David Boadella (born 6 July 1931) is a British psychotherapist and founder of a modality of body psychotherapy called biosynthesis, and the author of numerous books including poetry.
Boadella was born in London, the son of Harold Boadella, a Port of London transport officer, and Jessie, a secretary (maiden name Marsh). He served his military service in the British Army, Intelligence Corps between 1948 and 1952. He has one son and one daughter, Adam and Eilidh, from his first marriage in 1952 to a writer named Elsa Corbluth. He is currently married to Silvia Specht Boadella. They married in 1988 and their son was born the same year.
Boadella has studied education, psychology and English literature. He holds the following degrees: B.A. (with honors) from the University of London, 1953, an M.Ed. from the University of Nottingham, 1960. Here he also studied vegetotherapy and the concept of bioenergetics at the Peer Institute. He then has an Dr.h.c. from the Open International University of Complementary Medicine, given to him in 1995 for his work in the field of human and social sciences.
From 1957 he worked simultaneously as teacher for emotionally disturbed children as well as receiving patients in his psychotherapeutic practice. He worked as a teacher at various schools in Nottingham between 1960–1963, then as headmaster at Abbotsbury School in Abbotsbury in Dorset from 1963 and until at least 1970., He worked as a bioenergetic therapist at Churchill Centre from 1968, he was a lecturer at University of Bristol 1968–1971 and Weymouth College of Education 1973–1975. Boadella was director of Abbotsbury Publications from 1970. He was also a founding member of Chesil Poets which was a community project in creative writing for adults established in 1973.
Boadella is a psychotherapist (SPV and UKCP). He underwent five years of training analysis under Reichian vegetotherapist Ola Raknes in Oslo, Norway during the 1970s, and he has been influenced through his encounter with the work of Francis Mott to involve himself with configurational psychology. He has also received education from Frank Lake and later in cooperation with Lake he directed the Institute for Development of Human Potential in London.
In 1969 Boadella began developing his biosynthesis modality, which in its initial form had an expression which markedly followed Mott, after twelve years part time practice as a vegetotherapist and 15 years working with the emotional problems of children in an educational context. Starting in 1975 he began his training of others in biosynthesis in his own, as well as other institutes in London, one of these being the Institute for Biodynamic Psychology.
Since 1980 Boadella has traveled extensively around the world lecturing and giving guest seminars at universities and insititutes.
During the mid-1980s David Boadella and Dr. phil. Silvia Specht Boadella together founded the International Institute for Biosynthesis (IIBS), today located in Heiden, Switzerland.
He has since 1985 undergone training analysis in "psychosomatic centering" under Robert Moore in Denmark. In 1995 he was also awarded his honorary doctorate from the Open International University of Complementary Medicine for his pioneering work in the development and promotion of the disciplinary journal Energy & Character (established by Boadella in 1970) as well as for his contributions in that context. In 1989 David Boadella became the founding president of the European Association for Body Psychotherapy (EABP).
David Boadella reads French, German, Italian, Spanish, Danish and Norwegian. His interests also include chess, judo, mountaineering, sculpture and music. The article about him in Contemporary Authors (published in 1975) quotes Boadella as being a libertarian and with respect to religion being "Sympathetic to Taoism, but no official adherence."
Maladjusted Children, University of Nottingham Press (1960)
Coming of Age (poems), Outpost Publications (1972)
Wilhelm Reich: The Evolution of His Work, Vision Press, London (1973, later 1981, 1995), Regnery (1974)
Embryology and Therapy (1976)
Maps of Character (1977)
Styles of Breathing (1977)
Charge of Consciousness (1979)
Violence in Therapy (1980)
Death of the Ego (1980)
The womb, the tomb and the spirit (1981)
Jesus the Heretic (1984)
Psicoterapia del Corpo, with Dr.Med. Jerome Liss, Astrolabia, Rome (1987)
Lifestreams: an introduction to Biosynthesis, Routledge, London (1987, later 1991)
Befreite Lebensenergie: Einführung in die Biosynthese (German edition of Lifestreams), Kösel, Munich (1987)
Biosynthese-Therapie, Transform, Oldenburg (1989)
"Biosynthese" In: Rowan J, Dryden W (eds.) Neue Entwicklungen der Psychotherapie, 169-197. Transform, Oldenburg (1990)
"Wissenschaft, Natur und Biosynthese: Allgemeine wissenschaftliche Grundprinzipen der Biosynthese". Energie und Charakter 23(5), 2-60 (1992)
He has also contributed articles and poems to various journals, e.g. Man and Woman, Granta, Orgonomic Functionalism, Poetry Workshop, Phoenix and Voice.
David Boadella has been the editor of Energy and Character since 1970, and of Handfuls of Light since 1971.
