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Since the physical body and neurology are at least superficially similar across all humans, our evolution is largely common and our physiology is likewise shared [1] : the same basic material is being addressed by every therapy, exercise, spiritual practice, and self-help technique that exists - or at least it should be. There are just many different ways to view the elephant.
So there is inivitably going to be some similarity with many different approaches ...
[2]
And therefore is is possible to think that they are truly all the same like a plate of undifferentiated blancmange - but they are not, and small conceptual differences can sometuimes end up in rather large chasms when it comes to the details of how a technique is applied and particularly the intention that underlies that application.
[3]
Firstly, although this approach occasionaly approaches the body through dialogue. it is not a psychotherapy in the normally understood meaning of the word - because literally everything relates back to the body and your senses rather than thoughts. Neither is it a therapy in the normally understood meaning of the word, because the focus is almost completely on health (instead of what might be the problem).
Secondly, despite choice being exercised to preferentially focus on health, it also has little to do with modern versions of NLP/positive thinking - because these tend to be applied with the same manipulative and somewhat colonial goal oriented mindset that pervades our whole society. Instead, here everything is acknowledged and considered valuable - as part of an internal ecosystem but with the understanding that some focus of attention is more useful than others; AND choice is exercised (it's not “just all energy”).
And whilst the similarity with IFS (Internal Family Systems) and other parts-work psychotherapies has been pointed out to me several times, the intentions are different, and parts are considered from a biological rather than psycho-social perspective, an as such are all inherently temporary adaptations rather than things that necessarily need to be assigned identity. [4]
When I first started to look at similarities, I was surprised by the similarity with some aspects of CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy): which recognises the window of tolerance, suggests choices be made as to what is attended to, and acknowledges that distorted cognition is a major problem, considers an anchor to the here-and-now to be important, and that the “answer” includes psychoeducation, mindfulness and less focus on the past. However, (to name just one major difference) whilst CBT considers distorted cognition to be an individual error, I see it as largely a societal one that becomes amplified even more in certain individuals - who are then blamed for not thinking “correctly”. Most importantly, I do not consider cognitive changes in behaviour to be particularly useful, because they only work for small and relatively superficial imprints and cannot possibly get deep enough to address issues that drive deeply non-conscious somatic, metabolic (or even cellular) responses. And whilst I very much like the work of Carl Jung (and also like to quote him!), if you read through the theory and application here to any extent you will find that there are absolutely no analysis - merely a fundamentally simple shift in how sensory attention is used. The theoretical complexity arises because many aspects of the model I ampresenting here are frequently distorted (or at best not very well catered for) in popularised models of the body and the mind.
References & Notes