Integrative Bodywork & Movement Therapy (IBMT) is a holistic approach to Somatic Movement Education and Therapy based on principles of Body-Mind Centering®, Authentic Movement and Somatic Psychology.
The Institute offers training and professional development in the UK, Lithuania and Russia. The IBMT Diploma Programme was founded in 1990 by Linda Hartley, and is now taught by an international faculty of IBMT trainers. Our program maintains the high standards of an Approved Training Program of the International Somatic Movement Education and Therapy Association (ISMETA). Our graduates meet all requirements to become Registered Somatic Movement Educators (RSME) and Therapist (RSMT).
The Institute initiated a Masters Programme for Somatic Practitioners and IBMT Graduates which we hope to re-instate soon.
SOMATIC MOVEMENT THERAPY
SOMATIC MOVEMENT THERAPY (SMT) PROGRAM
The intention of the Somatic Movement Therapy (SMT) Program is to offer the practitioner tools to work with groups and individuals to enhance mental, emotional, physical and biological functions in order to bring optimal well-being and healing. The program integrates non-dualistic tantric philosophy, embodiment practices, humanistic psychology, Mind-Body Medicine techniques, osteopathy, and somatic body-work therapies.
The term somatics is derived from the Latin word soma, meaning “the living body.” Somatics is an approach to experience that accesses the full intelligence of our body and the subtle conversation of our subconscious in order to actualize our potential and support a deep inner process of healing. Healing is the processes of returning to our experience of wholeness. This sense of flourishing and well-being can be achieved by a range of practices that are validating, clarifying and self-expanding such as recognizing one’s optimal potential and strengths, identifying boundaries, providing a felt sense of agency, finding more ease and efficiency within the muscles and joints of one’s body, or bringing consciousness into one’s experience of their own body. This felt sense of self, also known as Embodiment, leads to an experience of being comfortable in one’s own skin and therefore able to engage with life more fully. Ultimately this facilitates: self-awareness, boundaries, self-esteem, emotional regulation, empathy, enhanced cognitive processing, easeful decision making of complex situations, body related self confidence, a greater sense of self-control, enhanced intuition, and a feeling of being both authentic and interconnected with others and the environment.
A Somatic Movement Therapist fosters these benefits by empowering their students and clients to discover pathways, transmute obstacles, and build inner resources to reach their desired goals.
Are you passionate about coaching, but find your sessions sometimes feel flat?
Do you believe that clients have a deeper wisdom of their own, but find yourself trying to ask the right question or use the right tool?
You’re not alone. Many coaches experience this and more and more are incorporating a somatic approach to provide the missing piece.
The Somatic School helps in-training and qualified coaches learn somatic approaches to work with the body’s intelligence in a coaching context
FREE Introduction to Body-Oriented Coaching Evening
Are you interested in training as a body-oriented coach but have questions you’d like answers to? Perhaps you’re wondering what “somatics” are? Or who would benefit from coaching of this kind?
If that sounds like you, join us at a free Introduction to Body-oriented Coaching Evening and get your questions answered. It’s a great way to meet your trainer, get a feel for what this training is all about, and in a small group you’ll have the space to ask all of the things you want to know!
The Somatic Coach:
Accredited Certificate in Body-Oriented Coaching
Coach training alongside modern psychology has focused primarily on verbal communication and the cognitive, reflective mind (insight, logic, reason, mental meaning making). For all that this has accomplished in the last century, it isn’t the complete picture…
The current trend in therapy and recent scientific developments suggest we’re on the brink of a movement, a cultural shift that is taking us from an understanding of the body as merely a taxi for the brain, to recognising the human being as an integrated system – an intelligent whole.
Intellectualising or exclusively talking about problems can keep clients stuck in a rut. Through Body-oriented Coaching there is potential to experience more than is already known and break through old stories, frozen beliefs and stuck patterns of behaviour.
In The Somatic Coach the whole spectrum of the bodymind becomes available, allowing creative and spontaneous ways of working that are rooted in experience, deeply felt, engaging and transformative.
This is a highly experiential programme drawing on some of the most established schools of body-centred therapy and somatic practice, including: Hakomi, Focusing, Authentic Movement, Mindfulness and Gestalt.
Through the exploration of process-oriented methodologies you will discover how we can work from our bodies in a way that aligns with, rather that upends, the traditional talking approach of coaching, without necessarily leaving your seat - seamlessly enhancing your current coaching practices. We’ll also explore other channels of communicating and relating.
Rather than give you an all or nothing way of working, our aim is to ensure you discover your own style, creativity and unique application of body-oriented coaching principles.
The learning process will be based on these same somatic principles, working experientially both individually and collectively. The way to know it is to experience it, not just in theory, but in practice. It is the ideal container for your continued professional development, rooted in your own embodied process.
Through this course you will learn a profoundly different way of being with your clients, but also a different way of paying attention to the world and your own sense of being in it.
Course Structure
The Somatic Coach utilises an integrative, experiential, and non-directive model to help students incorporate somatic approaches and work with the body’s intelligence in a coaching context.
1 Coach and client become conscious of their own embodied experience and learn to cultivate presence.
2 Coach and client explore the transformative potential of breath and voice.
3 Coach co-creates the relationship and supports the coaching process by actively attuning to the client and resonating for connection and co-regulation.
4 Coach utilises non-doing touch to support the client’s process and invites play to accelerate learning and embrace uncertainty.
5 Coach supports the client’s innate propensity for growth and forward movement through expression, release and integration.
Module 1: Presence & Sense
We live in a culture that is largely disembodied, so this module can be experienced as awakening the senses or coming home to the body. We’ll dip into biology, anatomy and interpersonal neurobiology to develop a foundational understanding of the bodymind. For many of us, actually being fully present to ourselves can feel like travelling into outer-space, or the great unknown. Like “somanauts” you will explore the worlds that exist inside of your body and expand your conscious awareness. Through the use of subtle and non-intrusive methods you will learn how to help your clients come into contact with the body as sensed in the present moment. In this way you will enable clients to step back and thoughtfully attend to their internal experience and thus explore the ways in which they have been influenced and shaped by their unconscious.
On this module:
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Learn somatic practices to come home to your body
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Learn to understand and explain how information from the body and present experience can be used to enhance deep awareness
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Help your clients re-sensitise and identify their “felt sense”
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Enable clients to tap into their inner wisdom and their inherent capacity for self-discovery
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What to do if your client doesn’t feel “anything” or feels “too much”
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Learn about the three classes of embodied perception (Interception, Exteroception and Proprioception) and their role in coaching
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Discover how an understanding of the nervous system can help you coach more effectively
+ Interactive Webinar: Contracting for Body-oriented Coaching
Module 2: Breath & Voice
Both breath and voice are ever present in every conversation, yet we tend to hear in one dimension. This module helps coaches fine tune their listening. The breath literally gives life and opens up our sensing selves. Conversely certain breathing patterns, such as holding one’s breath, is an effective strategy for feeling less. This module helps coaches attune to the breath-scape of their clients and use their own breath to maintain presence. In the same way the voice can bring us closer or further from ourselves. Our voice conveys a “you-ness”, but whether this “you” is honest and integral is subject to whether or not it is embodied. This module helps coaches hear and feel the difference.
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Learn how to track the breath and model breathing patterns
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Learn about the inhale, exhale, pacing and rhythm and what they indicate
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Discover the impact of your breath on others
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Sharpen your discernment between content and tone
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Learn how vocal tone reveals emotional state in coaching
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Connect every spoken word to the viscera with Embodied Speaking
+ Interactive Webinar: Trauma & the Boundaries of Body-oriented Coaching
Module 3: Attune & Resonate
This module explores how to use your whole self as a tool to adjust to your client and come into resonance with them. Helping the client tune into their own somatic experience and exploring your capacity to tune into what they are feeling too. This is about your relationship with your clients, their relationship with their bodymind experience, your relationship with your own, and how these all inter-relate. The Resonate & Regulate module will help you develop skills to notice even seemingly unimportant details that may in fact be outward expressions of adaptations or implicit beliefs, bringing habitual behaviours to the client’s consciousness and exploring the meaning and impact of their experience.
On this module:
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Establish a relationship in which it is safe for the client to become self-aware
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Discover how to attune to verbal and non-verbal communication
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Learn how to work with your awareness and attention to help your client access somatic intelligence
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Discover how to use non-disruptive Contact Statements to stay connected to your client’s present-moment experience
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Using your own body as a relational tool and working with mirror-neurons to enhance your intuition
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Learn how understanding the vagus nerve can help you maintain a healthy human connection with your client
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Empower yourself and your clients to self-regulate and co-regulate, using your bodies as the means
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Learn how to co-create and participate in mindful Experiments that evoke unconscious reactions for self-exploration
+ Interactive Webinar: Self-care for Coaches
Module 4: Contact & Play
Our communities are touch deprived, so much so that receiving touch can be profound and transformative. Physical contact in the coaching space is a grey area for most. This module equips coaches with the awareness and skillset needed to work with intentional contact in a way that is safe, supportive and in service of their clients. Where working with the body often invites a slowing down and tuning in, this module will also help both coach and client find greater agency with levity and humour. Research suggests that under conditions of Play, new behaviours require less repetitions to embody than without. Many of us have become rigid in the face of uncertainty. The whole invitation of play as a resource for coaches working somatically is that play opens up the possibility of it being an adventure, of being curious, of not-knowing, and to be with uncertainty with a quality of attention that is creative.
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Use touch to give clients instant non-verbal feedback about what they’re doing and how they are being
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Understand the generative application of “non-doing” touch in a coaching session
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Learn to navigate one nervous system coming into contact with another
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Explore the neurobiology of play to marry rigour with parasympathetic renewal
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Draw on improvisation principles to enhance your coaching skills and let go of having to “get it right”
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Find flow in the dance between knowing and not knowing
+ Interactive Webinar: Cultivating Embodied Self-awareness
Module 5: Express & Integrate
Everything we’ve experienced over the years, physical and emotional pain, happy memories as well as sad, have been stored in the cells of our bodies. Express & Integrate helps clients engage with their active imagination, allowing unconscious material to flow outward. In this module you will incorporates movement to expand the embodying dimensions of the work you and your client have done together. This is especially beneficial for those who have difficulty processing their issues verbally through traditional forms of coaching. Here, we tap into the aliveness of the body and learn how to help clients take conscious action. The coach helps clients practice, adopt, and integrate positive new experiences, beliefs, and choices into their current everyday lives and embody these changes.
On this module:
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Learn how to use Clean Language to create a bridge between the verbal mind and the body mind
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Work with strong emotions and bound energy, safely releasing them, and finding nourishment in the release
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Learn how to help the your clients transition between autonomic states to develop a resilient nervous system
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Help clients surrender to their feelings and experiences through genuine, expressive movement
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Learn how to create a safe space in which clients can increase self-awareness through movement
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Learn the vital skill of Witnessing, foster trust, and develop a supportive, non-judgmental presence as coach
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Bring more spontaneity and play into your coaching sessions and learn a body-oriented approach to goal-setting
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Offer clients an experiential way to work out their issues and help them explore ways to use their newly acquired knowledge to affect change
+ I
nteractive W
ebinar:
The Body-oriented Coaching Cycle (bringing it all together)
Additional Features
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5 x Interactive Training Webinars
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3 x Coaching Sessions with a Certified Body-oriented Coach
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Organic Intelligence Trauma Supervision Through-line
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Monthly Peer Practice Calls
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Body-oriented Coaching Marketing Series
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Online Community of Body-oriented Coaches
Accreditation
The course is accredited by the International Coach Federation
as providing 44 hours of Continuing Coach Education.
Course Fee
The cost of this pioneering course is £3300
0% interest payment plan available:
Secure your place with £450 deposit, then pay six payments of £475 over the next six months.
Dates & Location
The Somatic Coach is delivered through five online training modules.
Each module takes place over two days from 9.30am until 5.30pm and takes
place on the following dates:
Autumn 2020
Limited Spaces
22nd & 23rd August
19th & 20th September
17th & 18th October
14th & 15th November
12th & 13th December
Spring 2021
20th & 21st February
20th & 21st March
17th & 18th April
15th & 16th May
5th & 6th June
Location
London, UK
Venue
Chocolate Studios, 7 Shepherdess Pl, Hoxton, London N1 7LJ, UK
Course Trainers
Nathan Blair
Founder and Course Trainer
After working in Leadership Development and Talent Management at a successful Performance Consultancy, Nathan left the corporate environment to train as a Transformational Life Coach. Nathan later joined the team at Animas to head up the Centre for Professional Coach Development. As a coach, Nathan has worked extensively with clients to tap into their vast emotional and embodied intelligence. Working with the subtle messages of the body Nathan helps clients clarify their wants and needs, tune into their inner knowing to make better decisions and align themselves with their deepest desires.
His passion for somatics took him to California where he worked as a Connection & Intimacy Coach, facilitated weekly Men’s Groups and was a lead trainer for workshops on conscious sexuality and relationships. It was at the heart of this work that Nathan developed a deep understanding of relational embodiment and Intricate Tactile Sensitivity.
He has immersed himself in somatic practice over the last five years learning from the founding thinkers and practitioners in Somatic Psychology, Interpersonal Neurobiology and Body Psychotherapy. He is trained in Hakomi, Focusing and Authentic Movement and integrates these therapeutic techniques and similar modalities into a coaching context when working with clients and training coaches.
Nathan currently runs a private Couple’s Coaching practice back in London and is Founder of The Somatic School, the UK’s first ICF accredited school dedicated to training in process-oriented somatic practices and providing coaches with somatic and embodiment skills.
After working in Leadership Development and Talent Management at a successful Performance Consultancy, Nathan left the corporate environment to train as a Transformational Life Coach. Nathan later joined the team at Animas to head up the Centre for Professional Coach Development. As a coach, Nathan has worked extensively with clients to tap into their vast emotional and embodied intelligence. Working with the subtle messages of the body Nathan helps clients clarify their wants and needs, tune into their inner knowing to make better decisions and align themselves with their deepest desires….
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Cordelia Zafiropulo
Course Trainer
Cordelia is passionate about helping people become more fully embodied though developing untapped vocal potential. “The body is the voice; it is a crucial tool for self-actualisation”.
Initially Cordelia trained in the performing arts, in opera. Her intense vocal studies took her abroad for many years where she learnt specific techniques of singing. The understanding of the functional mechanisms of the voice and the immersion into the physical and psychological aspects of the voice, ignited her passion for self-development, presence, metaphysics, breathing techniques as well as somatic therapies.
Today she works with people individually, as well as in small, medium and large groups. Her professional experience ranges from; taking charge of voice and body language modules within Media Trainings, over corporate trainings on Presence & Impact to giving workshops on Breath & Voice. She works with singers, actors in training, people suffering from vocal problems, breathing problems, people with psychological issues around speaking up, as well as with people seeking deeper more authentic and aligned expression.
Cordelia is passionate about helping people become more fully embodied though developing untapped vocal potential. “The body is the voice; it is a crucial tool for self-actualisation”.
Initially Cordelia trained in the performing arts, in opera. Her intense vocal studies took her abroad for many years where she learnt specific techniques of singing. The understanding of the functional mechanisms of the voice and the immersion into the physical and psychological aspects of the voice, ignited her passion for self-development, presence, metaphysics, breathing techniques as well as somatic therapies.
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Rachel Blackman
Course Trainer
Rachel is passionate about helping people access a more enjoyable experience of “being in a body” and become more courageous in their creative agency. Rachel is a trained actor, improvisor, theatre maker, somatic educator, multi disciplinary touch therapist and embodiment trainer.
For the past 7 years Rachel worked as a guest trainer and co-lead trainer on the Embodied Facilitator Course (EFC) helping coaches and trainers around the world learn to work with the intelligence of the body.
Rachel’s own body of work Applying The Skills of the Actor, harnesses Actor training tools and the skills of the improvisor to learn everything from presence, state adaptation, being seen, being heard, connection to audience, managing how you are coming across and more…She makes theatre as Stillpoint and her private practice is Vibrantbody. She also works as an embodiment training specialist and a private contractor for Arts Organisations, businesses and consultancies through out the UK and Europe.
Rachel is passionate about helping people access a more enjoyable experience of “being in a body” and become more courageous in their creative agency. Rachel is a trained actor, improvisor, theatre maker, somatic educator, multi disciplinary touch therapist and embodiment trainer.
For the past 7 years Rachel worked as a guest trainer and co-lead trainer on the Embodied Facilitator Course (EFC) helping coaches and trainers around the world learn to work with the intelligence of the body.
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