Therapist in Mill Valley, CA

Glenn Fleisch, Ph.D., MFCC, LMFT

Body awareness therapy:

Unfolding body wisdom and restoring life-spirit

Is your life stuck, at a standstill, feeling blocked? Are you finding it difficult to resolve or move forward in important areas of your living? Do you often try to make changes, yet end up feeling discouraged, frustrated, resigned? Perhaps you wish to alter certain habits or develop new ways, but something seems to stop you from accomplishing or maintaining the changes. At this point of impasse, we can feel most disheartened. Although it may feel like the end, it is actually an opportunity for a new beginning. There is a source within all of us that can guide us forward- our body intelligence is the vehicle for growth and healing.

I specialize in helping people who are experiencing life-impasses, a dispirited condition in which life-energy stagnates and our desires for change feel blocked. At this edge, we often feel confused, despairing, at a loss about what to do or how to proceed. I discovered that at the point of "not-knowing," there is something in us that does know. The method I call Body Awareness Therapy (BAT) is a simple, powerful process of accessing and unfolding Body Wisdom. BAT awakens life-energy, restores spirit, and shows the right direction/ next steps.

Sitting and talking, while helpful, cannot themselves transform deeply ingrained patterns. Thus, I offer various possibilities for processing stuck places and resolving impasses- inner body awareness; outer expressiveness/movement; playing out embodied patterns, etc. These provide opportunities for developing "know how," learning new skills, developing capacities and healing core wounds. This method is based on the truth that our body contains a kind of knowledge, information and energy capable of healing core wounds and carrying forward our living where it has become stuck. It is effortless, in that we allow the body energy and inner spirit to guide us to the right steps and needed interactions.

BAT will enable you to: .1 deepen awareness of bodily feelings; .2 release long-held tensions, stress- freeing life-energy; .3 restore the body's spirit; .4 follow bodily messages/leads; .5 identify and transform bodily patterns/ heal psychic wounds, .6 develop new capacities- taking stands, initiating action, expressing oneself.

Our body is always moving toward where it is wounded or blocked, as well as to where there is new life, fresh air and greater vitality. Symptoms develop when the body's living energy and spirit have been broken or blocked from actualizing and expanding itself. When our awareness reconnects with the body, it reawakens this life-force, beginning a journey of recovering lost parts of ourselves and restoring our innate inner spirit. BAT can help release blocked energy, heal broken spirit and rejuvenate our bodily living.

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Education/Training

I have a B.S. degree from Brooklyn College (NY), an M.Ed. degree from Temple University (Philadelphia) and a Ph.D. degree (Cinical Psychology) from the Center for Psychological Studies (Albany/Berkeley, CA.).
I am a certified Focusing trainer and Coordinator with the Focusing Institute (New York) where I have been studying with various teachers for 16 years. Additional training has been in: Wholebody Focusing; psychoanalystic psychotherapy; existential psychotherapy; variety of somatic therapies; hypnotherapy; psychodrama; meditation/spiritual teachings. I also am very interested in research, philosophy, poetry and music.

Bio

I have been a psychotherapist in private practice for 35 years- helping hundreds of people work through difficult and entrenched patterns, and find their own right path in life. I believe that a good therapist should be open to learning through their own personal and professional experience. Thus, in addition to receiving training in many therapeutic models including: existential-humanistic therapies; psychoanalytic therapy; Focusing and Focusing oriented therapy; somatic therapies; shamanic healing practices; drama therapies- I have also done extensive research and writing on what I have discovered in my own work.

This has resulted in a continual evolution and expansion of how I work with clients When we bring accepting and sensitive awareness to the whole body and to whatever symptom, pattern, sensation is calling for attention, it awakens a healing energy, restoring the flow of spirit and life where it has been blocked or impaired. Often, when we are in the midst of a blockage or impasse, the body is showing something that indicates a potential direction or step needed to resolve the situation. or transform oneself.

In addition to my therapy practice, I lead workshops/retreats in the local San Francisco Bay Area, as well as throughout the United States and other countries. As a clinical supervisor and teacher, I support and train other therapists to learn this method of therapy. I have also written extensively on this work. Currently, I am an Adjunct Faculty member at CIIS in San Francisco, in the Integral Counseling Program.

Memberships

Some of my professional associations include:
CAMFT (California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists;
WAPCEPC (World Association of Person Centered and Experiential Psychotherapy);
USABP (United States Association of Body-Centered Psychotherapy);
Focusing Institute (Certified Trainer and Coordinator)

Payments Accepted

Cash, check, insurance, paypal

Hours:Monday- Thursday, 10 am- 8 pm

License:MFT #MFC 12608

Helpful Links

Practice Areas/Issues Treated

Therapy	Life Transitions
Addiction	Loneliness
Anger Management	Marriage & Family Therapy
Anxiety and Panic	Marriage Counseling
Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD)	Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
Body Image Issues	Online / Teletherapy
Caregiver Issues	Pre and Postpartum Mental Health
Chronic Illness	Relationship Issues
Couples	Self-Esteem Issues
Depression	Seniors and Elder Care Issues
Divorce	Stress Management
Eating Disorders	Trauma and PTSD
Grief and Loss	Work and Career Issues