I recently completed my second course through the Upledger Institute in SomatoEmotional Release work, and I wanted to take some time to reflect on the experience.
I won’t lie: SomatoEmotional Release really challenges my left-brain tendencies. I love cold, hard facts and extensive studies. SomatoEmotional Release, however, is grounded in Dr. John Upledger’s extensive work and draws from multiple psychological theories, including Gestalt psychology, Jungian psychology, and Robert Assagioli’s psychosynthesis model.
What SomatoEmotional Release is not is talk therapy. I always recommend that clients who choose to explore this work also have a talk therapist they can check in with while processing their experience(s). However, like all techniques, this work may not be applicable for all clients.
What SomatoEmotional Release is, however, is work with the mind–body connection. Through touch and guided visualization techniques, a person may access and release emotion that has been stored in the body’s tissues. For example, if someone trips and falls, the fear experienced in that moment might be remembered by the tissues along with the physical impact. The Upledger Institute refers to this disorganized energy—energy that disrupts the body’s natural patterns—as an “energy cyst”. The theory suggests that the body holds onto this energy and compensates by expending extra effort to function around it. It is not uncommon during SomatoEmotional Release work for the body to take on the physical position of an old injury right before an “energy cyst” releases.
During the course, we practiced specific objectives on each other at the table. One of my most meaningful experiences involved the scar area on my neck from the thyroidectomy I underwent after my thyroid cancer diagnosis. That day, the spot felt vulnerable to me. My partner placed her hands gently on the front and back of my throat and began using standard CranioSacral holding techniques. My closed eyes moved rapidly, and suddenly I was “experiencing” my surgery—yet observing it from above my own body. I felt what seemed like the breathing tube in my throat. I moved through the entire sequence: the removal of my thyroid, the cauterizing after the cancer was taken out, the suturing, the removal of the tube, and finally waking up in the hospital bed.
Throughout the visualization, I felt fear during the “surgery,” but an overarching calm held me. When the experience concluded, I felt myself “come back,” my eye movements settled, and I opened my eyes feeling lighter—less apprehensive about having had cancer. No, I don’t believe I actually witnessed my surgery. But the release of emotion allowed me to make peace with an experience that had continued to trigger anxiety. My partner was able to feel very specific changes in my tissues throughout the process. In Upledger terminology, these sensations are known as the Significance Detector and Stillpoint which allow the practitioner to better facilitate the process.
Since then, I’ve facilitated clients through different journeys. One of my favorite visualization techniques is to help a person give their pain a texture, color, temperature, or even a voice. From there we ask the pain its purpose, then guide the body through “sending it on its way”—perhaps by visualizing washing it away, burning it off, absorbing it, or transforming it. I can feel the tissues actually soften during this work.
I’ll end with a butchered quote from the final Harry Potter movie, where Harry asks Dumbledore:
“Is this in my head, or is it real?”
And Dumbledore replies:
“Of course it is in your head, but why should that mean it is not real?”
Valerie Carsey, LLC 