The Philosophical Backgrounds of Bodymind Integration

The Influence of various philosophical forces on Bodymind Integration

by Dirk Marivoet © 2016

THE PREMISES OF BODYMIND (PSYCHOCORPORAL) INTEGRATION 

Central to “Bodymind Integration” (also known as “PsychoCorporal Integration”) as taught at the IBI (Int’l Institute for Bodymind Integration) is the view that mind and body are inseparable. They do not exist in a causal relationship with each other because they are dimensions of the same phenomenon.

Other assumptions and principles of Bodymind Integration include the following:

• Fundamental Connection: There is a fundamental connection in the world, driven by energy and consciousness.
• Energetic Flow: The concept of an “energetic flow” as examplified by Jack Painter’s model, is considered central to human experience. Activation and deactivation, facilitation and inhibition, serve as core concepts for describing the energetic processes that manifest in the regulation or dysregulation of activation states, as well as in pattern formations that simultaneously represent information. The complementarity of consciousness and energy means that states are constituted by energetic patterns of activation and by consciousness processes, with each mutually conditioning the other (Wehowsky, A., 2015).
• Pathology and Connection: Pathology is understood as arising from a loss of connection to the essential self.
• Focus on Intrisic Health: The approach centers on the embodied, actual experience of the individual, which can be described in a descriptive, rather than analytical, manner.
• Interpersonal and intrapersonal work: Bodymind integration is practiced in relation to the therapist; making it both an interpersonal and intrapersonal process. It is a mutual undertaking between therapist and client, carried out with curiosity. Both therapist and client change through the experience, and there is no predetermined end goal.
• Self-Healing and Self-Regulation: In a conducive therapeutic environment, individuals can discover their own healing processes and achieve self-regulation.

“Bodymind Integration” proposes a coherent theory that incorporates progressive insights from philosophy, humanistic psychology, body-oriented psychotherapy, biomedical sciences, and other disciplines.

PHILOSOPHIC FORCES

As an existential approach, “Bodymind Integration” treats any aspect of an individual–body symptoms, sensations, feelings, images, thoughts, subtle energy, spirituality– as a potential entry point for connection.

“Bodymind Integration” emphasizes embodiment as an intrinsic and vital feature of human existence.  It re-associates the spirit with the body to foster a deeper appreciation of life. This process involves reintegrating dissociated parts of the spirit that have been fragmented from the body, thereby reuniting and re-associating them.

In “Bodymind Integration,” a practice of “somatic mindfulness” is encouraged, which includes detailed, moment-by-moment tracking of sensations, feelings, emotions, and impulses to movement. This is complemented by the use of energy charging and discharging, facilitating the completion of a „natural energetic cycle” (as discussed further below).

As a coaching, counseling, self development and body psychotherapeutic approach, “Bodymind Integration” provides a powerful means of making profound and authentic contact with the Self. This approach aims to restore and promote energy balance, cognitive understanding, insight, and equilibrium. The therapeutic alliance in “Bodymind Integration” represents a powerful joining of forces, stimulating and supporting the long, difficult, and often painful work of personal transformation. Here, the practitioner is not seen as a detached observer or technician but as a fully engaged human companion to the client.

“Bodymind Integration” is a resource-oriented approach. It emphasizes helping clients establish connection to the parts of themselves that are already organized, coherent and functional, fostering this connection with interest, curiosity and exploration.  The approach then works inwards from this stable base to address more defended, disorganized, ignored, dysfunctional or excluded aspects of the person’s being, without making these elements the primary focus of therapy or adopting a regressive model.

Blockages in the natural flow of energy (see chart below) are dissolved in uniquely tailored sessions, customised for each client. These sessions may involve hands-on-bodywork or non-touch guidance, depending on the client’s needs. The process incorporates titration (the gradual discharge and minimization of dysregulation or excess load resulting from traumatic experiences) and pendulation of internal experience (gently oscillating between contraction and expansion, fear and safety, anger and calm, grief and acceptance, inaction and action, etc.) to mitigate overwhelming or unintegrated emotional states, all while keeping the nervous system activation within a “window of tolerance.”

• “Bodymind Integration” examplified by Core Strokes™ as a holistic bodywork approach, is guided by a structured framework of steps and paradigm sessions. This framework includes a paradigm energetic cycle designed to bring dissociated parts of the spirit, which have been fragmented from the body, back into alignment with the body, thereby reuniting and re-associating them. Specialized holistic sexological work, known as Pelvic-Heart Integration, focuses on and supports the integration of the split between love and sexuality (heart and pelvis), enhancing sexual ability, satisfaction, and overall quality of life.

Bodymind Integration methods are a rich synthesis of various clinical and theoretical sources including Reichian and Neo-Reichian work, Gestalt process work, Peter Levine’s “Waking of the Tiger” / Somatic Experiencing, role play (e.g. Mother, Father), the theory of the five elements of Chinese medicine, myofascial manipulations, and more.

THEORETICAL CONCEPTS USED IN BODYMIND INTEGRATION ARE DERIVED FROM:

• Integrative and Transcultural Medicine: Different pre-modern medical systems are used, such as a rotating “poly-ray cosmology” (e.g. 2 elements–Yin/Yang; 3 doshas–Ayurveda: Kapha, Pitta, Vata; Hippocrates’ 4 elements: water, air, fire, earth; Chinese Medicine’s Five Elements, etc.). Depending on the capacity for integration, one can move up to a 10-ray system, like the Jewish Kabbalah, which maps the conditions of human consciousness and character.

• Hippocrates’ “Character Medicine” (460-377 BCE): Emphasizes “Know Yourself,” “human resources,” and balancing the elements of a person’s character (sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, melancholic).

• Existentialism: The humanistic thoughts of S. Kierkegaard (1813-1855) and F. Nietzsche (1844-1900), with a focus on “hjaelpekunst” (Danish: “the art of helping”), the awakening of the individual, the confrontation with self-soothing defenses, and the transformation of values into authentic values, realizing the human capacity to shape one’s own life.

• Phenomenology (Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Binswanger, Boss, Laing):  Integrates the concept that human beings are “being-in-the-world,” meaning that they are entities whose very fabric involves immersion in and openness to the surrounding world. The body is the primary site of knowing the world, and the body and perception are inseparable. Through intentionality, humans “co-create” phenomena rather than passively register what is there.

• Dialogical Existence (Martin Buber):.  Emphasizes the idea that within the unfolding relationship of an “I” to a “Thou,” the human person is born and reaches its full potential. Addressing another human being as an “it” diminishes both the other and oneself.

• C.G. Jung: The integration of concepts such as the collective unconscious and archetypes (animus, anima, persona(e), shadow, self), the reality of the soul, and the process of individuation as a lifelong process of psychic growth and realization of the self. Jung’s vision sees psychic suffering not as mere pathology but as a passage in the individuation process.

• Kurt Goldstein’s Holistic Theory of Organism: Applies the figure-ground principle from perception to the whole organism, suggesting that the whole organism serves as the ground for individual stimuli forming the figure.

• Kurt Lewin’s Field Theory: Proposes that both nature (inborn tendencies) and nurture (life experiences) interact to shape an individual’s behavior and personality.

• The Gestalt-psychology/Therapy (Frederick Perls et al.): Incorporates the existential dimension, the notion of the present “here-and-now,” and the existential responsibility for one’s choices. It also includes creative means for dealing with conflict situations, inner disunity, and fragmentation.

• Wilhelm Reich and Neo-Reichian Developments (Alexander Lowen’s Bio-Energetic Analysis, John Pierrakos’ Core-Energetics, Stanley Keleman’s Formative Psychology): Focuses on the body as the living memory of experience and hereditary suffering. Specialized work is done with character armoring, recognizing a spiritual dimension.

• Somatic Practices (Elisabeth Dicke, Ida Rolf, Tom Myers, etc.): Includes techniques for releasing chronic myofascial contractions, working with acupressure points, Chinese Five Elements theory, and other somatic disciplines like Alexander Technique, Feldenkrais’ Functional Integration, and Yoga.

• Psychodrama (J. Moreno), Family Reconstruction (Virginia Satir), PBSP (Albert Pesso), Bodymind Drama (Jack Painter): Utilizes dramatization, role-playing, and dramatic self-presentation to investigate and gain insight into one’s life. This may include enactments of memories, unfinished situations, inner dramas, or mental states in the here-and-now, with group members supporting the protagonist in specific roles.

• Transpersonal Psychology: Explores development beyond conventional, personal, or individual levels, encompassing wider aspects of humankind, life, psyche, or the cosmos.

Additional Fields of Influence:

• Intersubjectivity: Relational Psychoanalysis (e.g., Daniel Stern), Applied to Newborn Infants (e.g., Colwyn Trevarthen), Theory of Embodied Simulation (Vittorio Gallese – mirror neurons).
• Modern Somatic Psychotherapies: Includes Sensorimotor Psychotherapy (Pat Ogden), Somatic Experiencing (Peter Levine), NARM (Laurence Heller).
• Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Strengths-Based Therapy, Elements of CBT.
• Affective Neurosciences: Stephen Porges’ Polyvagal Theory, Jaak Panksepp’s work on Basic Emotional Systems, Dan Siegel’s Mindsight.
• Trauma Theories: Stresses the importance of working with the body, as derived from Bessel van der Kolk, Peter Levine, Pat Ogden, etc.
• Mindfulness, Contemporary Relational Themes in Counseling and Psychotherapy, Cranio-Sacral Therapy.
• Chaos Theory (Ilya Prigogine, Isabelle Stengers): Influences include the shift from genetics to epigenetics, behavioral epigenetics, the discovery of the social engagement system (Stephen Porges), and the anticholinergic anti-inflammatory reflex (K.J. Tracey).
• Stress Theory: The shift in focus from Hans Selye’s classic stress concept to Henri Laborit’s discovery of the inhibition of action syndrome (l’inhibition de l’action), which ties into behavioural epigenetic. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hD7lMDXDvt8)
• Aaron Antonovsky’s Concept of “Salutogenesis”: Focuses on the theory of “sense of coherence,” emphasizing the importance of being alive and real as a hallmark of health.
• Inter-subjectivity (Relational Psychoanalysis (e.g. Daniel Stern), Applied to newborn infants (e.g. Colwyn Trevarthen ), theory of embodied simulation (Vittorio Gallese – mirror neurons)

Broader descriptive terms: Humanistic, Holistic, Integrative, Existential and Transpersonal.

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