Soma ᐧ the living organism in its wholeness
We experience our whole lives in our bodies, and in our bodies we hold our resilience and our trauma. Through exploring the experience and wisdom of our bodies we can see how we have been shaped by our systems, community, family, landscape, relationships and experiences–and how we want to shape back. Somatics offers us ways to align our behaviors with our values: to turn intentions into practiced ways of being. Our bodies have an amazing capacity for healing and can support us in releasing what is no longer serving us and turning towards what does.
In somatics we ask what is it like to live in your body?
What is your body telling you about how it wants to move, rest, connect and use its power?
“Somatics is culture. The word somatics exists in a Western context to point out the break that happened between our minds and our bodies. Somatics doesn’t make sense in some ways, without that break having happened, it’s a term and field of study that emerges from that break of colonization.
Before that, we still practiced embodiment. Before that there were still practices across the world that helped us feel ourselves and feel our internal worlds. ”
learn more from Prentis Hemphill and The Embodiment Institute
“Somatics is a vast field of philosophy and practice that draws from many lineages and disciples. Prior to colonization, all of our ancestors had ways of connecting with their bodies that were embedded in daily life. Within our current conditions many of us have lost touch with our bodies and find that somatics offers a much needed pathway to reconnection.”
learn more from wildbody somatics
“Somatics is a practice-able theory of change that can move us toward individual, community, and collective liberation through working to embody transformation. Somatics with a social analysis understands the need for deep personal transformation, aligned with liberatory community/ collective practices, connected to transformative systemic change. They are inextricable and support each other.”
learn more from generative somatics