Awareness of our body and its wisdom is an empowering ability that we are all born with. However, as we grow into adulthood, we tend to lose connection with its messages. This innate ability becomes blocked by childhood conditioning, limiting beliefs and self-perceptions, and the residue of past traumas.
When we learn how to deepen our connection with our body, which is a powerful form of intuition, we access clarity and inner knowing quickly and easily in stressful situations. Tapping into our full body presence is how we awaken our creative potential; and how we cultivate greater ease and joy as we navigate our inner and outer worlds.
Listening to the spontaneous signals that our body sends throughout the day – gut feelings, tugs at our heart, tense neck and shoulders – sounds like a simple practice. As a species, we’ve been doing it for millennia. Early humans depended on this full `body wisdom in an instinctual way.
However, most of us are cut off from our body wisdom. We shut out physical and emotional sensations – all feeling – due to past traumas. Limiting beliefs about ourselves and our bodies colour our perceptions about what our body is trying to tell us. We are also distracted by our environment — the fast pace of life, our digital gadgets and the unsettling state of the world.
Our reactions to body sensations can be overly vigilant because our mind may be thinking that what is happening now is similar to a past traumatic event. This locks us out of the current moment and leaves us vulnerable because we can’t accurately sense what the rest of our body is telling us. Unfortunately, if we can’t feel present-moment sensations, we are relating through old patterns of fear, shame or doubt.
Learning how to feel and listen to the full range of body sensations nurtures our relationship with our self and with others. This deeper sense of connection flows over into our connection with all of Life — heightening our sense of belonging and growing a trust in our self and others. Listening more closely to what our body needs, physical and mental/emotional healing happens.
When we return home to feeling our body again and again, we access the nourishing flow of life force energy within and around us. We open more expansively to all of Life and our unique gifts flow through and from us into the world. Accessing our most valuable resource – our body – cultivates trust, presence and freedom.
How do you feel and sense your body right now? What is the relationship like that you have with your body? Can you hear your body wisdom?
If you feel called to deepen in your body wisdom, I offer 1-1 transpersonal somatic counselling sessions to explore past traumas, conditioned beliefs and present life challenges. It is a therapy that makes the connection between mind, body and the interconnectedness of Life. I work directly with your nervous system to facilitate a process of healing and awakening from personal and collective wounding. Email wendy@wise-living.co.za for more information of Wise Living services and to book a session.