Hello Chris,  Thank you so very much for posting this.  And all of your many thoughtful findings posted everywhere!

"The way out of pain is through it."   You said it, and how.  I had a similar experience to that which Epstein describes when I did the somatic exercises in Peter A. Levine's book "Healing Trauma."  My whole body exploded and I spent the six months or so punching my way out of deep infant brain-stem level survival grief [ at the gym :) ].  Then as the anxiety embedded in my cells got released -- which only happened because I felt through it and walked through it -- I began to be filled with this enormous sense of peace and love which resembles what Jill Bolte Taylor describes in "Stroke of Insight."  Levine in his Preface says that deep healing of trauma is sometimes compared to "a religious experience of God or a metaphysical awakening to enlightenment."  

   Has this book been reviewed on Books! Group yet? 

   Levine, Peter A., “Healing Trauma: A Pioneering Program for Restoring the Wisdom of Your  Body,” 'Sounds True, Inc.,' Boulder CO, 2005; ISBN 1-159179-247-9