Client-centred verbal and body psychotherapy

1. Introduction

Version followed: the Zurich GFK approach ("klientenzentrierte Gesprächs- und Körperpsychotherapie GFK", also called personzentriert-experienzielle Körperpsychotherapie) as described by co-founder Christiane Geiser (2021), plus the body-intervention catalogue and phase model of Ernst Kern (2015 article; book 2014, 3rd ed. 2023). Kern trained in person-centred body psychotherapy at GFK Zürich and now teaches it in Germany for the GwG. Where Kern's version and the GFK description differ, this guide says which one it is following. [source: Geiser 2021a; Kern 2015; GwG curriculum 2026; Itten 2015]

What it is. GFK stands for Gespräch, Focusing, Körper (conversation, Focusing, body). It is a Swiss training tradition and institute (Ausbildungsinstitut GFK, Zurich). Ernst Juchli and Christiane Geiser founded it in 1989, and it was admitted to the Swiss Charta for Psychotherapy in 1993. The institute offers two programmes: the psychotherapy training "klientenzentrierte Gesprächs- und Körperpsychotherapie GFK" and "Personzentrierte Prozessbegleitung und Beratung GFK" (counselling). Its teaching modules include Focusing (with Focusing-in-movement), its own "GFK character-structure model", Bohmian dialogue, cyclical thinking, psychotraumatology and meditation. [source: Geiser 2021a; GFK Kursprogramm 2017/18] It is a training tradition rather than a manualised protocol. Kern says plainly that person-centred body psychotherapy is not a separate therapy method. He calls it a perspective that makes the body a routine part of person-centred therapy and counselling. [source: Kern 2015] The verbal person-centred basis (Rogers' Gesprächspsychotherapie) is covered in Domain III guide 010; this guide covers only what GFK and Kern add with Focusing and the body.

How change happens. Rogers' core conditions form the relational base. Gendlin's experiencing theory gives the mechanism. The client attends to a bodily, pre-verbal "felt sense" of a whole situation, waits for it, and symbolises it (word, image, gesture, movement). Moving back and forth between felt sense and symbol "carries forward" the situation into new meaning. A felt shift, which Rogers called a "moment of movement", reorganises the whole situation. In GFK the body then no longer has to hold the stuck, structure-bound process. GFK explicitly contrasts this with release through discharge. [source: Geiser 2021a] "Body" has two meanings here. One is the physical body (breath, posture, movement, touch), which the therapist works with through perception, touch and experiments. The other is Gendlin's situational body, in which body and environment form one interaction. [source: Geiser 2021a; Geiser 2021b] Kern adds an emotion sequence: the client notices how an emotion builds in the body, accepts it, explores and symbolises it, reaches a primary adaptive emotion, and links it to goals and values. In his view change runs both bottom-up and top-down. [source: Kern 2015]

2. Framework

Two framings exist; name which you use.

A. GFK (Geiser): a process cycle, not fixed phases. The unit of work is the carrying-forward cycle: felt sense, then symbolisation, then a check against the felt sense, then a shift, and so on, repeated within and across sessions. Geiser's long case shows four stages, which she offers as a description of that case, not a protocol: [source: Geiser 2021a]

Slow, sparse dialogue with long silences; resignation and small wishes exist side by side. Goal: relationship and following the client's pace.
Exploration of the material the client brings (in her case a recurring dream); identification and alternatives are tried until a felt shift occurs.
Once the process moves, body work becomes more frequent and physical (posture, arm and shoulder movement, supported uprighting, pushing against resistance). The client develops new options.
Consolidation: the client can find the inner movement and return to it alone ("Prozessvertrauen", trust in the process). The therapy ends with an open door for return if the process gets stuck again.

B. Kern: five developmental phases (adapted from Röhricht, after Stern). [source: Kern 2015; Kern 3rd ed. table of contents]

Phase	Goal	Typical work
1 Arrival and basic safety	Regulate tension and arousal; safety	Breath, grounding, directing attention; safety through space, movement, imagery
2 Body self-experience, self-worth, identity core	Body and feeling awareness; core self (agency, affectivity, coherence, self-history)	Body perception, inner sensing, body self-image
3 Movement, motility, self-determination	Boundaries, active approach, self-efficacy	Pushing away, boundary movements, strength exercises
4 Body-self in contact	Trust, attachment, secure contact	Contact and touch exercises; expressing needs, asking, setting limits
5 Narrative integration	Place body experience in the life story	Working through, understanding body signals and emotions

Kern links an emotional level to each phase: atmospheric vitality affects (1), categorical emotions (2), action tendencies (3), expression and interactive regulation (4), biographical understanding (5). Focusing can be used in every phase. [source: Kern 2015]

Criteria for moving on. Kern gives one explicit rule: contact exercises (phase 4) wait until regulation, body perception and identity are established (phases 1 to 3). [source: Kern 2015] GFK's criterion works session by session, not phase by phase. Keep an intervention while the client's experience opens and moves; drop it as soon as experience narrows or nothing new happens. [source: Geiser 2021a] Working markers [synthesis]: move past phase 1 when the client can notice arousal and bring it down with a learned tool. Move past phase 2 when the client can describe body sensations with curiosity rather than alarm. Offer touch only when the client can say no and show you a stop signal.

Format and dose. Individual sessions, seated, with standing and moving segments. The work alternates between talking and body work and is done with or without touch. [source: GwG curriculum 2026; Geiser 2021a] Clients need room to stand and move; comfortable clothing and socks are used in GFK body courses. [source: GFK Kursprogramm 2017/18] Session length, frequency and total number of sessions are not stated in the sources; Geiser's case was a "long therapy". [uncertain] In practice [synthesis]: 50-minute weekly sessions, with body segments of 5 to 20 minutes and time at the end to talk the experience through.

Training. GFK runs a basic phase followed by an advanced phase, with study days and body-exercise seminars. [source: GFK Kursprogramm 2017/18] Kern's GwG course has 240 teaching units over about two years, including supervision days, and covers the core conditions in bodily form, Focusing, body entry points, expressive work, developmental and emotion-focused work, and trauma. [source: GwG curriculum 2026] Total hours of the GFK training were not found. [uncertain]

3. Guiding principles

From GFK (Geiser): [source: Geiser 2021a; Geiser 2021b]

The client is the expert on their inner world. Never interpret dreams, gestures or postures for the client; ask what it means in their world.
No predetermined relevance. No topic, dream or body area is assumed to matter in advance; follow what the client brings.
No expert behaviour. Do not know the solution in advance, set goals for the client, plan the treatment, or apply general theories (Geiser's example: "blocked aggression must be released"). Keep your own ideas in the background as hypotheses to check against the client's world.
Work with how, not what. Attend to the way the client relates to their experiencing rather than to the content.
Acceptance of the client's particular aliveness before change. This does not mean agreeing with everything; it means meeting the current form of life as it is before trying to change it.
Stay in the client's frame of reference and check. Reflect what you understood and invite correction, verbally and bodily.
Use your own resonance openly. Notice what happens in your own body and offer it to the relationship when it helps, labelled as yours.
Follow the client's rhythm. Notice your own impatience or urge to do more, and return to the client's pace, however slow.
Wait for the felt sense. Let fast, familiar answers pass; take small bodily movements seriously.
Criterion: opening versus narrowing. An intervention is useful if it changes experience in a way the client can feel. Drop questions and exercises that produce nothing new and try a different route.
Carrying forward, not discharge. The aim is a felt shift that reorganises the situation, not cathartic release.

From Kern's person-centred body psychotherapy: [source: Kern 2015; Itten 2015; Teichmann-Wirth 2015]

Body-based empathy. Track pre-verbal, affective and implicit-motor signs (breath, posture, tone, changes) and reflect them in words.
Body-based unconditional acceptance. Help the client notice body signals without judging them; treat the body as the main source of information about how they are.
Body-based congruence and presence. Trust your own bodily resonance; be physically present through posture and placement.
The felt body is the primary orientation point. When stuck in talk, ask where in the body something can be felt.
The body develops its own process with its own order. Let a movement or sensation continue in its own direction rather than steering it.
Dialectic of experience and reflection. Alternate sensing with putting it into words; finish with reflection and linking to the client's life.
Situatedness. Link any theme to a body sense in the concrete current situation.
Respect bodily space and boundaries. The therapist's own body history and the client's physical boundaries are part of the training and the work.
Safety and regulation come first. Regulate arousal before you deepen work and before you offer contact.
Integrate, don't add on. Body work is a routine perspective inside person-centred therapy, not a separate block of techniques.
Tension with non-directivity (noted by a reviewer). Kern's catalogue is more directive than classical person-centred work. Offer exercises as invitations the client can decline or change. [source: Teichmann-Wirth 2015; synthesis on how to offer them]

4. Intervention inventory

The GFK and Kern sources name these interventions and give their purpose, but they rarely give start positions, durations or closing steps. Anything of that kind marked [synthesis] is this guide's own wording for running the intervention safely. All example language is illustrative unless it is quoted and cited. Part A covers relational and verbal-bodily work and Focusing (GFK core). Part B covers Kern's body entry points: perception, breath, posture, movement, contact and expression.

4.0 Before any body work: screening, touch protocol, closing routine

Purpose: Make body work safe and voluntary. Kern's book has a section on touch (§6.4.1), but it is not drawn on. Kern's 2015 article says touch is to be found jointly with the client, told apart from unhelpful touch, and tied to a clear theme. The GwG course teaches work both with and without touch, and the ethics of touch. [source: Kern 2015; Kern 3rd ed. table of contents; GwG curriculum 2026] Neither GFK nor Kern gives a formal consent procedure in the sources. [uncertain] The consent elements below come from body-psychotherapy touch guidance in Bioenergetic Analysis. [source: Guest & Parker 2022]
Touch consent steps: (1) At intake, ask about the client's history with touch, abuse or assault, cultural or religious norms, and medical conditions. [source: Guest & Parker 2022] (2) Explain in plain words how touch might be used, why, that it can bring up strong feelings, and that consent can be withdrawn at any time; record written consent. [source: Guest & Parker 2022] (3) Ask permission immediately before each touch, every time. [source: Guest & Parker 2022] (4) Always offer a no-touch alternative: the client's own hand, a cushion, an imagined touch, or a verbal version. [synthesis; Kern lists imagined touch as an option] (5) Agree a stop signal, both a word and a gesture such as a raised hand, before you start. [synthesis] (6) During touch, check in briefly and watch for mismatch between verbal yes and body signals such as stiffening, holding the breath or a blank gaze; if you see it, stop and ask. [source: Guest & Parker 2022 on mismatch; synthesis on wording] (7) Afterwards, ask how it was and whether anything should be different next time. [synthesis]
Never: touch breasts, genitals or sexually charged areas. Sensual or sexual touch is never part of therapy. [source: Guest & Parker 2022] Keep touch to hands, forearms, shoulders, upper back and feet, the areas Kern names (hand, shoulders, feet, head). [source: Kern 2015] Touch to the head is close and intimate; use it only with explicit consent. [synthesis]
Extra caution or no touch: poor boundaries or fear of engulfment, history of abuse or assault, PTSD, erotic transference, cultural or religious prohibition, a weak alliance. Touch is contraindicated in psychotic disorders. [source: Guest & Parker 2022] Also take care with severe dissociation and with clients in acute crisis. [synthesis]
Training and licence: touch needs specific training (GFK or Kern-type body training), supervision, and a check of what your licence, professional code, jurisdiction and insurance allow. [synthesis; training requirement source: GwG curriculum 2026]
Screening for intensifying exercises (deepened breath, pushing or strength exercises, expressive or aggressive movement, standing work): ask about pregnancy, heart or breathing illness, epilepsy, recent injury or surgery, joint or back problems, psychosis, severe dissociation, active suicidality, and recent trauma without stabilisation. If any is present, use gentle, seated, low-arousal versions or none. [synthesis] The sources name no contraindications. [uncertain]
Closing routine for every body segment [synthesis, building on Kern's emphasis on reflection and GFK's "handle"]: return attention to contact with the chair and floor and to the room. Ask what the client noticed and what they will take with them. Ask for a word, image or gesture that holds it. Check arousal before the client leaves.

Part A: Relational, verbal-bodily and Focusing work

1. Body history intake

Purpose: Kern says the client's body history belongs in the intake. [source: Kern 2015] It shows the client's relationship to their body, any experiences with touch, and contraindications. Therapists work through their own bodily history in training too. [source: Itten 2015; Teichmann-Wirth 2015]
Steps [synthesis]: Ask about illnesses, injuries and surgery; sport, dance and movement history; how the body was treated in the family (touch, punishment, care); experiences of violence; current body sensations, pain and sleep; how the client feels in their body overall; and attitudes and fears about touch. Record what the client consents to.
Example language (illustrative): "In this work we sometimes pay attention to the body as well as talking. Can you tell me a bit about your body's history, its illnesses, injuries, what it has been through?"
Watch for: shame, numbness or vague answers, which may point to trauma; go slowly. Signs of readiness: curiosity, and specific answers about sensations.

2. Bodily empathic reflection

Purpose: Extend empathic understanding to the non-verbal level: breath, posture, muscle tone, movement and changes in them. [source: Kern 2015; Geiser 2021a]
Steps: (1) Notice a bodily change while the client speaks. (2) Name it briefly and tentatively, without interpreting. (3) Invite the client to check it against their own experience. (4) Follow what comes; drop it if nothing does. GFK variant: describe what you would feel if you sat the way the client sits, then ask whether it is the same or different for them. [source: Geiser 2021a]
Example language: paraphrasing Geiser's case: if I sat the way you sit, I would feel X; is that similar for you, or completely different? [source: Geiser 2021a, paraphrased] Illustrative: "As you said that, your breath seemed to stop for a moment."
Watch for: the client feeling watched or exposed. Reflect less often, and say what you notice rather than what it means. It is working when the client turns inward, slows down, or corrects you precisely.

3. Body-near empathy: breathing with, briefly taking the posture

Purpose: Get a felt understanding of the client's state by breathing in the client's rhythm or briefly adopting their posture. [source: Kern 2015] One reviewer asks that this be framed as an attempt to understand the client's self-concept. [source: Teichmann-Wirth 2015]
Steps [synthesis]: Mirror subtly and inwardly, not as an imitation the client sees. After 30 to 60 seconds, notice what arises in you. Offer it, if useful, as your own resonance (see 6).
Example language (illustrative): "When I sit the way you're sitting, I notice I get very small and quiet. Does that fit anything for you?"
Watch for: obvious mirroring can feel mocking. Ask before you mirror openly.

4. Regular inquiry into basic body phenomena

Purpose: Build the habit of noticing body signals without judging them. Kern recommends asking about basic body phenomena regularly and explaining that the body is the most important source of information about how one is doing. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Ask a short body question at the start, at emotional moments, and at the end of the session. Accept any answer, including "nothing".
Example language: Kern's question "Wo im Körper ist da etwas zu spüren?" (where in the body can something be felt?) [source: Kern 2015]; also "Wie fühlt sich das an?" (how does that feel?). [source: Kern 2015]
Watch for: a client who answers with thoughts. Gently bring them back to sensation. It is working when the client starts reporting sensations unprompted.

5. Naming discrepancies

Purpose: Congruence at the body level: point out a mismatch between what the client says and what the body shows. Kern's example is a sad story told with clenched fists. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Describe both elements neutrally, side by side, and ask about them with curiosity. Do not tell the client which one is "true".
Example language (illustrative): "You're telling me something very sad, and I notice your hands are in fists. What do you notice?"
Watch for: defensiveness, which may mean the client felt caught out. Acknowledge that and slow down. It is working when the client becomes curious, or a new feeling appears.

6. Offering the therapist's own resonance

Purpose: GFK therapists stay aware of their own bodily resonance and use it openly for the relationship when it helps. [source: Geiser 2021a; Kern 2015]
Steps: Notice a sensation or impulse in yourself. Check whether sharing it serves the client. Offer it briefly, as yours, and let the client accept, change or reject it.
Example language (illustrative): "I notice a heaviness in my chest as I listen. I don't know if that's yours or mine. Does it fit at all?"
Watch for: the client looking after the therapist's feelings. Keep it short, and return to the client.

7. Focusing accompaniment in session (GFK)

Purpose: The core GFK intervention: help the client relate to their experiencing so that a felt sense forms and can be symbolised and carried forward. [source: Geiser 2021a; Geiser 2021b]
Steps [source: Geiser 2021a]: (1) Invite the client to attend inwardly to the whole of the topic, at a suitable inner distance. (2) Wait. Let quick explanations and familiar answers go by. (3) Notice small bodily movements, words or images and take them seriously. (4) Reflect what comes, and let the client check it against the felt sense. (5) Ask the client to stay near a phrase without needing an answer and to check in from time to time. (6) If the experience narrows or nothing moves, drop the question and try another way in. (7) Repeat the cycle. Stop when there is a felt shift or a natural pause.
Example language (illustrative): "Maybe take a moment and sense how this whole thing is, in your body, right now... no hurry." "Is 'heavy' right, or is there a better word?"
Watch for: the signs of a shift: a breath, a release, a change of posture or voice, the client saying "yes, that's it", or new content. Intellectual analysis without any change in the felt sense does not count.

8. Gendlin's six Focusing steps (taught or guided)

Purpose: A structured way to teach Focusing for use in and between sessions. Gendlin presents the six steps as scaffolding, not the only way to focus. [source: Focusing.org six steps]
Steps [source: Focusing.org six steps, paraphrased]: (1) Clearing a space: attend inward, perhaps to stomach or chest; ask how life is going; as each concern comes, acknowledge it and set it at a little distance without going into it. (2) Felt sense: choose one problem and sense the whole of it as an unclear body feeling. (3) Handle: let a word, phrase or image come from that feeling. (4) Resonating: go back and forth between the handle and the felt sense until they fit; either one may change. (5) Asking: ask what about the whole problem makes it feel this way; let quick head-answers pass and wait for one that comes with a bodily "give". (6) Receiving: welcome whatever comes in a friendly way and stay with it for a while. Throughout, go gently. If a step does not work, move on and come back later.
Example language: Gendlin's prompt "What is the main thing for me right now?" [source: Focusing.org six steps] Illustrative: "What makes this whole thing so... tight?"
Watch for: pushing or trying hard, which works against it. It counts as Focusing even without a shift, if the client spent time with an unclear whole sense. [source: Focusing.org six steps]

9. Bias control: the opposite question

Purpose: Catch your own and the client's habitual interpretations. [source: Geiser 2021a; Geiser 2021b]
Steps: When a meaning appears, ask what its opposite would be. Then have the client check both against the felt sense, noticing small bodily movements.
Example language (illustrative): "And if it meant the very opposite, how would that feel inside?"
Watch for: the meaning that brings a bodily response, not the one that sounds most logical.

10. The word-meaning question (Thinking at the Edge)

Purpose: Open up a key word the client uses so that its personal, implicit meaning can unfold. Geiser takes this from Gendlin's "Thinking at the Edge". [source: Geiser 2021a]
Steps: Pick up a word the client stresses. Ask what they want it to mean here. Wait for a felt answer.
Example language: paraphrasing Geiser: what do you want this word to mean? [source: Geiser 2021a, paraphrased]
Watch for: a dictionary-style definition. Invite the client back to their felt sense of the word.

11. Closing handle (symbol for the whole session)

Purpose: A classic Focusing ending that makes the session's experience easy to recall later. [source: Geiser 2021a]
Steps: Near the end, invite the client to find a symbol, image, sentence or gesture that holds the whole session. Check that it fits. Suggest returning to it during the week.
Example language (illustrative): "Is there an image, a word or a small gesture that holds what happened today?"
Watch for: a handle that feels forced. Leave it open, and the client may find one later.

12. Dream work: entry invitations (Gendlin, used in GFK)

Purpose: Find a way from a dream to a felt sense. Geiser follows Gendlin's Let Your Body Interpret Your Dreams (1986). The therapist does not interpret. [source: Geiser 2021a; Geiser 2021b]
Steps: Offer one invitation at a time, such as: what is the most important part of the dream; tell the dream in three steps; be this part of the dream. If nothing moves in the felt sense, drop it quickly and try another. [source: Geiser 2021a] The moment of waking is especially useful to explore. [source: Geiser 2021a, citing Gendlin and Purton]
Example language (illustrative): "Which part of the dream is still most alive in you now?"
Watch for: the client fitting the dream into old schemas quickly. Slow down and come back to the felt sense.

13. Dream identification

Purpose: Find which dream element brings a felt change. [source: Geiser 2021a]
Steps: Invite the client to imagine being one element, and sense how that is in the body. Try others in turn; Geiser's case used the bird, the perch and the cage. Note which one brings a shift.
Example language: adapted from Geiser's case: how is it for you now, being the bird and seeing the door open? [source: Geiser 2021a, paraphrased]
Watch for: frightening identifications. Use 14.

14. Finding help: continuing a dream from the felt sense

Purpose: With frightening or stuck dreams, find resources and the forward-moving tendency Gendlin calls "life-forward energy". [source: Geiser 2021a; Geiser 2021b]
Steps: Look for symbols in the dream that have enough strength for this client. Unfold any choices that appear. Ask from the felt sense how the situation should continue instead.
Example language: Geiser's question: what could or should happen? [source: Geiser 2021a]
Watch for: symbols that look strong but feel weak to the client. Trust the felt response. With trauma nightmares, put stabilisation first (Part B, phase 1). [synthesis]

Part B: Body entry points (Kern)

Kern presents five ways from talk into the body: perception, breath, posture, movement and contact, plus expression and action taken from Focusing. Each comes as a list of options; start positions, durations and closing steps are not specified. [source: Kern 2015] Those details below are [synthesis]. Choose options by phase: perception and calming breath for phase 1 and 2; posture and movement for phase 2 and 3; contact for phase 4. [source: Kern 2015, phase model]

15. Outside-in attention orienting

Purpose: First step into body perception and a grounding tool (phase 1). Attention starts outside and then moves inward. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Seated, feet on the floor [synthesis]. (1) The client names and describes objects, sounds and textures in the room. (2) Then the contact of body with chair and floor. (3) Then one inner sensation. Allow 2 to 5 minutes [synthesis]. Close by asking what changed.
Example language (illustrative): "Let your eyes wander around the room... name three things you see... what can you hear?... and now, how is it where your feet meet the floor?"
Watch for: rising anxiety when attention turns inward. Go back to the outer focus. It is working when breath slows and the client feels more present.

16. Naming small sensations with friendly interest

Purpose: Build a vocabulary for sensations and an accepting stance towards them. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Ask the client to notice small physiological sensations (tingling, pulling, warmth, cold, tension), name them, and meet them with curiosity rather than judgement. [source: Kern 2015] Offer word choices if the client has no words. [synthesis]
Example language: "Wie fühlt sich das an?" (how does that feel?) [source: Kern 2015]; illustrative: "Is it more warm or cool? Spread out or in one spot?"
Watch for: catastrophising about sensations, as in anxiety or hypochondria. Describe the sensation, not what it might mean.

17. Finding a good place in the body

Purpose: Resource and anchor for regulation. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Ask the client to search for a place that feels neutral, pleasant or okay, and to stay there a while and describe it. Later, use it as a place to return to when the work gets intense. [synthesis]
Example language (illustrative): "Is there anywhere in your body right now that feels okay, even just a little? Maybe your hands, or your feet?"
Watch for: "nowhere". Accept it, and widen to the outside (a contact point, an object). It is working when the client can find the place again on request.

18. Inner body walk and detailed exploration of one area

Purpose: Fuller body awareness (phase 2). [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Guide a short inner walk through the body, for example from feet to head [synthesis on order]. Then pick one area or sensation and explore it in detail: size, shape, quality, and how it changes. [source: Kern 2015] Close with reflection.
Example language (illustrative): "Let your attention travel slowly up from your feet... just noticing... Where would you like to stay a while?"
Watch for: numb areas or areas linked to trauma. Do not push into them; go back to the good place (17).

19. Breath awareness and calming breath

Purpose: Read breath changes as signals and use breath to calm down (phase 1). [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: (1) Notice the breath without changing it. (2) Notice how it changes with a topic. (3) Calm: count breaths or follow the breath. [source: Kern 2015] Keep exhalations unforced, and stop if the client gets dizzy [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "Just notice your breathing as it is... and when you talked about your boss just now, did anything change?"
Watch for: paying attention to breath can raise anxiety in panic-prone clients. Shift the focus to the feet or to sound. It is working when breathing slows and the client feels calmer.

20. Breath linked to a theme; widening, deepening, breathing toward an area

Purpose: Bring breath into the process: to sense a theme, to widen a narrowed breath, or to direct attention. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Invite the client to breathe into or toward a specific area, or to let the breath become a little wider or deeper while staying with the theme. [source: Kern 2015] Keep it gentle and short (a few breaths), and pause between rounds [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "If it feels okay, let a breath go toward that tight place... just a little wider... and notice what happens."
Watch for and cautions: deliberate deepening can tip into hyperventilation, with tingling and dizziness. Return to normal breathing straight away. Screen first (4.0); avoid in panic disorder until regulation is secure, and in respiratory or cardiac illness, pregnancy and epilepsy [synthesis]. This is gentle breath work, not breath intensification; the sources do not describe prolonged hyperventilation techniques.

21. Sensing the current posture

Purpose: Make habitual postures (bent, contracted, rigid, upright) felt and available. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Ask the client to notice how they are sitting or standing right now and how it feels. Point out a habitual posture without judging it.
Example language: Kern asks how it feels to stand like this ("Wie fühlt es sich an, so dazustehen?") [source: Kern 2015]
Watch for: self-criticism ("I always slump"). Respond with acceptance, since the posture makes sense.

22. Amplifying, exaggerating, seeking the opposite, expressing through posture

Purpose: Make the meaning of a posture clear and find alternatives. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: (1) Invite a small increase, for example a little more pressure or contraction. (2) Then exaggerate the posture. (3) Then look for the opposite posture. (4) Compare the two. Alternatively, express a feeling through a posture. [source: Kern 2015] Hold each version for about 30 seconds to a minute, then talk it through [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "Let your shoulders come forward even a bit more... how is that?... and now find the opposite... what's different?"
Watch for: strain or pain; stop. It is working when the client has a felt "aha" or new words.

23. From collapse to uprighting (resource posture)

Purpose: For depression: work from a bent, collapsed posture with lowered gaze toward an upright posture and movement, in small steps. [source: Kern 2015; Teichmann-Wirth 2015 on "resource posture"]
Steps: Sense the collapsed posture first and accept it. Then explore very slowly how to come into uprightness: spine, gaze, chest. Go back and forth between the two.
Example language: Kern frames it as the client's own question: how do I come into uprightness? How do I get moving? [source: Kern 2015, paraphrased]
Watch for: uprightness forced as a "should". Stay with what the client can feel; even a tiny lift counts.

24. Sitting versus standing comparison

Purpose: Explore the same movement or posture in different positions and notice how the whole body (chest, breath) changes. [source: Geiser 2021a]
Steps: Do a small movement seated, then standing, and compare. Talk through the differences.
Example language (illustrative): "Let's try the same thing standing up... what changes in your chest, your breath?"
Watch for: dizziness or unsteadiness when standing up; let the client stand close to a wall or chair [synthesis].

25. Following involuntary gestures and movement impulses

Purpose: Turn spontaneous gestures into felt experience, and make inner attempts visible as movement. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Point out a gesture the client makes without noticing and invite them to repeat it slowly and sense it. Or ask the client to show physically how they try to do something. Let the movement develop in its own direction. [source: Kern 2015, "the body develops its own process"]
Example language: Kern's prompt "Zeigen Sie mir doch mal körperlich, wie Sie versuchen …" (show me with your body how you try ...) [source: Kern 2015]
Watch for: performing for the therapist. Slow down and turn attention inward.

26. Familiar versus unfamiliar movement

Purpose: Find new options by sensing how familiar and unfamiliar movements differ. [source: Geiser 2021a]
Steps: The client does a habitual movement, for example how they reach out with their arms, then tries an unfamiliar version, slowly, attending to how each feels.
Example language (illustrative): "That's your usual way... now try one you never do... how does that feel from inside?"
Watch for: fear of the new movement. Make it smaller.

27. Modulating movement: size, speed, Laban qualities

Purpose: Explore a theme by changing a movement's quality. Kern makes a movement bigger or smaller, faster or slower, and uses Laban's movement qualities of force, space, time and flow. [source: Kern 2015; Kern 3rd ed. table of contents; GwG curriculum 2026]
Steps: Take a movement the client has found and vary one quality at a time. After each version, ask what changed.
Example language (illustrative): "Make it much smaller... now bigger... slower... which one feels most right?"
Watch for: the version that brings energy or relief; stay with that one.

28. Moving from one state into another

Purpose: Use the client's bodily knowledge of how to change state, for example out of depression into movement. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Ask the client to find, in their body, how they get from state A to state B. Let them try it slowly, then reflect.
Example language: Kern asks how the client gets out of the depression and back into movement ("Wie kommen Sie wieder aus der Depression in die Bewegung …?") [source: Kern 2015]
Watch for: the client falling back into talk. Ask them to try it, not explain it.

29. Expressive and boundary movements

Purpose: Phase 3 self-determination: allow and support expressive movements of aggression, boundary-setting or swaying; set boundaries; approach actively. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Standing or seated. The client finds a movement for the theme, such as an arm pushing outward in front of the body or a step back. The therapist supports it and reflects. Repeat a few times and then talk it through [synthesis on repetitions]. Variant: mark the client's personal space on the floor, for example with a rope [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "What would your arms want to do with that? Try it slowly... and once more, with a little more strength if that's right."
Watch for and cautions: GFK does not aim at discharge; there is no hitting, kicking or screaming in the sources. Keep expression contained and done with awareness. Screen first (4.0). Stop if the client floods or dissociates. [synthesis]

30. Basic rhythms

Purpose: For depression with lost rhythms: attend to heartbeat and breath, and rediscover walking, running, cycling or swimming as basic rhythms. Conscious walking or running is suggested. [source: Kern 2015; Teichmann-Wirth 2015]
Steps: In session, sense the heartbeat or breath for a minute, or walk slowly around the room and notice the rhythm [synthesis]. Between sessions, the client might choose a rhythmic activity and notice how it feels. Set no performance targets [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "Let's walk a few steps together and just feel the rhythm of your feet."
Watch for: physical limits; check them first. It is working when the client notices more vitality.

31. Spatial polarity: away from and toward

Purpose: For withdrawal: experience contact through moving away from and toward someone in space. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Standing, therapist and client start a few metres apart [synthesis]. The client moves toward the therapist, or toward an object that stands for a person, and away again, finds the distance that feels right, and notices how each step feels. The therapist stays still unless asked to move.
Example language (illustrative): "Come a step closer... and now a step back... where is the right distance today?"
Watch for: freezing, or approaching only to please you. Respect the distance the client chooses; say it is right because they chose it.

32. Imagined supportive touch

Purpose: A no-touch entry point to contact. The client imagines a good, supportive touch and observes how the body responds. [source: Kern 2015] Also the default alternative whenever real touch is declined (4.0).
Steps: Seated. The client imagines where a supportive touch would help, from whom, and of what quality, then senses the body's response. Close and reflect.
Example language (illustrative): "If some support could come, where would it be good? Whose hand? Just imagine it... how does your body respond?"
Watch for: grief or longing coming up. Stay with it empathically. It is working when the client relaxes or feels warmer.

33. Co-discovering supportive touch (touch)

Purpose: Find, together, a touch that supports the client (hand, shoulders, feet, head), and learn to tell favourable from unfavourable touch. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Follow the full consent steps in 4.0. (1) Explain and ask. (2) The client says where and how. (3) Offer one light touch, for example a hand flat between the shoulder blades or hands resting on the feet [synthesis on placement]. (4) Ask whether it should be lighter, firmer, elsewhere, or stop. (5) Adjust, or remove your hand. (6) Talk through the difference between helpful and unhelpful touch.
Example language (illustrative): "Would it help to have a hand at your back? You decide. If yes, I'll put it there lightly, and you can tell me to move it or stop any time."
Watch for: compliance without real consent (4.0, step 6), and erotic or attachment transference. Discuss these in supervision.

34. Attention-directing and theme-linked touch (touch)

Purpose: Use touch to direct attention, for example a hand on the chest, or offer contact tied to a theme. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Consent steps (4.0). The client's own hand on the chest is the first choice; the therapist's hand on the upper back or shoulder is an alternative [synthesis]. Ask the client to breathe and sense under the hand for a minute, then reflect.
Example language (illustrative): "Maybe put your own hand where you feel it... and just sense what's under your hand."
Watch for: the client's attention leaving the body; ask where the attention went.

35. Presence touch, holding and comfort objects (touch)

Purpose: Express bond and presence, and let distress be shared physically: sitting beside the client, a hand on the shoulder, holding, blankets, soft objects such as a stuffed toy. [source: Kern 2015] Kern presents holding as body-level unconditional acceptance. [source: Teichmann-Wirth 2015]
Steps: Consent steps (4.0) every time. Offer the least intimate option first: blanket or object, then sitting beside, then a hand on the shoulder. Holding only with an established alliance, explicit consent, training and supervision [synthesis]. Talk it through afterwards.
Example language (illustrative): "Would a blanket help right now? Or would you like me to sit next to you?"
Watch for: regression and dependence, a client with abuse history who freezes, and boundary drift. This carries the highest boundary risk in the inventory; document it and take it to supervision [synthesis].

36. Supported uprighting: therapist's hands at the back (touch)

Purpose: Give physical support while the client explores new posture and movement. Geiser's case asked where support in the back would help and how the hands should be placed. [source: Geiser 2021a]
Steps: Consent steps (4.0). Ask the client where in the back support would help. Ask how your hands should lie (flat, firm, light). Place them there. The client moves slowly, opening the shoulders and lifting the arms, and senses the difference. Then remove your hands and compare. [source: Geiser 2021a; synthesis on sequence]
Example language (illustrative): "Where in your back would support be good? Show me how my hands should be."
Watch for: leaning in and depending on the support. Explore moving without support too.

37. Activating contact: pushing against resistance and strength exercises (touch)

Purpose: Phase 3: test strength and reactivity, and build self-efficacy and boundaries. Geiser's case used light pressure on the forearm for the client to push against. Kern lists strength exercises, pushing away, gentle contests of strength and playful wrestling. [source: Geiser 2021a; Kern 2015]
Steps: Screening and consent first (4.0). Stand stably, facing each other. Use palms or forearms only. The therapist offers light resistance and the client pushes, adjusting the force. Stop at the signal. Play-wrestling only with a robust alliance and enough space, matched in force, never pinning [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "I'll put some light pressure against your forearm; push back as much as feels right... and stop whenever you want."
Watch for and cautions: injury (joints, back, heart), and power struggles that re-enact the client's history. Dissociation or flooding means stop. It is working when the client discovers "I can push" and stands more upright afterwards.

38. Small body dialogue and enacting relational patterns

Purpose: Respond physically to small impulses and let relational patterns appear in the body, such as clinging or a power struggle, so they can be felt and understood. [source: Kern 2015]
Steps: Pick up a small impulse, such as the client's hand moving toward you. Answer with a small, mirrored movement. Let a brief non-verbal exchange develop, then pause and talk it through. Enacting a pattern can also be done with objects or with distance only, with no touch [synthesis].
Example language (illustrative): "Your hand moved toward me just now... shall we see what happens if we let it?"
Watch for: re-traumatising re-enactments. Keep it brief and contained.

39. Moving together

Purpose: Phase 4 contact: move together, with shared rhythm and attunement. [source: Kern 2015] Dance-therapy elements are part of the GwG training. [source: GwG curriculum 2026]
Steps: Standing. Start side by side without touch, matching walking or swaying [synthesis]. Who leads can switch. Hand contact only with consent (4.0).
Example language (illustrative): "Let's walk next to each other... you set the pace."
Watch for: self-consciousness; keep it small. It is working when the client can sense being in contact and still themselves.

40. Expression and action channels (from Focusing)

Purpose: Carry a felt sense forward through other media. Options include: a gesture or action; talking with the feeling as if it were a person; a movement, mime or dance; painting, or choosing an image (a postcard, a personal photo); a sound, tone or melody; letting inner parts speak; writing a letter; inventing a fairy tale. [source: Kern 2015] Kern's book also works with "inner parts" around basic needs. [source: Kern 3rd ed. table of contents]
Steps: Once a felt sense is present, offer two or three channels and let the client choose. Then check the expression against the felt sense, ask whether it fits, and adjust it. [source: Kern 2015; synthesis on the offering of choices]
Example language (illustrative): "Is there a sound for it? Or a colour, or a movement?"
Watch for: the expression getting ahead of the felt sense. Return to sensing.

41. Training attention and present-moment awareness

Purpose: For rumination and narrowed attention: practise directing attention and staying in the present. [source: Kern 2015] Mindfulness is part of Kern's theory and the GwG curriculum, and GFK runs study days linking meditation with GFK practice. [source: GwG curriculum 2026; GFK Kursprogramm 2017/18]
Steps [synthesis]: Short practices of 1 to 3 minutes, moving attention between an anchor (feet, breath, sound) and noticing when the mind has drifted.
Example language (illustrative): "When you notice you're back in the thoughts, just come back to your feet."
Watch for: self-criticism about drifting. Treat each noticing as success.

42. Body self-image and "body islands" (Kern's book) [uncertain]

Purpose: Kern's book has an "Alphabet der Leiblichkeit" (after Schmitz): affective involvement, body islands, body self-image, categories of bodily sensing, and basic body movements. The book also includes mapping one's body image. [source: Kern 3rd ed. table of contents; Itten 2015] The chapter is not drawn on, so no procedure from it is given here.
Steps [synthesis, not from Kern]: The client draws a body outline and marks where they feel clearly, vaguely or not at all, with colours. Talk about it.
Watch for: distress over "missing" areas. Frame them as places not yet felt.

Note: the GFK character-structure model

GFK teaches its own character-structure model, linked with Focusing in terms of narrowing patterns and process dynamics. [source: GFK Kursprogramm 2017/18] No description is given in the sources, so it is not given here. [uncertain] Do not substitute Reich's or Lowen's character typology.

5. Handling problems

Guidance from the sources (GFK, Geiser): [source: Geiser 2021a]

Very slow pace, and the therapist's impatience. Notice your own urge to do more, name it to yourself, and return to the client's rhythm. Long silences are part of the process, not a failure.
Premature closure or self-blame (for example, the client jumps to "so it's my fault"). Notice that the process has lost its tempo. Gently go back to exploring and the felt sense instead of arguing with the conclusion.
Tearful "why can't I?" questions. Stay with the feeling and ask what it is like right now. Tell apart a genuine question from a self-accusation. Invite the client to ask the question inwardly and wait for an answer that comes from experience.
The client wants your opinion. Answer honestly, but do not decide for the client. Which options feel possible is for the client to find.
Fear of losing what was gained. Don't hurry, and don't push the client into action. The client is free to take time.
Frozen, repeating images or material. Change the approach, for example take another perspective or a different dream element (12 to 14), instead of repeating the same question.
Ending. Close with an open door for return if the process gets stuck again.

Guidance from Kern: [source: Kern 2015]

Overwhelm or high arousal. Go back to phase 1: regulate tension through breath, grounding and directing attention (15, 17, 19), and build safety through space and imagery. Do not move to contact work until regulation, body perception and identity are established.

Touch-specific problems (Bioenergetic guidance, applies to any touch here): [source: Guest & Parker 2022]

Verbal yes, body no. Stop the touch, name what you saw without blame, and check again. Treat the body's signal as the answer.
Transference stirred by touch, or by its absence. Help the client notice their bodily reactions to touch and process them. Not touching can also make the therapist seem withdrawn.
Psychosis. Do not use touch.

Further guidance [synthesis: not in the sources]:

"I feel nothing" (alexithymia, numbness). Treat "nothing" as a felt sense: what is the nothing like? Is it grey, or a wall? Use outside-in orienting (15) and movement before stillness. Give the client word choices (16). Accept long periods with small signs of progress.
Dissociation during body work (glazed eyes, flat voice, losing track of time). Stop the exercise. Orient to the room: name objects, press the feet into the floor, sit up, keep eyes open. Use the client's name and present-tense contact. Talk it through once the client is back. Shorten later segments and stay in phase 1. Agree warning signs and a plan in advance.
Trauma memories triggered by touch or posture. Stop, remove the touch, ask before doing anything else, and ground the client. Afterwards, change the plan together. Trauma work belongs to specific training; the GwG curriculum has a trauma module. [source for module: GwG curriculum 2026]
Resistance to body work ("this is silly", "just let me talk"). In person-centred terms this is information to accept, not to overcome. Reflect it, explain the rationale briefly, and offer the smallest step, such as one body question. Or stay with talk and bodily empathic reflection (2), which needs no exercise. Never insist.
Non-adherence with between-session practice (Focusing, basic rhythms). GFK does not prescribe homework, so set none by default. If the client wants practice, agree on something tiny, such as using the session's handle once a day. Explore what got in the way with curiosity, not correction.
Ruptures, for example after a touch felt intrusive, an exercise felt like a test, or an interpretation slipped in. Name the rupture, take responsibility for your part, ask what it was like for the client, and adjust. Repairing it is relational work in its own right.
Directivity drift. Kern's catalogue makes it easy to run exercises one after another. Check every 10 minutes or so whether you are following the client or a plan. Go back to the GFK criterion of opening versus narrowing. [criterion: Geiser 2021a]
Strong emotion or cathartic escalation (sobbing, shaking, an urge to hit). GFK aims at a felt shift, not discharge. [source: Geiser 2021a] Slow it down, reduce the intensity, ground the client, and help them stay aware of the feeling rather than amplifying it.
Erotic feelings in client or therapist. Stop touch work, talk about boundaries clearly and respectfully, and get supervision. Never act on them.
Pain or physical symptoms. Body work is not a treatment for physical disease. Refer unexplained or new symptoms to a physician. Avoid painful movements.
Suicidality or self-harm emerging. Pause body work. Carry out a standard structured risk assessment and safety planning, including lethal-means counselling on secure storage and removal. Resume body work only once the client is stable.
Cultural or religious limits on touch or movement. Ask, and use no-touch and seated versions.

Sources

Sources:

Tried but not readable: the berufsberatung.ch GFK training page (cookie wall) and a Heidelberg repository document (bot-blocked). [uncertain: GFK's own curriculum details and its character-structure model]

Further reading (not drawn on unless listed above):

Kern, E. (2014; 3rd ed. 2023). Personzentrierte Körperpsychotherapie. München: Reinhardt.
Gendlin, E. T. (1978/1981). Focusing. New York: Everest House; German: Salzburg: Otto Müller.
Gendlin, E. T. (1986). Let Your Body Interpret Your Dreams. Wilmette, IL: Chiron.
Gendlin, E. T. (1996). Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy: A Manual of the Experiential Method. New York: Guilford.
Geiser, C. (2010). Moments of movement: Carrying forward structure-bound processes in work with clients suffering from chronic pain. Person-Centered & Experiential Psychotherapies, 9(2), 95–106.
Röhricht, F. (2000). Körperorientierte Psychotherapie psychischer Störungen. Göttingen: Hogrefe.
Geuter, U. (2015). Körperpsychotherapie. Berlin: Springer; Geuter, U. (2018). Praxis Körperpsychotherapie. Berlin: Springer.
Rogers, C. R. (1961). On Becoming a Person. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

← Previous · IV-081Body-oriented psychological therapy for schizophrenia Next · IV-083 →Psychodynamic body therapy