Body Wisdom
I WOKE UP from sleep in a panic. When I looked at my hand, I was surprised to see tiny half-moons in the center of my palm. My hand had been clenched into a fist during sleep, my fingernails pressing little indentations into the soft flesh. I’d been busy in my dreams: bracing, gritting, fighting. I was in my 20s. My body was trying to communicate with me. It would take many years before I’d learn to relate to my body as a friend.
I’ve been exploring the relationship between mind, body, and spirit for at least 25 years. In the past few years, I’ve become curious about how and what my body communicates. I began to notice how I held my body as I was chopping vegetables, or walking, or preparing for sleep. I became aware of what I was experiencing throughout the day: tense muscles, raised shoulders, a clenched jaw. My first practice came from simple intuition. Bit by bit, I began to relax my body throughout the day: I’d drop my shoulders and open my palms.
From there, a shift began. As always, the books, teachers, and lessons I needed most began to flow into my life. Eventually, one word bobbed to the surface: somatic. Soma means body; somatic means of, or related to, the body. I live mostly in my head—strategizing, worrying, planning, and analyzing—so for me, somatic awareness has been particularly transformational.
My understanding of somatic work began in 2021 when I took a class on trauma healing. There, I learned that simply noticing the sensations in my body could illuminate my understanding of who I am, what I need, and how I move through the world. During the six-week class, we talked about the nervous system, adrenaline, nutrition, hormones, and emotions. We learned about trauma and how we respond to it. We learned to notice the sensations in our bodies, from pain and tension to pleasure and neutrality. The sensations morph and change; the power is in the noticing.
A few months after I took the class, my teacher, Luis Mojica, invited me onto his podcast to talk about my experiences. Naturally, our conversation touched on everything from food and autoimmunity to death and consciousness. I think that’s what happens when you stumble into the world of somatics. We live our lives in a body, and as a result, relating to our bodies with awareness connects us with an endless number of mysteries.
Trust Yourself with Money was in the world for nine months when I took my first somatics class. Unwittingly, I used a lot of somatic language in describing my experiences with money. It was the beginning of a process of integrating different parts of myself. Today, I continue to explore, blending what I’ve learned about somatics with my ongoing experience of asking questions about money and personal agency.
If you enjoyed this post, please share it with a friend. Interested in working with me one on one? Learn more about my somatic approach to money at trustyourselfwithmoney.com/coaching.
