Holistic Therapy – Our Approach
Holistic Therapy – Our Approach
Most psychotherapists and relationship therapists have little to no significant training and yet sexual connection is essential to intimacy in most relationships. Most sex therapists have insufficient relationship training even though it is well established that relationship dynamics effect every sexual relationship and overall sexual satisfaction. Most sex and relationship therapists never have training in spirituality and/or religious influences in relationships or sex which means that a large part of the human experience is disregarded. CRIWB’s holistic therapy approach is different.
Holistic Therapy Serving Throughout California
CRIWB was founded on an integrative and holistic approach to therapy to meet a need generated by a deficit in the training of psychotherapists and other healing arts practitioners in integrating sex, sexuality relationship dynamics and spiritual aspects of the individual and the partnership. We are therapists who have specific expert training and supervision in individual, couple/partnership, sex and spiritual intimacy holistic therapy. We are dedicated to supporting our clients in integrating body, heart, mind and spirituality as they heal and create the intimacy, love and pleasure they desire.
With a holistic approach, to therapy, we can let go of the idea of being “fixed” because there is nothing wrong with us. Instead, we free ourselves to receive healing through acceptance, compassion and learning to love all our parts and experiences.
How Holistic Therapy Can Help
Many clients report that even after years of therapy, still not being able to achieve the changes that they have long desired.
Holistic therapy and healing is an approach that seeks to integrate and align body, heart, mind, and spirit in a way that supports you, honors your story, and allows you to experience more freedom and aliveness.
There is no need to “fix” you because everything that has occurred—the good, the bad and the ugly—has all occurred for your highest good. Healing is about connecting more fully to yourself and seeing all life experiences as stepping stones to what you desire rather than as obstacles you blame, keep you stuck, or that get in the way.
You do not need fixing. You are not broken.
What we all are in need of is healing.
Healing that helps us forgive the past and unearth our own brilliance.
Healing so that we can reawakenand connect more fully to a vibrant body, a loving heart, a creative mind, and connected to life itself. "
- JACQUELINE MENDEZ
Founder & Clinical Director, Center of Relationship & Intimacy Well-Being
Holistic Therapy, Healing & the Body's Wisdom
Our body remembers and holds deep within the tissue of our being what the mind and heart may have forgotten. What we experience in our lives, our tissues remember.
Whether physical, mental, or emotional trauma, the physical body remembers the experience of the mind and vice versa. In an effort to help us feel safe and so that we know how to respond and survive all experiences, the nervous and muscular systems develop a protective reaction for future threats. We develop a durable and robust defense mechanism or coping skill.
The problem occurs when this function no longer serves us and we are left with reactions shutting down, avoiding, dissociating, or habitual tension patterns. We find ourselves in an endless cycle of tightness and exhaustion due to an over-functioning of the sympathetic system—fight, freeze, or flight response.
So, when we experience something in our environment that reminds us even slightly of a previous experience or feelings or we experience negative emotions that don’t feel good, we then unconsciously choose to avoid, tighten, and re-enact previous responses. This is when seeking holistic therapy can help.
Integrating body-focused, movement and breath techniques along with more traditional therapeutic techniques, help bring into awareness our patterns of opening and closing to our desires and relationships. Once we can recognize these patterns, we can create shifts and ultimately heal and release what does not serve us in our present life. We then can make space for growth and vitality. When we are experiential in our work, we can reach greater depths that may not be present in traditional sit and talk therapy.
Holistic Healing Does Not Fix a Problem.
It helps us find ways to release and heal the memory of the body, heart, and mind while reconnecting to our spirit/soul. We teach the body to let go and unravel the habitual mental loops while opening up the heart space and reconnect more “wholey” with the energy of the body and with that of another.
Ultimately empowering ourselves in love, intimacy, sexuality and life mastery.
Why Include the Body in Holistic Therapy?
Everything begins with the breath.
Connecting with the breath allows for greater sense of relaxation. Breath can also create greater connection and alignment as habitual tension is released allowing for easier integration of body, heart, mind, and spirit.
Different breathing techniques, connecting the inhale and exhale, are used in holistic therapy to assist clients in relaxing the body. As a result, clients better understand and release habitual patterns. A relaxed body, after all, is an invitation to greater pleasure and erotic energy.
Breath also helps a client connect more deeply to the body, which in turn, allows for more space by allowing thoughts, memories, feelings, or unconscious blocks to surface and release.
The Physical Body as a Channel for Our Innate Wisdom.
The body speaks through tension, aches, relaxation, and pleasure. As a result, when movement and physical awareness practices are integrated into holistic therapy sessions, a more holistic manner of healing occurs. A more meaningful exploration of the nuances of the body happens in the present moment, and a deeper understanding of healing occurs.
This leads us to transform and liberate ourselves from the retelling of old stories that no longer serve us—those stories that keep us stuck in negative behavioral and relationship patterns—and get in the way of greater love, pleasure and intimacy.
Clients learn to tune in to the body’s cues as a response to emotional, mental, and behavioral states. Tics, aches, sensation, and pings, along with specific movement, allows the client to develop a keener sense of self awareness and observation.
This assists clients in replacing unwanted and unproductive emotional, mental, and behavioral patterns. Ultimately healing the whole of the person and opening the heart space to receive and give love more deeply.
Holistic Sex Therapy – The Sweet Spot of Sensuality and Sexuality
The sweet spot is the intersection of how we embody and integrate the physical, emotional, mental, and the spiritual aspects.
The practice that engages and helps us embody our innately sensual body is sensuality. Sensuality helps us align and integrate the body, heart, mind, and spirit which creates connection to the innate erotic energy.
Sexuality then becomes the expression of this alignment. Sexuality is the expression that supports us in desiring and creating intimate connection with others. CRIWB’s holistic sex therapy sessions can help clients achieve this.
Embodiment and Movement Within Holistic Therapy
Embodiment
Embodiment is the ability to feel what you are feeling.
From a psychological perspective, embodiment is a unifying process influenced by the body’s physiology, sensory systems, motor systems, and emotions.
It is the practice of remaining present and aware with what one is feeling, thinking, and experiencing while feeling the bodily responses to what is occurring rather than engaging in habitual responses that trigger avoidance, squelching of feelings, or other negative coping skills.
Movement
Slowing down, being deliberate with movement, and engaging in techniques that nourish the body, heart, mind, and spirit, so that one can experience life in the present moment.
Mindful movement is not dancing or movement that imposes on the body. It is about learning how the body communicates with you and how it wants to surrender to more a relaxed and pleasurable state.
During Center for Relationship & Intimacy Well-Being holistic therapy sessions, clients are taught how to use tension and relaxation to break-free from habitual patterns and tune into their intuitive wisdom while creating more aliveness, sensuality, and feeling more comfortable in their own skin.
Integrative Holistic Approach to Therapy
We provide an integrative therapeutic approach to the work we do. This means that the affective (emotional), behavioral, cognitive, physical, social, and spiritual aspects of an individual used in their treatment.
At CRIWB, we meet our clients where they are on their journey to pleasure and intimacy by weaving and healing life experiences that may perceived as obstacles while creating pathways to heart desires. We base our services on proven techniques while honoring our client’s unique stories.