phases
Basic phases of the Hakomi method are as follows:
1. Establish healing relationship
Establish a relationship based on trust and respect between practitioner and client
2. Establish capacity for mindfulness
"Mindfulness is a kind of nonelaborative, nonjudgmental, present-centered awareness in which each thought, feeling, or sensation that arises in the attentional field is acknowledged and accepted as it is"(definition from wikipedia). In Hakomi, mindfullness is an essential tool for realizing enduring transformation of our patterns. If this capacity is not well developed in the client we will engage in practices to build this capacity.
3. Examine experience
Using mindfulness, we delve into the present experience of the body-mind. We notice where and how the experiences of stuckness, disharmony, stress, and contraction appear.
4. Deepen into core material
Using a variety of Hakomi techniques the client immerses and cycles down through thoughts, sensations, emotions, memories, and meanings, to open the door to subconscious core beliefs--the underlying programs that we build our lives upon--often with difficult and counterproductive consequences. Usually, this core material is formed during childhood when we don't have the resources or perspectives to see clearly nor respond effectively to challenging situations.
5. Seeing clearly and providing missing experiencesIn order to heal, transform and evolve, we bring unconscious material into consciousness where it can be seen and experienced. The simple act of seeing ourselves more clearly, and knowing the underlying reasons we do the things we do can have a profound effect on the choices we make and how we experience ourselves. In addition, often times there is a missing experience that can be facilitated which will provide healing and contradict our conditioned beliefs. By bringing the right awareness to this contradiction we help the body and mind to re-organize to form new beliefs and felt senses that are better aligned with the reality of how things are now.
6. Transformation
The reorganization that comes from seeing clearly and having an expansive experience leads to the possibility of transformation. Where we may have been stuck in an outdated and painful pattern, we begin to find the blossoms of new choices. Our experience of ourselves and the world can shift dramatically in a short period of time.
7. Integration
The last step of the process, and in some ways the most important, is for the client to build this new way of being into their body and mind so that the old pattern fades and the new one becomes their default. It is during this phase that we shift the way we confront challenges life throws our way. This integration and implementation begins in our sessions together but the majority of the effort and reward is experienced in your everyday life as you steadily practice to shift into a new way of seeing, doing, and being in the world. Together we will create techniques and practices that will help you catch old patterns as they arise, and shift into more effective, integrated ways of being.
