Somatic Healing Tools To Use Daily

Somatic Experiencing is a gentle and powerful tool to help you learn the language of your body. This article will explain three ways to connect to your body daily to release unnecessary tension and rediscover the resilience within you. By using somatic healing tools throughout your days, you will feel more ease and less reactive to stressors.

Think of taking care of your stress similarly to having to do the dishes – you’re going to have to do it eventually, and doing them a few times a day (or at least once a day) is much less daunting than waiting a whole week to let them pile up. 

Somatic Healing Tool #1: Orient to the Present Moment

The why: Orienting in Somatic Experiencing is the process of scanning the environment to decide if there is danger or safety. Imagine that you’re walking in the woods and hear a rustle in the trees. Your body uses orienting to decide if the sound is a threat (a bear!) or something non-remarkable (a bird). Simple as it may sound, orienting is one of the first steps of a stress response and if it is interrupted, we are constantly on edge. Some folks describe it as the feeling of waiting for the other shoe to drop.

The how: You may already “know” in your logical mind that you’re safe, but your body needs time and very specific input to catch up with your brain. First, scan the room like you’ve never been in it before. If you can move around, touch some furniture and sense the texture on your skin. Use your neck muscles to turn your head, use your peripheral vision, and listen to the sounds around you. Finally, notice where in your body you sense any greater ease.

Somatic Healing Tool #2: Finding a Resource

The why: Unlike traditional therapies that often focus on verbal expression, Somatic Experiencing zeros in on the sensations and physical responses in your body. Your body (and the stresses it holds) does not speak English – it whispers in sensations, movements, and rhythms. When we can translate thoughts of safety into the language your body understands, regulation is much faster and more effective.

The how: First, find something pleasant – ideally something happening in/on your body, but it can be a nice piece of art or something in your environment too. If everything is awful inside and you’re in an aesthetically unappealing place (hey, it happens), finding something neutral works too. For example: my shirt is soft on my skin, or my feet feel firm on the ground. Track (or pay attention to) the sensation that emerges from the thing you’ve chosen to focus on. Perhaps your breath gets a bit deeper or your muscles relax. Ta da! You’ve down-regulated your nervous system.

Somatic Healing Tool #3: Move Through a Stress Response

The why: Imagine the residual tension you have at the end of a workday or a long day of trying not to explode at your kids. Somatic Experiencing uses the term “incomplete stress responses” to describe the buildup of tension and stress in the body that doesn’t get to release throughout the day. It can take a toll on the body if you reach the end of the day (or go months, or years..) without expressing the raw stress responses you’ve built up. AND, we can’t be yelling at everyone who makes us angry or running away from everything we find stressful. Enter tool #3: moving through the response.

The how: As with everything in SE, you’ve got options. Here is a popular option (and if it doesn’t work for you, no worries – reach out and we can come up with what does): notice the point of your body where you’re experiencing tension. Say, for example, your neck is tight. Instead of stretching it out, try going with the tension pattern and turning in the direction it’s already taking you. Do it slowly to help your body realize it happened. See if you can satisfy whatever impulse your body is having to return further to your baseline.

Each of these somatic healing tools are portable and can be done discretely. Try experimenting with a few each day and see what happens for your body. If you’d like to customize a plan, reach out today and we can make one for you!