Psychotherapeutic Postural Integration

Psychotherapeutic Postural Integration (PPI), is an alternative body psychotherapy method, which uses Postural Integration (PI) in a psychotherapeutic context.

It is an effective way to support individuals in dealing with the challenges in their lives in a more creative manner. The method helps them to change in every part of themselves, supporting them to become more aware in their bodies and empowering them to change their "bodymind" - that is - their bodies, emotions and attitudes, thus furthering their personal development.

In theory
At a practical level, PPI is an active psychotherapy in which the patient–client and practitioner (psychotherapist) interact to guide the development of self-awareness and consciousness, enabling clients to increase their sense of well-being, their capacity to feel, their ability to emotionally express themselves with clarity in their relationships.

Psychotherapeutic Postural Integration integrates a whole process and procedure of therapeutic touch into the ongoing psychotherapeutic process. This method therefore has a special place in the "science" of body psychotherapy. In PPI the claimed specific stimulation of the layers of fascia, allows the opening of specific dimensions of experience and history of the body and its different parts.

In the process of the sessions, bodymind connections become apparent linking memories, physical tensions, sensations and emotions. As in every psychotherapy, the client goes deeper into their own self. The main difference to verbal therapies is the role of the body in the process. The interaction between the spoken words, the sensations experienced and the emotions felt becomes deeper. The clients therefore get a greater felt sense of themselves, their inner resources and their inner tensions. Hidden wounds and old sufferings from personal family history are consciously expressed in the body.

In practice
In the presence of a supportive therapist, the clients can release the weight of emotional charge which holds them down and often, like a keystone, links different webs of tension in the bodymind. The result can be a lightening and softening and greater sense of aliveness.

To engage aliveness is a fundamental strength of PPI:


 * The client is regularly encouraged to allow movements, sounds, words to emerge, to allow the breath to come and go, to allow emotions …
 * The clients are at the centre of their psychotherapeutic process; it is they who take a stand in reality, whether that reality be hopelessness, suffering, self-rejection or a sense of ease and acceptance.
 * The method follows the client and adapts to each client; it is not a predefined process, nor a standard procedure.

Validation
Body-Psychotherapy has been scientifically validated by the European Association for Psychotherapy (E.A.P.) as have a number of the various modalities within this mainstream branch of Psychotherapy. One of these approaches or “modalities” within Body-Psychotherapy includes Psychotherapeutic Postural Integration which has been recognised as scientifically valid by the EAP.

Reading References

 * Rosenberg, Jack Lee: Body, Self and Soul: Sustaining Integration, Humanics (1985), (1989) ISBN 978-0-89334-082-7
 * Rossi, Ernest Laurence: The Psychobiology of Mind-Body Healing: New Concepts of Therapeutic Hypnosis, W. W. Norton (1993) ISBN 978-0-393-70168-5
 * Heckler, Richard Strozzi: The Anatomy of Change; East/West Approaches to Body Mind Therapy, Shambala (1984), (1993) ISBN 978-0-394-72703-5
 * Levine, Peter A.: Waking the Tiger – Healing Trauma, North Atlantic Books (1997) ISBN 978-1-55643-233-0
 * Pert, Candace B.: Molecules of Emotion, Simon & Schuster (1998) ISBN 978-0-684-84634-7
 * Johnson, Don & Grand, Ian J.: The Body in Psychotherapy, North Atlantic Books (1998) ISBN 978-1-55643-251-4
 * Juhan, Deane: Job’s Body, A Handbook for Bodywork, updated (1987), (1998) ISBN 978-1-58177-099-5
 * Damasio, Antonio R.: The Feeling of What Happens, Vintage (2000) ISBN 978-0-09-928876-3
 * Rosenberg Marshall B.: Nonviolent Communication – A Language of Life, Puddle Dancer Press (2003) ISBN 978-1-892005-03-8
 * Goleman, Daniel: Destructive Emotions, A Scientific Dialog with the Dalai Lama, Bantam Books (2004) ISBN 978-0-553-38105-4
 * Hartley, Linda: Somatic Psychology: Body, Mind and Meaning, Whurr (2004) ISBN 978-1-86156-430-6
 * Field, Marlena.: Body-Centered Coaching, Body Mind Spirit (2005) ISBN 978-0-9736643-3-1
 * Soldati, Massimo: Corpo e Cambiamento, Tecniche Nuove (2007) ISBN 978-88-481-1040-2
 * Erken, Rita and Schlage, Bernhard: Editors: Transformation of the Self with Bodymind Integration Postural Integration – Energetic Integration – Psychotherapeutic Postural Integration; Articles by 14 international authors; Hubert W. Holzinger Verlag, Berlin (2012) ISBN 978-3-926396-67-9