People sometimes ask me how I decide what to do during a session. The honest answer is that I try not to decide. I listen.
That way of working comes from Dr. John Upledger, who developed CranioSacral Therapy. He called what I’m listening for Inner Wisdom.
Dr. Upledger’s idea
Dr. Upledger believed each of us has an intelligence inside that knows what is going on in our lives, including our symptoms and what they mean, if they mean anything at all (Your Inner Physician and You, pp. 116–117).
He wrote that inside each person is “the information and wisdom” a therapist needs to understand what is happening (Subtle Energies, p. 136).
He didn’t insist on one explanation. Some people see it as a universal consciousness, others as a wisdom inside each person. What you believe, he said, is up to you (p. 117).
Because most of his work was about health, he often called it the Inner Physician. If a client preferred another name, he used theirs (p. 117).
In his view, the client’s Inner Wisdom sets the direction of a session, not the therapist (Subtle Energies, pp. 137–138). The client does the healing, he wrote, and the therapist is the student (p. 62).
He also sensed that a client’s Inner Wisdom sizes up the therapist’s skill and sincerity. He felt tested this way in almost every session (p. 79).
He summed it up simply: “Doing CranioSacral Therapy teaches trust.” It teaches you to trust the craniosacral system, the client’s Inner Wisdom, and yourself (p. 156).
Here’s how I see it
I first heard the term “Inner Wisdom” in my first CranioSacral class. The room was full of people whose work involves touch: doctors, chiropractors, nurses, physical and occupational therapists, and massage therapists like me.
I was excited, because it fit what I already believed. I was also confused. The idea felt vague, and I wondered whether it meant something mystical. That wasn’t something I wanted to bring to clients who came to me for manual therapy.
What made it click was the touch itself. Dr. Upledger taught a very light touch, about 5 grams, the weight of a nickel. At that weight, touch becomes a conversation without words. Your body feels my hands, and I feel your body: where it’s hot or cold, twisted or swampish.
Today I see Inner Wisdom as the intelligence behind homeostasis, your body’s way of keeping its balance. When tension builds, your body is asking, “What are you going to do about this?” If nothing changes, it puts a counterbalance somewhere else to keep you going. Your body isn’t broken. It’s doing an amazing job.
Your body isn’t broken. It’s doing an amazing job.
Inner Wisdom speaks through all of your 4 Bodies, each in its own language. Your Physical Body speaks in sensation. Your Emotional Body speaks in feelings, which aren’t the same as physical pain. Your Mental Body speaks in thoughts. Your Spiritual Body speaks in presence: are you here, or somewhere else? And the four are always talking to each other.
My Mental Body is always trying to fix things. Sometimes that helps, because it tells me when a session has gone far enough. But when I think, “I need to help this person release their hip,” that’s my agenda, not their body’s. That hip may need a thousand other things to unwind first.
So I come back to my hands. Before a session, I use the meditation tools I teach at 4Q Boundaries to get present, right down to my palms and fingers. When my attention leaves my hands and I start figuring things out, the conversation stops, and I become one more stimulus your body has to deal with. Instead, I notice the tension, wait, and let your body decide what to do with it. Sometimes it lets go somewhere I’m not even touching.
Of Dr. Upledger’s three kinds of trust, trusting myself took the longest. I’ve been meditating since 1994, and I’m still learning. That’s one reason the Upledger training tells therapists to get on the table themselves. The more I work on myself, the more present I can be with you.
Notice What You Notice
You don’t need to be on my table to listen to your own Inner Wisdom. The next time you notice an ache or a heaviness, pause before you try to fix it. Notice What You Notice. Which of your 4 Bodies is speaking?
If you’d like tools to explore your 4 Bodies on your own, that’s what I teach at 4QBoundaries.com.
Dr. Upledger believed you can go a step further and actually talk with this part of yourself. That’s my next post.
Sources
- John E. Upledger, “CranioSacral Therapy Part II: As It Is Today,” Subtle Energies 6, no. 2 (1995): 136–138.
- John E. Upledger, Your Inner Physician and You: CranioSacral Therapy and SomatoEmotional Release, 2nd ed. (Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, 1997), 62, 79, 116–117, 156.
