The individual session provides a safe space for expressing feelings and thoughts that are habitually suppressed in everyday interactions. Since free self-expression usually encounters internal and external resistance, the contact-oriented and relaxed setting of individual therapy invites creative paths toward expansion.

Breath and Feeling

The initial goal of individual therapy is to reduce the body's underlying tension and improve the permeability of the energy circulating within it. Through the repeated invitation and reminder to breathe fully and to place "fingers" on areas of physical perception (hand movements, facial expressions, shoulders, diaphragm, voice, speech, eyes, etc.), a heightened sense of self emerges. This allows acute or chronic muscle contractions and stereotypical movements to be recognized and released.

This process usually releases emotions very quickly. Holding tension may have previously been safer or even the only protection against unwanted sensations. Sooner or later such psychophysical reactions can affect behavior, thought processes, work performance, relationships, sex life, and health.

I repeatedly experience this phase of a therapeutic process as very fragile, as it requires a willingness to confront childhood experiences in order to recognize that the old defense mechanisms are no longer needed. From my own experience, I know the resistance that arises, which can consist of mystifying the experience of one's own bodily vitality, banishing it to a sphere beyond everyday possibilities. Stopping at this threshold leaves an unfulfilled longing and often quickly leads to a dopamine-dependent daily routine in which attention is completely absorbed by consumerism, media overstimulation, professional and athletic performance enhancement, and exaggerated notions of nutrition and sexuality. However, when the deeper, second layer is penetrated, people can discover and enjoy their own vitality in a feeling, breathing, and rather calm way.

The cognitive connection of this process with character analysis principles can be useful, but it doesn't have to be. The interpretive authority for the emerging feelings and thoughts always lies with the client. My function in this process is to ensure a safe and protected space.

Therapeutic Setting

The setting in individual therapy includes one to four trial sessions that precede the therapeutic process. In these sessions, an open approach to relevant previous therapeutic experiences is expected, and the perspective of therapy is discussed. When psychiatric diagnoses are present, I follow current scientific findings on the indication of body-psychotherapeutic procedures. I only make a (suspected) diagnosis, if at all, with the utmost care and caution. A successful therapeutic process does not necessarily require a diagnosis. The duration of therapy and the intervals between sessions depend on the individual's life situation. From the very beginning, even during the anamnesis, I attach the same importance to body language as to spoken language.
SKAN individual therapy and Reichian vegetotherapy have retained the setting of classical psychoanalysis in that they require the patient to lie on their back. The supine position minimizes basic tension in the body and increases psychophysical sensitivity. In contrast to Freud's setting eye contact is not avoided, but rather an essential medium for the relationship experience, including with the client.
Conditions that prevent lying on the back are not an exclusion criterion for individual therapy, which can also take place while sitting or moving around the room.

Fee

Clients are generally self-paying. The fee is €80 per session. Partial reimbursement of services under the German Alternative Medicine Practitioners Act (Heilpraktikergesetz) is only offered by a few insurance companies; in exceptional cases, individual pricing arrangements are possible upon request for those with financial constraints.