Somatics and phenomenological psychopathology: a mental health proposal

Abstract

This work begins with a brief review – from the physical education movement that began in ancient Greece and is deeply rooted in 19th century Europe, to the somatics movement alive today. The review captures primary historical and conceptual references, relevant to the therapeutic-embodied exploratory work. Then, G. Stanghellini’s mental health care model [2] is reviewed. This model is considered within reflexive self-awareness and spoken dialogue: the main vehicles in relation with alterity and its consequences in the realm of psychotherapeutic encounter and intervention. This will highlight the individual’s bodily movement and inter-corporeal ‘proto-dialogue’ as a prior realm of therapeutic intervention. Next, a brief consideration of E. Strauss work [31] is presented. This paper’s hypothesis is that bodily qualitative dynamics highlighted by phenomenology are essential for an effective mental health therapeutic intervention. A ‘seed’ of a framework is proposed in this paper; this seed assesses some phenomenological assets of a positive conception of mental health, for which self-awareness education is key to develop skills such as kinaesthetic intelligence and attunement and to educate healthy persons who can promote edifying social relations and environments.