The Embodied Psychotherapist - The Therapist's Body Story

The therapist's body is a vital part of the therapeutic encounter, yet there is an inherent inadequacy in current psychotherapeutic discourse to describe the bodily phenomena. This text uses accounts of therapists' own experiences to address this inadequacy, providing strategies for incorporating these feelings into therapeutic work with clients.How do psychotherapists use their bodies? The therapist's body is a vital part of the therapeutic encounter, yet there is an inherent inadequacy in current psychotherapeutic discourse to describe the bodily phenomena. The whole area of touch in psychotherapy has been given very little attention. "The Embodied Psychotherapist" uses accounts of therapists' own experiences to address this inadequacy in discourse, and provides strategies for incorporating these feelings into therapeutic work with clients. Drawing on these personal accounts, it also discusses the experiences that can be communicated to the therapist during the encounter.