ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses and compares the somatic approaches Pierre Janet described with those of sensorimotor psychotherapy, focusing specifically on physical “acts of triumph” and the pleasure of the completed action. When incomplete actions are executed to their full capacity, and thus thoroughly completed, the patient has reached the “stage of triumph”. The stage of triumph is experienced in sensorimotor psychotherapy sessions as clients safely experience body sensations and the completion of actions. Fully executing the physical actions that were evoked at the time of the original trauma often renders them more available as adaptive responses in current reality. The instinctive defensive actions that constitute an adaptive response to threat are often ineffective or interrupted, and thus left incomplete in its execution. In teaching new physical actions, the therapist must pursue two goals. First, the specific action must challenge the patient’s integrative capacity. Second, the action must not exhaust or “de-resource” the patient.
