In Psychosynthesis a rather significant space is accorded to techniques that broaden awareness, allowing contact with emotions, feelings, sensations and the body. Classical psychoanalytic methods are therefore considered complementary to other techniques that promote the expansion of consciousness, such as somatic techniques, meditation techniques, artistic and symbolic work, imaginative techniques, etc.

Techniques used to increase awareness often draw on the body as a resource, i.e. they use physical sensations, breathing, movement, stress positions, touch/contact, etc. Assagioli used the term Psychosynthesis because it is shorter and more accessible, but by Psychosynthesis he actually meant, bio-psychosynthesis.

Bios, the body is the seat of both consciousness and the unconscious in all its levels and, by virtue of this holding capacity, can be considered “the vehicle of vehicles” (Rosselli, SIPT Lecture, 2003). It is therefore very important to keep in mind the constant interactions taking place between the different psychic functions, in particular between body and emotions, and constantly reconnect the latter to the former and vice versa. Through a direct bodily experience, we can enter more easily into contact with our emotional life. We approach emotions through the body, and every experience that really concerns emotions is a bodily experience, not an intellectual one.

In the last decades, many body techniques have been introduced in psychosynthetic work. They include more traditional uses of the body as a source of images that can generate symbols and, more directly, body-oriented techniques borrowed from bioenergetics, integrative body-psychotherapy and other body-based methods of psychological growth and development. Dance, massage, martial arts (e.g. Tai Chi or Aikido), awareness meditation and other methods can also be used in a psychosynthetic context (Parfitt, 1990 e Percipalle, 2001, p. 121).

EXERCISES

Imagery may be used to illuminate the meaning of certain physical sensations. More specifically, we can ask clients to visualise a specific ailment, and allow an image to emerge that symbolises, for example, their headache, heartburn, back pain, calf cramp, sore throat, conjunctivitis, breathing difficulties, etc. In this context, many techniques can be used to work on psychosomatic disorders and tensions (Manichedda 2004 e 2011). Here are some examples:

• Door technique (Gerard cit. in Widmann, 2004)

In this technique, patients are asked to visualise a door on which is written a word referring, for example, to their psychosomatic symptom, e.g. “wheezing, burning sensation, weight on the chest”, or part of their body affected by it “heart, lungs, stomach, joints”, etc. Then the patient imagines opening the door and describes what they see behind it.

• Symbolic identification with psychosomatic conditions (Gerard)

Symbolic identification is a very effective technique for working with psychosomatic conditions (asthma, ulcer, neurodermatitis, etc.). The client is asked to imagine, for example, that they are their stomach-ache and invited to speak from that perspective: “I am my stomach. I am all agitated inside. I can’t digest this.” In this way, the client might start getting a sense of the psychological component of their psychosomatic condition.

For more:

• Know, Love, Transform yourself (Vol. I), Psychosynthesis books (pp. 175-185) – Buy now
• Know, Love, Transform yourself (Vol. II) – Buy now
• The Way of Psychosynthesis, Synthesis Insights (Part 1, Ch. 3, para. 2) – Buy now