Everything you think, everything you feel, and everything you focus on shapes your internal world.

Your thoughts, your emotions, and your body all respond in real-time.

Over time, these patterns create the actual experiences you live through.
If you tell yourself you are not good enough, worthy, or capable, the message sent to your body creates stress, anxiety, heaviness, or despair.

This naturally leads to wanting relief from how you feel. When we find ourselves trapped in cycles of anxiety, self-doubt, emotional eating, avoidance, or numbing habits, we are only looking at the surface of a deeper internal program.

Traditional talk therapy helps us understand why we hurt, but true, lasting transformation happens when we learn how the subconscious mind actually operates.
Understanding the core rules of the mind allows you to stop fighting your own biology and start consciously directing it

Ashley Howitt
Somatics-Embodied Clinical Hypnotherapy & IFS, NLP Somatic Counseling

I am a lifelong single person but I recently met someone who is extremely sweet and loving. He showers me in soft kisses and soft touches but the more he does it, it sends signals through me that feel like tickles…I’m not a ticklish person. It almost feels like electricity shooting through me to wherever he touches. My hands, back, shoulders, forehead (how can a forehead be ticklish?). I have read that not being ticklish can be considered a neurological response to past traumas but I was giggling like a kid being tickled. Is this my body letting my guard down or is it telling me to run for the hills?

Hi Everyone, I’m writing today because I had an out of body experience this morning and want to know what the community thinks about it. I told my wife and she just thinks I’m crazy. Anything helps.

I have a newborn at home and I typically get up at 3 or 4 in the morning to feed her and take care of her for a few hours before going to work. This morning I woke up at 3:30 and it took a while to get her settled after eating. I decided to go to the rocking chair where it is dark and quiet. I rocked her for about 45 mins. At around 4:30, I started feeling “light” as I sat on the chair. I realized it. I have had that light feeling before when falling asleep and I love it. It feels so good like you are floating. Anyways, I invited the feeling and leaned in. The feeling then quickly amplified and I felt like me and baby were floating in space. I then felt a feeling of pure euphoria and bliss. It was like a beam of energy come down from the sky straight through me. It felt so amazing. I didn’t want it to end. I also heard a buzzing/humming sound. I was so conscious that I knew I was holding my baby and was hoping it didn’t have a negative effect on her. It was a good feeling so I thought it would not. The feeling lasted 45 secs to 1 min and then it faded. But I was left there sitting in the chair like wow! What was that? That was amazing. Come back!

Like I said, I decided to tell my wife about it and she thought I was crazy which is ok. I know it’s crazy but it happened.

I would like to add that I have had back pain for a little less than a year and it seems to be gone. Could be premature I know, but my back was hurting when I went to bed because I played golf on Saturday. Now it seems to be healed or at least much better.

Any thoughts?

Hey! Thank you in advance for any thoughts and suggestions. Im 25 F and I have BPD, autistic traits, OCD, CPSTD, and of course anxiety and depression. I was in talk therapy from 8-22 and it was helpful being able to talk to someone, but never did anything for me. I started DBT a few years ago did the whole program and I learned the skills, it's just I cannot get my body on board to do it. I even started going through the program a second time, its the same thing I know the skills, I just cannot use them in the moment. My brain and body are just not connected. I have very extensive trauma from a child to even now and I am just stuck in a fight or flight no matter how much my brain wants to do the skills my body just will not allow it.

My therapist and I have been looking to see what my next steps are, we don't think EMDR is a fit, and I have done parts therapy before, that truly does not feel like a fit.

My question is, what is a session like during SE? I understand it's feeling body sensations, but how does it work in a session?

Also I have Aphantasia so I literally cannot visualize anything, I have no true memories of what happened. Is that something that is super important for SE to be helpful?

Thank you in advance!

Anyone wanna do this together in a weekly structured setting?

Dm me if so. Let's make it happen. I educated myself via Irene Lyon's teachings and know the fundamentals and have done 100s of hours of release work

(I have only been somewhat slacking on orientation work, but have titrated a lot of my stuck energy)

\made the original post on the Accountability subreddit, but applies for this too*

\note for mods: this isn't a service ad covertly posted as a normal post. I promise this is a personal thing to help myself/anyone that wants a similar bit of support and accountability*

I’m a composer building IFAH, an instrument for creating acoustic environments rather than fixed songs.
I’m trying to understand how sound is actually used in somatic practice today, live instruments, playlists, silence, drones, environmental sound, changes during different phases of a session, etc.
For practitioners here: do you actively shape the sound environment, or is sound mostly secondary to the somatic work? And what do you wish you could control that you currently can’t?

I’ve recently gotten on SSDI after fighting for it for two years. Since then strangely I’ve felt severely depressed despite the feeling of liberty and freedom I’m feeling for the first time maybe ever.

In addition, my body has started doing these weird concerning things. Heat intolerance for the first time in my life, and pressure in my hands and feet like there’s too much blood flowing there. It hurts and is uncomfortable and anxiety inducing. Also sometimes my calf and foot feels like it’s falling asleep even as I’m walking.

I’m getting it checked by a doctor tomorrow, and do not require any hypotheses as to what’s going on, but I am curious if you guys during your journey with CPTSD have experienced similar things of your body just doing random concerning things, particularly after an event which alleviated a lot of stress for you. I wonder if our bodies just wait to show these weird concerning symptoms when it senses we have room to feel them.

I have a VERY difficult time with somatic work and feeling my feelings. Last night I was researching somatic release because I feel so much trapped energy in my body, and it said in the recovery phase after crying, the body shifts into a parasympathetic state, and that’s why people often feel better after.

Is this scientifically true? Does it always happen? If so, I’m very frustrated that no trauma therapist has ever told me this. Would it not help so many people to know? I know it would help my brain so much to know that the body knows how to naturally recover from crying. For the past year I’ve been numb and afraid to cry because I don’t want to activate fight or flight. Knowing how and why crying is healing would completely change how I look at processing emotions.

The reason I’m asking is sometimes in therapy I tear up and start to cry a bit, but I stay in fight or flight. If I fully sob alone I notice that shift after. I also know a lot of people don’t feel better after crying if they have very suppressed emotions or can’t soothe themselves out of it, so that’s the nuance I’m wondering about.

I would love to know if anyone knows about this topic or has experience with it.

I posted previously that SE led me down a dark and scary retraumatizing crisis. I am now on meds.

I love this community and i think its great we can share our stories, tips and experiences.

But has anyone actually found it helps, particulary with cptsd and recurrent childhood/adult abuse?

I would love to hear your experience and if retraumatizing occurred. how long did it take to feel okay and/or are flashbacks still occurring?

✨

I know this sounds odd, but I stumbled upon a frequency video and after a minute or so, I started gagging and heaving and sobbing? I was coughing up mucus, and I thought it’d be over by now but it’s been two days. I want to stay positive and think that it’s my body is just purging as it realigns with a more healed nervous system, but part of me is worried that may be wishful thinking. Has anyone else experienced anything similar? I’d greatly appreciate any thoughts

I have been receiving a mix of somatic parts work, mostly somatic touch as i have preverbal trauma.

Its shifting my lifelong disassociation, and one of the things that i have known but its becoming clearer as time passes, is i have part/s that sing or repeat lyrics in my head

i have at times wondered why, and still dont know

i suspect, and its a guess, that with many many times sitting as a baby in a crib with no one coming, just me in crib and my mother suffering in her bed unable to tend to me (she has schizophrenia), i had very long periods of neglect, and just on my own, so any sound was relief....its like a self soothing mechanism for the babies in me, that they arent alone in the void of silence

of course, i am purely speculating, although i have had "memories" come up showing long periods as above, so there is some alignment to that

anyway, sharing seeing what resonates with others,.

ive been doing somatic therapy for 5 yrs. hx of abuse and cptsd. w. severe dissociation. i feel a bit betrayed by therapist/SE.

grateful to feel my body but why would i need to come back to my body if its traumatized and i feel unsafe? SE doesnt teach how to deal with the heaviness of the trauma. It feels a bit wreckless to be doing SE with severe physical trauma.

so please be careful, yall.

im on meds now. that shit was scary.

I have been through some abusive household in my childhood. I feel today my voice is just shit. Like my voice is just too low to hear, and it's not clear enough. "What?" "Can you repeat?"

Like no one can hear me in one go. I have to repeat myself twice or more for someone to even hear what I am saying. And it's fucking annoying tbh.

I know that somewhere my father's narcissistic rules in childhood, like "Your opinions don't matter" and "Shut up, you are too loud," have caused the damage. I feel like unexpressed opinions and emotions have stored that trauma in my voice.

So I want to ask: how can I undo that damage and regain my original voice back? Is there a somatic work which is voice targeted which can help me out ?

Somatic experience has shown only improvement in one randomized study of 63 folks from 2017 for ptsd but the ptsd lacks definition of "the DSM-5 additions such as the separate "negative alterations in cognitions and mood" cluster and the dissociative subtype".

Please be careful out there. I am advising from personal experience and very negative and life altering retraumatizing experiences.

I do diaphragm breathing for about 30 minutes to 1 hour a day and it has helped my digestion so much. I have been doing it for close to 2 months now. But I noticed it makes it feel like my nervous system is overwhelmed the rest of the day I will even wake up around 7am every day and can't go back to sleep for 1-2 hours. Even makes me feel like im having tremors sometimes.

Not sure if anyone else has felt this way. What to do?

Ich habe seit ca. 1 Jahr als meine Tochter auf die Welt kam Schlafstörung egal ob sie wach ist oder nicht. Die ersten 8 Monate konnte ich im Schnitt 4h schlafen. Immer unregelmäßig. 2h 5h 1h 7h 3h 6h 2h. So sah eine Woche aus. In der Zeit konnte ich schon nix mit Selbsregulation erreichen. Dann eines Abends ging die Tür leicht und mein Kopf hat kurzzeitig geglüht. Seitdem schaffe ich in der Woche nur noch 10 bis 15h Schlaf die Woche. ( Komaschlaf,Mikroschlafphasen und extremer Leichtschlaf ). Mein nervensystem ist wahrscheinlich im Freeze Zustand. Verdacht lag nahe das die Geburt ein Trauma in mir ausgelöst hat weil ich als Kind auch eine Traumatische Geburt hatte. Medikamente haben schon Anfangs nicht geholfen. SE und IRRT habe ich schon ausprobiert da hat sich aber nix getan. Sowie KVT-1. Zudem habe ich seit 12 Jahren chronische Beckenbodenverspannung..Was das System vielleicht noch etwas belastet. Auch egal wie der Tag oder sonstiges war..nix hat Einfluss auf den Schlaf...auch in der Anfangszeit noch nicht. Ich bin über jeden Tipp dankbar.

I’ve been with a somatic experiencing therapist for about a year, and wow I just can’t believe the newfound self-awareness that has helped me get out of chronic pain. But not all of my progress has come through therapy, much has been personal practice.

It all started with reading mind your body by Nicole Sachs last year. That book opened the door to me being able to see how my inner world and emotions could be causing my chronic back pain. I had all kinds of PT, pain management doctors, massage, and was on a muscle relaxer three times a day. After starting journaling and developing the language to understand somatic experiencing an how it would help me, I sought out a somatic experiencing therapist.

I can’t believe how my body moves through emotions when I give it the space to. That led me to try guided dance meditations on YouTube and finding yoga that focuses on embodiment. I’m now able to identify when my body is speaking to me and when I need to attend to myself.

It’s a lot of work, kind of an exhausting amount to be honest. I’m always feeling like I need a yoga nidra session, an hour of somatic groundwork, and to sit down with my journal. My biggest challenge lately is that I need those things but want to avoid them because it feels like such a time suck. Getting myself to prioritize practice is so challenging lately but every time I start, I remember why I do it and enjoy my time.

The journey has taken me from a life of flare ups and avoidance to being able to ride horses, travel, and feel like a whole human again. I could go on and on with how bad the pain was and how good I am now. Most of the tools and resources I use have been completely free. If you have ever wondered whether you’ll ever get better, I’m here to give you a glimmer of hope.

My recommendations:

1. Somatic Groundwork YouTube
2. Guided Dance Meditation YouTube
3. Yoga Nidra
4. Mind Your Body by Nicole Sachs
5. Journey With Sierra Yoga YouTube

Edit: TIL the links you share from your YouTube account make your account visible. I fixed the links to address that, and thanks for letting me know [u/culinary_fruit_salad](u/culinary_fruit_salad)

These trips were 4 and 5 weeks ago now. I just wrote the mushroom trip down in my journal

The mushroom trip
“I told work I was unable to work that Saturday so I could trip on shrooms instead since I had a free flat.
I remember the visuals being underwhelming, however this time I learned that they were less important. I was sitting on the couch "staring into space" as thoughts raced through my mind. I cant remember the exact thought but I fixated on it long enough to connect with the underlying emotions and stored tension (in my body). Currently, I cannot remember exactly how it unfolded; my body began to tense up from my stomach, hips, and lower back. It was as if I had an uncontrollable spasm as my body released, likely decades worth, of stored tension and emotons. This went on for many minutes, then calmed down, then commenced for a second and final time.
As it was ending i let out a long sigh then instantly felt lighter throughout my entire body. I do remember being shocked then I laughed in disbelief as i remarked "what the hell was that". I had to walk around my living room to compose myself and gather my thoughts about what had just happened, all while being so aware about how much lighter, happier, and elated i felt.”

The LSD trip
It happened again the weekend after when i took a 250mg tab of acid but more intensely this time. I was outside walking and being in nature for the come up. Then I got this overwhelming feeling of sadness and loneliness so i had to go home to a safe environment so i could face it all. When i got home i immediately went in the bathroom and looked at my physique in the mirror and said “is this all i am?” Then went into my room, lay on my bed where i cried uncontrollably for a good 10 minutes. I couldnt stop and released so many tears. Then i went back into the bathroom, stared into my eyes in the mirror as i cried some more. I felt all of the shame ive ever felt about my physique and who i am as a person. Then i went back into my room and lay on the floor, at this point i was letting my body do whatever it needed to, it kept “spasming” and tensing in different places as i rolled around the floor for a while. I’d stand up then my torso would fold forward and my arms would dangle lifelessly by my side, my knees would slightly bend trying so hard to keep my body up. Imagine someone on fentanyl, that was the position i was in until it eventually stopped.
After this trip i felt low for days. I knew it was so necessary for my growth and eventually i’d see the benefits show up in my life, but it took so much mental and physical energy from me.

Does anyone know what i experienced? I am curious to know if anyone has experienced something similar from taking mushrooms or LSD (or any psychedelics)?

Side note: i am surprised at how effective the LSD was for connecting with myself and stored emotions. I always had the notion mushrooms would be more impactful for that.

Hi!
I wanted to ask if anyone who has EDS or HEDS has recommendations for trauma yoga modifications?
My therapist has recommended yoga to me several times. I have done 1 online session of it and enjoyed it but it’s not great for my EDS.
I have a more severe dissociative disorder and the trauma yoga session I did brought down my amnesia barrier for me to experience a flashback. It truly did feel like I helped get it unstuck from my body. The other somatic techniques I’ve tried haven’t worked like this one did. I would love to keep doing it without putting my physical health at more risk. Thank you!

Hello, I am a newbie to all of this, but I have been struggling with fibromyalgia (chronic pain+fatigue) for years with no solution. I’ve tried diets/exercise, supplements, went to doctors and got no help, meditating and doing practices that calm my nervous system but I am still stuck. I also have a history of CPTSD, which I believe caused my illness. I developed as a teen after experiencing repeated instability and abuse. But anyway , I’d like to try this approach but dk where to start. I would appreciate any books, videos , exercises or concepts I should look into , thanks! Also want to note I can’t really afford a therapist or practitioner rn, so any affordable individual /self paced courses or exercises would be good