There’s a strange mood in the air wafting about on social media that Talking Therapy is somehow happening ‘in the head’, that it is only a ‘cognitive practice’ or worse, that it is somehow ‘happening in the brain’. Talking as a language practice, takes many forms, via all our senses and outward expression, such as art, music, poetry, dance, protest, and an underestimated gem of them all - silence.
Make no mistake that language in all its forms is phenomenological - it arouses the body with delicious delight, abject fear, immense sadness and ignites an emotional charge that is pure gold experientially because it is informing us of something. It has power, and is powerful, which is precisely why we are careful and feel the brunt of any carelessness. That is precisely how poetry and lyric work: evocation and provocation; brings us to our knees in tears; rises up with an energetic march; calms our restless nature; and soothes an aching heart.
From the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, we see clearly that language is always doing something - it is always at work - it is an act. Talking Therapy at its best is an act that drills softly and deeply to shift the sand within towards understanding, seeing and settling how life is and can be. Arrival is not a flimsy communication/exchange of words disconnected from bodily experience, and its power is not to arrive at some euphoric utopia, but to reconcile the suffering that we endure whilst being alive.
Aside from the power of the therapeutic relationship in itself, which is a highly skilled practice, grounded in particular Humanistic ethics, (sometimes overlooked and diminished as doing ‘a bit of person-centred’ work to make ready for a worksheet), Talking Therapy as a craft is a whole-body event where language shares secrets, slips, takes a risk, digs deep and has the potential to transform. We are not just talking life in therapy; we are encountering life as we speak in whatever form that language takes.
Do not underestimate language as a full-on bodily experience. Language is as much the whole body as experiencing the wind in your hair.