About Rachael
RACHAEL BRODY, MA, R-DMT
Rachael is a Somatic Psychotherapist with a MA in Somatic Counseling Psychology form Naropa University in Boulder, CO. She is a registered dance/movement therapist through the American Dance Therapy Association with extensive trainings in body-centered psychotherapy, creative arts therapies, trauma and trauma recovery, neuroscience, meditation and mindfulness, authentic movement, group facilitation, and rites of passage and ritual exploration. She is a trained Somasource® practitioner, using the 5 Rhythms as healing modality.
Rachael was raised on a rural mountaintop in western Virginia where she was blessed with the opportunity from an early age to connect to her senses and bodily experience as it related to the natural world. By living more or less aligned with the cycles of the earth and the seasons, she developed an awareness of how much life (and thus aliveness) is teeming all around when time is taken to explore and discover. Additionally she learned a great deal about death/decay, resilience, transformation, and rebirth by observing her natural environment. These ideas and philosophies have become a foundational component to her work as a psychotherapist.
Following her undergraduate studies at the University of Michigan, Rachael worked for an environmental non-profit in New York City, connecting communities throughout the five boroughs to the earth and their bodies through gardening and urban open space restoration.
While the work was incredibly meaningful and where she happened to meet her beloved partner (that guy up there ^ ), Rachael recognized a need and desire to incorporate psycho-emotional support into this body and earth based community work.
She and Noah moved to Boulder, Colorado where she completed her studies in somatic counseling psychology with a concentration in dance-movement therapy at Naropa University. While in graduate school she worked at Safehouse Progressive Alliance for Non-violence at the domestic violence shelter and completed trainings in anti-violence and oppression. She then worked as an intern therapist at Boulder Emotional Wellness, an affordable counseling clinic with a focus on PACT informed couples and family counseling and trauma recovery. She has studied authentic movement with pioneer dance therapist, Zoe Avstreih and has completed an extensive 170 hour training and mentorship in somatically informed trauma work with Thresholds Healing, Bridging Soma and Soul, all of which help inform her work with clients.
Rachael believes that somatic psychotherapy can support individuals and communities in coming into closer contact with our humanness- tolerating discomfort, building resilience, integrating the lost, stolen, or fragmented parts so that we can honor and own our wholeness, inner wisdom, and innate health.
In addition to her work as a psychotherapist, Rachael is a dedicated partner and mother, thoroughly transformed by the immeasurable joys and challenges of parenthood. She loves beautiful cookbooks and cooking, growing food, taking photographs, playing in the woods with her family, and dancing to any and all kinds of music or none at all.