Somatics & Forest Therapy

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What can Forest Therapy bring to somatic work? It's like coming home. The practice of forest therapy supports somatic work in a unique and special way for use in a wide variety of applications. They are two methodologies that create a robust and holistic partnership.

Who This Course Is For

• Mental Health and Medical Professionals seeking to understand and experience how forest therapy works as a generative somatic framework that can be used to complement treatment in a wide range of settings.

• Somatic coaches, therapists and practitioners who want a deeper understanding of how forest therapy supports clients in building somatic awareness, somatic transformation and somatic opening in alignment with their goals.

• Professional Guides who want an introduction to somatics and wish to gain a deeper understanding of the ways in which forest therapy fosters somatic awareness, somatic transformation and somatic opening as well as the variety of ways in which forest therapy is a generative somatic practice.

• Anyone wondering, what can Forest Therapy bring to somatic work?

Explore the connection of somatics and forest therapy

About Somatics and What You'll Learn

Somatics is holistically a part of both the spirit and the structure of Forest Therapy. The unique ways forest therapy intuitively blends with somatic practice, is very special indeed. In forest therapy, there is a clearly defined sequence of guided events that provides structure to the experience, while embracing an open partnership with the land that provides opportunities for exploring health, healing and wellbeing for each individual. Forest Therapy is a somatic practice, but more than that, it also supports the Arc of Somatic Transformation on many levels. Specifically, the practice of relational forest therapy supports the building of somatic awareness in partnership with nature and fosters resiliency and connection, all critical elements in the Arc of Somatic Transformation. Explore all of this in detail with examples and activities along the way.

"The term somatics derives from the Greek somatikos, which signifies the living, aware, bodily person. It posits that neither mind nor body is separate from the other; both being part of a living process called the soma.”  —Richard Strozzi-Heckler

Somatics invites us to engage all of our being; our sensing, actions, feeling and thinking. You may be most familiar with somatics in relation to trauma but it is also a holistic way to know ourselves as well as to transform and heal.

"I am both excited and blown away by the phenomenal ways the practice of forest therapy supports somatic work and the ways in which somatic work holistically supports everything we do. Somatic work in partnership with nature!"  —Nadine Mazzola, ANFT Trainer and Certified Forest Therapy Guide

You'll Learn

• A foundational understanding of:

  1. Somatics and the somatic frameworks this course is built on including distinguishing somatic awareness, somatic practice, somatic transformation and somatic opening.

  2. Relational forest therapy.

• A thorough understanding of the multiple ways relational forest therapy may be done as a generative somatic practice.

• A close examination of how relational forest therapy specifically supports the building and deepening of somatic awareness, somatic transformation and somatic opening.

• *This course will not train you as a certified forest therapy guide. (This is a separate training. Learn more here.)