Somatics
For those of you who know, and those who don’t, this has been a F*ing difficult semester for me. i’ve had a lot of ups and downs, emotional upheavals, therapy and somatics. my final for Somatics was to write a summary of my journey over the semester, no easy task. after finishing writing it, i decided to share. it won’t make complete sense to anyone, but here it is.
. .My Journey
My upbringing was extremely liberal; therefore I was very open to the idea of being able to better myself. I was not, however open to the idea that I did not need bettering, that everything I needed already existed inside me, I just needed to bring it to the forefront. So this is where my journey began, the learning that I have the tools to find support when I need it.
January began with me restarting therapy sessions and beginning a class to aide my healing. I found CRP difficult to get into and somewhat silly, but strangely therapeutic. I started to notice how my weight distributed, my posture, the aches and pains I had pushed to the back of my mind, and how little I actually relaxed throughout the day. By the end of the month I figured out that CRP was best for me anywhere but my dorm room; it was too distracting, too un-calming, and too loud emotionally.
February dawned the experiences of learning to relax my muscles through flexion and lines of movement. Through the lines that aligned the pelvic region I learned that I can walk with my feet straight and not like a pigeon. Through skeletal mapping I found some of my patterns of holding in my shoulders that I injured as a preteen. Through this I learned way to relax them, and understand where and why I have so much pain in them. As I continued CRP I started to feel little pops, twitches, and releases, not all of which were pleasant. I remember a small release in my hip occurring on a Monday that I never recorded and then my therapist was sick, and my world fell apart. It was a very black week. I didn’t see the correlation then, but subsequent events eventually showed me the connection. Besides this I also began to see my breathing as support and started to find my mantra to find peace: I am a tree.
March was another difficult month. I ended therapy the same week that I had my Feldenkrais meltdown. Before that however I was happy working on my breathing and finding my center. I had been beginning to feel really good and happy again. The different ideas of support, mental and physical, a had been complementing the work that I had been doing in my limited therapy; I had been lucky enough to get a therapist who was interested in somatic forms and knew that muscles have a visceral memory. But as I had not encountered any problems that I was aware of, I stopped being afraid and was able to let go. Then we had the Feldenkrais method. It felt good, and comfortable and right, up until we started work on the hips… by the time I noticed what was happening the emotions had already gotten too strong. After the initial onslaught, I was able to pull myself together again using breathing, and then forced rational thinking. Childhood memories are not all sunshine and roses for me. CRP became a terror, and I didn’t have therapy to help. But, by this point I had already acknowledged that I could use my friends as support back in February, so I tapped into that resource at hand; I told my roommate of my problem, and she helped coax me back into the physical pattern of CRP. From there she helped lead me slowly into being able to do it on my own by holding my hand or stroking my feet in silence. She truly was my savior in that. This experience is what really lead me to create my mantra, the final one. Breathing is my key to peace… and peace is something that has eluded me for a long time.
April was my mental fight; my fight against the emotional baggage that I’ve held for so long; my fight to reclaim my mind and body for myself. CRP was a large part of that fight. The days that I went into it, I had to try different techniques to see the internal damage and then let it go. I’m still working on it. Working with my skeletal system was helpful. I started to appreciate what was already working in my body, my feet, my hips, my spine, and I started to notice that my posture (the good posture) was becoming a habit. This I think is mostly do to the really fun and beautiful spirals. In the spirals I was able to stretch and breathe and loosen my hips in a way the other movements were unable. I’m still practicing these, and as I spiral I imagine my breath as waves crashing on the shore allowing my body to lengthen and curve like the edges of land where it meets the sea. I’ve also been learning lessens about letting go. Letting go is loss that I’m in control of, and therefore less painful. Its my decision, and no one else can take that away. At the same time, I’m learning to accept the changes that are unpredictable and to accept the losses that I have already been dealt in my short life. I want to let go, I like being able to breathe, and I like not having panic attacks every few weeks.
Set backs are not failures, they are experiences from which I will grow and change and accept. This is my promise to myself.
Thank you Linda for teaching a class that has had so much value to my life. There are lessons here that I will be taking with me, and I will be perfectly and wholly honest, this class has saved my life. No joke, no sugar coating. If not for this class I don’t think that in February I would have found someone to think for me when I was so obviously not in my brain. If not for this class, I would not have learned a way to collect myself together when explosions of emotion occur. If not for this class then I would have not learned to breathe through emotional pain affectively. If not for this class… so much would be different. Yes, this class released tension in my hips triggering the emotions, but I know that this would have happened on its own someday. Now I have the tools.
