The Foundation Training is the basic training of the Bodynamic Somatic Developmental Psychology education. Further three years will then provide certification for Bodynamic Practitioner. Certification recognized by the European Association for Body Psychotherapy (EABP) www.eabp.org when exams and sessions requirements are met with the possibility to transfer the certification to UKCP.

Alternatively, this training can be attended as a standalone education in the Character Structure Model and in the somatic work on developmental trauma.

In a 25-year study Bodynamic developed and contributed the most comprehensive and precise model of Character Structure of all the modern psychotherapy schools. It describes the child psychomotoric development in 7 phases from the second trimester in utero until the age of 13 (adolescence).

These Character Structures portray the psychomotoric development of a child as a resource and defense, shaped according to the type and timing of nurture and circumstances children experience affecting them differently in the earlier and later time of the developmental phase.

Developmental trauma plays a crucial role in the development and fixation of these Structures.

An early trauma caused for example by abandonment, neglect or an existential threat will severely compromise the person sense of a safe existence and his capability to make and maintain contact with people later in life. A later trauma on the other hand, e.g. caused by emotional coercion, a rigid toilet training or physical violence will tend to massively affect the child`s sense of autonomy, self-determination and will. 

Since infants and young children have only limited ways of coping with traumatic experiences and very little or no language to communicate, the body and its movements (the Body Ego) are of prime importance in coping with the intensity they experience. Growing up the child will develop through the 7 Character Structures with resources and defenses of a physical and a psychological nature, integrating and coming to term with the learning and the adverse conditions in their environment. These Structures shape the developing personality of the child and determine how they will think, feel and interact with others later in life.

The Bodynamic Approach makes use of these individual structures and uses them as resources in dealing with traumatic experience. A later structure for instance might be of help in containing and supporting a younger structure impacted by Developmental Trauma. This is also why the resolution of muscle armor at the wrong time can have a destabilizing or even damaging effect on clients.

Specifically, the conscious movement of the related muscles along with conscious body sensation will strengthen our Body Ego and generate in the individual a sense of self confidence and agency. The muscles activated in that process correspond to a specific developmental phase, theme and structure.

In the therapeutic intervention it is of crucial importance that the client has these experiences in contact with the therapist and later with people in their everyday life in order to be able to integrate it. As a direct result their capacity for stress and affect regulation will increase accordingly.

In this training you will learn how the child responds in the different developmental phases on the psychological/emotional and muscular/motoric level in relation to adverse conditions or traumatic experience. On the muscular level hypertonic or hypotonic responses will lead to the formation of a characteristic body posture with a corresponding expression, mimics, gestures, believe systems, behavior and more.

To recognize and treat Character Structure and the underlying Developmental Trauma we will specifically train body reading in different settings.

Furthermore, the training will teach you a variety of body exercises and therapeutic tools as well as the knowledge to work more precisely and effectively with the Developmental Trauma. An important part of this is the understanding of how to include the resources of the different Character Structures in the therapeutic healing process with your clients.

The Foundation training program will cover:

• History and principles of the Bodynamic System;
• Childhood developmental stages: themes and psychomotor development;
• Character Structures;
• Body reading;
• Group work;
• Bodynamic model of communication: Bodyknot;
• Physical exercises and role playing related to each Character Structure;
• Developing resources: centering, grounding, boundaries and more;
• Demo sessions on each Character Structures.