Somatics Glossary

It’s an umbrella term for therapeutic approaches that work through the body, movement, breath, sensation, rather than through talk alone, based on the idea that the nervous system holds the effects of stress and trauma, not just the mind.

Somatic therapy is the broad category. Somatic Experiencing (SE) is one specific, trademarked modality within it, developed by Peter Levine, built around techniques like titration and pendulation.

It means working with distressing material in small, manageable doses rather than all at once, so the nervous system isn’t overwhelmed. It’s one of the core techniques in somatic experiencing.

Small moments, a pet, a song, sunlight, that reliably nudge your nervous system toward safety and connection. The term is used as the deliberate opposite of triggers.

Body-based approaches to trauma and stress, including somatic experiencing and sensorimotor psychotherapy, have a growing body of clinical support, though research is still developing compared to more established talk-therapy modalities.

Talk therapy works primarily through language and insight. Somatic therapy adds direct attention to body sensation, movement, and physiological state, on the premise that some effects of stress and trauma are held in the body in ways that talking alone doesn’t fully reach.

It’s a phrase popularized by psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk describing how traumatic experience can be stored in the body as physical tension, reactivity, or sensation, not just as conscious memory, which is part of the rationale behind somatic approaches to healing.

It’s the vague, whole-body sense of a situation before it’s translated into words, a term coined by Eugene Gendlin. Much of somatic work begins by helping someone notice and stay with their felt sense rather than jumping straight to analysis.

Many people use somatic approaches, breathwork, grounding, titration, alongside or instead of talk therapy for anxiety, since anxiety often shows up strongly as physical sensation. It’s not a replacement for professional care for significant anxiety, but it’s commonly used as part of treatment.

Discharge is the release of survival energy, trembling, deep breaths, spontaneous movement, that was mobilized during a stressful or threatening event but never fully used or expressed at the time. Somatic experiencing aims to help that energy complete its natural cycle.

Pendulation is a technique of gently moving attention back and forth between a difficult sensation and a more neutral or resourced one, rather than staying fixed on distress. It helps build capacity to be with hard material without becoming overwhelmed.

Titration is about dosage, working with distressing material in small amounts rather than all at once. Pendulation is about movement, deliberately shifting attention between distress and safety. The two techniques are often used together in somatic experiencing.

Resourcing means deliberately connecting to a felt sense of safety, calm, or strength, through memory, imagery, or the body, before approaching difficult material. It’s used to build capacity ahead of doing harder emotional work.

Common techniques include titration, pendulation, resourcing, grounding, orienting, and body scanning. Different modalities, like Somatic Experiencing, sensorimotor psychotherapy, and Hakomi, combine these techniques in different ways.

Orienting is the reflexive scanning of your environment, literally looking around, that helps confirm safety. It’s often one of the first steps recommended when someone is in a shutdown or freeze state, before trying stillness-based practices.

Grounding is a specific practice, bringing attention back to the present moment and physical body. Somatic therapy is the broader therapeutic category that grounding techniques often belong to, alongside other tools like titration and resourcing.

It’s a body-centered therapy modality that integrates talk therapy with direct attention to physical sensation, posture, and movement, commonly used in trauma treatment alongside or instead of purely verbal approaches.

Hakomi is a body-centered psychotherapy approach that uses mindfulness to access unconscious beliefs held in the body, combining somatic awareness with gentle, experiential techniques rather than direct analysis.

TRE (Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises) is a technique developed by Dr. David Berceli that uses a set of exercises to induce a natural, therapeutic tremor response, intended to help release stored muscular tension associated with stress and trauma.

Somatic memory, sometimes called body memory, is the idea that the body can hold traces of past experience, especially unresolved stress or trauma, that show up as physical tension, reactivity, or sensation rather than as a conscious, narrative memory.

Somatic therapy often works directly with dissociation by helping someone notice body sensation and build interoceptive awareness gradually, since dissociation is understood as a nervous system’s protective disconnection from thoughts, feelings, or surroundings.

Hypervigilance is a heightened, sustained state of alertness to potential threat. Somatic approaches often address it through grounding, orienting, and practices that help the nervous system register real-time safety cues rather than staying braced for danger.

Some people use somatic approaches, including somatic movement and body-based awareness practices, alongside medical care for chronic pain, since pain and nervous system activation are closely linked. It’s generally used as a complement to, not a replacement for, medical treatment.

Embodiment is the practice of being aware of and present in your physical body, rather than primarily living in thought. It matters because most somatic techniques, from titration to grounding, rely on this kind of body awareness as their starting point.