The intention of the Embodied Flow Somatic Movement Therapy (EFSMT) Program is to offer the practitioner tools to work with groups and individuals to enhance mental, emotional, physical and biological functions in order to bring optimal well-being and healing. For this approach, healing is the processes of returning to wholeness. This sense of flourishing and well-being can be achieved by a range of practices that are self-expanding such as bringing consciousness into one’s experience of their optimal potential, providing a felt sense of agency, or even finding more ease and efficiency within the muscles and joints of their body.
This program integrates non-dualistic tantric philosophy, embodiment practices, humanistic psychology, Mind-Body Medicine techniques, and somatic body-work therapies. The term somatics is derived from the Latin word soma, meaning the living body. Somatics was developed by Thomas Hanna as an approach to experience the body from within in order to actualize human potential and to innate the processes of healing. The felt sense of our self, also known as Embodiment, leads to an experience of being comfortable in one’s own skin. Ultimately this facilitates:
- self awareness
- boundaries
- self-esteem
- emotional regulation
- empathy
- enhanced cognitive processing
- easeful decision making of complex situations
- body related self confidence
- greater sense of self-control
- enhanced intuition
- a feeling of being both authentic and interconnected with others and the environment.
A somatic movement therapist fosters these benefits by empowering their students and clients to utilize their own pathways and resources to reach their desired goals.
The non-dual lens of this program recognizes that mind, body, and spirit are one, that each individual is already whole, and the path to well-being requires addressing the obstructions getting in the way of that wholeness.
Welcome to Somatic Education Australasia (SEA), dedicated to the flourishing of somatic education, somatic arts practice and body-mind research in the Australasian region.
We are pleased to offer the first licensed Body-Mind Centering® (BMCsm) program in Melbourne, Australia, beginning with the SOMATIC MOVEMENT EDUCATOR certification program. Along with BMC programs around the world, our courses have been postponed since early 2020 due to the pandemic. Our courses will resume in October 2022, and registration is now open!
We appreciate your patience and understanding during these fluid and disruptive times. Sign up for our mailing list and check back here for schedule updates. We aim to have 2023 dates available very soon.
BMC Somatic Movement Educator training is for you if you
•are inspired by the process of embodiment
•want to develop ways to move in consciousness and presence
•have an interest in embodied anatomy and developmental movement
•want to teach movement and hands-on in any setting
•are an artist, therapist, educator or researcher and want to include Body-Mind Centering® in your work
Courses may be taken individually, or, upon successful completion of the entire 500+ hour course, students may become a Certified Body-Mind Centering® Somatic Movement Educator, and a Registered Somatic Movement Educator through ISMETA (The International Somatic Movement Education and Therapy Association).
Click here to download the SEA SME information booklet.
We Acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the Lands on which we practice and offer our classes. We pay our deep respects to Indigenous Elders past, present and emerging. SEA supports Pay the Rent.
Body-Mind Centering® is a registered service mark, and and BMCsm are service marks of Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen.
I recently completed the group reformer course though Tensegrity training at Queen St Pilates Studio in Adelaide. Over the three fantastic days of face-to-face training, I was able to broaden my knowledge and understanding of the body and the benefits and versatility of the reformer. Being only 1 of 5 people in this course meant that we were very interactive with the teacher and were able to ask frequent questions, create relative conversations, and feed off of each others ideas. It also meant that we could all use each other to demonstrate and create scenarios, and the instructor was almost always available to tend to us.
The online theory was thorough and simple to follow, which prepared me well for the hands on learning. Ample time was provided to complete the assessments away from the studio, and I loved having to put my knowledge to the test using real life scenarios and putting together class plans for different injuries, ages and fitness abilities. I think this type of learning prepares you extremely well for taking on clients. It was only a week after the course that I taught my first reformer class and it was incredible. I felt like I knew how to tend to each participant based on their abilities and knew how to modify/progress them. It felt extremely natural. I am still teaching at this pilates studio in Moonta Bay and over the course of these past few months I feel like the information I was provided with through Tensegrity has sunk in and progressed, and has not only been of high value to myself, but to the studio and its clients as well.
I have also now completed the face to face component of the Certificate IV in Contemporary Pilates & Teaching Methodology.
We are excited to announce new Body-Mind Centering® programs in Melbourne, Australia and New York City, United States!
Somatic Education Australasia join the current licensed training organizations around the world and Sonder Movement Project is adding a second program to their current offerings.
Melbourne, Australia
Somatic Education Australasia (SEA) is happy to announce the first Body-Mind Centering® certification program in Australia.
The Body-Mind Centering® Somatic Movement Education Program begins October 2019 in Melbourne. SEA is a collaboration between Olive Bieringa, Otto Ramstad and Kim Sargent-Wishart, created to provide Body-Mind Centering® licensed trainings to Australasia and support the development of somatic arts, education and research locally and worldwide.
Olive is a dance-maker, Certified Practitioner and Teacher of Body-Mind Centering®, Registered ISMETA Somatic Movement Therapist and Educator, with an MFA in Performance & New Media, a BA in Dance, and a shiatsu certification. She has been co-teaching internationally with Otto for over twenty years. Originally from Aotearoa/New Zealand, she has been wanting to bring a BMCsm certification program to New Zealand and Australia for many years to cultivate an expanded conversation around movement, consciousness, education, and somatic practice.
Otto is a choreographer, dancer, Certified Practitioner and Teacher of Body-Mind Centering®, and currently pursuing an MA in Choreography at Oslo National Academy for the Arts. His BMCsm journey began at just six years old in his first dance classes with Suzanne River, a Certified Body-Mind Centering® Practitioner. Otto has been co-teaching internationally with Olive for over twenty years, offering BMCsm workshops annually in New Zealand since 2004. He also applies somatic work in skateboarding and snowboarding.
Kim has been a Certified Body-Mind Centering® Practitioner since 1999, is a Registered Somatic Movement Educator and Therapist with ISMETA, and is currently enrolled in the BMCsm Teacher Training. She has a BA in Dance, worked as a bodyworker and Pilates-based movement instructor for over 20 years, and completed a practice-led PhD in Performance Studies in 2016. She regularly offers workshops and professional development in the greater Melbourne region, with a special interest in the dialogue between somatics, creative arts practices, and meditation.
Kim, Olive, and Otto first danced together in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1990s, and collaborated, along with Michael Ridge, to host Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen on her 2017 Australia/NZ teaching tour. It was during this tour that the idea for Somatic Education Australasia began to crystallize and become a reality.
The 2019 – 2022 Body-Mind Centering® Somatic Movement Educator program will be held at the beautiful and historic Abbotsford Convent in Melbourne. Course modules will be held twice a year for approximately three years.
The program will be taught in English with an international faculty, including program directors and senior teachers. In addition to Olive, Otto, and Kim, teachers include Jens Johannsen (DE), Friederike Troscher (DE), Gloria Desideri (IT), Mary Lou Seereiter (USA), Rebecca Haseltine (USA), Amy Matthews (USA), and Sarah Barnaby (USA).
For more information:
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.seasomaticeducation.com
New York City
Sonder Movement Project is happy to announce that it will be offering the Infant Developmental Movement Education Program (IDME) in Rhode Island and New York City.
The four developmental movement courses are being offered in conjunctions with the Somatic Movement Education Program in Cranston, RI, beginning February 16, 2019. Those courses are:
- Senses and Perception 1
- Basic Neurocellular Patterns (BNP)
- Primitive Reflexes, Righting Reactions, and Equilibrium Responses (RRR)
- Ontogenetic Development
The IDME 1 and IDME 2 courses will be offered beginning in October 2020 at Babies Project in New York City.
Sonder Movement Project’s SME and IDME programs are directed by Amy Matthews, who is a Body-Mind Centering® Teacher and Practitioner, and a graduate of the Infantant Developmental Movement Education program. Amy is also the co-founder and co-director of Babies Project in NYC, where she works with Sarah Barnaby to offer free and low-cost IDME sessions to babies, caregivers, and other adults.
We are delighted that IDME training and certification will be available in the United States, and in New York City where Amy has worked with hundreds of babies since 2008. We hope the program will draw professionals who are interested in expanding their approach to working with infants as well as anyone interested in developing and deepening their understanding of how we all began the life-long process of learning to move, learning to relate to others, and learning to learn.
The IDME courses will be taught in English by Thomas Greil and Amy Matthews, with additional teaching by Sarah Barnaby.
For more information:
Email [email protected]
Website: www.sondermsma.com
