Mindful Awareness in Body-Oriented Therapy

Mindful Awareness in Body-Oriented Therapy (MABT)

Help the body heal from trauma

Interoceptive awareness: the awareness and processing of inner body sensations and experience.
Essential for self-regulation.

MABT, created by Cynthia Price, PhD, MA, LMT at the University of Washington in Seattle, combines manual and mind-body approaches to develop interoception and self-care tools for emotion regulation. Some traumatic experiences are imprinted in the body beyond the reach of language and can only be accessed through interoception. Physical sensations related to the trauma continue to be experienced as if the trauma is still occurring in the present, even if decades have elapsed since the actual event(s). The sense of safety and wholeness disappear from the body. During an MABT session, the client is guided to become aware of physical sensations and link those sensations to emotions and cognitions. This process helps the client to gain a sense of safety in the body and personal agency. In this way, the body becomes a resource.

What to expect during a session

MABT can either be a stand alone treatment or it can be incorporated into a regular massage. The client remains fully clothed in an MABT-only session. All sessions start with intake questions and end with a chance to discuss the experience and decide on homework assignments.

Homework

By practicing body awareness frequently and in different environments, the client is better able to self-regulate, even in stressful situations. How and what the client is going to practice between sessions is called homework and is decided upon jointly between the therapist and client.The homework should only take a few minutes a day and should be easy to integrate into daily life.

More information

Interested in learning more about MABT? Check out usabp.org/center-for-mindful-body-awareness/ or listen to an interview with Dr. Price on Liberated Body podcast at liberatedbody.com/cynthia-price-lbp-060. To learn more about healing trauma, check out Brain Pickings: The Science of How Our Minds and Bodies Converge in the Healing of Trauma, which covers the work of reknown PTSD researcher Bessel van der Kolk.