LSBP
The
London School of Biodynamic Psychotherapy
Gerda Boyesen
18th May 1922 - 29th December 2005
| The London School of Biodynamic Psychotherapy |
Gerda Boyesen
18th May 1922 - 29th December 2005
| |
Gerda Boyesen
An obituary
by Carlien van Heel
Gerda Boyesen, born 18 May 1922, died peacefully on 29 December 2005 in London.
She is survived by her daughters, Ebba Boyesen, Mona Lisa Boyesen; her son, Paul Boyesen; her second husband Dan Smith and her grandchildren. Her funeral was held on 4 January 2006 at Mortlake Crematorium, Richmond, London.
Her remains will be buried in the family grave in Denmark.
Most people who had the pleasure of knowing Gerda will have been touched by her. She has had a transformative influence on so many people’s lives through her life work, Biodynamic Psychotherapy.
Gerda was born into a traditional family in Norway. Determined not to pass on her own authoritarian upbringing to her children, she wanted to understand human development and embarked on a psychology degree in 1947. Through her studies she met Ola Raknes, Nic Waal and Dr Havrevoll, all analysts, who had trained and worked very closely with Wilhelm Reich during his years in exile in Norway (1934-1939). Gerda received her Reichian training analysis from Ola Raknes, one of the most important people to have spread Reich’s body-psychotherapeutic approach in Europe after Reich moved to the USA. After completing her psychology degree and Reichian analysis, Gerda worked as a clinical psychologist in psychiatric hospitals.
Wanting to deepen her anatomical and physiological understanding of the body, she trained as a physiotherapist. Later, she studied a neuro-muscular massage technique developed by Aadel Bulow Hansen, which proved far more effective than the physiotherapy techniques she had previously learned. Gerda worked in the Bulow Hansen clinic in close cooperation with the psychiatrist Trygve Braatoy, who had also been inspired by Reich. Here she discovered that it was possible to influence a person’s unconscious and emotions through massage. She also saw clearly how clients’ emotional states changed through alterations in their body postures. All these studies and experiences shaped Gerda’s understanding of the link between the psyche and the body.
Gerda came to London in 1968 as one of the first Reichian body psychotherapists. She developed Biodynamic Psychotherapy, Biodynamic Psychology and Biodynamic Massage. In the seventies, she set up the Gerda Boyesen Centre in Acton, West London. People from all over the world came to London to train with her.
London remained her base, but she also worked extensively abroad, giving training, lectures and therapy all over Europe. There are now many biodynamic schools and practitioners in countries across the world, including Brazil, France, Germany, Holland, Denmark, Portugal, Israel, Switzerland, USA, Australia and Venezuela.
Her three children, Ebba, Mona Lisa and Paul Boyesen, are all eminent therapists who have developed her work and run their own training schools. The Gerda Boyesen Centre was approved as a training organisation by the United Kingdom Council of Psychotherapy in 1992, and in 1999 Gerda was made an honorary member of the European Association for Body Psychotherapy in recognition of her work.
Biodynamic psychotherapy combines bodywork and psychotherapy and is based on the premise that our emotional, mental and physical processes are always interdependent. Through our body, its muscular tensions and breath restrictions, we tend to keep ‘difficult’ feelings at bay. Though this may be helpful at that moment, it can lead to a sense of disconnection and can limit our ability to respond to life. As our minds and bodies start to soften again, we can feel the feelings that were repressed in the past and work through them; this helps us to regain more of our natural aliveness and gives us a deeper sense of who we are. This is not only an emotional and intellectual experience, it is also felt within the body.
Gerda’s discovery of ‘psycho-peristalsis’ - the body’s way of literally digesting stress, whether superficial or chronic, physical or emotional, in the intestines - is a huge contribution to body psychotherapy. Bringing repressed feelings to consciousness is only part of therapy. Helping the psyche and body to digest this material is just as important. This enables clients to get back in touch with their innate sense of wellbeing. The awareness of psycho-peristalsis helps to monitor a person’s ability to integrate the emotional material that would surface during the therapeutic process. This made Gerda’s work subtler and applicable to a wider range of clients than the mainstream Reichian bodywork.
Gerda embodied her teaching. She lived, comfortably, in her body and could fully allow the flow of her pleasure. Her work was gentle and accepting, yet very profound. She had the ability to engage with her students and clients on very deep levels. Gerda created a truly accepting space in which each client could make their own journey towards their own truth. Her psychotherapeutic interventions were sparing and simple, yet subtle and to the point.
During her years in London, there were also times of conflict and struggle. Gerda was a fantastic therapist and trainer, but her organisational skills were not of the same standard.
Like many gifted pioneers, she had difficulty in letting her trained students develop their own version of her work. The Gerda Boyesen Centre went through several crises and some people who were trained by her left to take her work forward in different directions.
Many of us who have known Gerda feel deep appreciation and gratitude for what she has given. Gerda was a remarkable, colourful, complex, gifted and deeply loving therapist and woman. She has opened up for us a never-ending, fascinating journey. May she rest in peace.
Very little of Gerda’s work has been published - something we hope to rectify in the near future. We hope that her full-length biography will soon be published in English and that her work will become more widely recognised.
‘The Collected Papers’ (from Energy & Character) is now out of print, and her books have only been published in French or German:
Entre Psyche et Soma - Introduction à la Psychologie Biodynamique, Paris, Payot, 1985;
Uber den Korper die Seele Heilen, Kosel Verlag, Munchen, 1987;
‘Biodynamik Des Lebens’ (Gerda Boyesen and Mona Lisa Boyesen), Synthesis, Essen, 1987;
Von der Lust am Heilen – Quintessenz meines Lebens, Kosel Verlag, Munchen 1995.
Carlien van Heel is a Biodynamic psychotherapist and trainer at the London School of Biodynamic Psychotherapy (LSBP)
To contact Carlien: carlienvanheel@lsbp.org.uk
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If you are interested in receiving more information about Gerda Boyesen’s work please contact:
London School of Biodynamic Psychotherapy (LSBP)
LSBP is a member organisation of the United Kingdom Council of Psychotherapy (UKCP)
Tel: 0700 079 4725
email: enquiries@lsbp.org.uk
website: www.lsbp.org.uk
Other organisations in the UK offering Gerda Boyesen’s work:
London
The Gerda Boyesen Institute
Chiron Centre
Cambridge
The Cambridge Body Psychotherapy Centre
To Contact us
Tel: 07000 794 725
e-mail: enquiries@lsbp.org.uk
Write: London School of Biodynamic Psychotherapy
73 Marylebone Lane
London, W1U 2PN