- Has experience and expertise in a therapeutic modality that is holistic and addresses all aspects of you—body, mind, and emotions and they understand how aspects of identity such as race, gender, sexuality, culture, and socioeconomic status influence your experiences and healing process. A therapist who acknowledges and respects your unique social context can create a more inclusive and supportive environment for your work.
- Can help you integrate attachment theory into your healing journey. Since being human is all about relationships, understanding and healing attachment wounds can be a powerful part of your growth. A therapist skilled in attachment work can help you understand how past relational dynamics influence your current relationships, and guide you in developing healthier, more secure attachments moving forward
- Creates a safe, regulated space for you to process emotions, trauma, and physical sensations.
- Works collaboratively with you to explore both your emotional and relational patterns.
- Offers clarity on their approach, treatment goals, and the logistics of therapy (fees, availability, etc.).
Remember, the most important factor is whether you feel comfortable and safe with the therapist. Take your time to ask questions and find someone who helps you feel heard, supported, and empowered to make meaningful changes in your life. If you’ve had therapists in the past who weren’t a fit or, even worse, caused harm, please don’t give up. Finding the right therapist is an essential part of your healing journey, and you deserve someone who truly sees and meets you where you are. Keep looking, and if we here at Pure Potential are not the right fit, let us help you find someone who is. Therapy should feel like a partnership where you feel seen, respected, and supported. We’re here for you.
In Summary:
6. Free Consultation Call
- Availability & Location: Does the therapist offer convenient session times or provide virtual options if needed?
- Fees & Insurance: Does the therapist accept insurance, what is the cost and duration of sessions? It’s important to understand the financial aspects up front. Note that many therapists choose not to accept insurance to provide more personalized care and maintain greater flexibility. Insurance companies often require a diagnosis and restrict treatment options, which can limit the therapist’s ability to offer holistic, client-centered care. By not working with insurance, therapists can focus on what’s best for the client, ensuring a more tailored, confidential, and effective therapeutic experience
- Treatment Plan & Approach: Does the therapist explain how they work, and do they offer a collaborative approach to setting treatment goals?
5. Practical Considerations
The relationship between you and your therapist is the foundation of healing, especially in somatic therapy. It’s not just a space for talking, but a place where you can experience earned-secure attachment, which can help repair old wounds from childhood or past relationships. A good therapist will support you in exploring your internal world and relational patterns, helping to build trust and connection.
While the therapeutic relationship is crucial, it’s also important to remember that the focus of the session is on you, not the therapist. From time to time, a therapist may offer self-disclosure—sharing a personal experience or insight—if it is relevant to your healing or can help build connection. However, this should never dominate the session. The therapist should not be talking all the time, and you should never feel like the session is about them. Instead, the aim is to create a space where you feel heard, understood, and respected—safe enough to explore your most vulnerable parts.
Ask the therapist how they work with attachment and how they ensure the space is safe and supportive for you. A good therapist will prioritize your needs and guide you in a way that helps you heal from past relational wounds.
4. Therapist-Client Relationship
A critical part of somatic therapy is nervous system regulation, and the therapist's ability to remain emotionally regulated and attuned to your experience is essential. The goal is to help you feel emotionally safe and supported, so you can explore your inner world, process trauma, and build resilience. Emotional regulation and attunement are especially crucial when working with trauma or deep emotional pain. Ask the therapist how they stay emotionally regulated during sessions and what strategies they use to remain present and connected, particularly during challenging moments. A therapist who is invested in their own well-being can more effectively create a safe, grounded space for you to do your healing work. Just as you are working to heal and grow, it's important that your therapist is also engaged in their own ongoing emotional work to ensure they show up as fully present and attuned to you as possible.
3. Emotional Regulation and Attunement
Somatic therapy is about addressing the whole person: body, mind, and emotions. We recognize that emotions often manifest physically—such as tension in the body or a racing heart—and these sensations offer vital clues about what needs healing. Somatic therapy helps you become more aware of your body's responses, emotions, and thought patterns, so you can release what’s no longer serving you. A somatic therapist may use tools like breath work, body scanning, mindfulness, or movement to help you process emotional or traumatic experiences in a grounded way.
In contrast to a more cognitive approach, somatic therapy doesn’t rely solely on talking through your issues—it acknowledges the deep connection between physical sensations, emotional experiences, and thought patterns. Ask the therapist how they use these body-based practices in their work and how they help clients regulate their emotional and physical responses to stress.
2. The Holistic Approach
When interviewing a therapist, ask about their training and experience and the specific modalities they use. Cognitive therapies, such as CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), DBT (Dialectical Behavior Therapy), and ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy), are widely used to help clients change negative thought patterns and develop coping strategies. These approaches are effective in managing anxiety, depression, and other mental health challenges by teaching clients how to identify and shift unhelpful thinking and behavior. However, while cognitive therapies are valuable for understanding and modifying thoughts, somatic approaches complement them by addressing the body and emotions, offering a more holistic path to healing.
A few examples of somatic, or body-based therapies are Sensorimotor Psychotherapy (SP), Somatic Experiencing (SE), Internal Family Systems (IFS), Trauma Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST) and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). While EMDR is not technically considered a somatic therapy, it does share some similarities with somatic therapies. Some EMDR therapists are trained both somatically and in EMDR. These methods are designed to address both the mind and body, working to process trauma, stress, and difficult emotions.
Sensorimotor psychotherapists are uniquely trained in both somatic therapy and attachment theory, which allows them to address trauma and emotional wounds from both a body-centered and relational perspective. This approach is particularly effective for healing early relational wounds—the emotional injuries we often carry from childhood and important early relationships. These wounds can affect how we relate to others and ourselves, influencing our sense of safety, trust, and connection throughout life. By integrating somatic methods with attachment theory, Sensorimotor therapists help clients explore the body’s responses to relational patterns, fostering a deeper understanding of how past experiences show up in the present.
This dual focus on bodily awareness and emotional connection helps create a safe and supportive space where clients can work through difficult experiences in a regulated way. The therapist’s ability to attune to your emotional and physical cues also creates a healing relationship that mirrors the trust and security you may not have experienced earlier in life.
When interviewing a therapist, ask them about their experience with both attachment theory and somatic techniques. Inquire about how they integrate these two approaches into their work, especially if you have concerns about past relational wounds or emotional blocks that feel difficult to overcome. A skilled therapist can guide you in reconnecting with your body and emotions, while also helping you build healthier, more secure attachment patterns—both within the therapeutic relationship and in your life outside of therapy.
1. Therapist’s Expertise and Specialization
What to ask when interviewing a therapist?
When looking for a therapist, it’s important to understand that different therapists use different approaches. Some therapists focus more on cognitive work, which involves changing thought patterns to influence emotions and behavior—this is often called “top-down” therapy. In contrast, somatic therapy is a “bottom-up” approach. Instead of only focusing on thoughts, somatic therapy acknowledges that emotional and physical experiences are deeply interconnected. This approach works with the body, the nervous system, and emotions as entry points for healing.
In addition to the body, emotions and thoughts, many therapies include attachment theory which recognizes how early relationships with caregivers shape our ability to connect, regulate our emotions, and trust others. Attachment theory helps us understand how these early experiences influence our relationships as adults. Therapists who are trained in attachment based modalities help clients to heal attachment wounds in the context of the therapeutic relationship itself. This relational aspect of therapy is foundational, as it creates the safety and trust necessary for deeper emotional healing.
In somatic therapy, we prioritize nervous system regulation, self-regulation, and emotional attunement—all of which are essential for healing attachment wounds and trauma. By addressing the body and nervous system first, we create a foundation of safety and calm that allows for deeper, more effective processing of emotions and thoughts. This bottom-up approach helps to regulate the body’s stress response, fostering resilience and emotional stability before diving into cognitive or emotional work. Once the nervous system is balanced, we can more effectively explore and process thoughts, memories, and emotions, leading to lasting and transformative healing. This holistic approach ensures that both your mind and body are aligned in the healing process