WELCOME to Janet’s home-page. Make yourself comfortable as she introduces herself.
Janet is a Master Somatic Movement Educator and Therapist, registered and insured through ISMETA (The International Somatic Movement Education and Therapy Association). This means that, as a MSME/T, Janet has fulfilled the requirements as formulated by ISMETA : a minimum of 1000 hours of training in Somatic Movement and 500 hours of teaching/sessions and has achieved high standards of knowledge, experience, and development in her work as demonstrated through publications, research, curricular development, conference presentations and/or embodied praxes.
Janet’s somatic training includes her certification as a practitioner of Body-Mind Centering® (through the School for Body-Mind Centering®) and as a Certified Movement Analyst, (training through LSSI [Laban/Bartenieffand Somatic Studies International™]).
In addition to her somatic disciplines, Janet is a fully certified as a 550+h matwork and complete apparatus through the Pilates Method Alliance, a Vinyasa-style 200 h yoga teacher through Yoga Alliance, and a National Health Practitioners of Canada-registered Traditional Thai Masseuse (advanced classical, and traditional foot). She also obtained a BA (psych) with distinction, The King’s University in 2010, and a BSc (biology) with distinction, University of Alberta, in 1986.
Janet has four main foci in her work:
Somatic Movement Education and Therapy
- Janet offers many educational workshops:Following in the lineage of Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, and of Rudolf Von Laban and his student Irmgard Bartenieff, Janet researches and assists others to recognize, refine and expand the WHAT, WHERE, and HOW of movement. It is an integrative exploration of whole body movement plus the subtler gestures, facial expressions, speech—the expression of BEING alive as framed through Body-Mind Centering® and through Laban’s Body-Effort-Shape-Space. Her workshops are for any and all persons desiring to deepen their awareness and skills in movement. This includes professional pre-requisite training for formal Laban Movement Analysis education, teacher training in yoga and Pilates, and special workshops for university theatre and athletics, as well as for the general public. Her clients include: performing artists (theatre, dance, music), lay persons, professionals (dentists, lawyers, veterinarians, physicians, clergy)—those seeking positive movement relationships with themselves, with others, and with their environments. Janet also serves on BMC® training programs in Europe.
Private Therapeutic Sessions
- Janet offers personalized, private therapeutic sessions to a variety of clientele: healthy laypersons from birth to 90 y, athletes, individuals recovering from acute or chronic injury, surgery, cancer, anxiety, eating disorders, PTSD, depression, and so forth. Janet delves deeply into the bodymind connection:exploring the embodiment of anatomical systems in our bodies, developmental movement, and our ontogenetic unfolding in relating to self, to others, and to our environments. In diving deeper into the integration and interrelatedness amongst our bodymind systems, Janet facilitates exploring the psychophysical aspects in movement, using her sophistication and subtlety in touch and movement repatterning, and her skills in therapeutic assessment and approaches. Janet offers sessions through the modalities of movement, somatizations, touch, imagery, and sound.
Embodied Spirituality
Janet also facilitates explorations in deepening one’s embodiment of spirituality. Janet has worked with Anglican clergy and parishioners in mindful approaches to liturgy, prayer, ritual, scripture reading, celebrations of birth, marriage, and of death.Janet’s practitioner research presentation delved into the embodiment of spirituality:
- Somatic Liturgy is a Body-Mind Centering ® exploration in spiritual formation. This project is essentially an inquiry into the practise of mindful movement as an avenue to nurturing one’s soul. Two guiding questions led this inquiry: How can a deeper experience of the ‘mundane’ (physical sensations, and daily actions) lead us into a more profound appreciation of the ‘miraculous’ such that the mundane and the miraculous are one and the same entity? and How can we bring congruence through the experience of our ‘self’ in our physical-emotional-mental-spiritual selves as we relate to ourselves, each other, the world, and to the divine?
- Towards an Embodied Spirituality is Janet’s research presentation at the BMC® conference in California, 2019: Dynamic challenges are encountered when one integrates a spiritual connection/awareness into a physical practice; likewise when one integrates a physical awareness into a spiritual practice. Janet presented her work with three distinct populations (a Vinyasa yoga class, an Anglican faith-based community, and individuals dealing with PTSD) and explored their experiences of transitioning from a limited to a multifaceted practice. Participants encountered examples of individuals growing into a deeper connection with themselves and embracing others, community, and a higher power. Participants were invited to experience components of this process and shared their thoughts and experiences in facilitating embodied spiritual connectedness.
Infant Developmental Movement Education
- As an IDME, Janet is committed to supporting caregivers and infants in the first year of an infant’s development. The first year of life is deeply relevant in developing natural movement and perceptual relationships to self, to one’s family and friends, and the environment. Janet’s IDME sessions are filled with observing, engaging, curiosity, and play in a safe and comfortable space. Based on cues from your baby, Janet invites movement in kind and gentle ways that facilitates wholistic developmental movement. Janet also explores subtleties in a caregiver’s handling skills, so as to support your baby’s sense of safety, comfort, and bonding. Janet is co-producer of the Moving Child film
- Janet also applies developmental movement patterns and underlying primitive reflexes, righting reactions and equilibrium responses to assist adult clients who feel ‘uncoordinated’, ‘stuck’, or who have a sense of un-ease in their movement. This too is done in a playful and in adult-friendly framework.
Mentoring
Janet is a registered ISMETA mentor who is excited to assist those individuals in the somatic field who desire to deepen their expertise. Janet offers a deepening of experiential anatomy specifically with regards to embryology, developmental movement, and early reflexes, as well as offering guidance in client supervision.
“We... know what has always seemed intuitively true— that separating the mind from the body, or nature from nurture— is impossible. Every biological process leaves a psychological imprint, and every psychological event changes the architecture of the brain.“