Somatic Shadow work assists us in birthing otherwise unknown parts of ourselves and our experience into the known, by making the unconscious conscious.
This inquiry gently empowers you to meet, explore, feel, breathe into, hold and integrate exiled parts of yourself.
The parts that we want to ignore, push away and not feel.
The unmetabolized shame, rage, sadness, and grief that sits as dense heaviness in the belly, and is often masked over by people-pleasing or the “strong independent, got-it-all-together woman”.
The sometimes unbearable sense of loneliness expressing itself as overachievement and repetitive episodes of burnout and exhaustion.
The fear that we don’t want to be with, manifesting as sharp gripping and tension in our neck and jaw. The bodily, cellular holding patterns of control that mirror our inner resistance towards letting go and yielding to life.
The shallow breathing and tingles in our chest that sit right on the surface of our awareness, bubbling up when we turn away from claiming our deepest desires, telling the truth, saying Fuck Off or Fuck Yes. The body’s contraction when we don’t allow ourselves to reveal who we are, out of fear of rejection or of being judged as too much. So we stay quiet, calm, agreeable and nice. We swallow our words, and our bodies are left full with what is unsaid.
We might even turn away from the felt sensations of pleasure and joy, feeling unworthy of safety and ease, and not knowing how to stay present with them.
Rather than softening into what is alive for us in the present moment, it can be easier to numb out and disassociate through information overload, scrolling, binge TV and imbalanced eating or exercising patterns. When we choose instead to slow down, turn our gaze inward, and tune in with what is happening for us inside our bodies, we are able to BE intimately with ourselves, and to discover the hidden origins behind feelings of disconnection to self and to others, the need for validation and approval, codependency, lack of purpose and feelings of unworthiness and unsafety.
Somatic reclamation and shadow integration opens you into a deep sense of intimacy, authenticity, and an embodied, long-lasting experience of feeling free and safe to be you. Growing your attunement to your somatic self offers you a place and practice that you can always return to, no matter how you are, or what is happening around you.
Maanee Chrystal
-Found of the Somatic Institute for Women