Beyond Words: The Embodied Power of Somatic Healing with Andrew Rosenstock

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What happens when healing moves beyond thinking and into feeling? In this rich conversation, Becca sits down with somatic practitioner Andrew Rosenstock to explore the profound world of embodied healing—the kind that words can’t quite capture.

What You’ll Hear in This Episode:

1. What somatics actually means and why it’s more than a wellness buzzword
2. How the lived, felt experience of the body differs from the concept of the body
3. Why talk therapy sometimes can’t reach trauma stored in the body and how somatic practices can
4. The metaphor of “explaining the taste of chocolate” as a way to understand embodied experience
5. The relationship between mindfulness and embodiment
6. Why doing somatic exercises is not enough without presence and awareness
7. How embodied healing transforms not just you, but your parenting, leadership, and relationships

About Andrew

Andrew Rosenstock is a registered somatic movement therapist, rolfer, and biodynamic craniosacral therapist. He has spent years helping people return home to their bodies and discover healing that thinking alone cannot unlock.

Whether you’re brand new to somatics or have been exploring embodied practices for years, this episode will expand your understanding and inspire you to listen more deeply to your body’s wisdom.

Find more about Andrew here: AndrewRosenstock.com

Want to begin using somatic healing in your journey, here is a great place to start:https://themotherhoodmentor.myflodesk.com/somatichealing

Work with Becca : https://www.the-motherhood-mentor.com/reclamationcoaching

If you’re ready to stop living on autopilot and start leading your life with deep presence, I’d love to work with you. Book a free interest call here: Click Here

💌 Want more? Follow me on Instagram @themotherhoodmentor for somatic tools, nervous system support, and real-talk on high-functioning burnout, ambition, healing perfectionism, and motherhood. And also pretty epic meme drops.

🎧 Did you love this episode? Be sure to follow and please take a quick moment to leave a review and send this episode to a friend. I'd love to hear from you on how this podcast impacted you, send me a DM or an email.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the Motherhood Mentor Podcast.
I'm Becca, a somatic healingpractitioner and a holistic life
coach for moms, and thispodcast is for you.
You can expect honestconversations and incredible
guests that speak to health,healing and growth in every area
of our lives.
This isn't just strategy forwhat we do.
It's support for who we are.
I believe we can be wildlyambitious while still holding

(00:25):
all of our soft and hardhumanity as holy.
I love combining deep innerhealing with strategic systems
and no-nonsense talk about whatthis season is really like.
So grab whatever weird healthbeverage you're currently into
and let's get into it.
Welcome to today's episode ofthe Motherhood Mentor Podcast.

(00:45):
Today, I have Andrew Rosenstockwith me, and I was first
excited to have Andrew on thispodcast.
We had connected through apodcasting group and he had sent
me a blog.
I think you would call it ablog an online article, maybe is
the better word.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
A writing.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
Yeah, about somatics and about especially how
somatics has become a buzzword,and as soon as I read it I was
like I want to have aconversation with this guy.
So, Andrew, thank you forcoming to the podcast today.
I'd love if you would just kindof briefly just introduce who
you are and what you do a littlebit.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Yeah, well, first thing, I'll say one of the
things, before I even go intothat, just to hit on something
you said which will tie in is Iam happy that you are happy to
talk about this, because for meit is, besides what we're going
to talk about, why it'simportant.
It's just, somatics islife-changing in a real, not to
be dramatic way, but a real,felt way, and so to dive more

(01:45):
into the depth of what it canmean, the roots of where it
comes from and what it points to, is something that I believe
people who are in several placeslike you and me love talking
about it.
So, yeah, which brings us into.
So I have a lot of titles.
One of them is a registeredsomatic movement therapist.
I'm what's called a rolfer,biodynamic, craniosacral

(02:09):
therapist, yoga therapist.
I got kind of lucky in that Itook a break from life and
became a backpacker and thenstarted studying along my
travels and, at some point,changed profession because I'd
studied so much and learned somuch and all of a sudden, I had
all these titles that, to me,all pointed to the same thing.

(02:33):
They all pointed to this way ofhow, how can we simply be in
this world with more ease?
You know, yoga would talk aboutunion, or what's union with
this thing?
There's less disconnection, sothere's more ease in that.
Rolfing talks about gravity.
I'm looking at how bodies movewithin gravity.
Well, if we can align withgravity, a force of nature or a

(02:54):
force of life, there's more ease, you know.
And biodynamic cranial has adifferent but similar sort of
approach, and so they're allvery similar in this way which
is, I think, either accidentalor my subconscious is like,
really primed, and I just didn'trealize that they're both.
So that's a bit of what, likemy titles are, but I I work with

(03:18):
people and just to kind offigure out what is what's going
on.
And so the cool thing aboutsomatics is it is really a
bridge between body and mind,you know, because a lot of it's
looking at how patterns of our,how we exist in pattern-making

(03:39):
ways and understanding how thepatterns are and why they are
and are they still serving usand if not, how do we evoke
newer patterns or differentpatterns?
So how's that for an intro?

Speaker 1 (03:54):
I love that and I even had to laugh when you were
like you know people.
I think something to theeffects of people like us love
talking about somatics, and Ithink that's what's fascinating
is.
I was so drawn to somatics, Ithink before I had even learned
the word somatics.
I was just drawn into movementas medicine, before I had the

(04:15):
language, before I had thetraining, before I had the tools
.
But I think what's reallyfascinating is a lot of the
people that I work with withsomatics are not always the
people you would think are drawnto somatic work and in fact, a
lot of times when I startedintroducing it into my coaching,
my clients were like wait, no,like let's go back to the

(04:35):
mindset, let's go back to thelike.
My thoughts create my feelings,create my actions, let's go
back to the like.
I want something concrete, giveme something to do.
And all of a sudden we startedintroducing somatic work and a
little bit they were like wait,this is too intangible, but they
would get done.
And they're like wait, I feeldifferent, I'm showing up

(04:56):
different, something's changed,but I can't put my finger on it,
I can't find language for it.
One of the things I loved inthat article you wrote is you
were talking about how do wedefine something that, like by
its own nature, isn'tnecessarily just cognitive?
So I'd love to just hear, Iguess, your roots of somatics
and like what does that evenmean to you?

(05:18):
What is somatic to you, andwhere do you see that disconnect
between how we try to explainsomatics versus what it actually
is in practice?

Speaker 2 (05:28):
Yeah, I mean, this is what I love talking about so
great.
One other thing I should sayfor a title just because it's
the Motherhood podcast is I'malso a dad to an amazing
10-month and what were like fourdays, five day old, 10-month,
five day old little girl, lena,who I love.
So what brought me intosomatics was a bunch of stuff I
first started doing.

(05:49):
What I learned was somatics airquotes for those just listening
in a yoga therapy training andwe were doing these exercises
that were like a littledifferent than yoga and they
were called somatics and theywere coming.
I later learned were coming outof Thomas Hanna's work and
Thomas Hanna is the person whokind of coined the term and I'll
dive into him a little bit butwhen I like and I liked them,

(06:11):
they were fun.
But later, when I sort oflearned more about somatics, I
realized that those practiceswere not somatic in the term.
They were just another way ofdoing an exercise.
They were still being taughtand doing this and while they
were fun, they were probably funbecause they were different and
I think a lot of people likethem because why, well, we've
been doing this yoga thing for awhile.
I'm kind of bored.
Here's this other thing.
Oh cool, now my ego can saylook at these other things I'm

(06:33):
doing.
I'm a better person now, youknow, or whatever it is.
I've got this new material Yay,spiritual Materialism, awesome.
But that's what kind ofintroduced me into it.
And so I was doing somatic.
I was doing what I would callHannah somatics, but it was much
later I realized I wasn't doingit.
What I would say is somaticallyand so like, what does that

(06:55):
mean to me is you have to kindof look at the origin of the
story.
So this guy, thomas Hannah who,by the way, I'm not like,
hopefully I'm not sounding like,oh, he's an evil person, he's
great.
He helped bring this out.
He was a student of a guy namedMoshe Feldenkrais and he was
also a philosophy.
I think he was a professor.
He was a philosopher I don'tknow if he was a professor or

(07:18):
not and he more or lesssimplified a lot of most of
Feldenkrais' practices andcreated these thematic practices
.
In my take, they're a littleless in-depth than Feldenkrais,
but they work.
They do a point.
And he brought stuff in.
But he came up with the termthematics and he says that it

(07:41):
comes from I think it's theGreek.
I always confuse them.
It's the Roman and the Greek.
I think it's the Greek.
I always confuse them.
It's the Roman and the Greek.
I think it's the Greek thatthere are two forms of the body
One is the lived body and one isthe sort of conceptual or dead
body.
So you can't see it.
But over on my side I have askeleton just over there, and
that skeleton, we would say, isactually nothing but an idea,

(08:02):
and when we impose that ontoourself, we're actually not
living within our body, we'reliving in the dead and
non-material thing.
But this soma, this lived,experienced body, that is what
we're attempting to work with.
It's sometimes whatphilosophers will say the
preconceptual, thepre-reflection.
Philosophers will say thepreconceptual, the
pre-reflection is right beforethe idea of it.

(08:25):
That is the experience, and sothat's where the somatics comes
from.
But what a lot of people don'tknow is that, hannah, actually
that philosophical statementhe's saying actually came, like
almost a hundred years beforehim, from a German philosopher
named Edmund Husserl, which Iknow this gets a little boring

(08:46):
for some people saying why doesit matter?
Not to me, okay.

Speaker 1 (08:49):
I'm getting out my notebook.

Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yeah, yeah, I've written a bit more about this.
And there's other peopleMichael Shea has written about
this, don Allen Johnson, variousother thematic people.
Don Allen Johnson is a big name.
Michael Shea is not as wellknown but written a lot of books
and great and a lovely dude.
So Husserl was actually theperson who kind of came up with
this.
He had the German word of andmy German's not great, but of

(09:12):
Korpenliebe or Liebe, and it'sthe same thing.
There's a sort of limb, bodyand this conceptual body.
So and then the variousphenomenology Herzog's father is
something called phenomenology.
That branch of philosophy hasreally impacted me and impacted
other body worker, movementpeople, because it's really

(09:34):
looking at how this body as anon-conceptual being is and how
can we move or be in this body,in this experience.
So that's sort of the roots ofhow I got more into somatics,

(09:54):
various sort of accidentalthings.
My first rolfing client when Igraduated as a rolfer was
actually a professor ofphilosophy and I was working on
him.
He said you're doing my workembodied, and I was like smiling
, like oh, thank you, having noidea what it meant, you know,
like okay, thanks.
And so we would work and hewould like explain these sort of

(10:16):
things to me from a veryconceptual level, and the
concepts were important becausewe are conceptual human beings,
we have a prefrontal cortex, fora reason, and it's great, and
making sense of stuff is great,but it's not the actual
experience, it's the, it's thecodification, the wrapping of
the experience, and sorecognizing the two is

(10:38):
incredibly helpful, because arewe, if we're trying to like,
heal or help ourselves, are wecontinuing to go more into ideas
which have value but can alsotake us far and far away?
We can actually be.
What I sometimes say is we canbe moving east, but we think
we're going north and so we keepgoing east.

(10:59):
Yeah, I'm going north.
And then all of a sudden, werealize, well, this didn't get
me to where I thought I would go.
Yeah, I'll take a break.
We realized, well, this didn'tget me to where I thought I
would go.

Speaker 1 (11:06):
Yeah, I'll take a break, yeah, yeah yeah, yeah,
it's the paradox of talkingabout something meant to be felt
, like you had said in thearticle, and I think that's what
drew me, I believe, deeply intosomatics.
For my own practice, for my ownhealing, is because I had done
so much cognitive talk therapyand I was in early motherhood

(11:29):
and I was at this place where Iwas, I was experiencing, you
know, I had a lot of freeze, Ihad a lot of disassociation that
I wouldn't have known.
I wouldn't have told you that Ididn't have language for the
experience until years later,until recently really.
But birth and kind of earlymotherhood all of a sudden had
me feeling and experiencingthings that I didn't have

(11:52):
language for and I had thecognitive understanding and
knowledge of like okay, traumaprobably created this, but I had
this.
I don't need to go back totherapy and talk about what
happened.
I already know what happened.
What I don't understand is whyI'm standing in my kitchen and
my toddler is triggering me likethis.
What I don't understand is whenmy husband does this, why is it

(12:14):
triggering these responses inme?
And that's kind of when I foundsomatics of like why is my body
still holding these things thatconceptually I can logically say
isn't happening anymore, but mybody is still experiencing and
in that, so in that season, Ihad this draw towards I don't
want to talk, I don't need totalk about what happened anymore

(12:36):
, I want to feel differently.
I know how I feel now.
I really didn't, but that's thelanguage I would have used and
I think that's what drew me intosomatic is, I had started doing
kickboxing workouts and aftereach kickboxing workout I would
just start crying and I didn'tunderstand why it was such a
relief, why it was such acathartic experience for me.

(12:58):
And that was kind of myintroduction into somatics, was
kind of understanding.
It wasn't just the intellectualidea of what happened, it was
the felt experience of it thenand that my body was still
experiencing it in the present,even though it was a past
history.
But my body didn't feel thatyet.
So I'm just curious.

Speaker 2 (13:19):
Your body didn't feel what didn't your body feel yet?

Speaker 1 (13:23):
My body didn't feel current safety, like my body had
never moved through theexpression of fight or flight.
My body had never processed ormoved through the trauma.
With integration.
A lot of my trauma was early onin childhood.
There wasn't.
So my body was starting to havethese expressions or have these
things that I was movingthrough and I'm grateful now

(13:45):
that I have the language for it.
But I again, it's that feltexperience of a thing, not just
the cognitive understanding ofsomatics.
It's and you spoke in thearticle of, I think we're, I
think so many people are seekingfor that one singular, all
encompassingcompassing solution,and I think somatics has become
the new keyword for that, thenew like oh, here's the magic

(14:09):
bullet.
But I think a lot of people areusing it as this prescriptive.
Here is somatics, here's the do, here's how you regulate your
system, here's how you calm down, and it's like you're missing
the part where you relate towhat you're experiencing and
feeling.

Speaker 2 (14:25):
Well, yes, and because it's more than just
movement, you find it in.
I have a lot of clients who aretop therapist clients.
They're top therapist, that'swhat they do in their clients.
Yeah, and they all of a suddensay, well, I'm doing these
somatic practices like IFS, andI'm like, how is IFS a somatic?
I understand that they name itthat way.
It's super conceptual.

(14:47):
Somatic experiencing, I find,can be somatic.
But most of the somaticexperiencing people I meet are
just doing it on a cognitivelevel and so you can codify the
physical and still be at amental codification of it, which
is therefore not the somaticprocess.
But again, right now I have ajoke that somatics is the new

(15:12):
nervous system, which was thenew psoas, which was the new
fascia.
I messed the order up.
It's a different order.
But which was the new black?
We just keep jumping forwhatever the new hot thing is,
because that's kind of how,whether it's a society or
whether it's how we're wired, weseem to keep liking that.
But somatics, I would say, byitself could be the the magic

(15:34):
bullet, but it generally isn't,because it's more inclusive than
even itself, and so it it's.
There's like so much more thatcould be done.
I bring various parts oftherapy-ish things into my
practice because I thinkunderstanding neuroscience is

(15:56):
pretty important here tounderstand a bit of the why of a
source, but also to recognizethe why we have is not
necessarily the why, it's justthe best why we can come up with
at this moment.
And so to get out of theabsolute of that but to say, hey
, this is what's going on.
For me it's incrediblyimportant in somatics and there

(16:17):
have been a few in the ISMEDA,which is the somatic, I forget
International Somatic andMovement Educators' Teachers
Association.
I'm gonna guess I forgetInternational Somatic and
Movement Educators TeachersAssociation, I'm going to guess.
I don't know the exact what itstands for, but I'm an ISMETA
member.
I should know there's been moreneuroscience coming in, but some
of the people again they'relike haven't fully, I think,

(16:39):
immersed themselves in thephenomenological, which is what
you're talking about, the feltfeeling of it prior, like.
Just for those who don't know,phenomenology, it's, this is the
branch of metaphysics that sortof looks at.
I mean, essentially buddhism isa is a form of phenomenology
where we're looking at the worldas simply phenomena and so that
there's simply things happeningof which prior to us labeling

(17:01):
it or making it as as we it.
There are simply justexperiences.
We cognitize the experience andlabel and create boxes for it.
That's what we're good at, butthat's not actually necessarily
what it is.
It's how we understand it to be, it's how we make it up to be,
and so semantics for me is veryphenomenological because it is

(17:24):
getting out of the way that weare.
Yeah, the problem is thatsometimes, as you know, it's A
I'm drawn in like five places,but B it's such a rich area and
the more we drop into it, tosome extent words fall away,
which is a great excuse and whyI can't say anymore.
But also it's a bit of thetruth is that maybe your clients

(17:47):
or you, when you've been there,you get into those sort of
deeper places where everythingis flowing or whatnot, but yet
there isn't a way to describe it, and I think that's partly
where I just went.
So I'll take a break there andsee how that was.

Speaker 1 (18:01):
Yeah, well, and it's true, I think a lot of the
somatic work I've done, I mean,even I just think of you know,
through fall and winter I wasdoing some pretty deep somatic
work and I, while I was goingthrough it, I didn't have a ton
of language to to explain andI'm someone who, like I don't

(18:21):
stop talking Hence why I have apodcast like jokes to all my
teachers, who every report cardI ever got was like Becca can't
stop talking, like I'm never ata loss for words.
And yet, somatic work, there'ssome times where I'm
experiencing something andthere's a felt sense of what's
happening, but, like, sometimesafter I won't have the language
for it.

(18:42):
I still don't necessarily havethe language for the work that I
did fall and winter, but I knowthat it deeply and intimately
changed so many aspects of mylife and I'm starting to witness
.
Things feel different, thingslook different, I'm showing up
different, I'm behavingdifferent, but there's not this
like pinpointed, like here's themagical pill that I took,

(19:02):
here's the somatic practice thatI did, because it was such an
interwoven experience ofrelating to myself, not even
always with cognitive words, butjust experiencing it.
And I'm trying to think of howto describe this for people
because we're on a podcasttalking about it, but it's like
it's the difference between metelling you what a cookie smells

(19:24):
like and you smelling a cookie.
I don's like it's thedifference between me telling
you what a cookie smells likeand you smelling a cookie.
I don't know why.
That's the example that came tomind.
It's the difference betweenintellectually knowing what is
what it's going to be like to bea parent and then actually
becoming a parent, actuallygoing through the experience and
the act of it.
It's the it's so good.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
I mean, that's the challenge with selling the thing
, and I have colleagues who sellbetter than I do, for sure, but
I would say, without somethingto eat or whatever, their
product is kind of a joke.
But their product, what they'reoffering, is far inferior,
which is why they're busier thanI am.
But when they can't help people, they send them to me and I'm

(20:05):
okay with that.
Sure, there's moments of fear,of insecurity that come up and
say, oh, but I should be busier.
But no, I had clients who aremarketing gurus and they say you
need to do better marketing forthis and I was like good luck.
And then after a few sessionsthey say you're right, you can't
really market it, because theissue is again to market.
It isn't it To market, it is toput an image around what we're

(20:27):
trying to express.
But that isn't the actualfeeling.
It still keeps us locked inthat way.
I mean, I appreciate yourcookie.
I used to use a similar oneabout tasting chocolate and
would say you know, if you seeme eating a piece of chocolate,
you say what is that?
You know you've never had it.
I say, oh, you know, it'schocolate, it's sweet, it's
bitter, it's dark.

(20:47):
And the person says ah yeah, Icompletely understand.
But then they go eat chocolateand I say that is not exactly
what I thought it would be right, or similar.
When I work with clients a lotto try to get them to separate
thoughts and feelings becausethey're so conflated together,

(21:08):
especially in this world that welive in.
I'll put a finger on them andsay okay, so what's happening
right now?
Like what do you feel?
And I say I feel you touchingme and I say no, I say no, no,
no, you don't feel me touchingyou.
You feel touch.
Let me explain another way.
Imagine if there was a midgethiding under a short person I
don't know if the correctapologies to people there A
small person under the tablethat you didn't see, and when I

(21:30):
put my finger on you, they wereactually putting their finger on
you.
Now you didn't see them.
You would say Andrew istouching you.
That is actually not what'shappening.
All you feel is touch.
Your brain creates anotherstory based on everything it
knows and labels the touchesAndrew and all that, unless you
were really familiar withworking with me for a while and
knowing what my touch actuallyfelt like.
We have now separated these twothings, or we've combined these

(21:53):
two things together, andrew andtouch to be one thing, but
actually, from the somatic way,there's just touch, right,
there's just touch, that's goingon there with another, there's
another object, this other humanbeing.
Does that make sense?
Does that make some sense?

Speaker 1 (22:08):
I mean that makes total sense and I think this is
we're, I think our culture is sostuck in the thought, in the
story, and I mean I live in thisworld of somatics, like
personally, I I it myself, butlike also as a coach and I'm
still a very cognitive personwhere it's like no, I'm not

(22:30):
actually experiencing andfeeling and sensing, I'm just
thinking about it, I'm creatingstories, I'm up in my head and I
think being up in our heads andin cognition is one of the ways
that we avoid sensation, weavoid feeling that touch,
because feeling for a lot ofpeople is very uncomfortable.

Speaker 2 (22:48):
Yeah, Well, yeah, we also don't want to demonize
cognition.
It's what keeps us alive.
It's what keeps us movingforward and it serves a great
point.
It's also wonderful as asympathetic nervous system
responds.
So if we need to be thinkingabout something, we're going to
be in a sympathetic state.

(23:10):
Sympathetic state Again.
Thinking is a hard word becausethere's certain levels and ways
of thinking.
Any sort of, I would say,movement happening from our
brainstem is mental thought.
So it's not mental movements ofthought, it's just not a purely
conceptual thought or a cortexsort of thought.

(23:30):
So I don't want to demonizethinking.
The issue is that it can runamok and so then we are spending
more time in there and takingus further out.
As you said, we can't think andfeel at the same time.
We can micro switch quickly,but we can't do it both at the
same time.
But we can create thought whatI was going to say like thoughts

(23:53):
as feelings or feelings asthoughts would probably be more
of it.
So we can sort of take over orhijack the actual felt sense by
using a logical reduction of itwhich keeps us from feeling and
keeps us moving in thatdirection, which serves a
wonderful purpose in lots ofways.
It just doesn't serve as sortof being more present, being

(24:16):
more here or really being withreality, because the sad thing
is and I don't mean to scarepeople everything that Rebecca
thinks, everything Andrew thinks, isn't really objectively real.
It's just our own subjectivereality, not that it can't align
with it, but it's just ourunderstanding of things and our
memories are very faulty.
We have a conversation for likea year from now again, and I'll

(24:38):
talk about how great your redshirt was and you'll talk about
how cool my purple shirt was,and that's not the case.
But that's how we remember itand we stick into that.
And so we keep looping in thesesort of non-real places, but
feeling prior to the thought,that feeling is real, it is just
nature, it is all that, andthat is in some way what

(24:59):
somatics can allow for.
But something I think we're kindof alluding to before is it can
be very scary, not in a sort ofhorror movie way, but you know,
when people, a lot of peoplework with trauma, say I really
want to work with trauma, right,but okay, well, why haven't you
been?
Because a part of us has beenheavily scared or traumatized or

(25:21):
whatever.
But again the mind will say ohyeah, I want to do it, but no,
working with all that sort ofstuff, all that stuff we've
pushed aside.
No, it's scary.
I don't want to feel.
I'd rather just be thisautonomous robot unit and just
kind of you know, do that sortof thing.
No disrespect to Elon Musk, youknow he's served very good in
ways, but, like you know, andthen you get sort of you get

(25:45):
what a lot of what I think tiesto the beginning.
I don't want to be this wayanymore.
Okay, what am I going to do?
I'm going to pendulate over tothis other way.
I'm going to do somatics.
Well, I'm doing the idea.
I'm being the best version ofmyself.
But that's still like wrappedup in in all this sort of sub or

(26:08):
or or contra, uh, likesubconscious or conscious aspect
.
Still, there's like a lot ofthis gripping, which is why so
many mental health, so many bodyhealth, so many coaches, really
unhealthy, like leaders intrauma.
I took this big trauma course,big leaders in it, christ man,
there was like very few peoplewho I felt safe with.
I was like these people haveavoided their body very well,

(26:30):
but they have, they canunderstand it, they don't live
in it.
And then you get the, the, theothers like most of the, many of
the, like the money, many of.
For me.
The people say who should Istudy with somatics?
I'll name some people and theysay I've never heard of them.
I say exactly the people you'veheard of.
A lot of times that's justinsecurity, that's that's hidden

(26:55):
repression, that says I gottashow how big I am look at me
right which I have no interestin studying with those people.
So there's like this kind ofcatch 22 of sorts.
Like most people that I knowdon't know bonnie bambridge
cohen and to me she's really oneof the last of the real like
people who have the depth ofwhat a somatic is.
Or andrew olsen or karen mccosewonderful, wonderful teachers.

(27:19):
But you haven't really heard ofthem and I think that's because
they're content with just beingthemselves, you know well you
spoke to, I think a few things.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
I apologize, I go no, I, I no, I love it, I love it
and I'm following along.
This is the way that I thinkand experience life too.
It's like it's somultidimensional and I get
pulled and all of thesedifferent directions all at once
.
But, like, what I'm sittingwith is there's, I think so many
people have such a desire fordepths and yet they don't know

(27:56):
how to live in the place of thedepths.
They know how to talk about it,they know how to look like it
and I think even just the fieldof coaches, of therapists,
there's so much about knowingmore without actually taking
that medicine.
Like you, you don't know it inyour bones.
And I think this is the likenot to bring myself on a whole

(28:19):
different tangent, because don'tget me started at GPT, but like
people keep being so excitedfor this thing and it's like
don't get me wrong, I see apurpose in like being able to
see patterns or like drawingstuff that would take you
forever, but I'm just likeknowing more has never helped us
.

Speaker 2 (28:39):
It's, it's it's yes and no, yes and no it has.

Speaker 1 (28:42):
There's certain things that can help with.
And yet I'm sitting here, going, I work with women and I count
myself as this person too.
I knew a lot, but it didn'tactually change the way that I
was living.
It didn't change the way that Iwas walking and breathing, my
posture.
It's like I I understood theconcept, but I didn't feel it in

(29:02):
my bones and it didn't changethe way that I moved and
experienced life.
And to me, I think it's justthis.
It can almost be thisperformance piece, but I think
our bodies can feel thatsomething's off, Something's
weird about it.
It's missing a depth.
But again, I think that'ssomething that it happens in
relationship, not just concept,it's not just here.

(29:26):
Let me sell you this outcome,Let me give you this result.
It's like I don't know whatyou're going to come with.
I don't know where you're goingto want to go with it.
That's not for me to say.

Speaker 2 (29:38):
Totally.
Yeah, I mean my first clienttoday.
He came in.
I haven't seen him in like sixmonths because he wasn't living
here and he's coming in and he'sbeen doing this program from
chiropractor stuff and he's anice guy.
But he comes in and I'm lookingand he's saying he feels much
better.
And I'm looking at him sayingI'm not going to sell this to
him.
I'm like you look much worse.

(29:58):
You look like you.
You know he's saying I'll dothis functional medicine thing.
And I asked him well,functional for what?
And whose definition offunction?
You know, because he looks likehe's put all this stuff on so
he can be stronger.
But the actual issue that wasthere was never actually
addressed.
So it's inside of it.
But you know he's got moreinformation, more knowledge,

(30:20):
more this or that, so he's doingit right, which, yeah, in some
way he is.
But also what we found withinit took a little while, but
minutes on the table.
There was a lot of discomfortunderneath.
That's what happens when icemelts.
It becomes, you know, ice isn'tlike I can't wait to be water,
no, it has to vibrate and move.
It's really uncomfortable.

(30:41):
Then it's like oh man, water isgreat, I don't want to be
frozen again.
But there's no way, I meanthere's no way we can know that.
Until we know that or until wefeel that and it's hard to feel,
like we said, it's sort of hardto feel that I think culture in
some way our culture gets abetter up.
I spent 12 years as a nomad.
I lived all over not all over,but over most of the world, much

(31:04):
of the world, and I saw a lotof similarities across a lot of
cultures.
So I don't know how much islike even east and west.
I mean they've blended a lot,so we like to keep these
separations.
I don't know how much is likeeven East and West.
I mean they've blended a lot,so we like to keep these
separations.
I don't know if it's our culture, I don't know if it's just
human culture.
I don't know what it is.

(31:24):
But yeah, I, I, I, I agree withwhat you're saying and I partly
don't, whereas the knowledgehas never done that, has never
helped us, and I know you kindof correct it.
But to say it's not that itcan't, it's that it maybe isn't
or really for you it wasn'thelping, which is also to say
that the next person you'recoaching it might be, and for me

(31:45):
, so much of my work is actuallyabout knowledge, but not just
knowledge, because you have acortex and you have a sub brain,
so we need to work with both,and if we're just working with
one, we're denying the actualsort of experience.
Does that make some sense?

Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yeah, yeah, I love what you're saying.
I think the way that I think ofit is.
I think there's a differencebetween knowledge and
information, between knowledgeand information.
My husband, for example, likewe have a garage full of tools
like welding woodworking.

Speaker 2 (32:20):
Oh, nice All of it.

Speaker 1 (32:22):
He can build anything .
He is incredible that way.
I technically own those toolsright Like they're all down in
my garage right now, but there'sa difference between me going
down there and being like thisis a welder and me actually
knowing how to weld things likeknowing how to use that.
I think that's the different tome, that's the difference

(32:43):
between information andknowledge is I have the applied
knowledge of how to use thatthing.
That to me is somewhat of likeembodied knowledge and
information.
Does that make sense?

Speaker 2 (32:54):
yeah, it makes sense to me why, somewhat of like
embodied knowledge andinformation, does that make
sense?
It makes sense to me why youwould think that it doesn't make
sense to me as from a logicalreasoning.
For me, the way that I, it doesmake sense, but that definition
, the knowledge, because youcould say I still have
information on how to use it.
I just I don't know how to useit, but I have information on

(33:14):
how I could use it, but I don'tquite know how to use it, so
that some of that, that sort ofmetaphor you spoke of, doesn't
fully resonate.
Yeah, but I think I get whereyou're going.
For me, what I say, thedifference between like thinking
and knowing is that knowing wefeel known, we don't feel
thinking.
So when we know something andthere's actually there's a felt

(33:36):
depth to it of like, oh andthere's actually like, so that
there's it is tied more into,into more of a feeling, not that
our feeling is is right,because we can be totally sure
it's something really I knowthis to be true.
And then later we realize I was, I was wrong, but in that
moment it is what we knew to betrue, and so there, later, we
realized I was.
I was wrong, but in that momentit is what we knew to be true,

(33:57):
and so there was.
There is more of us being there, whereas it's just thinking.
For me, thinking has more of anupness to it and knowledge has
a weight to it.
I feel myself in it.
Whereas thinking is there, mybody isn't really there.
It's a cloud over there.
Does that make some sense?

Speaker 1 (34:12):
Yeah, yeah, I like the way you defined that.
I'm curious for you and you Ithink we were kind of touching
on this a little bit but likethe difference between like
mindfulness and embodiment, oris there a difference like where
, where do those two connect?

Speaker 2 (34:27):
as I also teach meditation and so this and I
teach in a slightly differentway than most, because for me it
ties in exactly to that I findmany meditation teachers not
very embodied and I think it'san interesting aspect.
So I think, first what I'll sayis, when I talk about
meditation and mindfulness, Isay that people can often

(34:50):
confuse these two together, theyconflate them together, that
mindfulness is meditation, andthe first thing we want to know
is that is not fully true, thatmindfulness is the doorway into
meditation or being in ameditative way or meditative
state, but it's the doorway intothe house.
But we don't want to be walkingaround with the door saying,

(35:11):
hey, look at that, this is myhouse right here.
It's just a way in.
It's not the same thing.
You can have the house withouta door in a way, but you can't
have a door.
That doesn't mean you have ahouse, you can just have a door
sitting by itself.
So we can kind of confuse allof these things together and
people get stuck in these sortof mindful ways and they're
doing all these mindfulpractices, calling it meditation

(35:33):
.
But it is the doorway in, so insome way it is required.
It is so we could say thatbecause it's required, because
it's the start of the process,it is one and the same, even
though it's also not the same.
It's the entryway in.
It's more of a process way oflooking at it.
So mindfulness is required formeditation and I'll bring it

(35:54):
into embodiment in a little bitif I can.
But for most people they're notmeditating, they're simply
stuck in a thought, whereas whatis meditation?
For me, meditation is simplybeing with the world as it is,
not lost in thought about theworld or in a heavily
disassociated state, just beingwith things as they are, just
being with things as they are.
I can bring in thephenomenology from Heidegger's

(36:16):
Das Fein if you want, but Idon't get a little bit more
technical.
But I find that really reallyhelpful.
It's what Buddhism is, I thinkmore or less, or that Buddha was
more or less saying was notbeing lost in our thoughts, not
being lost in desires, simplybeing here.
But Buddhism didn't really dealwith embodiment at that point.

(36:39):
So the issue is we can do thesemindful practices and then get
to these states and say, ah, I'min meditation without realizing
we're really just, we've justsort of either peeled a layer or
added a layer on and whathappens for some is they get, so
this will seem like a branchthat'll tie in.
There are some, some scientists,researchers are looking at how
meditation isn't always healthy,how it actually can be very

(37:00):
disassociated, and there arelots of experiences that people
going to meditation retreatsgetting like a really bad
dissociation.
And that, to me, makes totalsense, because meditation itself
is a disassociative program orprocess.
We are in a state of beingwhich is largely we're talking

(37:22):
about largely mental based andwe're attempting to get out of
it.
So we're going to get out ofour current state, we're
dissociating from our currentstate.
Well, there's a lot of stuffunder the hood that we haven't
dealt with or we pushed away,that we forgot about, we haven't
seen, and we kind of clear sometop layer and then all that
stuff comes up.
Well, holy shit, that is notgood, that's scary.
We check out in various ways orwe block it even more and we

(37:46):
block it even more.
And now we're in meditationbecause we're just like in these
sort of states and we keeptelling ourselves we're in.
And because we tell ourselveswe're in it, guess what?
We're in it even more.
Look at me.
Embodiment to me comes afterthat, or it doesn't have to come
after that, but usually itcomes after that where we
recognize oh, I'm in meditation,look at me, whatever that sort

(38:08):
of is.
And then we realize, wait aminute, there's no.
There's either no ground hereor there's too much ground here.
And by what I mean by that iseither like I'm floating, but I
haven't realized it, or like I'mthe ground's really heavy and I
can't even move.
These are sort of two ways ofdescribing it.
Neither are very balanced,whereas when we get into that
embodied state we're not tooheavy on the ground or too up in

(38:31):
the sky, which again issomething I think hard to fully
explain until we feel into that.
I had a new client on Mondaymaybe yesterday, no Monday, I
think who after her session shesaid it oh my god, I feel the
ground.
I haven't, I haven't.
She didn't realize how shewasn't feeling the ground and I

(38:54):
was like, yeah, that's.
She's like.
This is so weird.
I said well, for you, it'sweird.
I hear this five times a weekat least, you know because we're
so wrapped up that we haven'tfelt, we aren't aware of the
ground.
We're up in these, these, theseprocesses, and again we need to
be.
We have kids.
Like you have kids.
It is very hard to just be here.

(39:14):
Like you know, right beforethis call, my wife sent a video
of my daughter opening drawersand I'm like holy shit, we need
to know, like this is awesomeand exciting and also like holy
shit, we need to, we need toquickly baby-brew the house.
This is like she's going to,like she could drink more.
You know, I could get all sortof wrapped up and when I do that
I'm not in the ground.

(39:36):
So the meditation I find for atleast in my own process and
dealing with people, usuallywe're in, kind of after some
point of mindfulness, we get tothis other place where we're in
one or the other, but there'snot the embodiment there.
The embodiment sort of comes alittle bit later and then the

(39:58):
embodiment in some regarddoesn't embodiment such a silly
word because really, what doesit mean?
To be disembodied is to be deador to have some part of us cut
off, right, so like you lose thearm and the arm is disembodied.
We're using this, we're usingembodiment from a philosophical
term which really is aboutpresence, and so the more that
we are present, the more we arehere with what is, the more
embodied we are and it's peoplethinking black and white, it's

(40:18):
super spectrum-y Like.
So when I needed to take a breakbefore it's because I wasn't
really here.
I was getting really excitedand that was cool and there was
this and that, but I wasn't ableto be here.
And I can, I can exist in thatway, I can function in that way
because of all these sort ofpatterns and mind-making things.
But because of my practices, Iwas able to recognize it.

(40:39):
Now some could say, but youshould have recognized it
earlier, and I would agree,you're right, I should have, but
I'm not there yet.
So I did just fine, but I couldhave recognized it earlier, but
I didn't.
When I did, I said, oh okay,yeah, take a moment.
Right, first of all, am I safeto take a moment If my kid's
about to drink that like poisonin the counter?
Please don't take a moment.
Please don't be like wait aminute.

(41:01):
No, please act in that way.
But when I can, I can check in.
And I would somewhat saytheoretically, when we could be
deeply embodied, we wouldactually be doing that in that
sort of way, without being in afully on hijack state, but of
just kind of moving with it.
But, as you mentioned earlier,when we're living with other

(41:22):
people, especially children,it's hard to be present.
So does that kind of answer,the embodiment?
There's more.
I could go, but did that kindof answer the embodiment.

Speaker 1 (41:34):
there's more I could go, but and I love that you
brought it to presence, becausethat's actually I.
I was going there too when youwere talking of I.
I think we use we throw aroundthe word presence or embodied,
like those.
Those are words that are thrownaround but people aren't just
describing like not just whatdoes it mean, but how does it
feel, how does that, what doesthat look like when you're
moving through your day, presentversus not present?

(41:57):
One of the ways that I oftenthink of it is are my thoughts
and my sensations in the roomwith me, like, am I here or am I
like too floaty, where, like,I'm thinking and feeling about
something else the past, thefuture?
Am I with my kid?
But I'm thinking about work,which there's nothing
necessarily wrong with that butlike you can be in the room

(42:17):
without really being in the room.
It's like when you're drivingand you're like, how did I get
here?
It's like, well, you weren'tembodied, you weren't present
because you were just kind ofrunning on autopilot, and I
think it's very easy for us torun on autopilot.
Well, I shouldn't say yeah itis.
For a lot of people it's easy torun on autopilot Especially I
think of, like my functioners,the highly ambitious.

(42:39):
They're really good at justgoing through the motions and
doing what they're supposed todo, but it's missing this color.
It's missing this liveliness.
It's, you know, a lot of, andI'm curious to know if you've
experienced this in parenthood.
But a lot of women, a lot ofmothers, they come into this
season of life and they go.
I don't know who I am anymore.

(42:59):
I don't feel like myself.
And when they say I don't feellike myself, I think what they
literally mean is I don't feelme.
I can attune to my child'sneeds and what they have, what I
have to do for them, theactions I have to go through,
but I don't have like a.
I don't feel deeply connectedwith my feet on the ground to
where I am, because there's justso much going on.

Speaker 2 (43:23):
I just felt again.
As mentioned earlier, I'm not amother, so I can't really fully
tell you about that because Iwill never have that experience.
I can share what I see with mywife and with others.
I think you're touching on apoint, but I think a bigger part
really has to do with identity,and so the issue is how we've

(43:43):
identified or perceived ourselfto be shifted.
And so if I'm feeling myself,as I've always felt, as Rebecca,
and all of a sudden I'veshifted out of Rebecca into
Andrew, I won't feel like Andrewfor a while because the
perception was always as beingRebecca.
It's not the best metaphor.
So part of it, I think, is thatthey're not feeling like

(44:07):
themselves because they don'tknow who they are, because the
identity has changed and so, asit's changing, how can we?
I mean, it's a little bitdifferent.
But people say how is it beinga dad?
And my answer people don't lovemy answer.
I say I don't know, I don'tfeel like a dad yet, and I know
it's been 10 months, but Ipresume it's going to take me a

(44:28):
little while before I I mean I,you know, I know I have a
daughter and I know she's likeI'm tearing up just thinking
about it, she's my favoritething in the world and I love
holding her identity, that Iconceptually I understand it,
but it still hasn't landed in meand I think it's so much easier
being a father than being amother.
It's so much like my wife isdefinitely dealing with that and

(44:52):
she's also from another culturethat has other ways of looking
at it and she's living outsideof her culture as well.
So it's like it's really hardfor her in a lot of ways and she
definitely struggles a lot morewith it.
And I think there's naturally ahormonal safety towards safety,
which is also worry, and so weget in these worry states which,

(45:14):
again, as we become, we mightsay, as we become more embodied,
as we become more aware, we cansay, well, that's a stupid
thing, I shouldn't be doing thator whatever that sort of you
know thing is, but like thatdoesn't change anything because
it's still kind of there.
And the more we can kind ofmeet it with compassion and be
like, oh God, yeah, of course,of course I'm worrying and I
recognize I don't need to be.
I don't need to be, but I canseem to stop worrying and that's

(45:37):
in some way the only way toreally allow it to move through
us, whereas most of us keep thislike stronghold.
I shouldn't be doing it, but Iam, and I don't know whatever
that is, but yeah, it's it's.

(45:59):
Yeah, it's easier being a dad.
To sum it up no, yeah,embodiment is about easier being
a dad.
No, um, I think it'schallenging in different ways I
was gonna say I think it's.

Speaker 1 (46:04):
I think it's different and challenging in
different ways and I think it'sknow I could go off on this
subject, but I think it's reallyfascinating to see my brain
wants to go five differentdirections, even just with that.
I think men and fathers face avery different experience, and

(46:24):
it's not to say that it's easier.
I think there's aspects, butthere's.
I think there's a lot ofpressure on men, on dads.
I think at least my perspectivethere's a lot less talk about
it, there's a lot less resource,there's a lot less grace or
understanding, yeah, or theopposite.

Speaker 2 (46:46):
Unquote well, there is, but then there's, there's
again, there's this, thispendulum, this polarity, so
there's the sense that there'snot enough talk about it.
And so then there's these likemen's groups that are coming up,
but to me they're so false,they're so fake, they're,
they're you know, for themthey're not.
That's and, and as usual, we,we, we swing through polarities.
So, yes, there's, there's lesstalk than there could be, but

(47:08):
then, because of that, there'sthat rebellion into it which is
similar to that somatics thingof you know, oh, I'm, I'm doing
this whole other thing.
No, I'm gonna, I'm gonna jumpinto the other extreme, because
that's where it is and that thatpenduling is like, but that's
also somewhat required in mostforces and as a way of
reorienting to, to that.

(47:29):
But yeah, I think, there, Iagree with you, I think there's
that.
But yeah, I think, there, Iagree with you, I think there's
less of it.
But I also think there in someways should be, because there's
more, there's more, there's justmore challenges just being a
mom, but also like again, justbiologically, like there's so
much like we kind of like do ourthing, and then you know, like

(47:52):
we so much, like we kind of likedo our thing.
And then you know, like we'rehopefully emotionally supportive
, but we're like we don't have areal physiological shift to it.
And then, even after the childdoes, come all that hormonal
stuff.
We get some hormonal regulation, but not a super lot.
And I should preface I'm not anexpert on this topic so I might
be saying something that isn'taccurate probably, but you're

(48:14):
right, still the issue.
Then we get this other.
I was like like yesterday I hada new client this is different,
similar new client and man.
He kept coming in for neck pain, neck pain.
He couldn't relax and he saidit a few times like no way, man,
I've got to be a man.
Or like.
And I was like I said this isbeing a man like, puffing your
chest up, that's being a manLike.

(48:34):
That's not being a man, that'spuffing your chest up.
You know, like I said, you knowI got to be strong, I got to be
a man.
I said the most intensestrength I know is vulnerability
.
That's not being a man, beingvulnerable.
Men are vulnerable, come on.
So you know be, you know likeplaying with him a bit.

(48:55):
Of course I think we are.
I was just kind of trying toplay with him to get him to see
that this concept of what it isto be a man is also so, so
ripped, as, as is what it is tobe a woman.
I mean, my wife is Chinese.
She well, she has so many ofthese like things about what
this is.
What like this is what ourdaughter should do.
This because she's a female andI'm like I don't do whatever
she wants to do.
Like pink isn't a female color,it's a color that we have

(49:16):
generally in most cultures puton that, but it's one of my
favorite colors and I'm a prettyhetero dude.
So what does that mean?
If I like pink, you know, isthat like pink I do.
I have a pink corduroy suit.
It's beautiful that I have apink corduroy suit.

Speaker 1 (49:32):
It's beautiful, that sounds epic.
That sounds epic.
I mean even I think it's hardto wrap that topic up because I
think it's an important one.
But you know I work with womenexclusively pretty much.
I've worked with a couple menand like I've worked with like
couples a bit here and there.
But even the women that I don'twork with I keep a pretty strong
pulse on what's happening withmoms and a huge dynamic with

(49:56):
early motherhood being reallyhard is the dynamic with their
partner and I'll the complaintsor the struggles that I hear of
women from their partners.
I hear that in here thatstruggling and he was struggling
before the baby came but nowthat the babies come it feels
like they're bleeding outbecause there's so much pressure

(50:17):
biologically, socially, likethere's so much.
I mean you're lacking sleep,you're going through, there's so
much being pulled on you andpushed in on you and I think for
a lot of women part of theirstruggle is that there was
already a rift in therelationship on their partner

(50:43):
and all of a sudden they don'thave a steady co-partner to
co-regulate with or to hold or apartner that they view as
steady.

Speaker 2 (50:48):
Because it's very possible that the partner is
very steady but it's not in theway that they're looking for and
so therefore it's not steadywhile they are.
But I will just say a fewthings out of sort of humor but
also seriousness.
People will ask me like, how isyour lack of sleep?
And I say we didn't really haveit.
And you know why we didn'treally have it?
Because my wife is Chinese.

(51:09):
We had an in-house nanny, whichwas expensive, but we had an
in-house nanny for two monthsbecause of the Chinese, believe
it's time.
Usually it's the mother whodoes it, or the mother-in-law or
the father, but mom's mom.
But they usually have someonecome whose job it is to kind of
wake up so that the mom can restthere was so many wonderful

(51:29):
motherhood things so the momrests, which also means the dad
gets to rest, and so we had timefor two months.
And then my wife more or lesstook over and she said why don't
you sleep in the other room soyou can rest and work?
And I said you know, I wouldlike to take care of the baby
sometime.
But also we had different roles.
So there is a lot of it.
But also, like we just wentback to China to see my in-laws

(51:53):
we hadn't met their daughter yetand I was on a bike ride with
my wife because my in-laws tookcare of, were taking care of,
the kid and I said, oh yeah, Iwas thinking to myself, oh yeah,
that's right, we used to be inlove like half joking, half
serious, you know, because wewere having fun, because we had
somebody else taking care of thekid and in their culture that's
what it does and it's in someways so much healthier for the

(52:18):
husband and wife dynamic.
So I can't wait for my in-lawsto get a visa to come so that my
wife and I can like do thingstogether again while also having
a safety that our daughter iscomfortable and not ignoring her
, because we need that bondingtime as well.

Speaker 1 (52:33):
But just putting it in that yeah, I think, I think
truly a lot, of, a lot of thepains of modern motherhood,
fatherhood, marriage after ababy.
Is that like?
oh yeah you have one singleperson who has to be your
village and it's just anunreasonable ask.
Even if they're a really steady, solid, healthy partner, they

(52:57):
can't be the entire village.
There was meant to be so manypeople, and I think that is so
much of what we crave and longfor, and that's not just.
It's not just an idea, it's afelt experience of relationship.
It's not just an idea, it'sit's a felt experience of
relationship, havingunderstandable people.
I'm curious, as we start towrap up, is there something that

(53:17):
, like, feels like we missed,that feels important to name
this conversation?

Speaker 2 (53:22):
about somatics or embodiment two things, two
things one is to kind ofdovetail what we were just
saying, which is, I think thatthe more we become more into
somatic practices which to me isreally about being aware and
being with the world as it isthe more that happens, the more
we can get into the situationhe's just talking about.
And so for me, for example, Ibecome that village and I
recognize the pressure put on meby the situation and also

(53:45):
recognize it has to be that way.
And so how can I be in thissituation as best as I can,
navigating these differentforces, be it cultural, be it
psychological, be it whatever,and saying, okay, I'm going to
have to take this hit right now,this wind gust, but do I have
to be a solid or can I movearound and how can I also bring

(54:05):
other things in so that therecan be more of this flowing?
Well, we can't do that whenwe're all stuck in fear or worry
or disassociation.
So the more we have thesepractices, in my experience it's
not that it makes it easier.
In fact, in some way it makesit harder, because we see more
and there's more, and the thingsare always there but we haven't
seen them.
So now we're seeing more, whichat first is, oh, it's hard.

(54:26):
But oh, to actually responddifferently.
So that's one thing I just wantto tie in.
The other, I think I'll quicklytry to go in, because you
mentioned this word twice, justfrom a somatic standpoint.
So you mentioned somethingabout, like people going to
depth, or you had some very deepsomatic moments, and I would
just counter a little bit to saythat for me there is no depth
in somatics and that therebecause in order for there to be

(54:50):
a depth, there has to besomewhere something measuring it
.
And that's what our ego tricksin.
It loves to sort of say look atme, look how deep I've gone,
look how far I've gone.
But you know, as one of therewas a professor of embodiment
who I was, maybe I was workingwith at some point, maybe to
write something, and you'dalways get upset.
He'd say, but what's the goal?
Where's the end line?
And but, mark, there is no goal.

(55:12):
There are goals, there are sortof markers, but they're not
really it, and the more we getthere we see that there are.
Other is because it's reallyjust this it's both ever
expanding and also somewhatnothing at the same time.
And so for me, when I like yes,to some extent there's a depth
there, there's a depth ofinformation.
To some extent there's a depththere, there's a depth of

(55:33):
information.
But also, the trick is thatwhen we're then in that depth,
or when we think we're in thatdepth I don't know if I can
fully tie it together in wordsyou know, like when we're
swimming in that depth, there isno depth, there's just the
experience.
I'm just here.
There isn't look how deep I am,or all that sort of stuff.
There's just, there's just lifeunfolding as it is, as as it is
.
Does that make some sense?

Speaker 1 (55:54):
I love that and, as you were saying that, I was like
everything you said I agreewith and I was like that's
interesting, that word deep forme I wonder if there's a
different word I would use butit's this experience of like me
below the neck, it's like theanimal and what's interesting is
it's like it's deep and yetit's not at all deep.

(56:14):
It's like the animal.
I'm a mammal, moving throughlife, doing things, saying
things, and to me, I thinkthere's a weight, maybe to it I
don't know, I don't know, I'dhave to explore that but yeah,
what you just shared, yeah.

Speaker 2 (56:33):
I love that you brought that piece to it.
I love when there's ability.
It's what I do in work isbringing people to their
boundaries and then just for us,oh there are my boundaries, and
then can we go a step beyond,because that's how boundaries
expand, and not taking two steps, maybe even a half a step.
So there was something aboutyou that I said, hey, I can do
that, but many of the people Ididn't believe they could.
So that's my way of sort ofrecognizing something in you.

(56:58):
But also it's bringing intoembodiment.
It's how not that any of ourperceptions are real, they're
real to us, but how are weperceiving things?
And what is that informationtelling us?
And there's so much informationthat if we don't bring it into
that top brain and analyze itbut we just sit with it, it's
the way people speak, the waythey move, the way they sit, all

(57:21):
that sort of stuff is tons ofinformation happening beneath
the cortex and when we can kindof in tune with it, holy shit,
we can learn so much.
And from a coaching or for meas a body worker, whatever the
hell I am, that's where thedepth is is, the more I become
regulated in myself, the more Ican see again dysregulation.

(57:42):
What is dysregulation?
But a form of regulation it'sregulating around the thing that
it perceives the more we cansee those sort of responses
which actually allow us toremove them or help them.
We don't remove them, we helpthe person remove them if and
when it's the time for it.
So that's my closing.

Speaker 1 (57:59):
I love that closing, except I don't want to close
there because I have so many theterm when I use the term
parasocial relationship.
So like I think of how peopleknow taylor swift, right, taylor
swift is everywhere in the newsright now social media news, at
least I don't know, I know, Iknow of her.
I don't, I don't know very muchdetermined that they know her,

(58:23):
they know her motives, they knowher ideals and like, had a
conversation or heard heroutside of performing and
they're like, well, and there'sall these, and it's like whether
performance is a pretend,whether her performance is
authentic or not.
There's never been a directrelationship, but I think more
and more people's relationshipsto each other, but even to

(58:46):
themselves, I think I've metpeople where I think I don't
know, like I don't know ifyou're here with me, I don't
know if you know you.
There's like this weirdemptiness and it almost feels
like I'm watching them on socialmedia but not actually knowing
them, or like there's not arelationship going on.

Speaker 2 (59:05):
And I think Well, you can't have a relationship
through social?
Well, it's not true.
You can't have a directrelationship through social
media because there's a, there'ssomething in between.
The other thing is it's it'sall performative.
I try to.
If anyone looks on my youtube,you'll find relatively horrible
videos, because I was trying tosay how I found so much
performance and, from a somaticstandpoint, that wouldn't be it.

(59:26):
So I was trying to find a wayof not performing while also not
not performing Right, and itdidn't.
It didn't work, but it was aneffort I tried.
So there's there's naturallyeven even to some extent, you
and I in this talk, we're in abit of performance.
Now, as we get to know eachother more, some of that

(59:47):
performance will will go down,but there's a naturally
occurring thing with it and, yes, we can also be.
I think this is kind of whatyou're saying we can be in
performance with ourselves.
We can even in some way learnthat and that becomes our
natural way of being.
But it's not.
It's a learned response whichcreates a disconnection, which
maybe is sometimes where you seepeople when they seem like

(01:00:09):
they're not there, although theother part of the reason they
might not be there is they mightnot feel safe or be perceiving
safety from you or from others.
So this client I worked with,she came in and after two years
I was like what's different?
And she said no joke.
She said I finally decided thatyou're not a perv.
And I was like cool, two years,it took two years.

(01:00:32):
So she wasn't, she wasn'tscared of me.
In fact, early on in sessionshe said it's not you I'm scared
, if it's the use that camebefore you.
So she's seeing me, but she'snot seeing me.
She's responding to perceptions, understanding all that sort of
stuff in there, and there's forme, there's nothing I can do
about that, except be myself,have compassion, sit with it and

(01:00:55):
, in some way, hope, although Idon't think hope is the right
word.
At some point this may shift,and it did, and it has and as
she's become more comfortable.
But her checking out, I'm notlooking at that saying why is
she checking out?
Because I'm never going tofigure it out.
It's not that I don't care, Idon't love that phrase, but it's
like I'm not that concernedwith it because it'll come later

(01:01:16):
, if it does come.
Instead, for right now, can Imeet the checking out and maybe
come one step in or have thembecome a little bit more aware.
But in some regard we want themchecking out because them
checking out is has served insome way or another, and so we
want to keep that on.
But again, we can go on.

Speaker 1 (01:01:34):
I think that's actually a beautiful place where
I can, finally, I keep sayingI'm going to wrap it up, and
then I'm so bad at doing thatbecause I just love this
conversation.
But I think that's the heart ofsomatics is a relationship to
what's happening, without tryingto force it into something or
force it into a certaincontainer or even force it into

(01:01:57):
a specific movement of likeyou're safe, you're safe, you're
safe and it's like well, herbody actually doesn't perceive
safety right now.
So you saying that mightactually bypass or gaslight her
out of her experience.
Even well-intentioned, you'retrying to make her feel better,
even if she doesn't feel good.
So I think somatics is such apowerful medicine or practice or

(01:02:18):
you know, again, people arelike it's this new thing and
it's like Nope, it's been aroundforever.
It's more popular.
I think it was around beforelanguage existed, before people
used it as a theory, as apractice.
It's just, I think it's thedifference of being human.
I think it's coming back to morehumanity.

Speaker 2 (01:02:37):
Yeah, the issue is that now there's like three
other things I want to say, butwe'll take more time.
I guess I'll say quickly, justbecause you mentioned a word
that I find, as far as thegaslighting, the issue it's
really tricky here is that insome regard, regard, there is a
gaslighting perceived but thereisn't necessarily a gaslighting
happening.
So the person is perceivingthere's no gas in the tank and

(01:02:58):
what you're trying to kind ofinform them, and so a part of
them can actually get on board,but a part of them doesn't
believe it, and so I struggle abit with, like a lot of times
I'll leave that.
A lot of times my wife will sayyou're gaslighting me and bit
with.
Like a lot of times I'll leavethat.
I'll say a lot of times my wifewill say you're gaslighting me
and I'm like no, I'm actually Ihave no intention for that.
I'm I'm trying to get you tosee something that I don't
believe you can perceive yet andI believe to be true.

(01:03:19):
And when you can see that, butuntil that person, until that
becomes that way and similar,until people experience what
we're talking about, we'regaslighting this whole thing,
but then then they, they, theyget it and and so if people hate
this talk at first, well, theywouldn't have listened this far.
But if they do hate this talkat first, just say that you know

(01:03:39):
what, cool, and maybe at alater point recheck in, because
there's lots of stuff.
I one of my uh, you know I'llkeep going quickly one of my
favorite books that has a lot todo with somatics.
Actually, the first time, firsttime I read it, I couldn't
finish it.
I hated it.
The second time I read it, Iliked it more, but I thought,
well, the author is still.

(01:04:00):
I didn't like it at first, he'sso pretentious.
And then, the second time, Isaid he's still kind of
pretentious, but the book's good.
And the third time I read itthis book and this guy's an
awesome, he's so awesome but henever changed.
He was the same person when hewrote it.
Every time I read it he's thesame person.
All that changed was how Iperceived it, and I wasn't at a

(01:04:20):
place where I could haveperceived it, because it was
deeply somatic and I wasn'tthere.
I was deeply.
What book was it.
It's called Spacious Body.
I think it's called Adventuresin Somatic Ontology.
It's called Spacious Body.
I think it's called Adventuresin Somatic Ontology.
It's by a rolfer named JeffMaitland.
Another time I'll go in andtalk about him.
He's passed away two years agobut really helped open my mind
to various things.
But yeah, so that's sort ofthat thing about gaslighting.

(01:04:42):
All right, All right.
Yeah, we're good.

Speaker 1 (01:04:44):
It's one of those words that it's overused and
some people are using it todescribe a different experience
than what other people are usingit for.

Speaker 2 (01:04:53):
Right, which we can say both about gaslighting and
somatics.

Speaker 1 (01:04:56):
Right, andrew, I loved this conversation.
I feel like you and I couldprobably talk for hours, so I'm
literally just going to cut usoff Thank you so so much for
being on the podcast and I'lldrop some of our like you
mentioned so many resources.
I'm like I'm gonna need a wholePDF of all your books, which I
just love.
Thank you so much for thisconversation.

(01:05:17):
It was so good and I'm hoping,as people listen to it, we
covered like a lot of ground.
Like I was sitting here, justlike you know so much, like I
feel like I learned a ton fromyou today, even if you just took
one piece of this and just kindof turned it over in your mind.

Speaker 2 (01:05:34):
Yeah, just one piece, hopefully.
Just one, yeah, and if peopleare interested you'll have
contact.
I mean, I meet generally morein person because I think the
body is a being in physicalpresence, can give more
information of sorts.
But I also do stuff online withpeople, so you know they're
interested as ways of findingstuff.
But it's there's so many Idon't want to sell, I just want

(01:05:57):
to have people find information.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
I can resonate with that Awesome.
Thank you so much, Andrew.

Speaker 2 (01:06:03):
Thanks, dude.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
Thanks for joining me on today's episode of the
Motherhood Mentor Podcast.
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(01:06:28):
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(01:06:50):
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