According to the Boston Change Process Study Group (hereinafter, the Boston Group), moments of deep connection between therapist and patient seem to be fundamental when thinking about change in psychotherapy (Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998). These moments cause an expansion or transformation in the knowledge of how to be with others, which is termed as implicit relational knowing (IRK) (Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998). The term was coined by the Boston Group (Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998) as a way to research change in psychotherapy. Likewise, one of the fundamental principles of dance/movement therapy (DMT) is that by exploring a more varied vocabulary of movement, people experience the possibility of achieving a safe equilibrium and, at the same time, greater spontaneity and adaptability (Payne, 1992). This expansion of movement patterns encompasses change in IRK through moving dialogues and danced Moments of Meeting (MoM).

Both verbal and movement models of intervention, with a relational approach, place the interactive process of the therapist-patient relationship in the center or, as Stern (2004) calls it, the implicit agenda. This interactive process is characterized as being subtle, unorderly, improvised, co-creative, and embodied (Bruschweiler-Stern et al., 2005; Fuchs & de Jaegher, 2009; Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998). All these characteristics, according to Lauffenburger (2020), make DMT a privileged approach to operate at this level.

Over the last several decades, investigation in neuroscience and psychoanalysis has shifted from a unipersonal view of an isolated brain that autoregulates itself, to a two-person vision of a brain that regulates itself in interaction (Gallese, 2003; Lyons-Ruth, 1999). Schore (2019) states “that the structure and function of the mind and brain are shaped by experiences, especially those involving emotional relationships.” (p.13). In the last decades this has led to a shift in all forms of psychotherapy focusing more on the relational aspects of the work.

DMT can be considered as an embodied and intersubjective therapy, including the bodies of the therapist and client in a moving dialogue (Lykou, 2017). Its enactive character seeks to overcome the mind–body dualistic view and gives importance to the intersubjective experience (Koch & Fischman, 2011) in psychotherapy. The embodied approach posits that perception, cognition, attitudes, affect, behaviour, and their interrelationships, are based on sensorimotor processes. In other words, the mind has a foundational origin in the experience of the body (Damasio, 2003) where the body is understood as a living organism that expresses and interacts with the environment (Koch & Fischman, 2011).

For Totton (2014), the founder of the Embodied-Relational Therapy (ERT), the embodiment and the relational focus are vital and inseparable for the therapeutic process. We need the body to relate to each other, therefore, relationships are above all bodily events (Lapierre, 2015).

In this sense, the enactive approach (Varela et al., 2011) understands knowing as an action, in which an organism, through its interaction with the environment, transforms the world at the same time as it is transformed by the world. According to these points of view, it can be said that the mind is not reduced to brain processes, but rather functions within the interaction of the brain, the body, and the environment, building a dynamic scaffolding that allows cognition (Gallagher & Payne, 2015).

According to Fischman (2009), Marian Chace (1896–1970) already understood DMT as a relational therapy and proposed getting involved in the subjective experience of the patient. In this sense, the currents of relational psychology agree with this approach, conceiving the psychotherapeutic encounter as reciprocally co-constructed by the participants, where both subjectivities, that of patient and analyst, contribute to the form and content of the dialogue that emerges between them (Lyons-Ruth, 1999). This is how the pioneers and various generations of dance/movement therapists (dmts) have approached the therapeutic encounter as a deeply interactive phenomenon, understanding themselves as embodied subjects participating in the relationship and in a construction of meaning.

Stern (2004) defined intersubjectivity as the human capacity of sharing, knowing and resonating with the subjective experience lived by another person, in other words, as the ability to read intentions. Fuchs (2016) understood the development of intersubjectivity as a pre-reflective and embodied process, debating the theory of mind, the reading of hidden intentions, to lead to a theory that puts embodied interaction at the centre of social cognition. Fuchs (2016) proposed interaffectivity and intercorporeal memory (Fuchs, 2016), while drawing from Merleau-Ponty’s concept of intercorporality (2012). These terms are defined below, and are regard as the pillars of “how to be with others”, and the basis of relational implicit knowing (Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998). Fuchs (2016) spoke of embodied affectivity, suggesting that emotions are not simply read or interpreted, but rather are expressive and dynamic forces that affect individuals through bodily resonance and connect them with each other in circular interactions. This generates embodied interaffectivity, where the interlocutors are intertwined in a process of bodily resonance, and mutual incorporation that provides the basis for an intuitive empathic understanding. Empathy, in its original German Einfühlung means “feeling into something.” Lapierre (2015) distinguished between three levels of empathic relating: First of all, emotional contagion, such as body resonance, which occurs naturally when people share feelings; then affect attunement, which is the response instinctively or not, to how the other feels. And finally, he talks about empathy, which is based on the two previous processes, emotional contagion and affect attunement, and cognitive elements. In the context of DMT, this empathic and intuitive understanding is taken as a shared movement, concentrating on what happens in an intersubjective kinesthetic relationship (embodied and enactive), where the body is its source (Rova, 2017). Intercorporeal memory (Fuchs, 2012) is non-symbolic, non-verbal and procedural knowledge that is acquired in early childhood. It is a particular way of relating that includes, for example, how to show affection for others, learning to attract attention or to joke, among other manifestations (Duarte et al., 2021).

The understanding of intersubjectivity as an embodied and related process (Samaritter & Payne, 2013), placed DMT in a privileged position when it comes to understanding change in psychotherapy from an embodied intersubjective perspective. From developmental research, empathy is seen as attunement (Stern, 1985), emotional availability (Gerhardt, 2015) or resonance (Siegel, 2010) which is reciprocal (Rova, 2017), among other ways of approaching the embodied and enactive nature of this process (Koch & Fischman, 2011). DMT and other bodily psychotherapies with a relational approach pay special attention to the bodily processes of empathic relating, delving into the kinesthetic dimension of empathy (Berger, 1972; Rova, 2017). Similar processes also occur with transference and countertransference, as described by DMT authors and other body psychotherapies, highlighting its somatic component (Dosamantes-Beaudry, 2007). According to Totton (2014), transference dynamics are both psychological and bodily processes that take place at an implicit level and that create a resonance in the body itself, of what is happening to the other.

Federman (2011) described how the concept of kinesthetic empathy was conceived by Roskin and later developed by Dosamantes-Alperson. It is understood as the ability to understand/feel, with and through movement, the experience of others (Fischman, 2009; Rova, 2017). On the other hand, somatic transference and countertransference, is understood as the somatic reactions that the patient has towards the therapist and the therapist has towards the patient, respectively (Dosamantes-Beaudry, 1998). The somatic sensitivity that is required for these processes, is acquired by the dmts during their training and applied in their clinical work (Federman, 2011).

Lapierre (2015) approached relational body psychotherapy from transference dynamics and therapeutic resonance. Coming from an embodied perspective he saw the body as engaged in continuous dialogue, needing to pay attention to the tuned and collaborative therapeutic alliance. From philosophical point of view Mühlhoff (2015) investigated further into “affective resonance”, underlining the unfolding of a creative dynamic within a relational interplay.

DMT founding members highlighted the bodily character of the empathic phenomenon. Marian Chace focused on the role of the therapist’s body in the reflection of the movement, and on resonating with the internal movement of the client, while Mary Whitehouse focusing on witnessing the experience of another (Fischman, 2009). Chace explored mirroring as an empathic response to the movement of her patients. On the other hand, Whitehouse in her practice of “Authentic Movement” worked both with the experience of the mover, in their own body and that of the witness (Adler, 1999), using resonance and letting the body be moved by the experience of others (Fischman, 2009). DMT founding members highlighted the bodily character of the empathic phenomenon, through the use of their own body in the reflection of the movement, and through resonating the internal movement, while witnessing the experience of another (Fischman, 2009).

This article considers these approaches, taking DMT tools and processes, such as the dynamics of somatic transference, kinesthetic empathy and affective resonance, as embodied processes. DMT thus proposed a theoretical-clinical model that comes close to the approaches of relational psychoanalysis from an embodied perspective that allows it to operate at an intersubjective kinesthetic level (Fischman, 2009).

Effectiveness in DMT occurs through the sum of aspects common to various psychotherapies with elements that are specific and unique to this discipline (Lauffenburger, 2020). Stern and the Boston Group (Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998; Stern, 1985) contributed to DMT in their investigation of how change occurs in psychotherapy, as they make the importance of the implicit and the relational central to the debate. The Boston Group (Bruschweiler-Stern et al., 2002; Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998) posit “something more” referring to non-verbal, psycho-emotional transformative experiences that occur in the expressive interaction between caregiver-infant and therapist-patient dyads. This relational dance (Stern, 1985) is co-created in the interaction, and is the result of a process that results from variability and redundancy, where the unpredictable and the improvisatory play a fundamental role (Bruschweiler-Stern et al., 2005). Lauffenburger (2020) affirmed that DMT, from a relational approach, operates mainly in the implicit domain, having the tools to work in the non-verbal, non-linear, interactive and creative plane.

According to the Boston Group (Bruschweiler-Stern et al., 2002; Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998) the early non-verbal interaction of the caregiver-infant dyad forms knowledge of how to be with others. This can be defined as intercorporeal memory (Fuchs, 2012). According to Tronick (2007), during childhood, Implicit Relational Knowing (IRK) encompassed the recurrent pattern of movements of mutual regulation between infant and caregiver. What is learned in relational terms and the memory of these early interactions is subject to variation; it is active knowledge, in which each encounter contributes. That is, IRK is co-created moment by moment through interactions and various relational contexts (Duarte et al., 2021).

This is supported by new perspectives to understand neurodevelopment, parting from a systemic view and understanding it as a continuous process: “based on the plasticity of the nervous system; the biological, dynamic and inherent capacity of the central nervous system to undergo structural and functional adaptive changes in response to environmental demands”(Förster & López, 2022, p. 338). These statements lead us to a growing understanding of the importance of the relationship with the environment and its quality, for the optimal development of individuals. Research in neuropsychoanalysis is emphatic in proposing the importance of emotionally charged relational experiences in the function and structure of the brain and mind (Schore, 2019). These social interactions between right brains, especially during critical early periods, through synchrony and spontaneous interpersonal mechanisms, shape emotional circuits within the brain. These are expressed in how we relate both in attachment and in therapeutic relationships (Schore, 2019).

Studies of DMT (Koch & Fischman, 2011; Samaritter & Payne, 2013) in resonance with research in neurosciences, attachment and child development, agree on the importance of relationships and the environment, in the development of the brain and mind, and specifically IRK. This makes us think that it is through nonverbal dynamics or “feeling of what is happening in relationship” (Laufenberger, 2020, p. 22) the greatest changes in psychotherapy could be generated, by applying this type of corporeal memory to DMT interventions.

MoM are moments of special connection that are intersubjective (Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998), intercorporeal and interaffective (Fuchs, 2016). They occur between people, and involve a reorganization of IRK. MoM occur in therapy as a result of an interactive process, through relational dances or mutual regulation (Tronick, 2007), moment by moment during a process that the Boston Group has called moving along (Lyons-Ruth et al., 1998). With this concept they refer to travelling and advancing directly or indirectly towards the implicit or explicit objectives of the therapy (Duarte et al., 2021). The relational movements of moving along can be transformed into present moments, which are a direct temporal experience where the person becomes aware of their subjective experience, while and how they are experiencing it. According to Stern (2004), during psychotherapy, the desire for intersubjective contact generates a series of present moments, where both individuals are aware of the present experience shared with the other. In this sense, as the relationship progresses and deepens, it also leads to the emergence of now moments, which differ from the present moments by being more intense and suddenly unfolding, loaded with immediately imminent consequences. MoM come to satisfy the need for resolution of a now moment (Stern, 2004).

The process of socio-emotional micro-regulations that occur in the caregiver-infant or therapist-patient dyad develops, in therapy, through moving along, lead to present moments or now moments that generate, or fail in the attempt, dyadic states of consciousness (Tronick, 2007) or moments of meeting.

According to Tronick (2007) these moments expand the state of consciousness of both participants, making them more complex and coherent, and therefore expanding IRK to new ways of being with others. Dosamantes-Beaudry (2007) describes that in certain moments of DMT therapies, adult patients regress to pre-verbal states, showing that an affectively attuned DMT can collaborate in the creation of a transitional space (Winnicott, 1982) that allows moments of special intersubjective connection, which produce “fresh and spontaneous affective exchanges” (Dosamantes-Beaudry, 2007, p. 78), which can be codified as MoM. In this sense, DMT has access to pre-verbal states where, through attunement, kinesthetic empathy and affective resonance, a multimodal exchange can be accessed (Stern, 1985) that enables MoM.

According to what has been reviewed so far, only few publications use MoM explicitly in DMT other than theoretical studies or clinical cases referring to individual experiences. This study seeks to make an empirical contribution to the understanding and characterization of MoM via a qualitative methodology applied to the subjective experience of professional dmts with clinical experience in individual therapy.