Below I share with you my own understanding of Integrative Body Psychotherapy (IBP) from the perspective of Kundalini Yoga. For the official resource go to www.ibponline.com.

        According to the Kundalini Yoga  tradition our eternal soul with unlimited capacity enters the body in 120st day of a woman’s pregnancy. Until then the child’s and mother’s souls negotiate their compatibility in terms of karmic imprints. The question is: “Is this mother a good vessel to carry and guide this child’s soul in order to fulfill his/her mission in this lifetime?” And vice versa: “Is this child a good teacher for this mother to learn what she needs to learn as a mother in this lifetime?” If there is a miscarriage or abortion, this etheric contract did not go through. If consensus was achieved, then the soul enters a fetus and the process of “downloading” begins.

        A mother creates 8 out of the 10 energetic bodies, which we recognize in Kundalini Yoga. That is why the prenatal time is crucial for further development. Yogis knew this and they pampered expectant mothers, so they could have a time and space to take care of themselves, meditate, and elevate all levels of their being. If you read this and feel bad about not being so lucky, no worries, because the two souls involved needed exactly such experience as they have already received.

         Integrative Body Psychotherapy (IBP) recognizes the eternal capacity of the soul. The core belief here is that “Life is a Somatic Experience". The already mentioned “downloading” happens in the delta state of brain functioning, when we absorb everything like a sponge. This happens in the child’s Primary Scenario, which is the time and space into which a child is born with its economic, political, and social conditions, with family relationships and dynamics. Even the mother and father’s history is transmitted and recorded in the child’s energetic structure. A child develops a way to survive under the given conditions, which IBP calls the Character Style. If the Primary Scenario is difficult, the Character Style can be very reactive or defensive. It serves the child in the early years as a survival mechanism. In both IBP and Kundalini Yoga we understand that what we develop during the first 6-7 years of our lifetime we somehow continue to carry on for the rest of our days. In Kundalini Yoga we say that we are energetically set by then and the window is closed (our 7th or crown chakra/fontanel closes around the age of 8). Consequently we may find ourselves as mature adults still using the tactics of  6-year old child. It is a subconscious program that we keep running. With our present capacity as fully-grown adults we can do much better and replace the old “software”, which does not serve our current needs.

         IBP brings into awareness our unconscious patterns and habits. There are many components, which this model of psychotherapy uses for unveiling and healing of old wounds. The breath, somatic and cognitive awareness, and body movements (yoga) are the core ones. It takes courage to face our past. Some unresolved or painful issues act as a burdens, which we may continue to carry, or which we may decide to deal with and transform.

         It is not an easy process. Our Character Style is veiled by Agency, a term which IBP uses to describe our ability to please others in order to survive. Agency acts like a cover-up for our instinctual needs. We learn to pretend, just to be accepted. We adopt the dreams of someone else just to fit into the matrix. For such survival actions we may pay a very high price – we often forget who we really are, what the mission of our soul is, what our own true needs and dreams are.

         With IBP therapy we learn how to recognize Agency patterns in our lives. Under the layer of Agency is the hard layer of our Character Style, which doesn’t allow us to expand and “breathe” freely and live fully, because it often acts like a rigid structure. When we explore our Character Style we start to understand why we act the way we do, because under the Character Style are all our experiences from our Primary Scenario. At this point of discovery we are tapping into (self)understanding, (self)compassion, and forgiveness of the Self and our caretakers, because they did the best they could under the circumstances of their own Primary Scenario. This is a no blame model. Our souls came here for a lesson. We need to start with compassion to begin healing of any wounds.

         If we did not receive the basic messages, which every child needs for healthy development, we are going to seek them for the rest of our lives. These messages are:       “I Love You” “I Want You”, “I See You and I Hear You”, “I’ll Take Care of You”, “It is Not What You Do, but Who You Are I Love” and many more. Did we receive these messages in our childhood? If not, we might have a tendency to seek them through our partners or other people around. But maternal or paternal love cannot be replaced with any other love in later life, and that wounded longing child inside may drive us crazy. We can heal only from within.

        IBP therapy offers an opportunity to connect with that delicate child within (through breath and body) and give him/her that missing message which re-establishes connection with our soul, where we are wholesome, capable and extremely well nourished. We are diminishing our duality and establishing unity of the body, mind and soul. Only with work on all these levels can we achieve the sustainable integration of our “new software”, which can open many doors that had remained shut, and create steady grounds for a fulfilling life.