Interconnectedness of Body and Mind
The neurobiological connection between our physical body and our emotions can manifest itself in many ways. We often think emotions only exist in our mind, but they also exist in our body. This is particularly true in young people from collectivist cultures.
Think of a kid complaining of a stomach ache - you may give them medicine to calm it, but often it’s a result of being anxious about something they’re experiencing. From a trauma standpoint, we practice “somatic experiencing” to see the way in which trauma stores itself in the body of students suffering from PTSD. Emotions like fear, depression, anxiety, and rage are all related to physical sensations in young people’s bodies. If we do not allow them to move through and express these emotions, they get “stuck”.
We start all our group sessions with movement for two reasons:
It allows students to get in touch with the signals their body sends them, and allows them to integrate their conscious mind and grow their sensory understanding of their body.
Young people who present symptoms of ADHD often do so as a result of developmental trauma. Movement and expending physical energy helps them self-regulate and focus on the lesson at hand.
Young people are very connected to their physical body because it's constantly growing and changing all the time. At The B.R.I.D.G.E., our practice uses movement to break physical holding patterns in order to break through the mental holding patterns students cling to as a result of trauma.
