In this 30th episode of 'Healed Now What?', host Lisa Dawn, explores the transformative power of self-connection through somatic and attachment psychology. Celebrating the podcast's milestone with personal reflections and a special giveaway, Lisa delves into the importance of understanding our body’s sensations and emotions.
She provides listeners with practical exercises to help connect with their bodies and emotions, emphasizing curiosity over judgment. Lisa also highlights how these practices can improve our relationships with ourselves and others, advocating for a shift from domination to presence and curiosity.
The episode concludes with an inspiring quote from Thomas Hubble, framing the human body not as an instrument, but a realm to be experienced and enriched.
Enter the draw for a free somatic/attachment session by leaving a review on ITunes or a rating on Spotify and email me a picture to adorninfusions@gmail.com
In this 30th episode of 'Healed Now What?', host Lisa Dawn, explores the transformative power of self-connection through somatic and attachment psychology. Celebrating the podcast's milestone with personal reflections and a special giveaway, Lisa delves into the importance of understanding our body’s sensations and emotions.
She provides listeners with practical exercises to help connect with their bodies and emotions, emphasizing curiosity over judgment. Lisa also highlights how these practices can improve our relationships with ourselves and others, advocating for a shift from domination to presence and curiosity.
The episode concludes with an inspiring quote from Thomas Hubble, framing the human body not as an instrument, but a realm to be experienced and enriched.
Enter the draw for a free somatic/attachment session by leaving a review on ITunes or a rating on Spotify and email me a picture to adorninfusions@gmail.com
Greetings, my friends, and welcome to another episode of Healed Now What? A podcast where we discuss life, relationships, connection, and trauma through the lens of somatic and attachment psychology, nervous system health, relationships, and self discovery. I'm Lisa Dawn, and I'm on a mission to teach people how to transform their deepest wounds into their greatest strengths by first transforming the relationship they have with themselves. So whether you've had trauma, years of failed partnerships, or just want a better relationship with your body, I've got you covered. I am a Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, Educator, Relationship Mentor, and Trauma Survivor. With a lifetime of experience helping not only myself, but countless others transform their lives by learning how to become the fullest versions of themselves. Learn more at www. somatic. com We do this through self awareness, connecting with their bodies and changing the way they perceive themselves and others. I have coached innumerous people how to heal their wounds and create lasting change so they can live a more joyous, passionate and fulfilling life. Thank you so much for tuning in and enjoy the show. Hey guys, Lisa Dawn here, coming to you live from my spare bedroom. Today is episode 30. Woo hoo! And my husband decided to Get some of our friends and family together to celebrate this milestone with a gift. So I'm feeling all kinds of sentimental and grateful today that I'm here with you also celebrating this milestone. So thank you for tuning in and being part of this journey with me. This was once only a dream and Perhaps there's something that's on your heart that you deeply wish to create. And my advice is that you'll never know until you start one foot in front of the other. And with that, I think I'll likely do an episode on procrastination and why we do it. So stay tuned for that. Also, for those of you listening, I want to celebrate you by doing a little giveaway. So what's up for grabs a free somatic and attachment session for anyone who listens to this episode and heads over to iTunes. and leaves a review or Spotify and gives a five star rating. So to enter, just send me a picture of your review or rating to adorninfusions at gmail. com and you are entered. So good luck. I'll contact the winner next Wednesday. And I'll also put the email in the show notes and share this with anyone that you think would benefit from some somatic work. Okay, so on to today's episode. So I know that I didn't grow up learning how to be with uncomfortable sensations and emotions, and the chances are pretty high that neither did my folks. It just wasn't a big part of our culture as it is now becoming. So each year we make advances to understand our beings a little more, and the more we learn, the more attuned we can become to who and what we really are. It's fascinating what we really are. So back then when I was growing up in the 80s, there was no language like, Oh, you're feeling sad. What does that feel like in your body? Or what does it feel like to be angry? What images or actions come to mind? Or what about notice what you're thinking before you have that reaction of wanting to bite your sister? So, What I'm saying is we didn't necessarily have the knowledge or the guides that helped to make our unconscious behaviors conscious in a sweet and kind way or the ability to feel into an expression as it's coming out. And on that note, we just kind of gave passes or turn the other cheek to certain behaviors. So for example, Well, Uncle John's on the bottle again, or Auntie June ate most of the pastries on the table again, or your cousin Joelle was caught shoplifting again. There wasn't this understanding for so many of us that all of these behaviors were as a result of something within that hadn't been expressed. Something beyond the actual behavior that were. likely very unconscious and probably pretty painful. So in other words, growing up, I'm sure that it was this way for many of you listening in today. We didn't necessarily learn how to be present. What we learned was how to be disconnected. So we spend the rest of our lives not feeling what our body is actually feeling. So sometimes when we dip into the world of sensations and tuning into presence, it can feel really uncomfortable and at times overwhelming and pretty daunting and just keep in mind that we're all just learning as we go. But we can also take small steps towards presence in the mundane. which actually prepares us to be present with other things in our lives. How can I bring the mind to the body instead of the mind taking me away from my body? Our minds can serve to disconnect and also to connect. It just takes practice. And let me tell you, the mundane is rich with sensations and experience. For an example, let's try something right now. And, of course, if you need to come back to this practice, please do. So just take a moment and put your hand on a surface, maybe that surface is a table, if there's one nearby, or maybe that surface is your leg, and just gently slide your hand back and forth. And as you do, see if you can notice what parts of your body like this. See if you can notice what happens under the skin of my hand. What is the texture of the surface? And just notice what parts of your body react to this light touch. And as you can see, there's so much happening just with this simple practice. And so you just had an experience of sensations, which are expressions of the unconscious. And this is a brilliant way to get in touch with things we don't even know are there. And we can do this without a story, which is what we do with somatic work. And I want to give another mini practice, and this one is from Louis Mojita. I hope that's how you pronounce his last name. Who is another incredible somatic experiencing practitioner. So let's take a moment to get into the presence of joy or something pleasurable. So just look around the space you're in right now and find one thing that you like, one thing that feels sensationally pleasant. Now this could even be the temperature of the room or the surface of what you're sitting on. It could be a smell in the air or it could be something that visually catches your eye. Anything in your space that brings you a sense of pleasure. And as you connect with this, notice what part of your body feels that. What part of your body responds with a sensation by connecting to this thing? Where does your body feel? I love that plant or that picture. What sensation can you feel inside? Is it warmth? Do you smile? Does your chest feel lighter? Do you take a deeper breath? What tells you I love this? Just notice. Just take another moment there. So that place within you that is able to feel and sensationally connect with this thing is a place that has capacity. And so most of you will notice that not every part of your body is feeling this. You'll notice that maybe your belly got soft, but you have no awareness of your arms. It's an incredible tool for us to take some time for our bodies to show us which parts have the capacity for presence. So these places that you feel inside of you that are delighted or pleasurable, that is a place that has the capacity for being here now. And if you nurture that place for a few moments, and of course you can do it with your hand, maybe just placing a hand on that, that spot. You can also do it by directing your breath there. And maybe you'll also notice from that place, how does my body respond. What emotions come up? Is there a physical movement that arises? What sounds want to come out? What stories come up? When we tap into a place that has capacity, we tap into a place within us that is able to resolve things we didn't even know needed to be resolved. What a brilliant system. And resolve doesn't necessarily mean they go away. It means that they have merged into the greater whole of us. Meaning my body has metabolized what was once stuck. It releases from a place inside of me so it can be with all of me. I even just get shivers saying those words. How brilliant and magical. And this all involves curiosity, presence, and a dash of wonder. I want to connect why being with ourselves and developing a sense of belonging and relating to ourselves internally creates a container to be able to relate to others. with more presence, wonder, and curiosity. And from this place, nourishment flows. There's a quote that I saw somewhere, um, and I don't know if this is the whole of the quote, but I, I think I'm getting it right. Somewhere between the left and right brain is where you wonder. This is the place where you get curious and ask questions. So this idea of getting curious about ourselves and others as a way to evoke our wisdom. When we wonder and get curious about people and our bodies, instead of going into the need to fix, control, and dominate, we access this part of our brain that delivers dopamine, serotonin, rather than the part that gives us cortisol and adrenaline. So this is a huge thing to consider. There is this biological process that is taking place when we are sitting in a seat of judgment rather than curiosity. For those of you wishing to dive into the world of somatic healing and get a taste of what it's like to discover the wisdom of your body, I'm offering a hundred dollars off my signature course, reclaiming resilience to the listeners of this episode. It is a self paced five week course that teaches you how to be with big emotions and sensations. It expands your capacity for more joy. More love and more pleasure while you also learn how to access your boundaries, intuition, and build safety within your body. Essentially, you'll be learning how to harness the power of your nervous system and welcome in more clarity, authentic communication, and fulfilling relationships. In the program, we are changing the way that we perceive ourselves, our patterns and our limiting beliefs, as well as finding our unique voice. Use the code ALLCAPSFEELGOOD at checkout. And for those of you who are seeking one on one support, I also offer coaching and therapy packages and one on one sessions. I'll pop all of that information in the show notes. And now let's get back to the show. And I want to mention that connecting is just something that we are. We can't stop it. It is fundamental. It is being. And this connecting is not just local. Within our bodies, it's relational, it's cosmic. How we feel in connection to ourselves, to others, often relates to our sense of belonging here on the planet Earth. Our sense of belonging anywhere has to begin with ourselves. So we do have a choice in how we approach ourselves and our relationships, even though sometimes it may not feel that way. We're always trying to create this sense of belonging, and when we belong inside of ourselves, coming into the body, coming into our home, like, I live here, I inhabit this place, I take up space here. When we fully arrive here, we can be anywhere. Then feel as though we belong. Because belonging is an internal feeling. Belonging to this part of you, this is your essence. This essence that is inhabiting your body. So we don't necessarily fit anywhere other than inside ourselves. Which is kind of like a wild thing to consider. So within that, this is all about learning how to relate to ourselves. Instead of identifying as one thing or another, we learn how to allow our bodies to be our guides. We see them as something in me that we have the ability to tend to. We become our own source of safety. And of course, we are made to regulate with one another. through the process of being with one another, but we can also do this by deepening our connection with ourselves. So this is something that took me years to understand, even though I had heard this through various spiritual teachers, it kind of also felt dismissive and reductive to me, there was something about it that felt right, but also something that felt missing, didn't fully. feel complete to me. And it wasn't until I completed my somatic training that I began to grasp this concept of, I am not my body. I have a body, but I am not my body. So it is less about living in a body and more about living with a body. So let's break this down to how I now understand it. I am a caretaker to my body, just like I am a caretaker to my relationships. And my job is not to control or dominate my body, but to listen to it, to relate to it, to give it my attention. We have this tendency of wanting to dominate our bodies, and we also try and dominate the things that we don't understand. And if we take that over into our relationships, which we often do, Then we want to, in some ways, dominate the people we are in relationships with, our friendships, our neighbors, our friends. I think I already said friends. I totally did. Then we want to dominate whole groups of people that are other than me. And this energy of dominance becomes the energy of how we live. Whereas, if we can cultivate a relationship with our own bodies that is not about dominating, but rather one of curiosity and wonder, things can begin to change in our relationships and in the world at large. When we begin to learn how to relate to ourselves, we are learning something really different about how to be with others that translates directly. If I can learn how to be with me in a way that doesn't try and dominate or fix my soma or my body, I'm also learning that it's not helpful for me to try and dominate yours either. And this ripples out everywhere. It becomes this cultural shift. I'm going to be curious about that person instead of judging them. I'm going to get curious about myself instead of judging it and just see what is there. See what arises. I'm going to see others as having their own needs and wants and desires that are equally as important to mine. I want to be curious about them and what they're wanting as sovereign beings. I'm going to see my body as its own sovereign being. One that I am not here to fix or control. And our whole essence of being is relational. We long for connection. We want to also form secure attachments, but we can also form secure bonds with ourselves. And I want to just note this interesting fact that oftentimes our driving force in relationships is the need that wasn't met. And when I say that, I mean that the people we are drawn to are typically the folks whom we had the most difficulty with in childhood. So whichever caretaker we experienced the most anxiety with or who didn't meet our needs tend to energetically be the ones we pull into us so that we can heal parts of ourselves that didn't get our needs met. So, the negative association or the shadow aspects are often more powerful than the positive because the need is connected to our survival. So at this unconscious level, we'll be in a relationship or draw in a relationship to ourselves with this person that is like the person who didn't meet our needs. But then we'll expect them to be like the person that we fantasize about meeting our needs. So fun. So there is this driving force within us that wants to merge with the things that we have pushed way down. And look, all of us come to every relationship unfinished. This is a gift. We get to explore greater depths of ourselves from those around us. And some connections are easy and graceful and others seem to be pulling out all of our worst traits. And all of this is related. And at some point we have to learn how to become what we want. We have to give ourselves the things that we never received. And often times we do this in relationship as well. But we can start doing it by relating to ourselves in a new way. So again, we are attracted to the people that can heal some parts of us. So we want to get curious about the relationships we choose. Getting curious about the people we love or want to form bonds with. When we learn how to become curious about ourselves, we set up the framework to approach our relationships in this way too. How do we get to know anyone? By asking questions with an open mind. Can you tell me your intention for saying that? How was that for you? Let me see if I got what you just said. Is there more about that you wish to share? You make sense. Did I get your feelings right? So we connect by validat by validating and empathizing. By discovering who the folks are in our life right now, we give them our presence. Because the past is always there waiting for us to move into the present moment. Let me tell you, from years of experience, this works far better than trying to get our point across and trying to be right and coming at our people with friction. We are the lab. We are the experiment. So in just like relationships, our bodies have their own rules, their own intentions. Our job is to relate and observe. We can live in our bodies comfortably and understand how to respond to them in ways that are meaningful to them. And we do this by recognizing that our bodies have their own needs, their own feelings. And we can start to treat it as a separate being that we inhabit and it is deserving of a real and well developed relationship. This body is sovereign and I am inhabiting it. So our relationships are not ours to control and dominate and neither are our bodies. So we're learning how to tend to ourselves and others, we're learning how to be with them. We are discoverable and knowable, just like the partnerships and friendships in our lives. It's kind of like I was speaking earlier with Uncle John or Auntie June. We pathologize the person, the person. We go after the behavior but not the root of what is going on. And when we do this, we miss so much wisdom by not taking a peek at the roots, at the sensations that are always bubbling up below the surface because it's the roots that are fueling the behavior. This force is propelling us into the actions we take in our lives. We will be overwhelmed, we will all be traumatized, we will have events that split us, and these split selves remain underground. And we may develop awful behaviors, compulsive drinking or shopping. And we think we have to get rid of the behavior because it is problematic. When we build this capacity to be present with what is, we have developed this ability to do it with others as well. So self witnessing another part of ourselves is so incredibly transformative. It's this idea of bringing our shadow parts and allowing them to merge with our light, with the rest of us. And we do this by becoming present and learning how to be with our bodies. We have to find what is lost or unmet and bring it to the surface, otherwise it has no choice but to find a new way of expressing. Its job is to express and it's going to find a way to do so. So with that, I want to leave this, this conversation with a quote from Thomas Hubble, the human body. is not an instrument to be used, but a realm of one's being to be experienced, explored, enriched, and thereby educated. Thanks for tuning in today. We'll see you all next week. As always, thank you so much for listening. Life is busy. So it means even more that you're carving out time in your day to be here. Listen, we've got so many great episodes coming up, so please make sure you subscribe to follow along on Apple podcasts or Spotify. And for those of you who like to watch your podcasts, we are now uploading them to YouTube. And if you appreciate these episodes, please do us a favor and leave a rating or a review and share it with anyone you think could benefit. See you again next Wednesday.
