A Somatic Experience of Feeling and Processing Emotions

The time I felt my own power and never looked back

Hello again, beautiful people!

And welcome to the new peeps who subscribed to my page - I’m so glad you’re here ♡

Today I continue my series on emotions, which started with us exploring the importance of integration in emotional healing- you can read about it here.

In this article, I’ll share my first experience with 1:1 somatic therapy and how it illuminated for me what it really means to allow emotions to fully move in the body—to process.

I’m used to sitting with my emotions. In fact, this has been a crucial part of my healing journey. But for the most part, this looked like writing about them, analysing them and finding connections between them.

Anything but feeling them.

I would find myself beginning to allow myself to feel, but because of the intensity, my mind would interrupt the process by creating meaning out of it or by adding layers of judgement. This in turn added further layers of shame or guilt that eclipsed the emotions underneath. It was a dead end that left me unsatisfied.

What I came to realise is that, for my emotions to have the space that they needed, a witnessing without interruption had to take place.

Another thing that was key for an emotional circuit to be complete was expression: allowing my body to do what it needed to, so that the emotional energy could move through.

These realisations came to light in my first 1:1 somatic session with my teacher. I had been in one of her 6-month mentorship containers prior to having a private session with her, so I knew I could trust her.

The kind of healing and aliveness I experienced in her programme was incredibly powerful, so I became curious about how a 1:1 session would feel like, given that I was navigating some intense emotional processes at the time.

Now, to the moment that changed my understanding of how emotions work and what it actually means to process them

I showed up to the session having a whole page written about what I was feeling and how it was impacting my life at the time. I wanted answers.

But the moment my teacher asked me: so, how do you feel today?, I burst into tears.

I wanted to explain, justify, give context, tell my story, but none of that happened because my teacher kept me connected to how it all feels.

More crying came, followed by sighing and finding stillness, and then even stronger waves of different emotions took over. I’d find myself wanting to talk about it, again. To create a story and a meaning out of it.

But my teacher would gently nudge me back to my body, to my felt sense, reassuring me that she’s got me. This went on a few times.

She would ask questions like:

If what you’re feeling now could make a sound, what would that be?

Is there a movement or a shape that this feeling could inhabit?

If you were an animal in the wild right now, how would you let this energy move?

There were noises and sounds and muffled screams and I just found myself no longer resisting my body. A lot of expression came through my hand and arms, nothing specific. Just shapes and gestures.

She would remind me of my posture, of the ground beneath my feet that’s holding me, of all the possibility that lies within my own body to support me.

The energy moving through me had all kinds of textures and flavours, and invited me to use my body as a safe space that could hold it all. I had this felt realisation that this is what my body is for, and that I had been interrupting its innate intelligence and natural instincts all this time.

I felt, probably for the first time, how the felt sense of an emotion can change and shift, the more you allow it.

From sadness, to frustration, indignation, resentment, disgust, full on anger, and eventually full on awe! (yes you heard me well)—all these layers came to the surface as my teacher held space and redirected me to the body whenever I wanted to retreat into explaining.

I felt my whole body alive in a way I hadn’t before.

Eventually I was no longer interested in talking about it and just let my body do what it needed to. I could feel electricity and aliveness to the tips of my fingers and toes. My vision was clearer, my senses were awakened, whole body vibrating.

Big “aha” moment there: wow this is what it actually means to let an emotional wave run its course. Pretty fascinating.

No meaning making, no rationalising, no analysing. Just my animal body doing exactly what it does best: complete processes and restore homeostasis.

Towards the end of the session I just felt completely alive. All my senses enhanced and responsive. Another “aha” moment: Ah this is what it actually means to connect to your own life force. Oh this is what it means to harness the body’s resources. To resource. The body already knows how to do it. Hmm.

I also understood what it means to be safe to feel it all. To finally let the body metabolise old energy that was crying to be expressed.

And to be witnessed by another in the process.

It dawned on me: I need support. I need containment. I need the safe space of someone who has walked this path and is not afraid of my release. I need to know I’m not too much.

There is no way back from that experience. It is the evidence that tells my body we can feel hard things and we’re ok. And not only that, but we come alive in that process.

I’m writing this to inspire hope, trust and curiosity in the intelligence of your own body. It holds all that it needs to unlock your aliveness, joy and yes, power.