DESCRIPTION OF BIOENERGETICS

Bioenergetics is a therapeutic counselling approach used to work verbally and physically with clients seeking in-depth emotional counselling.  Practitioners of Bioenergetics believe that the mind and the body are an inseparable unit.  They see a difficult behaviour or an emotional discomfort in a person’s life in relation with muscular holding patterns in a person’s body.  They understand that such muscular holding patterns were mostly structured as a result of early childhood trauma.  A practitioner of Bioenergetics works to understand the personal history of a client while, at the same time, relating that history to the muscular holding patterns in a client’s body.  In Bioenergetics therapy a client

a) explores the current difficult behaviour or emotional problem,

b) explores the childhood circumstances related to the current problem, and

c) works physically to release the holding patterns structured in the body corresponding to the difficult behaviour or emotional problem.

The physical approaches include various grounding exercises, breathing exercises, stretching exercises and expressive exercises.  The physical work and verbal work are inseparable.