Somatic Couples Therapy Training
An Integrative Model
By: Gal Szekely & Liron Cohen, founders of Love Made Simple | CEUs Available!
[WE ARE CLOSED UNTIL 2025] Join us for a hybrid course on couples therapy that provides a simple yet comprehensive map for working with couples.
Love Made Simple emphasizes somatic and mindfulness-based work while integrating the essence of leading therapeutic modalities.
Our training uses hands-on experiential learning and goes beyond learning techniques. It helps participants become better therapists by developing their skills, unique style and therapeutic presence.
Learn more by watching this video:
In this training, which is designed for both new and seasoned therapists, you will learn:
1. How to help couples turn relationship challenges opportunities for healing and growth
2. How to use somatic and experiential exercises in couples therapy
3. Go beyond communication and work with core wounding and patterns
4. Combine attunement and intuition with strategy and structured exercises
5. Develop confidence, presence and more ease with couples therapy
We created Love Made Simple as an integrative framework...
It brings together the most important insights from leading couple therapy approaches (EFT, PACT, IFS, Hakomi and others) with our experience of working with over a thousand couples one-on-one and in our workshops.
The result is an approach that expands beyond psychodynamic and is:
Somatic and Experiential
Relationship patterns happen fast and in an unconscious way. An eye roll, a change of breath, a turn of the head can create an impact. Likewise, the therapist can use experiential exercises and somatic interventions to get beneath the words and the mind defenses and provide an embodied experience of change.
Mindful and Growth-Oriented
Using mindfulness enables people to slow down, develop self-awareness and learn to see their relationship challenges as an opportunity to grow. We believe that “secure attachment” is not enough and focus on relationships as paths of personal and spiritual growth.
Intuitive and Structured
Simple tools, maps and structured exercises help make couples therapy more effective and less chaotic. Yet, they are only effective if you combine them with deep attunement to the clients and learning to trust your own intuition.
Therapist-Focused Rather than Technique-Focused
We focus on improving the maturity and relational skill of the therapist and see them as important (if not more important) than learning techniques. We want you to develop your style of therapy, not follow a rigid method.
About The Trainers - Gal & Liron
We are psychotherapists, teachers, parents, business owners and university professors. But, (this is probably the most important part) we’re also a real couple who have different personalities, different likes and dislikes, yet we share a common vision.
We started The Couples Center in 2011 and Love Made Simple in 2020 - this is how passionate we are about couples work! We’ve offer couples workshops (Level 1 & Level 2) for over 7 years, and we’ve built a comprehensive online course, plus several other mini-courses, as well as date-nights for couples.
Gal is a recovered tech guy who became a tree hugger, somatic believer and a meditation enthusiast. He is a teacher of the Hakomi mindful somatic psychotherapy and of the Tamura Method of Conscious Energetic Touch in therapy, and he is an adjunct faculty at CIIS university. In his spare time, you will find him on the tennis court, trying psychological techniques to improve his forehand shots (or forehand shots to improve his psychology).
Liron started as interior designer, but later realized she was called to transform the “interior design of the self.” She is known for her natural authenticity, intuition and ability to balance warmth and directness. She explores the realms of sound healing and shamanic hypnotherapy in psychotherapy, and she is also an adjunct faculty at CIIS university. She leads a couples-focused supervision group, as well as couples workshops. In her spare time, you will find her baking delicious desserts while holding a baby in one arm.
What therapists are saying about our trainings...
Jessica T., LMFT
The experience of learning from Gal and Liron has offered me a comprehensive training from which to springboard and expand in my work with couples. One feels extremely well supported in working with them while also encouraged to trust one's own intuitions and capabilities. I feel that I grew clinically while also integrating couples work from a somatic, energetic and emotional lens. Would highly recommend learning from them to any developing therapist at any point in their career!
Mia Y., LMFT
Gal and Liron offer a balance of structured learning and organic exploration. I know I will walk away with practical steps for working with couples, as well as a feeling of being touched personally. Their focus on technique and therapist development offers the depth I seek in trainings. I always look forward to my next opportunity to learn from them.
Jeff S., LMFT
The couples counseling method that Gal and Liron teach in this course was extremely valuable for my growth as a therapist. While they integrate some of the best of EFT and PACT and IFS and Gottman, they have added their own unique theory of couples therapy that makes this training stand out from the others. The addition of somatic, mindful, and experiential work to the theories above, makes this couples therapy approach deeper and more meaningful for clients, and allows me to get faster results for them.
Who Is This Training For?
Psychotherapists and experienced coaches who have a calling to transform people’s relationships. If you see relationships as a path for spiritual growth, if the words somatic, mindfulness and experiential excites you and if you know that being a better therapist starts with learning about yourself - then you’re the right fit!
This training is suitable for professionals with different experience levels – new practitioners will gain tools, strategies and confidence in couples counseling, while more experienced practitioners can expand their skills of working somatically and with mindfulness, as well as develop their therapeutic presence and intuition.
About The Training
This is a hands-on training that is focused on helping participants develop their skills, unique style and therapeutic presence. The majority of the time will be devoted to experiential learning, including analyzing videos of live sessions, practicing with each other and doing exercises that are designed to promote personal reflection. Participants will be asked to learn some of the theoretical material at home through watching videos recorded in a previous training.
Training includes 48 hours (CEUs) live instruction time and 14 hours (non-CEU hours) via a prerecorded online course.
This training combines 3 virtual meetings and 2 three-day-long in-person meetings:
- Virtual meetings will be held Thursday or Friday mornings from 9:00 am to 1:30 pm PST via zoom:
- Dates: 06/22/2023, 07/07/2023 and 07/14/2023 | Virtual meetings will be recorded for participants. - Two in-person trainings will be held at Sacred Streams in Berkeley on:
- Friday - Sunday, June 23rd - 25th, 2023 from 9:00 am - 4:30 pm PST
- Friday - Sunday, July 21st - 23rd, 2023 from 9:00 am - 4:30 pm PST
Here’s what you’ll learn in the training:
The Relationship Blueprint:
Understanding what makes us feel loved; communication as a cycle and the structure of conflict; main challenges couples bring to counseling.
About Couples Counseling
What makes couples counseling different from individual therapy or coaching, and what is required from the counselor; an integrative framework that combines Attachment and Differentiation; goals and frame of couples counseling.
Strategies and Skills
How to work somatically and experientially with couples; Effective Interventions - contact, empathic reflection, crossing interventions; how to use mindfulness and experiential exercises.
Self of The Therapist
Looking at the counselor’s own models of relationship and capacity for intimacy; developing empathy and intuition; learning to work with high conflict couples; developing sense of confidence, groundedness and trust in yourself; working with countertransference in psychodynamic, somatic and energetic levels.
Fees and Special Discounts
- Licensed Practitioners: $2200 for regular registration
- Associates: $2200 regular registration (Special Early Bird Discount for Associates, Save $150 with code:TRAINING150)
Special Group Discounts
If you have a group of 3 or more students, each person receives a $150 discount.
Email us for this option: [email protected]
Cancellations and Refunds
Cancellations accepted via email. If you cancel 30 days in advance of the first day of training, you will receive a full refund less a $30 administrative fee. If you cancel 15 days in advance of the first day of training, you will receive a 50% refund less a $30 administrative fee. No refunds will be granted less than 15 days before the first day of training. No refunds will be granted for non-attendance.
Interested in learning more about our style?
More therapists' reviews...
Amy T., AMFT
Having assisted multiple workshops with Liron and Gal, my clinical skills working with couples have developed and deepened further than I could have ever imagined. I feel so much more confident and at ease sitting with couples. They each lead and train not only with exquisite expertise, yet also authenticity and compassion, which I found offered a truly rich and immersive experience.
Biran L., LMFT
Gal and Liron provide a clear and comprehensive perspective of how to work with couples. They intellectually map out both the long term goals, and how to guide couples through the emotional intermediary stages in building a vibrant and healthy relationship. I was delighted that I could immediately apply what I learned into my own work in a concise and meaningful way. I highly recommend their workshops and trainings.
Jasmine M., AMFT
As an aspiring Couple’s Therapist who’s volunteered for TCC workshops multiple times as well as participated in various trainings - I found the approach to be truly effective and integrative, incorporating somatic principles and practical techniques and tools that has helped my build skills and confidence as a Therapist working with Individuals and Couples.
Continuing Education Credits (CEUs)
Course meets the qualifications for 56 hours of continuing education credit for LMFTs, LCSWs, LPCCs, and/or LEPs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences. To qualify for the certification the student must attend all the live sessions and submit a program evaluation form. The certificate will be sent via email at the end of the training.
The Couples Center is approved by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists to sponsor continuing education. The Couples Center maintains responsibility for this program/course and its content.
CEPA Provider Number: 144125
Overall Learning Objectives:
- Explain the connection between relationship satisfaction and challenges to the 4 basic needs.
- Describe the three areas of relationship success and the two components of intimacy
- Assess couples’ negative communication cycle and apply the three levels of the cycle for effective interventions
- Identify three types of interventions for deepening couples’ interactions
- Evaluate couples interactions based on somatic cues
- Use experiential exercises for exploring and transforming relational patterns
- Identify personal edges in working with couples and have a plan to address them
- Describe goals and interventions for the five stages of working with couples
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