LAURIE F. SCHWARTZ

After graduating from Grinnell College in 1974 where she majored in music and anthropology, Laurie F. Schwartz entered the U.S. Peace Corps and was a teacher at Limuru Girls School in Kenya for the next three years. She returned to N.Y.C. in 1978 and has been involved with somatic forms of healing and consciousness since that time.

Laurie began her training with Ilana Rubenfeld in 1979 and continued her search for the  integration of psyche, soma and soul. She is certified in the Hakomi Method of Body-Centered Somatic Psychotherapy, Gestalt Art Therapy, Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy, Jin Shin Jyutsu, and Family Constellations. She has also explored Jungian Dream Analysis with Robert Bosnack and Group Dream Work with Monte Ulman. She also participated in an ongoing enrichment program in Jungian Psychology, and received training and supervision in Modern Group Analysis with Dr. Louis Ormont.

Laurie is a licensed massage therapist and counseling psychologist in New York State. She has been in private practice since 1985 and currently maintains a full-time private practice in NYC integrating the Hakomi Method with Somatic Experiencing, Hellinger work and other somatic approaches with individuals, couples, families and groups. She has a gift and a passion for helping individuals and couples work through the early unmet needs for healthy attachment both biological and emotional. She also has discovered creative ways to heal the effects of trauma in a group setting with the use of dance, rhythm, sound, movement, imagery and poetry in mindfulness.

Laurie like’s to find user friendly ways to help people remember the ESSENCE of healing. The return to BEING aware in mindfulness of our BODIES as we BREATHE while also establishing a BOND with our BONES and the potential for the awareness of BLOOD flow while establishing and maintaining BOUNDARIES and BIRTHING the sense of BELONGING to Self in BALANCE and with BEAUTY. The 11 B’s.

Laurie has facilitated seminars integrating somatic psychotherapy with the creative arts for the past 25 years in the United States and has also taught and supervised therapists in Poland, Israel, India, Africa, and Switzerland.

Laurie’s approach to body-centered psychotherapy was the topic that Amelia Kaplan chose to research for her Doctoral thesis at Rutgers University in 2004. Laurie and Amelia received an award from the United States Association for Body Psychotherapy in 2005 for “Outstanding Research” in “Advancing the Profession of Body-Psychotherapy.” They have published a short article entitled, “Listening to the Body: Pragmatic Case Studies of Body-Psychotherapy” in the USABP Journal. This Doctoral Thesis was voted #1 in the State of New Jersey in 2006 and it is available for anyone interested.

In addition to an ongoing private practice Laurie has a gift and passion for supervision with individuals and groups. She also enjoys the integration of body-centered modalities with the creative arts. She has created an experiential seminar entitled “Soul in the Body” where people are given the opportunity to explore intimacy with self and other. It has been a popular workshop at conferences during the past 20 years.

At present Laurie is involved with ongoing supervision for graduates of the Hakomi Trainings and Somatic Experiencing Trainings. She has a gift and a passion for helping people find more ease and comfort with embodiment in somatic states of BEING both in their personal and professional lives.

Laurie does have personal and professional experience with mental illness and drug addiction.  She does also share her recovery process from co-dependency when invited. She has been involved with The Meadows treatment center personally and professionally.

In closing: “If we examine every stage of our lives, we find that from our first breath to our last we are under the constrain of circumstances. And yet we still possess the greatest of all freedoms, the power of developing our innermost selves in harmony with the moral order of the Universe, and so winning peace at heart whatever obstacles we meet. It is easy to say this and write this. But it always remains a task to which every day must be devoted. Every morning cries to us: Do what you ought and trust what may be.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

Contact Laurie F. Schwartz at SacredStreams@mac.com or 212-496-1727.