A peek inside of session from this week // why this work continues to excite the heck out of me.

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Hey hi Reader,

I wonder about the last time your feelings took you by surprise...

When's the last time you slowed down and turned inward to face whatever feelings might be under the surface, only to find that what was there was not at all what you thought would be?

Maybe you thought after a particularly challenging week at work you'd find frustration and exhaustion under the surface, but instead were surprised to meet grief. Perhaps you expected to find sadness after a big change in one of your relationships, only to be met by fear and longing.

Can I invite you to pause here, just for 30 seconds, sitting back in your chair, maybe closing your eyes, and recall the last time you had this sort of unexpected emergence of feelings you didn't know were there? What happened when you happened upon those surprise feelings? Were you able to be with them? Witness them? Stay with them? Be curious about them?

Or were they so surprising, and perhaps maybe a little (or a lot) uncomfortable, that you had to turn away to distract or soothe from them?

No right or wrong response to those surprise feelings. Because guess what, Reader, stumbling on feelings you didn't know were there is actually a tell tale sign that you're growing through them. Even if it's hard to stay with them, feeling their edges IS growth!

If you stumble into surprise feelings, congratulations, they're a doorway to whatever lies beyond the pain they might originally present with.

A recent client story to give some backbone to my point:

In session with one of my clients last week, let's call them Sara, we were "dropped in," mindfully sensing into the body, feeling for what might underneath some long-standing anxiousness around body image. At first, not a lot came up. Just quiet stillness for a while. Then, slowly, Sara's body started speaking through sensation: a hot, buzzy feeling arising in her chest and throat. Checking in with her, she said she could stay with that hot, buzzy feeling for a bit longer to see what else might be there. Frustration. So we followed it and watched it move from her chest and throat, and then into a sinking feeling of fear in her tummy.

Anxiety-> Frustration-> Fear.

When we were unpacking and integrating what happened a few minutes later, Sara said something akin to, "Wow. I've never felt that much in my body before when trying to work on this body image stuff. I knew there had to be a lot there, but I didn't know it would feel like that! I didn't know it would be so uncomfortable! I feel like we just uncovered something big, like a breakthrough."

Though the feelings were big and uncomfortable, and Sara might still have lots more to process, she said something in her shifted. She could feeeeel, as a compassionate witness versus being totally taken over by the feelings or avoiding them altogether. Sara left with hope that this body image anxiety she's carried for sooo long is something the does indeed have the capability to heal. A deepened sense of agency, self trust and possibility. That's the magic of somatic work.

Well, er, magic and also, that's just what happens when we allow our bodies to speak and we actually hear them. Slowly, with time and trust, the body starts to reveal things that it has "known" somatically for a long while. Unmet needs and the wounds they leave behind live in the body, until we can bring them to consciousness and honor what they need from us now. When we listen with the body, what was unconscious becomes conscious. And when it's in our consciousness we can work with it in new, nourishing ways.

Sara might still have anxiety that turns to frustration that morphs to fear come up, because healing requires a back-and-forth titration between the edge of those hard feelings and coming back to safety. But-and-also, she now has hope and possibility and a sense of power within those feelings. From that place, we grow, we heal, we find life's goodness.

So, sweet Reader, what surprise feelings might be in you right now?

What might be there, waiting and wanting your attention? And what might you need (for support & stability) in order to be with all of those surprises with compassion and curiosity?

If & when you're ready to go beyond all the head-knowledge I bet you already have😘 about your patterns, your wounds, your "stuff," and really dig into what the body knows, I'm here. ​

Until next time,
xo
​Holl

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