The CBT Dive

Getting out of your mind and into your body with somatic therapy

• Rahim Thawer, MSW • Season 2 • Episode 7

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Instead of exploring thoughts patterns using CBT this episode, Rahim interviews somatic counsellor Megan Blair, who then guides him through a mini session where Rahim plays the role of the client who is encouraged to explore what his body is experiencing and what insight it can give him.

They discuss the practice of somatic experiencing and its focus on the mind-body connection. Megan explains that somatic counselling is a body-based practice that looks at the mind-body connection and uses various modalities such as somatic experiencing, Internal Family Systems, and Focusing. They explore how somatic counselling can help individuals with social anxiety and how it focuses on cultivating an inner sense of knowing and regulating the nervous system. 

The conversation emphasises the importance of cultivating curiosity and giving voice to different parts of oneself. It delves into the concept of feeling heard and understood, and the need for alignment and attunement within oneself.

#somatic #mindbodyconnection  #somatictherapy  #internalfamilysystems   #nervoussystem #nervoussystemregulation #nervoussystemhealing

ABOUT THE CBT DIVE PODCAST
The CBT Dive is a video podcast that brings therapy skills to the real world. Each episode welcomes a new guest who wants to explore a challenging situation using the most common cognitive behavioural therapy tool: the thought record.

ABOUT HOST
Rahim Thawer is a queer, racialized social worker and psychotherapist based in Toronto. He's created The CBT Dive podcast to support folks who want to learn how to use a thought record and to demystify what therapy can look like.

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SPEAKER_00:

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the CBT Dive. Today, we have a special guest. Her name is Megan Blair. She's a counselor who focuses on somatic experiencing. I'm really excited to take a back seat and not be the therapist in this session and see what I can learn from getting out of my mind and into my body. Megan. How are you doing?

SPEAKER_01:

I'm doing super well. I'm super excited to be on this podcast with

SPEAKER_00:

you. I'm excited to have you. I was just reflecting on how we met the other day because people asked me if I made any friends while I was in Puerto Vallarta. Yeah. And I said, yeah. I met one friend and her name is Megan and I met her at yoga. Yes. And she's a therapist. And now I know you don't always call yourself a therapist. You go by different titles, but I've been excited and interested in your work since we've met. So let's start off with what kind of therapeutic practice do you do?

SPEAKER_01:

Sure. I mean, just like what you might say, it's always a holistic approach, right?

UNKNOWN:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

But my training specifically is in somatic practices and mindful-based practices.

SPEAKER_00:

Ah, I like that. I like the language. I'm going to ask you to help me pick it apart a bit. So a lot of my listeners know what cognitive behavioral therapy is. And because of the state of social media, whether people realize it or not. They know what psychodynamic therapy is because they're often thinking about trauma responses and the unconscious and attachment. But you do somatic counseling, right? And so could you tell us what somatic counseling is?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. It's an umbrella term. that is used in the field to describe body-based practices. And so looking at the mind-body connection. So they've kind of branched apart into different modalities.

SPEAKER_00:

Like

SPEAKER_01:

maybe some of your listeners know what somatic experiencing is. But some other ones, like Peter Levine, he started that in the 1970s. But others might be internal family systems. Dick Schwartz started that. And also focusing, Eugene Gendlin started that. And it's kind of like they were all kind of, a lot of them were part of the same group. And so like one of them helped start the other. And They're all, there's a lot of crossover and even what you're describing in looking at attachment styles is very much a part of a lot of these modalities as well. So I think the simple way to describe it is it just, it places importance on the mind body connection as the focus of intervention.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. Okay. So we're focusing a lot on the body and you use this term somatic experiencing and it just, stood out to me that you didn't say experience like something in the past it's something that's ongoing

SPEAKER_01:

so i like to just really start with looking at the lay of the land for you what does that feel like for you in your body because it's going to be different for everybody right what's important about this is that it is so like a lot of modalities and psychotherapies it's always client but it has to work for the client for the individual

SPEAKER_00:

right and When we talk about the mind-body connection, is our premise that that connection is poor to begin with? Or do we live in a world that makes that connection ruptured in some way? I'm trying to figure this part out.

SPEAKER_01:

No, that's a really good question. I don't think that I think of a lot of our therapeutic modalities or talk therapy, right? We're always interested in the cognition and what's going on in our brains. But really, there is so much knowledge that is constantly being taken in through the body and more specifically, the nervous system. And I listened to your podcast, you've talked about the nervous system. So maybe some of your listeners have already been turned on to talking about listening about the autonomic nervous system. But I feel like it's a just a different way of entry, you know? And that's why we say both the mind and the body, because it's not either or. It's that connection between the two of them. And what's really important about this field of study is that safety isn't something that we can realize through cognition. It's something that we need to feel in the body, right?

SPEAKER_00:

I see.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. So we're constantly taking in information from our environment, from inside of ourselves, through dynamics, through relationship. And so how can we start to tune in to how we take in information through the nervous system?

SPEAKER_00:

What do you think? Well, I'm kind of thinking about if I were a client, how would I... understand a session or how would I know that I came to therapy and I did what I was supposed to or that I had a good session? I'm trying to figure out with somatic work, like, do I leave a session feeling frustrated? And then the therapist says, yeah, that's what being in your body is. Or do we spend, like, do I come in and talk about a problem and And then you might say, okay, hold on to that problem. And I'm going to redirect you to do a bunch of exercises that get you in your body. And then we approach that problem again. I'm trying to figure out how a session would look and how I might know that I'm like doing it. I'm doing it right. That feels important

SPEAKER_01:

to me. No, those are really good questions. And of course, like you might be frustrated sometimes, you know what I mean? Like we might hit that upper end of what feels... comfortable, right? And I call those the pointy edges. And I think that there's the right level of hard work that it's not going to overwhelm like we talked about before but we want to be challenged in our sessions you know i know cognitive behavioral therapy focuses a lot on homework i really love experiential sessions so in the here and now we're going to do this together if that feels right so personally i really if there was like a problem that a client might be bringing up in a session, I might bring it into an experiential, I call them experiments, you know, and try this off because also if it doesn't work, if a client says, I hated this, that's good information too, you know? So it's never on the binary of like, is this good? Is this bad? It's, um, was this useful to you or why wasn't this useful to you? And it's all good information. I

SPEAKER_00:

see. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. Okay. So I've got a good, you've got me thinking about this. And a follow up for me then is about success from your perspective. So can you share maybe an anecdote or a story where you're working with somebody over one session or several sessions and you see I'm curious about how you understand the progress and what you would label as a success for that person or how you would label it as a success together.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes. I can tell a story about a past client and how I measured that, how I saw that as success. I had a past client that had a few different ethnic identities in former Yugoslavia. And they were at ends with each other. So there was some internal conflict that was happening. And we used a modality that's called focusing. And within this practice, it's a lot of cultivating what they call a self and presence. But it's just an objective perspective. Can we cultivate an objective perspective just to see what's going on in the body? So doing a body scan, seeing what's there. And then when something comes up, a part comes up that wants to be worked with, we can start to create dialogue with that part. We can start to see, is there patterns of other parts that light up? And we can also see what it wants from its perspective, what it doesn't want you to experience. So it's something that we worked on for a while together. And, um, holding those different backgrounds within herself. And then last summer, she went back to her home countries and was able to travel there, feel resourced enough to go to these different countries. And also with the I guess, with the grace of knowing that hard things were going to come up, right? So the end goal of this isn't that you're not going to have to write hard emails. You're not going to have to have hard conversations with your partner. It's that I feel like I know myself well enough to know what's too much and what are my tools when things get to be too much. And then really that... that measure of success for me is the flexibility of the nervous system. How can it come out of regulation and then come back into regulation? And she felt resourced enough and she felt that was supported enough to face some hard things. So I call that success in my mind, even though hard things happened, you know? Of course.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. I totally hear that. Thank you for that. So, I just want to recap what I've heard you say. I've been taking some notes here. So some of the things you said in terms of somatic experiencing, you've kind of told us what some of the interventions and techniques are. So there's education or what you would call psychoeducation around the nervous system. and the window of tolerance. So when you're feeling really activated or you're under activated, either way, it's a response to being triggered and you're just not in your optimal zone. And then you've talked about awareness building. So you've educated people on the nervous system and now it's their own kind of awareness of what is too much, what is hyper and what is hypo aroused for me. And that's in their context relative to other events and settings. I really like the language you used around experiential work and doing experiments. And from what I gathered, experiments happen in the session and outside the session. And an example of experiments is parts work. Is that right?

SPEAKER_01:

You got it.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. And parts work is something I know about through Gestalt. Okay. but it's similar to internal family systems. And I didn't realize it's part of somatic experiencing, but you've made that very clear because it's about doing something in the moment and then reflecting on what it feels like. The last thing that you mentioned that I thought was really interesting was you use this language of she felt resourced enough. And so I've heard this in passing from people that we're gonna work on resourcing or internal resourcing. What does that, can you expand on that language a bit? So what does it mean when a therapist says we're gonna work on your resourcing or make you feel more resourced?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and it's something that we've kind of mentioned before is that internal sense of knowing is really important to that internal resourcing, right? So even resourcing might be practice with interrelationship focusing and being able to use that as a tool if feeling super activated, maybe just going internal into the body and saying what's here and then seeing if a part is here that wants to be worked with, you know? And I think a great thing about this is just holding the multiplicity that we all have. Instead of over-identifying with, I am sad, I am mad, it's saying a part of me is sad. A part of me also might be joyful. A part of me also might be filled with grief. And so it's just really holding the multiplicity of all these different parts that we have. But going back to your original question, kind of straying here, is that... Resourcing could be a lot of different things, but mostly I think the key in this practice is cultivating an inner sense of knowing.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. An inner sense of knowing. If we were to do a little role play, would you be able to be my somatic counselor for a moment? Because I could use this right now. Sure. Okay. Would you be willing to try that? Okay, so I'll tell you really briefly what I'm going, like what's going on in my life. And that is just that I'm embarking on a lot of change. And I am someone who theoretically likes adventure and change, but the process is tough. It's anxiety inducing. There's a level of misery. I feel like there's not enough time. There's anxiety about the future. And I know once I move to the next place, so I'm about to actually move to another city and state, and I know very well that the adjustment time will be longer than what I anticipate because it always is. And so... I'm just throwing this at you, but I do wonder if you've got an experiment for me or a way to help me know better my internal self.

SPEAKER_01:

I love this. And I love that you're curious and open and also willing to be vulnerable and just throw out what's happening for you now. Do you feel comfortable closing your eyes and going inward?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, I'm here.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. So I'm going to do a little bit of lead in. And so that is just going to just bring awareness to the body. So I'll be doing that. So you're invited to close your eyes if you'd like. I'm starting to feel the edges of the body, what your feet are resting on, what your hands are resting on. Maybe feeling what you're sitting on, what your back is resting on. Just noticing you pressing against that area and that area pressing against you in that contact. And then starting to go a little bit more inward, starting with the head, asking yourself, how's the head doing today? Any sensations there or lack of sensation, that's also good information. Sometimes people see images or colors, there's no right way of doing this. Going down to your neck, tuning into your neck, how is your neck doing today? down into your chest, tuning in here. And then tracing the line of awareness down into our left arm. And then going over to the other side and tracing the right arm coming back to the center and moving down to the stomach, moving down into the pelvis, and then moving down into the left leg. And this is a big area, so making sure that you're taking your time, noticing any any sensations in this area of your left leg. Then coming over to our right leg. And then lastly, let's see if we can just zoom out on a macro level and just taking in the whole body, maybe even around the body and just asking ourselves what's going on with our bodies today. And then bringing in that focus for today, the whole thing around all of the changes, all of the moving, and then just seeing how that lands in the body. When something comes up, you might let me know.

SPEAKER_00:

You know, the two things that really came up, like I noticed when you asked me to breathe differently or actually you asked me to move the scan from my right arm, then back to my chest and my stomach, I was suddenly breathing deeper. And as soon as I breathed deeper, I thought to myself, oh my gosh, I'm so thirsty. And it made me think, have I not been aware that I've been thirsty for probably some time?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And then I thought, okay, let's keep going. We did the scan. And you said the leg is a big part and I'm sitting cross-legged. So it's still the same size. It's still a big part, but it's overlapping another part. And I'm kind of all, tucked in in a way. And sometimes I sit like that, not always. And so just being aware of it, I thought like, I'm really, I want to say like closed in some way, not feeling particularly open. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Right. And something's in you feeling closed.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Yeah. And maybe we can kind of stick with that part of what would it be like just to close the eyes and go back in and really feel into that closed part there. Is there a certain place in the body or is it just kind of some movement happening?

UNKNOWN:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, I'm thinking like, it's hard for me to feel the close part, but I'm thinking about it. Yeah,

SPEAKER_01:

that's good awareness.

SPEAKER_00:

And the part of me that's closed is kind of like, if I try to focus on it, an image comes up of like, dragging something you know like dragging a lot of dead weight and it just makes like makes me think about everything i have going on right now where whether it's fun and social or it's work productive something whether the deadline is passed or something that I have lots of time to do, I'm just like closed and I'm dragging my feet. And this morning, yeah, I'm just like dragging it, dragging it. And this morning I looked at my calendar and I just like emailed a bunch of people and canceled a bunch of things. And I just... Everything feels heavy, and I think that closedness, the dragging, is my state of being. I don't know what it's telling me, but I think I'm shutting down a bit.

SPEAKER_01:

Mm-hmm. In this moment, you feel yourself shutting down.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Yes, not with you specifically, but when I reflect on the change, yeah, I'm like shutting down. I want to cave into the closed part.

SPEAKER_01:

You want to cave into this closed part. There's a desire to want to go to this closed part.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Look, I'm not seeing it as bad. I'm seeing it as like... barrier not what i was supposed to do but i want to just listen to it and i want to just be horizontal on my couch endlessly it's like what i

SPEAKER_01:

want and you know i'm not sure as far as recording but maybe in a session we would experiment with that right we would say what would it be like if now we went to and did horizontal you know so

SPEAKER_00:

that

SPEAKER_01:

might be something to play with but And checking in to make sure that that is the right description here is that something feels heavy and also something feels like it's dragging along and it's closed. And just feeling into that description because also you have permission to change it or add to it, you know?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. I think... think I would keep it? I mean, it's similar to like dragging a suitcase uphill, but kind of thinking, I don't know what's in this thing. I just don't know. Heavy. Like what is in it even? Who picked this route?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. That's interesting. It feels like a suitcase being dragged up a hill.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Yeah. And And maybe we could just, from that objective perspective, seeing if we can cultivate that sense of curiosity and then feeling into this part that's heavy and dragging the suitcase up a hill. Yeah. Let's just see if we can give some voice and agency to this part. And also noticing when we start to blend with this part, you know, it might be something that's pretty close right now. And it might be something that, we want to start to identify with. And that's okay if that happens too, but being aware of that too. So feeling like we can maybe just give the mic over to this part that is heavy and dragging the suitcase up a hill and wants to close and wants to be horizontal. And what kind of company would this part want from you?

SPEAKER_00:

What kind of company? That's a great question. I think that part wants me to consult with them because that part is thinking, why am I doing this? I'm not sure it makes sense. I only want to do things that make sense. And that part wants me to think like them, and be less directive and instead consider what I'm doing to that part.

SPEAKER_01:

So it has something to say.

SPEAKER_00:

It does.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

It's protesting, in fact, I think.

SPEAKER_01:

It's protesting.

SPEAKER_00:

What is it protesting here? I think that part of me is saying, stop. And like only make me work if it leads to something, if it makes sense.

SPEAKER_01:

Only leads to something and only makes sense. Yeah. And how do you receive that message?

SPEAKER_00:

I think I feel like a bit, called out or like a bit embarrassed because my scatteredness is being seen by another part of me. A

SPEAKER_01:

part's feeling a bit exposed here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. The decision-making part of me is feeling exposed.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. So there's another part online I hear, that protesting part and that embarrassed, exposed part. So there's a couple of different parts that are happening here. And also maybe just really taking in what that heavy suitcase part has to say. It's saying it's protesting and maybe just really letting that part know that you heard it or you understood it. Maybe that's what they need to hear back or, or no wonder they're feeling that way because of everything that's going on. Maybe see what it feels like for that part to feel heard.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. I mean, I think through this process, that part feels more heard just because we've identified that third part. Yeah. But if I were to talk back to that part, I might say, okay, I hear you. I'm going to stop adding things to the calendar and making big plans. or pulling us in different directions. I'm gonna sit with you and look at you and feel our joint energy to see what makes sense as the next step.

SPEAKER_01:

What makes sense as the next step.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And how was that received?

SPEAKER_00:

I think the protest part is... I don't want to say happier now because it's like, it's tired, but I think more content with the prospect of like synergy and attunement.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. It's letting you know that that part of synergy is really what it's wanting. It sounds like.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Does that sound correct? It's a yes from this part.

UNKNOWN:

Yes.

SPEAKER_01:

yes good and just seeing if more dialogue wants to happen here or maybe this is a place of that it is complete for now if there's anything else that wants to be said in this moment

SPEAKER_00:

I think the protest part has a lot more to say, but maybe it doesn't have to happen now. When I tune into that part, really, it is mad. I think it's saying, it would say, we can do much more if we work together

SPEAKER_01:

But

SPEAKER_00:

also you're misusing me.

SPEAKER_01:

There's

SPEAKER_00:

a limit to how much I can lift or drag or push.

SPEAKER_01:

It sounds like this part is worried about something. Does that sound right?

SPEAKER_00:

I think this part is worried about getting all used up and then being criticized for not being able to continue moving.

SPEAKER_01:

It's worried about being used up and being criticized about not moving.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Because the bigger part of me that makes all the decisions at the end of the day does, will say, like I will say to myself, I guess even to this part, we didn't do enough today. We didn't do what we set out to do. It wasn't as organized or linear as it could have been. We're going to try again tomorrow. And so that sounds like positive, but it's a criticism.

SPEAKER_01:

That's great self-awareness of knowing that criticism that's coming online too. It's part of criticism. It's part of protection maybe in some ways.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. I think both parts, the protest part and the now embarrassed, but decision-making part both know that, that a lot can be accomplished with good alignment.

SPEAKER_01:

And maybe just taking a moment to really let them know that you hear that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, the decision-making part is saying, I hear that. You're totally right. Let's give ourselves time to sync up.

SPEAKER_01:

Let's get into the area. Time to sync up.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And you might let these parts know that you can return to them. It sounds like that they are needing, are requesting more audience. And you might just want to let them know that this is a place that you can return to.

SPEAKER_00:

We'll be back.

SPEAKER_01:

We'll be back.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank

SPEAKER_01:

you for that. And

SPEAKER_00:

it's helping me or it helped me just connect with myself. Like I feel less scattered, a bit less fragmented.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

I will say it did feel like it's like a kind of emotional mental work to respond when you say, what does this part want to say to that part? Or is that part saying something? You know, like to me, that was like, oh, this is, and I know it's meant to be work, but I just want to articulate that that is not easy. It takes some focus.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that's interesting. And I think that's why I also really like experiential in session things is that we can kind of, you know, also I think a big part of it is hearing it back. Like, what was it like for you to say, like, oh, this part is protesting? What is it like to hear those things back and reflected to you? And it might be, ah, that's not quite right. It's not really protesting. It's just going into collapse, actually. Or, you know, like...

SPEAKER_00:

I think, like, from a somatic perspective, you bypass a lot of the jargon and the language and the memes and the TikToks, and we go to, like... hey how does this feel in this situation in this context with this person when you think about this event when you approach this time of year how does it look feel sound taste how do you imagine it and what meaning do you make of that and so i i'm really drawn to like the somatic way of being, particularly after this experience with you. For me, I'm always just a bit scared, I think, because you know that I do cognitive behavioral therapy and I do psychodynamic therapy and gestalt is a small part of my practice. And I think that's because I frankly have to be a bit less vulnerable when I do those modalities.

SPEAKER_01:

both

SPEAKER_00:

as a patient and as the therapist.

SPEAKER_01:

Right.

SPEAKER_00:

Whereas when I have to be in my body and really attuned, I'm more vulnerable. I'm doing a different kind of work. I'm exercising another kind of muscle that I'm not that familiar with, frankly. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Thank you for saying that too. Because I think as practitioners, we're always asking ourselves, how much do we put ourselves out there to clients? What's appropriate and what's too much, you know? And I think that's a question that many, many, many practitioners have in all modalities. Because as we all know, that client relationship leads to a lot of patient success as well. Right.

SPEAKER_00:

Totally.

SPEAKER_01:

So it's really important. But how do we do that? That's appropriate.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And that exists in somatics as well. Right.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely. Yes. Thank you so much, Megan, for being on the CBT dive, talking to us about a bunch of stuff that's not CBT, which I think is super important, frankly, right? I think opening up to a multitude of modalities that help us get to know ourselves is really important. And I'm honored to have met you in this way because you're like adding to my knowledge, you know? So thank you.

SPEAKER_01:

You as well. It's a great podcast and I'm like really happy to be here on this podcast and also with

SPEAKER_00:

you. Yeah, take care. We hope you enjoyed that experience. I certainly did. Thank you again to Megan Blair, our special guest for today. If you're interested in somatic counseling and some of Megan's work, you can find her on Instagram or Google Megan Blair. Thank you for joining us at the CBT Diet, and we hope to see you again.

UNKNOWN:

Thank you.

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