Approaches to support
Compare therapies and body-based approaches: what they involve, the evidence, costs, and where to find practitioners. Before choosing one, read how to spot red flags.
Sorted by strength of evidence. What these grades mean →
People with specific traumatic memories that still feel vivid and charged; often faster than open-ended talk therapy for single-incident trauma.
People carrying chronic bracing or holding patterns who like slow, curious, exploratory movement — it's gentle and cognitive, not a workout.
People in supervised treatment — often for depression that hasn't responded to other things — for whom a short, plasticity-opening reset, with integration afterward, is appropriate.
People who settle better through slow, flowing movement and breath than through stillness — a good fit if sitting meditation doesn't work for you.
People who want a body-based, movement approach with a strong emphasis on choice — you're always invited, never instructed, and nothing is checked or corrected.
Realistically, only people within a legal, screened, medically-supervised research context — and even there, cautiously.
Some people find low doses briefly embodying and settling. It fits best, if at all, for those who respond that way and use it deliberately and sparingly.
People exploring within legal, screened, supported research or therapeutic settings — where set, setting, and integration are taken seriously.
Almost anyone as a gentle, always-available tool — especially people who want something concrete to do in a revved-up moment.
People drawn to working with their inner conflict as 'parts' — the self-critic, the protector, the wounded younger one — rather than as symptoms.
People who feel talk therapy understood them but didn't reach the body — bracing, startle, shutdown that words don't touch.
People carrying a lot of physical bracing and tension who are drawn to a body-first release rather than talking.
People who carry a lot of physical bracing and find that skilled, attuned touch and co-regulation help them settle in a way talking doesn't.
People who find the states language ('settled', 'fight-or-flight', 'shutdown') clarifying and want to work with a practitioner who uses it.