OUR WORK BEGINS WITH LONGING 

With our form of bodywork, we create spaces that make it easier to feel oneself and connect – with oneself, the environment, reality, music and play, with other life forms of this world and, last but not least, with others.  

Workshops 

Over the years, the actual body therapy has been enriched with numerous extensions, borrowings, and strokes of genius. We conduct weekend workshops in Hamburg every 4 to 8 weeks. The annual highlight that catalyzes many enduring shifts and transformations is our one-week summer workshop. Since the 1990s, we have organized summer workshops in various formats. For many years, these took place in Aix-en-Provence and are currently held in the Elbe River Biosphere Reserve.
 

Training 

To people who work with people, to artists and creatives, or to people who are therapists themselves, we want to pass on the art and craft of bodywork and its theoretical foundations. 

Bodywork, as we understand it, is a school of feeling and thus of life and there is a resonance ability and accuracy that can be learned - this is our concern. 

Individual sessions

1:1 bodywork in the classical sense is in itself an effective therapy, often also preparation and accompaniment of group-based work.  It is about seeking out what is alive and flowing in the body and discovering and working through blockages of breath, feeling and expression. 

Interested in one-on-one sessions?

Michaela Simon, Hamburg: 

www.koerperarbeit-simon.de  

Antje Vogt, Hamburg: 

www.praxis-antje-vogt.de   

Carsten Dernedde, Norwich (UK): 

www.skanbodywork.co.uk

Body and energy work 

Breath intensifies energy, then the body autonomously finds the appropriate expression, a lot of movement and movement 

Movement and theatre work 

Central to us is music, working with variability and with the joy of play.  

Stage Presence becomes Life Presence 

Group work 

Groups are entities within which energy resonates and propagates. The collective reaction of the group amplifies and multiplies the positive change and joy experienced.
 

Why bodywork? 

Our work begins with longing.  Our most basic human trait is the desire to feel connected to ourselves, to others, and to the world we live in.  In the state in which we are capable of connection, the face is open and communicative, the posture is relaxed upright, play is just as possible as concentrating on a task, cooperation and interaction with others is easy and this is also perceived by others.  Bodywork makes it easy to translate back into the associated feeling those memories that are mainly stored in the body, for example in the form of 'holding on' or 'not feeling' or 'holding one's breath'. 
In this back-translation, the original body feeling, the emotions and the movement impulses that were held in the body become active again. Then it can be possible to feel the feeling completely, to feel the emotion to the end and to allow the movement impulses. As a result, the inhibition and restraint in the body becomes less. Instead, there is a feeling of space and mobility in the body and also the desire and ability to take one's place with one's fellow human beings. 

Everything flows: becoming whole through resonance 

What can bodywork do? 

The idea that bodywork could help is obvious if you experience yourself as cerebral or emotionally cut off. Bodywork can also be helpful if you suffer from intense emotions, such as anxiety disorders. Some people come to us because they can't express certain feelings, such as boundaries or affection, and they want to learn how to do so. Another motivation for bodywork can be to get your own creativity going again. On the whole, however, it is not necessary to feel a clear connection between a concern or problem and one's own body. Bodywork can accompany psychotherapy for anxiety disorders, panic, phobias, post-traumatic stress disorders, depression, sexual disorders, relationship difficulties, addiction, somatization, psychosomatic disorders. Bodywork does not replace psychotherapy, but as with psychotherapy, it is about gaining more leeway in emotional and behavioral reactions, dissolving old patterns and being able to surrender to the play and flow of life with more confidence.

What is Resonance?

Resonance involves vibrations, streaming, vegetative identification, and being in feeling contact. We humans are designed to connect and cooperate with one another. However, beyond a manageable group size, discomfort arises. In our modern world, we must find ways to interact with strangers without emotional intimacy. This challenge can disconnect us from our own bodies, especially during interactions with others. This disconnection often manifests in our breathing – typically shallow and brief. Conversely, deep breathing, coupled with awareness of bodily sensations, eventually leads to a sense of flow or vibration. In this state, genuine contact with others becomes more palpable.

It raises an intriguing question: how can we sense and manage others' emotions? Certainly, observation plays a role – human facial expressions, speech, and posture are highly communicative (provided there's no significant cultural barrier). Simultaneously with observation, an automatic mimicry occurs. When we attentively observe someone, we subconsciously mirror their movements and experience related feelings and emotions within our own bodies. This phenomenon is harnessed and refined in bodywork training. Resonance allows us – under favorable conditions – to achieve a harmonious connection with one another, creating a group that is indeed greater than the sum of its individuals.

Our Team

We come from diverse backgrounds and professions. What binds us is friendship, shared experiences from our 'Skan' bodywork training in the 80s and 90s, and a passion for this work – now evolved yet still direct, simple, and profoundly human.

Michaela Simon

For over three decades, I have provided body therapy for individuals and groups of various sizes. Equally long has been my tenure as a psychotherapist grounded in analytic psychology and as a supervisor for individuals, couples, groups, teams, and executives. Over time, my learning continues.  Over time, I have learned many methods of therapy and bodywork. For bodywork, I still prefer Reichian Skan Body Therapy as the most vital form. Today, I select the most meaningful focus from my extensive repertoire. To me, body therapy is the most vivid and comprehensive way to work on oneself. As a trainer, I impart my expertise and rich experience to both small and large groups.

 Antje Vogt 

For many years I have been working in private practice as a body psychotherapist and ELPH therapist in Hamburg.  Recognising the causes of a person's illnesses and stresses has interested me from an early age. After studying psychology at the University of Hamburg, I learned holistic healing methods such as body psychotherapy and craniosacral work and trained as a psychotherapist according to the Heilpraktikergesetz. Intensive theatre work has accompanied me on my way.  Since 2005 I have also been trained as a certified ELPH therapist and ELPH teacher and have been working with this method ever since, because it is profoundly redeeming and changes holistically. 

Carsten Dernedde 

In the 90s, I completed my training as a body therapist while studying medicine in Hamburg. Today I live near Norwich in the UK, where I work as a GP, body therapist and EMDR therapist with a focus on attachment.  The bodywork I learned is based on the work of Wilhelm Reich (1897-1957), whose focus on the flow of life energy impressed me a lot practically, but whose basic theoretical assumptions were less convincing to me. Since my training in bodywork, I have been fascinated by how neuroscience, behavioral biology and other branches of science have made possible a deeper understanding of human functioning and feeling, which is becoming more and more convergent with the liveliness and warmth for which I am so grateful to bodywork.

Why Bodywork 

Our work begins with longing.  Our work starts with our wishes. Our most basic human trait is the desire to feel connected to ourselves, to others, and to the world we live in. At the same time, however, we give a lot of space to the fear that this longing for connection (the word alone!) could be a defect: unacceptable, a reverie, undeserved and outrageous; also that 'the others' are unable or unwilling to respond to it. 
Although this desire to connect with is the most beautiful thing about being human, we are often rather insecure about it. We hide it from ourselves and from others. We diminish it or disguise it in autonomy, sometimes even with contempt or contempt. Or we feel intense connection, but only in our own grouping, in opposition to others. Of course, the inner reality of restraint and inhibition also corresponds to an external reality in which self-expression, attachment and also physical security in one's own history and reality of life are not possible unbroken: in other words, a world in which trauma, lack of freedom and lack of relationship occur. Today, we know a lot about the biological processes involved in shaping our being-in-the-world. 
Long-term memory, i.e. personal experience and memory, serves to provide behavioral patterns at any moment in the unpredictability of the world that could be useful for survival, whether it is something simple like knowing what is edible, or something complex like a relationship pattern. 
In the case of trauma, this means that remembered threats can have the same effect on us as present threats: they can be overwhelming; then the muscles relax, the hearing perceives human voices less well, and hopelessness and listlessness make social connections more difficult. Or they may seem threatening but surmountable; then the body automatically adjusts to fight or flight, the muscles tense, digestion pauses, the gaze narrows and the priority for self-preservation makes relationships more difficult.

The positive counterpart to these automatic 'alarmed' functions is the state in which we are capable of connection; In this state, the face is open and communicative, the posture is relaxed, upright, play is possible as well as concentrating on a task, cooperation and connection with others is easy and this is also perceived by others. Whenever memory traces are 'read' in the brain, feelings are activated that draw attention to what is likely to be the right next action. In this process, which is actually continuously active, sometimes even during sleep, newly added information is constantly incorporated into the memory treasure. Ideally, the activated memory with new connotations of security and connectedness is stored back in the long-term memory as soon as we can turn to something else. 
Bodywork makes it easy to translate back into the associated feeling those memories that are mainly stored in the body, for example in the form of 'holding on' or 'not feeling' or 'holding one's breath'. 
In this back-translation, the original body feeling, the emotions and the movement impulses that were held in the body become active again. Then it can be possible to feel the feeling completely, to feel the emotion to the end and to allow the movement impulses. As a result, the inhibition and restraint in the body becomes less. Instead, there is a feeling of space and mobility in the body and also the desire and ability to take one's place with one's fellow human beings. 

Dates 

2024

Weekend workshops in Hamburg 

03-05 May 2024 

07-09 June 2024 

:: Summer Workshop :: July 19 - 26, 2024 :: Elbe Valley Biosphere Reserve::  

August 23-25, 2024 

September 13-15, 2024 

December 13-15, 2024   

We have a great desire to  to work with you in the sun and dance in the rain - :-) 

To raise questions and to move big and small things.    

To laugh out loud, to cry softly,  to wrestle and scuffle, melt and listen.    

To be together and feel the buzz.  

Be on your own. 

Be with yourself.    

We look forward to hearing from you!