Somatic Massage for safe healing
Jan Normanton • September 14, 2024
The cornerstone of healing is safety
Somatic massage offers a beautiful medium for safe healing, encompassing
* compassion
* co regulation
* connection
* care
* collaboration
* client led approach
* calming
All this is communicated to the nervous system mainly non verbally through the medium of consensual touch.
Words are not enough for our nervous system to feel safe. It needs to feel safe directly through the senses.
This accounts for the success of embodied healing.
Leaning into a change process that feels safer, planned, paced, can offer a smoother journey into what we do want, whilst tempering and taming the fears, doubts and sense of regression that may present themselves along the way
Whilst talking therapies have a significant role in healing in their own right, we can end up inadvertently holding up our healing process by getting invested in talking ABOUT our issues rather than dealing directly WITH our issues via the body – the place of trauma
Distraction is everywhere! If we allow ourselves to engage like a kid in a candy shop, taking it all in with gusto, we can end up frazzled and fragmented, feeling less than safe and sound within
Paying attention and tending to our body can pay dividends, engendering trust and allowing us to show up in life in a dynamic and flowing way rather than fixated rules and regulations made up by the mind to keep us safe and based on old paradigms that may no longer serve us.
It’s only through direct embodied experience where can make an informed decision about who we are and then really get to know ourselves. Relying upon the brain is only part of the picture and a skewed one at that full of external influences and second hand beliefs
There can be a disparity between what’s going on in your brain to keep us safe and what’s going on in real time in your body; learning to discern the difference as to what feels true can be surprising and helpful
Functional freeze can be a useful survival strategy when facing trauma, chronic stress and any form of overwhelm; habitualised however, it can become a sneaky way of life, resulting in a life unlived.
Understanding that healing work isn’t linear can help us be more compassionate with ourselves and our process. Consider healing more of an ongoing, ever evolving journey within, that if done consistently, will bear fruit over and over again
It takes time, energy, effort and commitment to do our inner work. Ultimately it’s worth it, if we wish to lead a conscious life and take ownership of ourselves within so that our external world reflects this and we get to live on purpose.
Try a values audit to find yourself if you experience a sense of loss of self or your way in life; this can bring you back to what matters to you and form the foundation of your future self
