What is Somatic Experiencing?
Somatic Experiencing (SE) is a body-oriented approach to healing trauma, developed by Dr. Peter Levine. Unlike talk therapy, SE pays attention to what's happening in your body — tension, heaviness, held breath, racing heart. These are your nervous system's signals.
SE works with these sensations to help the body complete what got interrupted during a traumatic or overwhelming experience. We're not that interested in what happened — we're interested in what didn't get to happen.
How it's different
Most people have tried talking about their problems, and talking helps, to a point. But trauma isn't primarily stored in your thoughts — it lives in the body. That's why you can understand your patterns intellectually and still repeat them.
SE works at the level where change actually happens.
"Trauma originates as a response in the nervous system, and does not originate in an event. Trauma is in the nervous system, not in the event."
Dr. Peter Levine"Traumatic symptoms are not caused by the event itself. They arise when residual energy from the experience is not discharged from the body."
Dr. Peter Levine