumatherapy, therapy, Trauma

“Emotions are often what lead people to act.” ~Dr. Britt Wray

 

In sessions about the state of the world, politics, systemic opression and the climate crisis, we focus on increasing resilience so that we don’t get stuck feeling the wide range challenging of emotions it brings. It is human to feel fear, sadness, anger, guilt, shame, and despair when we face reality and are confronted with loss, unpredictability, and threat.

 

It is also human to want to protect ourselves from this; we often want to avoid pain. We can become overwhelmed or numb if we feel too much at once. Then we are no longer able to act, and this does not help us personaly nor collectively.

 

Yet if we want to find our way in the wilderness of our times, we need to feel what is inside us. We feel because we love and care. And when we feel we do it is important is that we not only pay attention to what challenges us, but that we also pay attention to what we are grateful for, to what brings us pleasure, to beauty, and to what nourishes our lives. It is in the tension between pain and fear on the one hand and gratitude and love for life on the other, that our resilience grows. Trying to contribute to a more just world is what gives meaning to our lives.

 

Emotions often spur people into action. It may well be that feelings of ecological anxiety and grief, while enormously challenging, are in fact the crucible through which humanity must pass in order to muster the energy and conviction needed to make the life-saving changes that are now required. (From: Source)

 

Photo: Javier Miranda

embodied activism & resilience

02.11.2025 Psychotherapy, somatic therapy, somatic traumatherapy, therapy, Trauma

“At its best, activism is a form of healing. It is about what we do and how we show up in the world. It is about learning and expressing regard, compassion, and love.”

~ Resmaa Menakem

 

Standing up and speaking out against social norms that are causing social opression and the climate crisis, in whatever form, is an act of activism.

 

We are all born with the capacity to express ourselves and to protest when injustice is done to us or to others. Every human being has the right to stand up for themselves and for others. To do this, you need access to your caring, your heart, your voice, your courage, your strength.

 

Sustainable activism is about moving back and forth between pain and action. If we move too quickly from pain to action and don’t allow ourselves time to mourn what we have already lost and are yet to lose, we try to mask our pain with solutions. This can burn us out.

 

The reality is this: it is already too late to stop losing what is being lost. And everything we do can prevent things of getting worse.

 

These times call for inner activism and outward activism (Caroline Hickman). The inner process of daring to feel our fear and grief can fuel the vitality we need to use our voices and take action to address injustice and stand up for life. This is what brings meaning and creates hope.

 

“Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.” ~Vaclav Havel

 

Foto: Michiel Wijnbergh