…to learn to sit in your one beautiful true Self.

Our bodies are rich with communication and protection, care. But all of us have reason to distance ourselves from what’s being experienced in our bodies. And at one point we have chosen—consciously or unconsciously— to lose access to this relationship.

The balm then is to chose curiosity over fear, to chose relationship.

Healing depends on knowing your body, like a friend, in all of its somatic dimensions. So whether in yoga or somatic coaching, our work is befriending the body, which looks a lot like starting a new friendship—who is this body that has been your long-time and perhaps little-known companion? And what might you be afraid of as you begin to know?

My teacher Dora Gyarmati taught me that our bodies long for connection through breath, gesture, and movement, but all too often, the sensations of our bodies are overwhelming, especially for trauma survivors, so we do everything we can to wall off from sensation. And my teacher Judith Blackstone has taught that in this walling off, we begin to literally shut down parts of our bodies to keep things out and to keep things in. But she’s also taught that there’s hope—once we begin to notice where we contract and shut down, and we get curious about it in a grounded way, we can begin to release and disentangle our constrictions.

When we soften toward our bodies, and notice that this one beautiful body you get in this life is yours, and its for you, this friendship becomes clear and deep.