January 22, 2025 • 26 mins
Episode Summary:
Welcome to another enlightening episode of Celeste The Therapist Podcast! 🌟 In this episode, Celeste dives deep into the world of somatic practices, exploring how they can help us release tension, enhance awareness, and promote healing. Whether you're feeling stuck, overwhelmed, or just curious about new ways to improve your well-being, this episode is packed with practical tools and insights.
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Website: www.stwyt.com
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Email: info@celesteThetherapist.com
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Follow Celeste: @CelesteTheTherapist
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
You are now tuned in to Celeste, the therapist podcast. Hello.
My name is Celeste. Thank you so much for giving me a try. If
you are new here, I wanna say thank you so much for checking me
out. What we do here is I talk about
areas of our lives that we get stuck in. I talk
about why we get stuck and I help you shift the way you think
(00:22):
about it by giving you practical tools. I'm all about
using what you have, starting where you can. And I
think a lot of times people tend to give up because they don't
understand why they're feeling the things that they're feeling
or why things are happening. And I find that the more
educated we are about a topic, the better it is
(00:44):
for us to create change in our life. If
you are a longtime listener, thank you so much for sticking it out with
me. I appreciate you. If you enjoy these
episodes that I do, Do me a favor, share it with somebody
that you love. If you want a topic discussed, all you
got to do is email me, info at celestatherapist.com. If
(01:05):
you want to follow me, you can follow me everywhere at Celeste Therapist.
Also, I have a whole wellness center that I created called
Shifting the Way You Think. And if you want to learn more about
the wellness center, get involved, attend 1 of the classes. All
you got to do is go to dot com again.
That's dot com.
(01:30):
All right, let's get into this amazing episode.
Hey, hey. Hi, beautiful people. So
I just got back last week from Barbados. Had
an amazing time. I went to celebrate my husband's birthday. His
birthday falls on the date we had our first date. So it's always like super
(01:52):
special. While I was there, I
was very over, I felt overwhelmed. I felt it in my stomach. When
I go on vacation, when I just had my private practice, I
learned I was fine. My clients knew what
was happening. My systems were in place. So I
was able to relax a little bit better. And the day
(02:15):
before I would get back, that's when I would feel a
little something. But throughout this vacation, now I
have this wellness center. So if you're new here, I have
a wellness center called Shifting the Way You Think, where we
provide different workshops and classes and I
have other people under me. So it's
(02:36):
new, right? And I was just thinking how my body was responding. I
wasn't afraid. I leaned into it. I felt
when my stomach was turning. I felt all these things. And it
was OK. I felt fine. When
I say I felt fine, meaning I felt these things, but it's kind of like, OK,
I know what's happening. Kind of like if you get a paper cut, you're not freaking
(02:58):
out. You see the paper cut, you're like, oh, man. And then you put Band-Aid on
it. You try not to get water on it. You make the adjustments. That's
what I did. And it had me thinking about my people and
how much our body's responding. So today,
I just want to talk about somatic practices. Every
time I meet with people, I'm always teaching them about different
(03:20):
somatic practices. It's not something that we hear about
or we think about. We know about therapy. People talk
about therapy. We know about psychiatry. People talk about psychiatry. But
the other things that can help us get to where we need to be I
don't feel like mainstream media, mainstream society is
talking about it. So let's talk about it. This is going to
(03:42):
be really good for people that might feel like stuck. If
you've been in therapy, you feel like you're missing out on something. I
feel like you're going to find what you need here. So as we
get started, the word somatic, right?
is a new word for some people. So let me just tell you what it means. And also, if you
are listening to me in audio, don't forget that this podcast does
(04:04):
stream on YouTube. So if you want to check
out the visuals, head on over to Celeste Therapist
on YouTube, and you can find these episodes. I am
a very visual learner, so that's why it's important to me to provide that for people.
All right, so the term somatic comes from the Greek
word soma. Wait, before I get started too,
(04:26):
don't forget, and for people that are new, use this podcast as
a learning tool, right? If you're on a wellness journey, if you struggle
with finances or finding somebody to help you on this journey, I
talk about so many different things, right? So get
a notebook, get a pen, take notes, right? Go
back to these notes. I want you to be able to feel empowered when
(04:48):
you leave my sessions on this podcast. All
right, so somatic. The term somatic comes from the Greek word, soma,
which means body. Somatic practices
are techniques that focuses on the body as a way to enhance
awareness, release tension, and promote healing.
(05:09):
They can include a variety of activities like yoga, dance,
body work, and mindfulness. These practices encourage us
to tune in our bodily sensations, emotions, movements,
helping us to reconnect with ourselves on a deeper level. That
was a mouthful. So I want to kind of break that
down for you a little bit. So when you think about the body, when
(05:31):
you think about your experiences, a lot of times people can
remember their experience. There's a lot of times people cannot remember their
experiences, but guess who's remembering the experiences, the
body. A lot of times things are happening and
these emotions, these things that are happening are trapped in
our body, right? Some people are walking around, if you're watching
(05:52):
me, my shoulders are up, very tense all the time,
not realizing it, having back aches, right? Someone
said, you know, I'm so young. I realize I need to do somatic work. I'm
so young, but I feel old. Like my body feels
so like broken down. And a lot
of that is happening is because of the way we live our lives, right? We're
(06:13):
going through things and we're not processing them. We're not dealing with them
and they're being stored in our body. So let's talk about like
just talk one-on-one therapy. We can intellectualize things.
I can teach you about what's happening, how it's happening, help
you understand things better. You can come to a great understanding and
still feel like something is going on in your body. I talk
(06:36):
about this a lot. A lot of times we don't realize it, but the
things we go through can get trapped in different parts of our body. For me, it's
my back, my stomach, and my healing, the inner child
class. This is something that we talk about during the
first session. It's a three-week course that I do in person at
the center. And we talk about how the body can
(06:57):
hold pain in your body and create other ailments that
may come up. So that's essentially what somatic
practice is used for, right? It's used to
help release things, to release the tension that's happening
in your body, to become more mindful and
aware of what you are feeling. Remember
(07:19):
as children, and I know this happens a lot in black households,
we were to be seen and not heard. And if you didn't experience that,
like that's really great. Like if you were, you had a caregiver, a
parent that said, look, how are you feeling? Like, how's your body feel?
Right. And this isn't about blaming anybody, but
a lot of times our caregivers were in survival themselves. They
(07:41):
didn't have the capacity to even know what they were feeling or what they had
going on. They were probably operating from a depressed or anxious
state a lot of times, right? So we
were never taught how to check in with what's going on in our body.
If we weren't bleeding sometimes, a lot of times it's
like any kind of pains, if there's nothing happening, you learn to
(08:02):
ignore, you learn to adjust, right? There's people
that's hunched over, typing all the time, don't even realize all
of the things that are going on in their body. because of their
positioning and their posture, right? So somatic
practices can allow you to get more in tune with what's going on
in your body. Now let's talk about the benefits of somatic work. So
(08:25):
benefits of somatic work, emotional release. So many people find
that somatic practices can help them process and
release emotions that are stored in their body, leading to
a greater sense of emotional wellbeing. This emotion chart
here that I'm pulling up by beam, as you can see, all
of these emotions, these are things that we go through. And
(08:45):
unfortunately, a lot of times they are trapped in our body and
we're rooted with so much struggles that are going on
because we don't know how to release them. Another benefit
of it improves your movement and posture. So by becoming more
aware of our bodies, we can improve our movement patterns and
posture, which can lead to a better physical health. So
(09:07):
for me, like I'm very in tune with when I'm hunched over, when
I'm not sitting up straight, right? As we get older,
unfortunately what happens is that when we keep leaning over
and when we're not really adjusting our posture, staying
uncomfortable, is we start to experience some things that
don't reverse, right? So really being mindful of
(09:29):
that. Let's talk about some more benefits. So stress reduction,
engaging in somatic practices can lower your stress
levels by focusing on the body. We release
pent up tension. Breath work. Breath
work is a practice, right? When people are overwhelmed in
stress, unfortunately, we don't know what we can do about
(09:50):
it. Something as simple as putting my hands over my heart. and
I'm taking a deep breath, that little bit, that
one breath can help me reset a little bit, right? Working
on creating somatic practices in your life can
allow you to breathe better, can do a lot of
things to think better, right? Because you don't have all this stuff that's pent up
(10:12):
in you. Also, if you're working on
doing somatic work, it can enhance body awareness. So
it can allow you to recognize when discomfort happens, when things
are going on. I always tell you, if you listen to this
podcast, sometimes you could be struggling and
you may not intellectually know it. It's not in your conscious
(10:34):
mindset. but your body's responding. When
the pandemic hit, I was already working from home. It
wasn't a lot of pressure. But then when I started working with people and
the anxieties and fears, what happened was I started
to feel like my back. It felt like something just hit my back.
And I was like, oh my gosh, this is a lot. Intellectually,
(10:56):
I didn't realize how heavy it was because I'm used to
working with people and doing heavy work. But
now I'm doing heavy work that is across the nation,
across the world. We're talking about the same thing. There's no
like, okay, this was hard. Let me reset. But it's like
every single session, there was similar things that were going on. And
(11:17):
it created this energy in my system that
was full of like, oh my gosh, what's next? What am I going to do? How
am I going to help these people? So be
mindful of the somatic practices being
able to allow you to get more in tune with
your body. Because when you're in tune with your body, you can start to
(11:39):
re-correct and change the pattern that
you're finding yourself going. If you recognize, for
instance, I was just keep that same example, my back starts hurting.
So I'm like, ooh, I got to really check in with myself. I got to start amping
up some of my practices because my body and my system is starting to
feel stress. Then I'm not getting myself to a place where
(12:00):
I'm hunched over, my stomach's turning, where I'm overwhelmed because
guess what? I understood the signs that was happening and
I was able to change the pattern in the way I was doing things
so that it doesn't continue to increase. And then another
benefit is mindfulness and presence. So somatic practices encourages
us to be present in the moment, fostering a sense of mindfulness that
(12:22):
carries on in our daily lives. The thing about
being mindful and present is that that's kind of
the only way you can have peace. It's hard to have peace if
you're dwelling on the past. It's hard to have peace if you're
worried about the future. And I understand being
present for so many people in different times
(12:44):
of their lives has been hard, and you may have allowed yourself
to escape through imagination,
through checking out, through ignoring the problem, right? But
if you lean into the problem, if you lean into the
present, it'll allow you to feel more empowered. It's really
hard to feel empowered if you continue to recycle all
(13:06):
the past and bad things that's happened. Because when you're doing that,
your mind is only focusing on all the bad things. So
it's only going to show you all the bad things that are going on in
your life. And I'll give you an example. If you
have a red car, what's gonna happen, a red Toyota,
let's just use Toyota, what's gonna happen is you're gonna find yourself
(13:26):
seeing a red Toyota all the time. Nobody went
out and said, oh, you got a red Toyota, let me get a red Toyota, but
your mind is seeing it every day, so then you're seeing the same car
all the time, right? So that same mindset goes
for the things that we're thinking about. If
you don't allow yourself to be present and redirect
(13:49):
some of that dwelling on the past, some of that negative
things that are happening in your head, if you don't do that, your
mind is going to help you continue to be in that way of living and
the way of thinking. And it's not about ignoring, it's
not about pretending that things aren't happening, but it's
about balancing it out. Yes, these
(14:11):
things are happening, but what can I do? What do I have? What
am I grateful for? One practice
that I've seen online that I would encourage you
to do, you can get a jar. Once
a week, write down something positive that's happened for the week and
put it in the jar. Anytime you're struggling, you can
(14:31):
go to that jar, look up the things that are going well,
especially if you're somebody that is not used to practicing gratitude.
Another thing you can do to help you practice gratitude and bring in the
present is to have a journal where
you are writing down the things that you're grateful for.
That's something that I do with my kids every night. I ask them a few questions, but
(14:53):
one of the questions is, what are you grateful for? Allowing me
to ask them what are they grateful for, it puts them in the present to
help them think about their day and how it went. These
are not things that we've been taught how to do. So
those are just some benefits of having a somatic practice.
What are some examples of somatic practice, you ask? So
(15:14):
yoga is one. And when I first
started therapy as a client and started
doing somatic work, yoga was the first practice. And
for people that think about finances, I started
practicing on YouTube. I did not have
the money means time. My kids were young.
(15:36):
We only had one job. I had just adopted my oldest
kids who were both special needs. So I was at
home and I didn't have the luxury of being
able to afford even a gym membership. So when
they would go to sleep or when they were at school, I
would put YouTube on and start following someone that
(15:57):
did different yoga practices. I'm somebody that I'm like, okay,
I don't have this, but what do I have? It's really hard
for me the way my mind, the way I've built my mind to
allow my circumstances to stop me, right? Even
I have more now, but even when I didn't have more, my
mindset wasn't like, poor me, I don't have this. My
(16:19):
mindset was like, okay, I don't have this, but what do I have? And how can
I get to that point? I'm always planning and
thinking about things. And to the point where at
one point the planning and thinking was more survival where I
was like, okay, what's the next thing? And always looking at
the worst case sometimes, that kept me kind of stuck. But
(16:39):
I'll think about the worst case, but I don't sit in that. I
used to sit in that. I don't sit in that anymore. I'll think about
the worst case, but a lot of times I sit in the best case scenario.
which has allowed me to continue flourish and building my business
and my practice. So yoga is
one, dance movement is one, right? They have dance classes, but also
(17:01):
you could just dance at your house, put some music on, start moving your body,
right? That's another practice. Body scan,
Pilates, Tai Chi, groundwork, and breath work. Body
scan meditation, that's something you go on YouTube, you type in body scan
meditation, somebody is going to come on, there's different
people that do it. Some people you may not like their voice, right?
(17:23):
So go to the next one. Don't think you got to pick the first one that comes up. You
can even start with the five minute body scan meditation. If you're not
used to being still and meditating, like five
minutes is like small enough. Don't feel like you got to do 10, 20 minutes. and
it allows you to go through your body. When they start saying like, okay, we're
going to start from my head, move your head from side to side, then
(17:44):
they'll say something like, unclench your jaw. You didn't even realize your
jaws clenched, right? Right now, I'm just telling you, unclench your
jaw, right? Put your shoulders down, right? You may start noticing
like, oh my gosh, I didn't realize my shoulders was up. Oh my gosh, I didn't realize
my jaw. Oh my gosh, unclench your hands. I didn't realize I
was holding my hands so tight. Now when I
(18:04):
drive, when I start doing like this, so if
you're listening, I have my
hand squeezed tight like I'm on the steering wheel. And
I notice when I start doing that, I'll unloosen it up.
That's how in tune I got with my body, where I'm like, all right, take a
deep breath, right? If I'm late for something or if I feel
(18:27):
overwhelmed or anxious about something, I'll find myself clenching
my hands like this and then I'll just loosen it up and I'll
just take a deep breath. These are things that I do automatically. Over
time, I've learned this. I don't want you to think I was born this way. These
are things I learned how to do to get more in tune with my body, so
that's why I'm sharing with you. The last thing I want to
(18:48):
share is how do I get started? That's
a great question. Before I go into that, I just want to put this
quick advertisement up. I hope you're enjoying the episode. Quick
announcement. I want to give you some ways you can support, right?
I have two books. One is called Relationship Goals. It's a
guide to a healthy relationship. I also have a guided journal.
(19:09):
And if you find yourself stuck in thoughts, want to get your thoughts on
paper, I ask you different questions. And I also ask you
how you're feeling. I provide you with the feelings chart. If
you go to celestatherapist.com, you could find 365 days
of intentional living along with relationship goals. Another
way you could support me, I have this wellness center that
(19:31):
I'm so excited about called Shifting the Way You Think Wellness Center.
At my center, I do not want finances to be a reason why
people can't get what they need. So, if you want to donate a
class to someone, please feel free to go to my website and
you can give a donation. The classes run between 15. and
(19:53):
$35. My goal is for everyone to be able
to access these services regardless of finances. So
if you can donate, please donate to your girl center. I
would be greatly appreciated. All right, y'all let's get back
into this amazing episode. All
right, y'all, let's get into how to get started. So one,
(20:15):
you can find a class or workshop that focuses on somatic practices.
I have this wellness center and a big part of
why I created it is because I wanted to create wellness practices
for people to learn about. We have a monthly series
right now on building programming as we go, but the next
(20:36):
one is happening called Rest and Recharge. So
this is an offering that guides you through breath work, chair yoga,
and a guided meditation. We also have another one called Mindful
Yin. So Mindful Yin offers yoga postures
that are held in stillness for short periods of time, focusing
on the connective tissues, various breath and techniques, and
(20:58):
concepts of mindfulness are woven into the class as
poses are held, right? So those are two classes
right now that are being offered at the center. That's
an example of finding a class that can focus on
somatic practices, right? If you're not doing the YouTube thing,
find out if your local community center, a lot of times these local
(21:21):
centers have discounted rates that
are available if finances are an issue. So that's one
thing that you can do is find in a class or a workshop. Another
thing you can do, you want to work on... You're saying
like, dang Celeste, I think I need to start
working on some somatic work. I'm not quite ready to go into a
(21:42):
class yet. YouTube is one way, but Practicing
mindfulness. So if you can work on incorporating mindfulness into your daily
routine by taking just a few moments to check in with
your body and notice how you feel. So
maybe before you hit the shower, before you go to bed, on
your lunch break, try to create a practice with something
(22:04):
that you're already doing so you don't feel like you
don't have enough time. And it's literally just having
a seat. taking a deep breath, and
then just paying attention to your body. For
some people, being still is so scary and so hard.
And if you're like, what's wrong with me? Why is that hard for me,
(22:26):
Celeste? Because at some point in your life, being still was
probably challenging, and so you escaped. So
I need you to have grace with yourself if you're finding yourself struggling
with this idea of stillness. The third thing,
create a safe space. So set up a comfortable space
at home where you can practice somatic exercise, whether it's
(22:47):
through movement, meditation, or breath work. The
next thing is listening to your body. So pay attention to what your
body's telling you. If you feel uncomfortable, adjust
your practice accordingly. And if you go to
a somatic class, like breath work, meditation,
yoga, You'll see these people that teach
(23:10):
these classes, they're very, very affirming. They're like,
there's no wrong way to do it. If that doesn't feel comfortable, lay this way.
It's a very chill vibe, where it doesn't feel
like there's a lot of pressure. Um, the last thing I'll
say is to be patient with yourself on this journey. Remember
that somatic practices are a journey. Be patient with yourself as
(23:31):
you explore what works best for you. So I gave you
some examples of some somatic practices, but there's so many different
ones. Once you may be like, Oh yeah, I'm not doing that. And once you, you
might find yourself realizing, Ooh, that works good. So don't
feel bad if something doesn't work for you. But I will say, Give
it some time to kick in. Give it
(23:52):
some time. And don't feel like you have to
run to a center to get this work done if you're not ready for
that. Start at home. Something that you're interested
in. I was interested in Pilates. I still haven't gone to a shop, but
I've learned so much by following somebody on YouTube
who does it. breath work, right? You don't have
(24:13):
to run to a meditation class if you're not ready for that. But I
would encourage you to try, even if it's in the comfort of your own home, pay
attention to how you're feeling, right? So the goal
in this work, the somatic work, is to help you become
more aware of what's happening with your body so you can
give yourself the tools you need to relax and settle down. I
(24:36):
don't want you to put pressure on yourself. So I
really hope this was helpful. I hope this makes sense. If
anything I ever say resonates for you, understand you have the power to
create change, but you have to really work on believing
in yourself. I wanted to tell you about one more class. One of the
things I realized is that As adults, it's
(24:56):
hard to make connections and do things outside of going to
the club or going somewhere where there's just music, no
real chill vibes. So I
created a series called Connections. And
the first series in Connections is a program
called Craft and Chill. And what craft
(25:19):
and chill is about is just, we're going
to get some coasters, some wine glasses, and
we're going to create art,
right? With some music and food behind the scenes. So
it's not like I'm going to be teaching a class. It's not like you have to like
(25:39):
present or anything like that. It's literally just getting out of your house,
coming to the center where the vibe is just so relaxing and
chill. And I'm not an artist by
no means, right? I can't give you any tips, but I
can be there to help you just relax and
enjoy the vibe. So if any of these classes or
(26:00):
things that I'm doing you're interested in, all you got to do is go to the website to
sign up. And
if there's ever a topic you want discussed on the podcast, let
me know. You can go to the website, email me and
I will gladly bring it on here. So thank you all so
much for rocking out with me and I will talk to you
You are now tuned in to Celeste, the therapist podcast. Hello.
My name is Celeste. Thank you so much for giving me a try. If
you are new here, I wanna say thank you so much for checking me
out. What we do here is I talk about
areas of our lives that we get stuck in. I talk
about why we get stuck and I help you shift the way you think
(00:22):
about it by giving you practical tools. I'm all about
using what you have, starting where you can. And I
think a lot of times people tend to give up because they don't
understand why they're feeling the things that they're feeling
or why things are happening. And I find that the more
educated we are about a topic, the better it is
(00:44):
for us to create change in our life. If
you are a longtime listener, thank you so much for sticking it out with
me. I appreciate you. If you enjoy these
episodes that I do, Do me a favor, share it with somebody
that you love. If you want a topic discussed, all you
got to do is email me, info at celestatherapist.com. If
(01:05):
you want to follow me, you can follow me everywhere at Celeste Therapist.
Also, I have a whole wellness center that I created called
Shifting the Way You Think. And if you want to learn more about
the wellness center, get involved, attend 1 of the classes. All
you got to do is go to dot com again.
That's dot com.
(01:30):
All right, let's get into this amazing episode.
Hey, hey. Hi, beautiful people. So
I just got back last week from Barbados. Had
an amazing time. I went to celebrate my husband's birthday. His
birthday falls on the date we had our first date. So it's always like super
(01:52):
special. While I was there, I
was very over, I felt overwhelmed. I felt it in my stomach. When
I go on vacation, when I just had my private practice, I
learned I was fine. My clients knew what
was happening. My systems were in place. So I
was able to relax a little bit better. And the day
(02:15):
before I would get back, that's when I would feel a
little something. But throughout this vacation, now I
have this wellness center. So if you're new here, I have
a wellness center called Shifting the Way You Think, where we
provide different workshops and classes and I
have other people under me. So it's
(02:36):
new, right? And I was just thinking how my body was responding. I
wasn't afraid. I leaned into it. I felt
when my stomach was turning. I felt all these things. And it
was OK. I felt fine. When
I say I felt fine, meaning I felt these things, but it's kind of like, OK,
I know what's happening. Kind of like if you get a paper cut, you're not freaking
(02:58):
out. You see the paper cut, you're like, oh, man. And then you put Band-Aid on
it. You try not to get water on it. You make the adjustments. That's
what I did. And it had me thinking about my people and
how much our body's responding. So today,
I just want to talk about somatic practices. Every
time I meet with people, I'm always teaching them about different
(03:20):
somatic practices. It's not something that we hear about
or we think about. We know about therapy. People talk
about therapy. We know about psychiatry. People talk about psychiatry. But
the other things that can help us get to where we need to be I
don't feel like mainstream media, mainstream society is
talking about it. So let's talk about it. This is going to
(03:42):
be really good for people that might feel like stuck. If
you've been in therapy, you feel like you're missing out on something. I
feel like you're going to find what you need here. So as we
get started, the word somatic, right?
is a new word for some people. So let me just tell you what it means. And also, if you
are listening to me in audio, don't forget that this podcast does
(04:04):
stream on YouTube. So if you want to check
out the visuals, head on over to Celeste Therapist
on YouTube, and you can find these episodes. I am
a very visual learner, so that's why it's important to me to provide that for people.
All right, so the term somatic comes from the Greek
word soma. Wait, before I get started too,
(04:26):
don't forget, and for people that are new, use this podcast as
a learning tool, right? If you're on a wellness journey, if you struggle
with finances or finding somebody to help you on this journey, I
talk about so many different things, right? So get
a notebook, get a pen, take notes, right? Go
back to these notes. I want you to be able to feel empowered when
(04:48):
you leave my sessions on this podcast. All
right, so somatic. The term somatic comes from the Greek word, soma,
which means body. Somatic practices
are techniques that focuses on the body as a way to enhance
awareness, release tension, and promote healing.
(05:09):
They can include a variety of activities like yoga, dance,
body work, and mindfulness. These practices encourage us
to tune in our bodily sensations, emotions, movements,
helping us to reconnect with ourselves on a deeper level. That
was a mouthful. So I want to kind of break that
down for you a little bit. So when you think about the body, when
(05:31):
you think about your experiences, a lot of times people can
remember their experience. There's a lot of times people cannot remember their
experiences, but guess who's remembering the experiences, the
body. A lot of times things are happening and
these emotions, these things that are happening are trapped in
our body, right? Some people are walking around, if you're watching
(05:52):
me, my shoulders are up, very tense all the time,
not realizing it, having back aches, right? Someone
said, you know, I'm so young. I realize I need to do somatic work. I'm
so young, but I feel old. Like my body feels
so like broken down. And a lot
of that is happening is because of the way we live our lives, right? We're
(06:13):
going through things and we're not processing them. We're not dealing with them
and they're being stored in our body. So let's talk about like
just talk one-on-one therapy. We can intellectualize things.
I can teach you about what's happening, how it's happening, help
you understand things better. You can come to a great understanding and
still feel like something is going on in your body. I talk
(06:36):
about this a lot. A lot of times we don't realize it, but the
things we go through can get trapped in different parts of our body. For me, it's
my back, my stomach, and my healing, the inner child
class. This is something that we talk about during the
first session. It's a three-week course that I do in person at
the center. And we talk about how the body can
(06:57):
hold pain in your body and create other ailments that
may come up. So that's essentially what somatic
practice is used for, right? It's used to
help release things, to release the tension that's happening
in your body, to become more mindful and
aware of what you are feeling. Remember
(07:19):
as children, and I know this happens a lot in black households,
we were to be seen and not heard. And if you didn't experience that,
like that's really great. Like if you were, you had a caregiver, a
parent that said, look, how are you feeling? Like, how's your body feel?
Right. And this isn't about blaming anybody, but
a lot of times our caregivers were in survival themselves. They
(07:41):
didn't have the capacity to even know what they were feeling or what they had
going on. They were probably operating from a depressed or anxious
state a lot of times, right? So we
were never taught how to check in with what's going on in our body.
If we weren't bleeding sometimes, a lot of times it's
like any kind of pains, if there's nothing happening, you learn to
(08:02):
ignore, you learn to adjust, right? There's people
that's hunched over, typing all the time, don't even realize all
of the things that are going on in their body. because of their
positioning and their posture, right? So somatic
practices can allow you to get more in tune with what's going on
in your body. Now let's talk about the benefits of somatic work. So
(08:25):
benefits of somatic work, emotional release. So many people find
that somatic practices can help them process and
release emotions that are stored in their body, leading to
a greater sense of emotional wellbeing. This emotion chart
here that I'm pulling up by beam, as you can see, all
of these emotions, these are things that we go through. And
(08:45):
unfortunately, a lot of times they are trapped in our body and
we're rooted with so much struggles that are going on
because we don't know how to release them. Another benefit
of it improves your movement and posture. So by becoming more
aware of our bodies, we can improve our movement patterns and
posture, which can lead to a better physical health. So
(09:07):
for me, like I'm very in tune with when I'm hunched over, when
I'm not sitting up straight, right? As we get older,
unfortunately what happens is that when we keep leaning over
and when we're not really adjusting our posture, staying
uncomfortable, is we start to experience some things that
don't reverse, right? So really being mindful of
(09:29):
that. Let's talk about some more benefits. So stress reduction,
engaging in somatic practices can lower your stress
levels by focusing on the body. We release
pent up tension. Breath work. Breath
work is a practice, right? When people are overwhelmed in
stress, unfortunately, we don't know what we can do about
(09:50):
it. Something as simple as putting my hands over my heart. and
I'm taking a deep breath, that little bit, that
one breath can help me reset a little bit, right? Working
on creating somatic practices in your life can
allow you to breathe better, can do a lot of
things to think better, right? Because you don't have all this stuff that's pent up
(10:12):
in you. Also, if you're working on
doing somatic work, it can enhance body awareness. So
it can allow you to recognize when discomfort happens, when things
are going on. I always tell you, if you listen to this
podcast, sometimes you could be struggling and
you may not intellectually know it. It's not in your conscious
(10:34):
mindset. but your body's responding. When
the pandemic hit, I was already working from home. It
wasn't a lot of pressure. But then when I started working with people and
the anxieties and fears, what happened was I started
to feel like my back. It felt like something just hit my back.
And I was like, oh my gosh, this is a lot. Intellectually,
(10:56):
I didn't realize how heavy it was because I'm used to
working with people and doing heavy work. But
now I'm doing heavy work that is across the nation,
across the world. We're talking about the same thing. There's no
like, okay, this was hard. Let me reset. But it's like
every single session, there was similar things that were going on. And
(11:17):
it created this energy in my system that
was full of like, oh my gosh, what's next? What am I going to do? How
am I going to help these people? So be
mindful of the somatic practices being
able to allow you to get more in tune with
your body. Because when you're in tune with your body, you can start to
(11:39):
re-correct and change the pattern that
you're finding yourself going. If you recognize, for
instance, I was just keep that same example, my back starts hurting.
So I'm like, ooh, I got to really check in with myself. I got to start amping
up some of my practices because my body and my system is starting to
feel stress. Then I'm not getting myself to a place where
(12:00):
I'm hunched over, my stomach's turning, where I'm overwhelmed because
guess what? I understood the signs that was happening and
I was able to change the pattern in the way I was doing things
so that it doesn't continue to increase. And then another
benefit is mindfulness and presence. So somatic practices encourages
us to be present in the moment, fostering a sense of mindfulness that
(12:22):
carries on in our daily lives. The thing about
being mindful and present is that that's kind of
the only way you can have peace. It's hard to have peace if
you're dwelling on the past. It's hard to have peace if you're
worried about the future. And I understand being
present for so many people in different times
(12:44):
of their lives has been hard, and you may have allowed yourself
to escape through imagination,
through checking out, through ignoring the problem, right? But
if you lean into the problem, if you lean into the
present, it'll allow you to feel more empowered. It's really
hard to feel empowered if you continue to recycle all
(13:06):
the past and bad things that's happened. Because when you're doing that,
your mind is only focusing on all the bad things. So
it's only going to show you all the bad things that are going on in
your life. And I'll give you an example. If you
have a red car, what's gonna happen, a red Toyota,
let's just use Toyota, what's gonna happen is you're gonna find yourself
(13:26):
seeing a red Toyota all the time. Nobody went
out and said, oh, you got a red Toyota, let me get a red Toyota, but
your mind is seeing it every day, so then you're seeing the same car
all the time, right? So that same mindset goes
for the things that we're thinking about. If
you don't allow yourself to be present and redirect
(13:49):
some of that dwelling on the past, some of that negative
things that are happening in your head, if you don't do that, your
mind is going to help you continue to be in that way of living and
the way of thinking. And it's not about ignoring, it's
not about pretending that things aren't happening, but it's
about balancing it out. Yes, these
(14:11):
things are happening, but what can I do? What do I have? What
am I grateful for? One practice
that I've seen online that I would encourage you
to do, you can get a jar. Once
a week, write down something positive that's happened for the week and
put it in the jar. Anytime you're struggling, you can
(14:31):
go to that jar, look up the things that are going well,
especially if you're somebody that is not used to practicing gratitude.
Another thing you can do to help you practice gratitude and bring in the
present is to have a journal where
you are writing down the things that you're grateful for.
That's something that I do with my kids every night. I ask them a few questions, but
(14:53):
one of the questions is, what are you grateful for? Allowing me
to ask them what are they grateful for, it puts them in the present to
help them think about their day and how it went. These
are not things that we've been taught how to do. So
those are just some benefits of having a somatic practice.
What are some examples of somatic practice, you ask? So
(15:14):
yoga is one. And when I first
started therapy as a client and started
doing somatic work, yoga was the first practice. And
for people that think about finances, I started
practicing on YouTube. I did not have
the money means time. My kids were young.
(15:36):
We only had one job. I had just adopted my oldest
kids who were both special needs. So I was at
home and I didn't have the luxury of being
able to afford even a gym membership. So when
they would go to sleep or when they were at school, I
would put YouTube on and start following someone that
(15:57):
did different yoga practices. I'm somebody that I'm like, okay,
I don't have this, but what do I have? It's really hard
for me the way my mind, the way I've built my mind to
allow my circumstances to stop me, right? Even
I have more now, but even when I didn't have more, my
mindset wasn't like, poor me, I don't have this. My
(16:19):
mindset was like, okay, I don't have this, but what do I have? And how can
I get to that point? I'm always planning and
thinking about things. And to the point where at
one point the planning and thinking was more survival where I
was like, okay, what's the next thing? And always looking at
the worst case sometimes, that kept me kind of stuck. But
(16:39):
I'll think about the worst case, but I don't sit in that. I
used to sit in that. I don't sit in that anymore. I'll think about
the worst case, but a lot of times I sit in the best case scenario.
which has allowed me to continue flourish and building my business
and my practice. So yoga is
one, dance movement is one, right? They have dance classes, but also
(17:01):
you could just dance at your house, put some music on, start moving your body,
right? That's another practice. Body scan,
Pilates, Tai Chi, groundwork, and breath work. Body
scan meditation, that's something you go on YouTube, you type in body scan
meditation, somebody is going to come on, there's different
people that do it. Some people you may not like their voice, right?
(17:23):
So go to the next one. Don't think you got to pick the first one that comes up. You
can even start with the five minute body scan meditation. If you're not
used to being still and meditating, like five
minutes is like small enough. Don't feel like you got to do 10, 20 minutes. and
it allows you to go through your body. When they start saying like, okay, we're
going to start from my head, move your head from side to side, then
(17:44):
they'll say something like, unclench your jaw. You didn't even realize your
jaws clenched, right? Right now, I'm just telling you, unclench your
jaw, right? Put your shoulders down, right? You may start noticing
like, oh my gosh, I didn't realize my shoulders was up. Oh my gosh, I didn't realize
my jaw. Oh my gosh, unclench your hands. I didn't realize I
was holding my hands so tight. Now when I
(18:04):
drive, when I start doing like this, so if
you're listening, I have my
hand squeezed tight like I'm on the steering wheel. And
I notice when I start doing that, I'll unloosen it up.
That's how in tune I got with my body, where I'm like, all right, take a
deep breath, right? If I'm late for something or if I feel
(18:27):
overwhelmed or anxious about something, I'll find myself clenching
my hands like this and then I'll just loosen it up and I'll
just take a deep breath. These are things that I do automatically. Over
time, I've learned this. I don't want you to think I was born this way. These
are things I learned how to do to get more in tune with my body, so
that's why I'm sharing with you. The last thing I want to
(18:48):
share is how do I get started? That's
a great question. Before I go into that, I just want to put this
quick advertisement up. I hope you're enjoying the episode. Quick
announcement. I want to give you some ways you can support, right?
I have two books. One is called Relationship Goals. It's a
guide to a healthy relationship. I also have a guided journal.
(19:09):
And if you find yourself stuck in thoughts, want to get your thoughts on
paper, I ask you different questions. And I also ask you
how you're feeling. I provide you with the feelings chart. If
you go to celestatherapist.com, you could find 365 days
of intentional living along with relationship goals. Another
way you could support me, I have this wellness center that
(19:31):
I'm so excited about called Shifting the Way You Think Wellness Center.
At my center, I do not want finances to be a reason why
people can't get what they need. So, if you want to donate a
class to someone, please feel free to go to my website and
you can give a donation. The classes run between 15. and
(19:53):
$35. My goal is for everyone to be able
to access these services regardless of finances. So
if you can donate, please donate to your girl center. I
would be greatly appreciated. All right, y'all let's get back
into this amazing episode. All
right, y'all, let's get into how to get started. So one,
(20:15):
you can find a class or workshop that focuses on somatic practices.
I have this wellness center and a big part of
why I created it is because I wanted to create wellness practices
for people to learn about. We have a monthly series
right now on building programming as we go, but the next
(20:36):
one is happening called Rest and Recharge. So
this is an offering that guides you through breath work, chair yoga,
and a guided meditation. We also have another one called Mindful
Yin. So Mindful Yin offers yoga postures
that are held in stillness for short periods of time, focusing
on the connective tissues, various breath and techniques, and
(20:58):
concepts of mindfulness are woven into the class as
poses are held, right? So those are two classes
right now that are being offered at the center. That's
an example of finding a class that can focus on
somatic practices, right? If you're not doing the YouTube thing,
find out if your local community center, a lot of times these local
(21:21):
centers have discounted rates that
are available if finances are an issue. So that's one
thing that you can do is find in a class or a workshop. Another
thing you can do, you want to work on... You're saying
like, dang Celeste, I think I need to start
working on some somatic work. I'm not quite ready to go into a
(21:42):
class yet. YouTube is one way, but Practicing
mindfulness. So if you can work on incorporating mindfulness into your daily
routine by taking just a few moments to check in with
your body and notice how you feel. So
maybe before you hit the shower, before you go to bed, on
your lunch break, try to create a practice with something
(22:04):
that you're already doing so you don't feel like you
don't have enough time. And it's literally just having
a seat. taking a deep breath, and
then just paying attention to your body. For
some people, being still is so scary and so hard.
And if you're like, what's wrong with me? Why is that hard for me,
(22:26):
Celeste? Because at some point in your life, being still was
probably challenging, and so you escaped. So
I need you to have grace with yourself if you're finding yourself struggling
with this idea of stillness. The third thing,
create a safe space. So set up a comfortable space
at home where you can practice somatic exercise, whether it's
(22:47):
through movement, meditation, or breath work. The
next thing is listening to your body. So pay attention to what your
body's telling you. If you feel uncomfortable, adjust
your practice accordingly. And if you go to
a somatic class, like breath work, meditation,
yoga, You'll see these people that teach
(23:10):
these classes, they're very, very affirming. They're like,
there's no wrong way to do it. If that doesn't feel comfortable, lay this way.
It's a very chill vibe, where it doesn't feel
like there's a lot of pressure. Um, the last thing I'll
say is to be patient with yourself on this journey. Remember
that somatic practices are a journey. Be patient with yourself as
(23:31):
you explore what works best for you. So I gave you
some examples of some somatic practices, but there's so many different
ones. Once you may be like, Oh yeah, I'm not doing that. And once you, you
might find yourself realizing, Ooh, that works good. So don't
feel bad if something doesn't work for you. But I will say, Give
it some time to kick in. Give it
(23:52):
some time. And don't feel like you have to
run to a center to get this work done if you're not ready for
that. Start at home. Something that you're interested
in. I was interested in Pilates. I still haven't gone to a shop, but
I've learned so much by following somebody on YouTube
who does it. breath work, right? You don't have
(24:13):
to run to a meditation class if you're not ready for that. But I
would encourage you to try, even if it's in the comfort of your own home, pay
attention to how you're feeling, right? So the goal
in this work, the somatic work, is to help you become
more aware of what's happening with your body so you can
give yourself the tools you need to relax and settle down. I
(24:36):
don't want you to put pressure on yourself. So I
really hope this was helpful. I hope this makes sense. If
anything I ever say resonates for you, understand you have the power to
create change, but you have to really work on believing
in yourself. I wanted to tell you about one more class. One of the
things I realized is that As adults, it's
(24:56):
hard to make connections and do things outside of going to
the club or going somewhere where there's just music, no
real chill vibes. So I
created a series called Connections. And
the first series in Connections is a program
called Craft and Chill. And what craft
(25:19):
and chill is about is just, we're going
to get some coasters, some wine glasses, and
we're going to create art,
right? With some music and food behind the scenes. So
it's not like I'm going to be teaching a class. It's not like you have to like
(25:39):
present or anything like that. It's literally just getting out of your house,
coming to the center where the vibe is just so relaxing and
chill. And I'm not an artist by
no means, right? I can't give you any tips, but I
can be there to help you just relax and
enjoy the vibe. So if any of these classes or
(26:00):
things that I'm doing you're interested in, all you got to do is go to the website to
sign up. And
if there's ever a topic you want discussed on the podcast, let
me know. You can go to the website, email me and
I will gladly bring it on here. So thank you all so
much for rocking out with me and I will talk to you
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