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Weeklong Seminars, N. Falmouth, MA -- Cape Cod
HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL
DEPARTMENT OF CONTINUING EDUCATION
10th ANNUAL SUMMER SEMINARS

    Pesso Boyden System Psychomotor (PBSP) was co-created in 1961 by Albert Pesso and Diane Boyden-Pesso.  Their mind/body treatment approach derives in part from their comprehensive knowledge of working psycho-dynamically and their extensive experience working with trauma and abuse survivors.  The objective of this seminar is to help clinicians develop an in-depth understanding of the contributions PBSP can make to their work with a broad range of patients.  The aim is to create theoretical and technical bridges between PBSP and mainstream psychotherapeutic work.

    Of particular clinical usefulness is the way in which the PBSP therapist empathically tracks the patient's verbal expressions, affective experiences, bodily states, and core belief systems -- with an eye to making these elements more accessible to the patient's consciousness.  This microtracking facilitates emergence and re-experiencing of the early-on traumatic parental failures.  In addition, the PBSP therapist focuses on the patient's proactive efforts to bring about that which he/she most needs in order to heal; the patient "choreographs" the moves of individuals enlisted as "ideal parents" and then constructs kinesthetic/sensorimotor memories deriving from gratifying interactions with them.  This corrective provision is something that takes place in the present but is experienced, and internally registered, "as if" it had actually taken place in the past.  The new memories are placed alongside the original traumatogenic memories, thereby positively modifying future expectations.   In PBSP the primary therapeutic actions is therefore not about grieving unmet developmental needs; rather, it is about symbolically gratifying those needs.

Inquiries should be directed to:

Harvard MED-CME
P.O. Box 825
Boston, MA 02117-0825
Tel: (617) 432-1525
Email: hms-cme@hms.harvard.edu