Somatic Practice

As the mind and body begin to quiet, relax, and open in meditation it is inevitable that you will encounter contracted areas in the body. These are areas in the body where we have stored unprocessed emotions, feelings, and traumas. Instead of ignoring these areas and persisting with your meditation it can be helpful to include somatic work in your meditation. For instance when you are in the midst of your meditation and you begin to feel a knotted area in your gut or your heart you would then allow for the opportunity to explore this area of your body. In this way you are allowing your meditation to become flexible to accommodate whatever is arising for you in that moment. Over time it will help you drop deeper into your meditations to do the work of clearing these blocks as they arise.

The clearing process is simple, but it does involve the willingness to explore what is hiding out in those contracted areas in the body. At some point in time, usually in early childhood, certain emotions became stored away because they were too much to process in that moment. These are heavy emotions like shame, guilt, grief, fear, anger, rage, jealousy and greed, just to name a few. What is really required is the willingness to experience something that isn’t comfortable.

If you aren’t comfortable exploring these on your own there are trained somatic practitioners who can assist you in the process of unpacking these contracted areas of the body. Although no one can do the work of feeling into these areas of the body for you. Whether you are working with a professional or on your own it is you and only you who will be plumbing the depths of your own being.

I have found that if you try to emphasize the element of curiosity this helps build momentum or courage to feel what lurks beneath the surface of a contraction. There is SOMETHING there, what the hell is it? Be curious about exploring FULLY your whole self. Meditation isn’t always bliss and unicorns. More often, especially in the beginning we will encounter one hellish realm after another. There can be very painful experiences in this exploration. But this is what is arising in this moment.

Trust that what is arising in this moment is exactly where you are and exactly what is supposed to be arising. The meditation is showing you that particular thing because that is what you are ready to see and feel. Try not to push anything away for want of a different experience. This can be easy to do if we are practicing something like mantra japa, wanting to be merged in the bliss of the Self and nothing else. But if we cling too much to the desire for merging with the Divine then we suppress what the Divine is revealing to us in that moment when something like a contraction begins to surface into our awareness.

I am not a trained professional in this work. This is just what I have learned from first hand experience and from the teachers that I have worked with. In some cases the trauma can be very severe and you shouldn’t feel any shame or guilt if you feel you need extra help in unpacking what is arising. Skilled professionals exist in this area of expertise precisely because we need them at times. Please take full advantage of these skilled professionals and seek them out if you feel the need. Do a google search for somatic practitioners or Hakomi therapy and find someone to work with.

Here is how I approach somatic work when something arises in my meditation that I want to explore. As I tune in to the body at various stages of my meditation I may become aware of a contraction. This area may be cold, or hot, it may feel like static or numbness. The muscle around that area is usually tight. This is how I begin to notice there is something there to be explored. It may also present itself as a raw emotion arising in meditation. But typically I am aware of how it’s presenting in the physical body before I unearth the stored emotion underneath.

As I tune in to the contraction I begin to feel, gently, into it. The key here is gentleness. Be ever so gentle with yourself. This area is locked up for a reason. It’s a protective measure. You have armored yourself. So be gentle and soft and loving here. Hold yourself as you would hold your child. Be nurturing here. Say to yourself, “I love you and I am here for you. Whatever you want to present to me here I am with you. This is a safe place”. You don’t have to say those words but this is the atmosphere you are building for yourself so you can begin to relax into the contraction.

Typically this process takes patience. There is no forcing your way into these contractions. Provide the space for them to unwind with the intention of holding yourself in loving awareness and they will begin to soften and open. From here there will be an experience of an emotion. All you have to do from this point is, as much as you can, stay with the emotion completely. Try to keep the body as relaxed as possible. Let the emotion totally sweep over you. Let it take you. Become one with it. If there is a story attached to the emotion try not to get caught in the mental processing of the story. That would only serve to take you out of the experience and back into the mind. Stay at the heart of the emotion. Let it run through your whole body.

Sometimes my body will want to shake and I have found that to be another way in which I process these emotions, so I will let myself shake. Just be aware if you are trying to force something that is not natural. As the emotions runs through the body it will eventually begin to dissipate of its own accord. You will notice that the contraction in the body has released. Whatever was stored there has been felt in to and now the body will present as being open in that area.

In some cases, for dense contractions, you may have to return to them over and over again. Each time you dive into it there will be a layer of it that will dissolve. Don’t feel discouraged if after repeated trips into a contraction you find that it still persists. Some of our traumas are very dense and it simply takes patience and the willingness to return to them as many times as is needed to clear them.

As you explore this work you may also find it to be helpful to do some body work, go get a message or move the body in dance or yoga. Sometimes body work alone can help release these contractions. I have found that some form of body work and somatic practice work hand in hand together.

Below is a recording of a guided meditation by Ed Muzika that I have found to be very helpful in this work as well. Please check it out.