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A practical guide to recognizing, managing, and releasing chronic stress through somatic awareness

In recent years, we see a growing interest in Nervous System regulation and Somatic Bodywork. More and more people have become interested in the deep well-being that comes from regulation and somatic practices. 

Most people are looking for and longing for mental balance, without understanding that the body is the easiest way to reach it. By learning how the physical body can influence and stabilize the mental and cognitive one, we free ourselves from suffering, unsettledness, and imbalance.

With the book “The Body Keeps the Score,” Bessel van der Kolk, a Dutch psychiatrist and researcher, played a key role in changing how trauma is understood in relation to the body and the nervous system.

As with everything I do and bring into my work, I first need to experience it in my own body. At that time, I was already working part time as a tantric bodyworker, yet I felt there was much more than what I was offering. 

Twenty years ago I had no clue about the meaning of presence. I used to live from a very organized and powerful mind. WILL was the mantra, pushing through life to get where I wanted to be in order to fulfill expectations, mostly my expectations, so that I could feel that I was doing enough, that I was enough, and that I was safe.

The sentence explains that trauma isn’t just a psychological experience it also lives in the body, affecting how we breathe, move, relate to others, and react to life, while reshaping the natural functioning of our nervous system.