Charlotte Selver (April 4, 1901, in

Ruhrort Ruhrort () is a district in the borough of Homberg/Ruhrort/Baerl within the German city of Duisburg situated north of the confluence of the Ruhr (river), Ruhr and the Rhine, in the western part of the Ruhr Area, Ruhr area. Ruhrort has the largest ...

(Duisburg), Germany – August 22, 2003, in Muir Beach,

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

; née ''Wittgenstein'') was a teacher of the Gindler/Jacoby method of awareness and exercise, a

somatic Somatic may refer to: * Somatic (biology), referring to the cells of the body in contrast to the germ line cells ** Somatic cell, a non-gametic cell in a multicellular organism * Somatic nervous system, the portion of the vertebrate nervous syst ...

bodywork method she further developed and taught after her arrival in the United States in 1938 as Sensory Awareness. The central point of Selver's work was "experience through the senses". She was convinced that the well-being of the individual, the society as a whole and even the worries about our environment depend on how far we find new confidence in organic processes. Selver had a deciding influence on the "Human Potential Movement", which was cultivated and named at the

Esalen Institute The Esalen Institute, commonly called Esalen, is a non-profit American Retreat (spiritual), retreat center and intentional community in Big Sur, California, which focuses on humanism, humanistic alternative education. The institute played a ke ...

, where she taught as of 1963. Because of that, she also had influence on

Humanistic Psychology Humanistic psychology is a psychological perspective that arose in the mid-20th century in answer to two theories: Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory and B. F. Skinner's behaviorism. Thus, Abraham Maslow established the need for a "third force" ...

and the therapies based on it. Aspects of her work, especially the conscious sensing of the body and the following of physical sensations (Sensory Awareness), flowed into many of the methods of physical work, physical therapy, physical psychotherapy and psychotherapy which still exist at Esalen and other venues today.

Biography

In the 1920s, Charlotte Selver encountered

Elsa Gindler Elsa Gindler (19 June 1885 – 8 January 1961) was a somatic bodywork (alternative medicine), bodywork pioneer in Germany. Born in Berlin, teacher of wiktionary:Gymnastik, gymnastik, student of Hedwig Kallmeyer (who, in turn, had been a student of ...

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

, who together with the students in her courses, researched how the natural gifts of people could be developed, even at an adult age. Up until she emigrated to

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

in 1938, she studied with Elsa Gindler and the music teacher, Heinrich Jacoby, and she reestablished contact with them in the 1950s. In 1971, the "Sensory Awareness Foundation" was brought into being. Its goal is to preserve and document Charlotte Selver's life work. In 1995, the "California Institute of Integral Studies" in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

awarded her an honorary doctorate. Charlotte Selver died on August 22, 2003, at her home in Muir Beach, California, among her closest friends and students at the age of 102.

Sensory Awareness

Sensory Awareness has its origin in the work of the gymnastics and exercise teacher,

(1885–1961), and the Swiss music teacher, Heinrich Jacoby (1889–1964). They never gave their 'work' a formal name. The fundamental objective of the Jacoby/Gindler approach is the development of the person (integral unfolding as development and growth to meaningful being). Charlotte Selver was Gindler's student in Berlin before she emigrated to the United States in 1938 and she introduced this work under the name of Sensory Awareness.

Influences on bodywork and psychotherapy

Charlotte Selver touched and encouraged thousands of people in the USA, Mexico and

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

in her 80 years of work, among them influential personalities, such as: * Psychoanalyst

Erich Fromm Erich Seligmann Fromm (; ; March 23, 1900 – March 18, 1980) was a German-American social psychologist, psychoanalyst, sociologist, humanistic philosopher, and democratic socialist. He was a German Jew who fled the Nazi regime and set ...

Zen Zen (; from Chinese: ''Chán''; in Korean: ''Sŏn'', and Vietnamese: ''Thiền'') is a Mahayana Buddhist tradition that developed in China during the Tang dynasty by blending Indian Mahayana Buddhism, particularly Yogacara and Madhyamaka phil ...

philosopher

Alan Watts Alan Wilson Watts (6 January 1915 – 16 November 1973) was a British and American writer, speaker, and self-styled "philosophical entertainer", known for interpreting and popularising Buddhist, Taoist, and Hinduism, Hindu philosophy for a Wes ...

and his teacher

Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki , self-rendered in 1894 as Daisetz, was a Japanese essayist, philosopher, religious scholar, and translator. He was an authority on Buddhism, especially Zen and Shin, and was instrumental in spreading interest in these (and in Far Eastern phi ...

Fritz Perls Friedrich Salomon Perls (July 8, 1893 – March 14, 1970), better known as Fritz Perls, was a German-born psychiatrist, psychoanalyst and psychotherapist. Perls coined the term "Gestalt therapy" to identify the form of psychotherapy that he devel ...

, the founder of

Gestalt therapy Gestalt therapy is a form of psychotherapy that emphasizes Responsibility assumption, personal responsibility and focuses on the individual's experience in the present moment, the therapist–client relationship, the environmental and social c ...

Ida Rolf Ida Pauline Rolf (May 19, 1896 – March 19, 1979) was a biochemist and the creator of the pseudoscientific practice of Structural Integration, later termed Rolfing, a type of manual therapy that claims to aligning the human body's so-called " ...

, the founder of

Rolfing Rolfing () is a form of alternative medicine originally developed by Ida Rolf (1896–1979) as Structural Integration. Rolfing is marketed with unproven claims of various health benefits, is recognized as pseudoscience: "The idea of vital energ ...

* Moshe Feldenkrais * Peter Levine, founder of

Somatic experiencing Somatic experiencing (SE) is a form of alternative therapy aimed at treating trauma and stress-related disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The primary goal of SE is to modify the trauma-related stress response through bott ...

* Ron Kurtz, founder of

Hakomi The Hakomi Method is a psycho-therapeutic approach developed by Ron Kurtz in the 1970s that integrates mindfulness and somatic techniques to address psychological and emotional issues. Approach and method According to the Hakomi Institute, th ...

therapy * Somatics teachers and practitioners including Don Hanlon Johnson, Judyth Weaver, Pat Odgen, Susan Aposhyan, Christine Cadwell, Edward Maupin and others who taught at the Esalen Institute, including teachers of Esalen Massage

Literature

* Brooks, Charles: "Erleben durch die Sinne". DtV, Munich 1991, . (Charles Brooks describes courses of his wife and colleague, Charlotte Selver. 230 pages with photographs, original English title: ''Sensory Awareness''.) * William C. Littlewood, Mary Alice Roche: ''Waking Up: The Work of Charlotte Selver''. Author House, Bloomington 2004, * Charlotte Selver: ''Every moment is a moment'' In: Deutsches Yoga-Forum, 3/2005 * ''Sensory Awareness - zur Arbeitsweise von Charlotte Selver'' In: Feldenkrais Forum, 4/2005

External links

Sensory Awareness Foundation

Jacoby/Gindler work. Sensory Awareness
''in German''

Sources

–

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broadcast, Friday, October 14, 2005 (11:30 - 11:50, WDR 5) ''in German'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Selver, Charlotte 1901 births 2003 deaths People from Duisburg People from Muir Beach, California Somatics Emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United States