Hakomi Approach

Hakomi is an experiential body centered therapy approach that uses mindfulness and the innate wisdom of your body to safely: recall and reexamine past experiences; uncover hidden core beliefs that shape your life; and open new life possibilities and choices. Hakomi is based in the belief that mind, body and spirit operate together, not as disconnected parts.

How Hakomi Works

Hakomi psychotherapy uses first-hand, felt experience to enable the process of self-discovery and change. Because it deals with more than thoughts, emotions, and behaviors, somatic therapy may open you up to information that can be overlooked in more traditional analytic psychotherapy.

In Hakomi, the added awareness of sensations and felt experiences within the body are used to deepen the work. This can provide a channel of cooperation between the unconscious and conscious, and help facilitate communication among parts of yourself that may be lost, hidden, or isolated.

The Hakomi Principles

The Hakomi Method is based on seven principles that underlie all aspects of the work and guide the practitioner to approach both the client and the process with a sense of wholeness, respect, and humility:

  • Unity: an inclusive awareness of the interrelatedness of things
  • Organicity: the recognition and honoring or each person’s individuality
  • Mind/Body/Spirit Holism: the assumption that all elements of experience are essential
  • Mindfulness: the value of being genuinely aware of exactly what is happening
  • Nonviolence: a commitment to respect and loving regard
  • Truth: the pursuit of the actual nature of things
  • Change: the trust that things can and will move and evolve

How Hakomi Can Help

Hakomi is a wonderful therapy for those who are interested in exploring themselves at a deeper level. Hakomi uses mindfulness and present moment awareness to help you recognize, explore and shift habitual ways of acting and responding and connect more with your aliveness. It uses multiples dimensions — body, thoughts, emotions, posture, beliefs—to explore, change, and grow.

“Therapy is first about discovering. It’s about who you are and about what your deepest emotional attitudes are. It’s not just about who you think you are … It’s about who you are in the very heart of yourself. That’s the flavor of psychotherapy, discovering yourself, discovering your real attitudes toward the most important pieces of your life.”  —Ron Kurtz, Hakomi founder.

Hakomi Resources

I am a Hakomi Therapist. Contact me to learn more about the method.

Read more about Dr. Vera

Olga M. Vera, PhD, LP

Dr. Vera is a licensed Clinical Psychologist with over 24 years of experience in the mental health field.

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