Certified Hakomi Practitioner
Work that listens to what your body already knows.
I'm David Brown. I work with the slow, honest language of the body — breath, posture, sensation — to help you understand patterns that talking alone doesn't always reach.
About David
A steady presence for unsteady moments.
Off the clock
I came to Hakomi through two paths that gradually became one: my background in massage and somatic work, and my own healing journey. My work with the body had already taught me that our experiences don’t live only in our thoughts — they live in our nervous systems, our posture, our breathing, and the way we respond to the people around us. Sometimes the body reveals something before we have words for it.
Through my own experience with Hakomi, I began to recognize the wounds beneath some of my reactions and the places within myself I hadn’t always known how to hold with compassion. Rather than judging a reaction or trying to make it go away, I learned to slow down and get curious — what might this be protecting? Learning to meet myself with that kind of understanding is at the heart of the work I now offer others.
I’ve practiced massage for twenty eight years and Hakomi for eight, training at the Swedish Institute in New York City and through the Hakomi Institute in Berkeley, CA. This work has given me a deep appreciation for how our bodies hold and express what we’ve lived through. Hakomi let me bring that understanding into a gentler, more mindful exploration of the patterns that shape our lives.
My role is not to tell you who you are or what you should do. I offer a steady, respectful, and compassionate presence as we listen for what your own experience is showing us.
The Hakomi Method
Mindfulness first. Insight follows.
Hakomi is a gentle, mindfulness-based approach to somatic self-exploration, built on the idea that the beliefs shaping your life are often held in the body long before they're held in words. Rather than analyzing your story from the outside, we slow down and study it from the inside — together, in real time. It rests on six principles:
Mindfulness
We work in a state of relaxed, present-moment attention — the same state where old material naturally rises to the surface.
Non-Violence
Nothing is forced. We follow what's already trying to happen in you, rather than pushing toward an agenda.
Organicity
You're treated as a living system with its own wisdom and direction — not a problem waiting to be fixed.
Mind-Body Holism
Thoughts, emotion, and physical sensation are one continuous conversation, not separate channels.
Unity
Your patterns make sense in the context of your whole life and history — nothing is examined in isolation.
Loving Presence
A quality of compassionate, respectful attention that allows every part of you to be welcomed, not just the comfortable parts.
A Simple Example
Imagine someone cuts you off in traffic and you feel a flash of anger. If you slow down and notice your body, you might find heat in your face, a tightening in your chest, your hands gripping the wheel.
In a session, we might gently explore that response together — staying with the sensation, becoming curious about what else is there. Not to decide in advance what it means, but to slow down something automatic and listen more closely to what it's showing us.
The goal is to help you develop a more compassionate relationship with yourself and create greater room for connection, freedom, and choice.
What To Expect
How a session unfolds
Arrive & settle
We start with a few quiet minutes to land in the room and check in on what's present for you today.
Notice
I'll invite you into mindfulness and help you track what's happening in your body as we talk — a tightness, a temperature, an urge to move, or a particular movement or posture.
Explore
Together we run small, gentle experiments — a word, a posture, a moment of stillness — to see what they stir up. This is where the real material tends to show up.
See what wants to happen
As we sit with the body sensations that come up, they often lead to memories, impulses, feelings, or thoughts.
Integrate
We slow back down and talk through what you noticed, and what it might mean for how you're living outside this room.
On Relational Wounds
Sometimes the wound isn't only what happened.
Complex trauma doesn't always come from a single overwhelming event. It can develop through painful experiences that happen repeatedly over time — particularly within the relationships a child depends on for comfort and safety. Sometimes the wound is also what didn't happen: a caregiver who couldn't stay present, help make sense of big feelings, or offer a way back to a settled state.
As adults, we may keep relying on the strategies we built back then — pulling away, staying watchful, taking care of everyone but ourselves — even when our circumstances have changed. Hakomi helps us approach these patterns with compassion instead of shame: we get curious about what a reaction has lived through, what it's protecting, and what it may still need.
Over time, being met with steadiness and respect can help you learn to offer that same steadiness to yourself. The goal isn't to stay calm all the time — anger, fear, and sadness are part of being human. It's to recognize what's happening and respond with a little more awareness and choice.
Who I Work With
You don't need the right words to start.
I offer individual Hakomi sessions for adults who feel stuck or disconnected, or who find themselves caught in emotional or relational patterns they understand but still cannot seem to change.
Hakomi tends to help most when talking alone hasn't gotten you all the way there.
This is likely a good fit if
You have enough support and stability in your life to explore difficult feelings without becoming overwhelmed, and you're curious about the patterns shaping your relationships and sense of self.
You may be better served elsewhere if
Your primary need is sexual trauma treatment, severe or acute trauma, active suicidality, active psychosis, or significant dissociation requiring specialized care — or if you're in an acute mental-health crisis. David is not a licensed mental-health therapist, and Hakomi sessions aren't a substitute for psychotherapy, psychiatric care, or emergency services. If your needs fall outside this scope, he'll say so and help point you toward more specialized support.
Get Started
Let's find sixty minutes for you.
- Session length 60 minutes
- Format In person
- First step Free 20-minute consultation call
- Availability Weekday mornings & afternoons
Thank you.
I'll be in touch within one business day to find a time for your free consultation.