What is somatic therapy? Experts explain how it works

Imagine for a moment that you're at the beach. You can feel the soft, warm sand beneath your feet, the gentle caress of the ocean breeze on your skin, and the soothing sound of the waves crashing nearby. Suddenly, without warning, a painful memory or troubling thought emerges, causing a surge of anxiety. Instead of letting this emotion dominate, what if you could tap into the sensations and movements of your body to help process and heal those feelings? This is what therapists describe as somatic therapy, sometimes referred to as body psychotherapy.

What is somatic therapy?

Unlike traditional cognitive behavioral therapy, which centers on the connection between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, somatic therapy goes beyond talk. At its core, somatic therapy encourages integration between the mind and the body, supporting the notion that “the body holds onto traumas, emotions, and memories,” says Ryan Sultan, MD, therapist, psychiatrist, medical director of Integrative Psych, Columbia research, and clinical professor. “By working with the body, you can release and heal from these troubling experiences,” Sultan continues. According to him, “Instead of focusing solely on talking through issues, this therapy focuses on bodily sensations, movements, and other physical experiences to aid in healing.”

For instance, imagine you are dealing with the trauma that can follow a car accident. Certain sounds — car horns or screeching tires — might set off panic for you in this scenario. With a somatic therapist, you’ll be guided through how to tune into your body and work through these moments. Somatic therapists can teach you grounding techniques, special movements, and calming breathing exercises. Over time, you can learn to control these reactions and, in doing so, make progress toward healing from the trauma.

What are the types of somatic therapy?

There are many kinds of somatic therapy. According to Sarah Rollins, a licensed clinical social worker, somatic experiencing practitioner, and therapist at Embodied Wellness, these are some of the most popular types of body psychotherapy:

Somatic experiencing — can help resolve trauma by focusing on bodily sensations and releasing pent-up fight, flight, freeze, and fawn responses

Sensorimotor psychotherapy — combines talk therapy with physical techniques to address trauma and emotional issues throughout the body
Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) — processes traumatic memories using bilateral stimulation to reduce their emotional impact
Brainspotting — identifies trauma by pinpointing eye positions linked to distressing memories and sensations
Internal family systems (IFS) — explores different aspects of personality to promote healing and self-awareness

What are the techniques of somatic therapy?

There are many techniques employed beneath the somatic therapy umbrella. Rollins describes one technique as an example: “This exercise is called pendulation and it was developed by Peter Levine. The goal is to practice changing your state by noticing a mild disturbance and then moving between the disturbance and a place of calm or relaxation.”

First, she invites someone to find a place in their bodies where they feel tension, pain, or an unpleasant emotion. Then she moves to another area of the body or environment that is more pleasant — the feeling of joy in their heart or a beautiful painting on the wall, perhaps. Finally, she guides them to slowly move between these two places, encouraging them to simply notice their experience without judgment.

“Some of them might involve simple grounding exercises, like feeling one's feet firmly planted on the ground, while others might include more intensive movement-based therapies or touch,” Dr. Sultan adds. Practicing dance as a way to work through recurring nightmares, for example, may not seem like a natural solution, but pairing the two may help to express feelings, channel energy, and process trauma in a way that talking alone might not achieve.

What can somatic therapy help with?

Somatic therapy can assist with a range of mental health disorders and issues. Specifically, Sultan says, “Somatic therapy can help with trauma, depression, anxiety, eating disorders, stress, grief and loss, self-esteem, dissociation, and more.”

Because trauma can show up in the body in various ways — muscle tension, disrupted sleep, or digestive problems — addressing the body can be a key component of healing.

How does somatic therapy work?

So, how does it all work? Rollins explains the process like this: somatic therapy works by first and foremost connecting us to our bodies. Through trauma, life events, and stress, we often tend to disconnect from our bodies. This is a protection mechanism, but the trouble is that healing and disconnection are often at odds with each other. Once we are connected, we can create more space for learning to tolerate and befriend the sensations we experience rather than respond from a place of fear. Next, we can learn how to regulate our nervous system states and how we respond to fear (fight, flight, freeze, and fawn) so we no longer feel like permanent passengers, with the body’s reactions always at the wheel.

Our bodies are repositories for much more than what we eat. Sometimes, especially in cases involving ongoing and/or severe trauma, chronic tension can build up and set off unwanted physical symptoms or behavioral patterns. “Somatic therapy helps people tune into these bodily sensations and, through awareness and certain techniques, release pent-up emotions or memories. It's a process of bringing unconscious or barely-recognized bodily reactions into conscious awareness, where they can be processed and integrated,” according to Sultan.

What is the effectiveness of somatic therapy?

The effectiveness of somatic therapy has garnered attention in recent years. Since there are different subtypes of somatic therapy, each approach carries varying risks and benefits for those who engage. However, for every subtype, efficacy, to some extent, has been observed — and it’s often promising. EMDR has been shown to potentially help reduce symptoms of PTSD by more than 61 percent in some. In studies regarding somatic experiencing, a study found evidence of a long-term decrease in PTSD symptoms.

At the end of the day, only you (with the guidance of your therapist and/or healthcare team) can decide if somatic therapy is something you’d like to try. While it can work well in a formal somatic therapy setting with a licensed practitioner, there are also countless somatic exercises online you can consider — including our own child-led somatic series.

What is somatic therapy? Experts explain how it works