How Does Healing Happen?
the nitty-gritty of somatic practice
In my previous post, I began to explore some of the ways in which somatics differs from other forms of self-work. I outlined that somatic practice begins by orienting to ease, or letting go of hardness: literally, in the form of tension and bracing. We then shift awareness towards enjoyment and pleasure, to allow the body and self to dilate and relax further; and to build capacity and safety into the system.
These two steps, which I referred to as pre-requisites in that post, may, in and of themselves, be the focus of our practice for a long time. Most of us need repeated reminders in both these directions: to soften, and to soak in pleasure. And there will be times in life where we don’t need to go any further or deeper, and simply being and recharging in a somatic way is exactly what we are called to do.
However, many times once these two foundations have been set, something else begins to emerge in the somatic process. I used the word healing in the title of this post because this process usually is healing in nature; though it could also be considered as a kind of guidance, self-unwinding, or inner realignment. Regardless of what we call it, this post outlines two principles that are required for that secondary, deeper process to unfold. It is a process that comes forth only when the body feels safe and resourced enough (by the previous two principles) to take us there, or when there is something needing to be resolved and attended to beyond known horizons.
Instead of using photographs from nature as I did earlier, in this post I’ve decided to include a series of paintings that to me, capture and illustrate the process I’m describing. I hope you enjoy absorbing both words and images.
In the previous post, I mentioned titration, or the natural balance between resting and exploring new terrain within ourselves. This balance is not something we can shift or control: our body knows what it needs, and it will make those needs clear to us when we listen. Because many people come to somatics with a problem they want to fix, it can be difficult to accept that their body has its own priorities and path towards healing.
This doesn’t mean that somatic work is not going to be supportive in that moment: on the contrary, it means that the work is to offer your body what it needs and asks for, and trust that when the time comes to unravel whatever issue you’ve brought with you, you’ll therefore be able to see it through fully, with a sense of internal grounding and support. In other words, by trusting your body’s own timeline and process, you discover your somatic self as an ally, who will then guide you through a deeper and more integrated healing process.
I recognize that I’m describing things quite linearly here; in reality a lot of these phases and principles get mixed up during a practice or process. In general, we begin with softening and safety, and progress to deeper healing, guidance or unwinding—but for many people all the phases happen simultaneously, or we go back-and-forth freely between them. The body is not a linear organism. But it helps the mind to have (a rough) linear map—so here we go.
the somatic process
3 ▪️ welcome the unknown
vs. limiting yourself to the known and familiar
When we begin to orient towards the body, we are essentially inviting in a little bit of mystery, an unknown quantity into the equation. To use the popular Zen metaphor, we are emptying our cup, and bringing in a sense of openness and receptivity. What normally fills our cup is mental preconceptions and known framings, narratives and beliefs, ideas we have about ourselves and the world. All of these are valid ways of experiencing life, but they are limited, in that they stand one step removed from immediate experience, or present-moment reality.
If we are willing to step out of these modes and discover what else is present, we find new perspectives, fresh information, shifts in perception and much more. Instead of thinking or narrating or trying to figure things out, we start to sense, move, feel and touch… opening up entirely novel ways of perceiving situations, problems, other people and ourselves. What can we learn from the act of sensing someone’s presence (or memory), rather than thinking about them? What new information is hidden inside our gut feel, or heart feel—that gets drowned out by our stories and beliefs?
Because the body is always in the present, its experience is always fresh. And because we spend so much time in our heads, the body’s experience is also usually somewhat unfamiliar, or at least potentially novel. It is beyond what we already know and believe: a little enigmatic, a little unfamiliar. We may come in with our agendas and notions of what we want to fix, or what we need; but often those are unnecessary and may even block the way forward. So this step is an open inquiry, a way of listening to what the body has to say. Often we are surprised by what we discover, and sometimes we feel validated by it. Either way, this step is necessary if we want to unfold anything further. Without it, we remain stranded in the narrow zone of the known, what we are already carrying with us, and there is no space to expand beyond it.
Many times this is a deeply liberating moment—because we have gotten so stuck in our old habits and patterns and ways of thinking, that we become smaller and smaller, more and more stifled, unable to find new pathways or even to perceive anything differently. Stepping out of such confinement involves not knowing what lies ahead, and can bring with it a sense of release and pleasure in and of itself. When we feel safe enough to let go in this way, we will also usually activate our natural curiosity, an instinct to seek out and explore further.
4 ▪️ follow the flow of what arises
vs. have your own ideas and agendas and impose them everywhere
This principle could be called many things: accommodation or responsiveness, curiosity, fluidity or sensitivity. It’s a way of saying that we are going to honour whatever the body brings to us, and follow its lead. In doing so we usually have to drop our plans and structured agendas of how things are supposed to be, what is meant to happen and when it is supposed to happen.
This attitude arises out of a fear of the unknown, and in turn fosters a controlling mindset that needs to manage, predict and regulate everything. Beliefs like this have a dampening and blocking effect on the flow of life—they stifle creativity and keep us boxed in too neatly for anything wild and deep to be heard. For many of us, the terrain of the body is the one remaining wild place we can still access. Our way of practicing needs to be truly liberating for us to be able to feel that connection, and not fall back into old ways of self-censorship and -limitation.1
When I start to work with a client 1-1, I usually preface our sessions by saying: this is what I think (or more accurately, intuit) we should explore, but we need to see what your body actually brings up, and follow that thread. It’s more important to do the latter than to follow your or my plans of what we think we should be doing here. This is a central tenet of somatic practice: shifting from a top-down, control-oriented approach to the body where it’s supposed to be obeying orders from the mind; to a bottom-up, trust-oriented approach where we allow ourselves to be as we are, and accommodate the life process as it unfolds towards healing and wholeness.
The wonderful thing about being so accommodating is that (1) it’s incredibly liberating to have a space where you commit to unfolding your own process so deeply: without the baggage and the pressure of goals and deadlines; and (2) it is richly satisfying to find, again and again, that when you listen, your body takes you exactly where you need to go, and shows you exactly what you need to know.
To be clear, it’s not that there is no structure involved or that we’re just wandering around aimlessly—it’s that we surrender our need to be in control of what’s going on, and allow ourselves to be guided by a bigger, or deeper force inside us. You could call that the life force, energy, qi or prana, the soma, the subconscious self, the embodied spirit etc.; all are different words for the same thing.
It’s ideal if we can bring a sense of flow and freshness to this attitude: not only are we accepting what emerges, but we are willing and curious to dance and move with it. In the beginning, particularly if we’ve come to somatics with a lot of issues to solve, it doesn’t seem possible to have such an attitude. Curiosity has been covered over with fatigue and cynicism; openness has contracted into fear, or been scattered by overwhelm. But the beauty of somatic work is that the body itself carries within it this quality of flow, adventure, lightness, curiosity. In other words, it’s something built-in to the system that will re-emerge and flourish over time, if we remember to make space for it and orient towards it regularly.
Technically, conditioning already begins to unwind in the original first step, when we release the bracing and holding patterns that kept us within its shell. And it continues to happen in an ongoing manner as we deepen and continue the work.
The universe is always speaking to us and guiding us. As you said, when we "empty our cups" and let go of our agendas, we are better able to listen to the guidance of the universe. This is wonderful reminder for me. 🙏
Reminds me of how with a simple little cut, one may put some ointment, but 'it' heals 'itself'. Awesome paintings! There's a Zen saying "When hungry eat; when tired sleep." Sometimes i experience eating a lot when i typically wouldn't and i start wondering 'what is going on?'... and then typically i find myself unexpectedly busy with yard work, so i realize that my 'intuitive hunger' was giving me energy for the work.