Both somatic therapy and charismatic Christianity can involve intense physical reactions in people, such as trembling, shaking, writhing, and crying. This got me thinking about whether there might be some common ground in how both practices achieve these effects.
‘Slain in the Spirit’ in Charismatic Christianity
During worship, Pentecostal and charismatic Christians might fall to the floor in a state of ecstasy: this is known as ‘slain in the Spirit’, or, alternatively, ‘slaying in the Spirit’, ‘falling under the power’, ‘overcome by the Spirit’, and ‘resting in the Spirit’. When this occurs, the person believes themselves to be filled with the power of the Holy Spirit, and they become overwhelmed by this power, causing them to collapse. This can occur on one’s own, but it typically happens in group settings, such as small prayer groups, religious retreats, and church services. While lying down, the person may speak in tongues, laugh, weep, or sing praises to God.
Other reactions (those related to somatic therapy) may include making animal noises, slithering, shaking, and convulsing. People will fall to the ground when the pastor touches them, which some participants describe as a feeling of electricity or warmth, which is reminiscent of the physical sensations people describe during a kundalini awakening (a spiritual experience that results from practising kundalini yoga). Not all incidents of falling in Pentecostal or charismatic Christianity are attributed to the influence of the Holy Spirit; there can also be fakers and, according to charismatics, the influence of demonic activity. Similar phenomena can be observed in cases of spirit possession and trance states in other religions.
Sceptics explain slain in the Spirit through autosuggestion, peer pressure, or the desire to experience what others have experienced. In an article published in the Skeptical Inquirer, Joe Nickell looked at slaying in the Spirit during a Benny Hinn healing crusade in 2001. He compared the practice to hypnosis, stating that participants “merely engage in a form of role-playing that is prompted by their strong desire to receive divine power as well as by the influence of suggestion that they do so […] In short, they behave just as if ‘hypnotized.'” A professional hypnotist said that “This is something we do every day”. Arguably, slain in the Spirit is very much akin to a form of hypnosis.
Even those who have attended charismatic church services and experienced ecstatic states later admit the role of psychology in the effects that occur. In 2015, the writer Jules Evans interviewed the evangelist Nicky Gumbel, who ran Alpha, a 10-week course on Christianity, during which many attendees experience ecstasy, or ‘Holy Spirit encounters’. At the time of the interview, Evans was working on his book on ecstatic experience, The Art of Losing Control. He had converted to Christianity at this point, following his own ecstatic experience (although he eventually left the church). During the interview, Evans stated:
[T]here’s a risk in charismatic Christianity, going back through the Pentecostalists, the Methodists, all the way to mystics like St Theresa, of taking physical sensations as evidence for ‘God’s favour’. But physical sensations are very easy to manipulate through hypnosis and suggestion or auto-suggestion. I’ve been to services where the preacher says ‘you might be feeling dizzy, or you might be feeling warm’ or whatever. It’s not reliable evidence so there’s a risk in putting too much weight on it.
As in the case of hypnosis, hypnotic suggestibility – someone’s tendency to respond to hypnosis, which varies between individuals – may help explain how prone someone is to being slain in the Spirit. Variations in general suggestibility (broader than hypnotic suggestibility) could further explain why some are more likely to experience intense reactions during charismatic Christian worship. These psychological forces can play a powerful role in altered states of consciousness. For instance, we know that hypnotic suggestion can be used to induce mystical experiences.
Somatic Therapy: Can We Release Trauma Through Shaking?
I have wondered whether, in some instances (not all), similar mechanisms may underlie the physical sensations and reactions people experience during somatic therapy. This form of therapy is intended to treat trauma-based conditions such as PTSD and C-PTSD in a body-focused way. Many somatic practitioners and clients believe that the emotional memory of the trauma is stored in the body – in the tissue and cells of the body – which manifests as both the physical and psychological symptoms of trauma. Some have referred to this ‘somatic memory’ or ‘cellular memory’. The idea behind forms of somatic therapy – such as Somatic Experiencing (SE) and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) – is that reactions like trembling, shaking, and crying are ways of releasing the trauma stored in the body.
However, some therapists – including body-based practitioners – believe that the basis of somatic therapy is rooted in pseudoscience, including the concept of trauma being trapped in the body. While there are undoubtedly molecular and cellular effects of trauma, it does not follow that memories of the trauma are stored in the body (beyond the brain). There are also other ways to explain the shaking reactions that might occur during somatic therapy. For example, in the case of psychedelic-assisted somatic therapy, shaking behaviour can occur as a result of psychedelic activity at serotonin 2A receptors. Because of this, shaking may not necessarily be a sign of shaking off tension and trauma but may be the result of psychedelic action on serotonin receptors. As such, people without unprocessed trauma may find themselves involuntarily and uncontrollably shaking during a psychedelic journey as well. In addition, shaking (as well as altered states) during high ventilation breathwork practices, which are sometimes a part of somatic therapy, can result from changes to oxygen and CO2 levels in the body.
There is some evidence that somatic therapy can help alleviate the symptoms of PTSD: SE can lead to significant reductions in these symptoms. But as I highlight in an article for Psychedelic Support, there is a scarcity of published studies, methodological limitations with existing studies, a reliance on anecdotal reports, and possibly misguided extrapolations of animal behaviour (e.g. shaking after escaping predation) to cases of human trauma.
Of course, trauma may not be literally stored in the body, but the physical mark of trauma in the body may lead one to think of trauma being trapped in the body in a metaphorical way. And somatic therapy may effectively treat the physical and psychological symptoms of trauma through a body-focused approach.
Crying can release tension, reduce cortisol levels (associated with stress), and increase levels of oxytocin and endorphins (associated with positive feelings). While whole-body vibration has not been shown to reduce cortisol, many people do report that shaking helps to release muscular tension and stress. Indeed, as noted above, studies have found that somatic techniques help decrease physical and psychological discomfort, stress, irritability, strain and pain, and negative affect. It has been claimed that somatic therapy achieves this by shifting the body from a sympathetic state (fight-or-flight response) to a calmer parasympathetic state. In other words, shaking is meant to help regulate the nervous system. As in the ecstatic experiences of charismatic Christians, somatic therapy can also lead to a relaxed and euphoric state of mind.
While somatic therapy may be helpful in the treatment of trauma and offer relief, it is not clear whether it is effective (particularly in isolation) in achieving long-term cessation of PTSD symptoms. Regular somatic therapy could help one manage these symptoms, but if it’s incorrect to think it releases trauma stored in the body, then could regularly shaking off tension really help to address the deep mental wounds of trauma? How does one know when the trauma has been fully released? Or, in some cases, is the trauma never fully resolved on a physical level, and so regular somatic therapy is necessary? There are initial (but promising) studies showing that SE can lead to significant, long-term symptom reductions. However, SE still has few rigorous studies and a limited evidence base supporting its effectiveness.
Autosuggestion, Suggestion, and Suggestibility in Somatic Therapy
Autosuggestion is when you influence your mental and physical state by thoughts and ideas that come from yourself, rather than someone else. You can think of it as self-hypnosis. Suggestion is when these influencing ideas come from another person (e.g. a hypnotist or faith healer). Variations in suggestibility can affect how likely we are to respond to the suggestions of others. These factors may all be relevant in somatic therapy.
Within the context of ’trauma culture’ and the rising popularity of somatic therapy, it’s possible that many cases of intense physical reactions in therapy stem more from the above psychological factors than trauma release. But the picture is likely more complex than this in many instances, too: the physical reactions can be genuinely beneficial for one’s well-being as well as be the outcome of autosuggestion, suggestion, and suggestibility.
If one holds the idea that trauma is trapped in the body and somatic therapy is the most effective approach for releasing it – ideas originating from oneself and others (most importantly, experts) – then one could be more inclined to vibrate and shake during treatment. As Evans noted, physical sensations can be induced through hypnosis, suggestion, and autosuggestion. Expecting, desiring, and intending to shake off trauma would, I imagine, increase the likelihood of shaking during somatic therapy (and during other body-focused approaches, such as breathwork, which I’ve experienced myself).
As in the case of charismatic Christianity, the stronger the physical reaction, the greater the perceived ‘reward’: in the religious context, this would be the more one is filled with the power of the Holy Spirit, while in the therapeutic context, this would be a more profound and deeper release of trauma. Intense shaking could then prove to oneself that the treatment is working. Initial (but mild) physical sensations could – due to desire, expectation, and influence from the practitioner – also snowball into stronger sensations.
Furthermore, just as peer pressure can influence being slain in the Spirit in charismatic Christianity, awareness of others’ experience of somatic therapy and the popularity of the ‘releasing trauma through shaking’ narrative can make one more prepared, ready, and prone to experience certain physical sensations during somatic therapy. The trendiness of somatic approaches could influence how people engage with and respond to them (this is also true of many other therapeutic techniques, regardless of whether, or to what extent, they are informed by science).
The highly popular work of Dr Peter Levine and Bessel van der Kolk gives many the conviction that trauma is stored in the body, and the deepest form of healing lies in somatic approaches. (Increasingly, however, we are seeing critiques of their popular books, particularly How the Body Keeps the Score by van der Kolk.) It is not my intention to dismiss their approaches outright, nor to deny the real benefits that many have experienced (and continue to experience) through them. However, it’s also important to view the phenomena of somatic therapy critically, and consider how our understanding of similar physical reactions – as seen in ecstatic experiences – may be relevant. In this way, there could be some common ground between somatic therapy and charismatic Christianity that deserves to be acknowledged and explored.
