body talk
I have seen a lot of bodies over my years of practice, and they all talk to me.
Each session is a dialogue between the client’s body tissues and my hands. Here’s what a typical session looks like:
Gif of Let me hear your body talk The Office - Business Ethics [S05E02], Steve Carell and Amy Ryan in headbands dancing awkwardly, with white Let Me Hear Your Body Talk text.
Just kidding, I don’t ever wear headbands. They usually give me a headache.
I do, however, find that almost all bodies say the same things, in various combinations.
Just as an experiment, see if your body reacts as you read each different statement. If you notice any changes, it might be a message that your body has been trying to give you.
I am doing the best that I can.
Every minute of every day of every month of every year. You ask me to move, I move. I move the best way that I can with the strength, range of motion, and resources that I have available to me. This applies to all kinds of movement: physical, emotional, mental, or even spiritual.
I am ALWAYS working towards wellness (even when it doesn’t feel like it).
My cells are busy metabolizing and repairing, my organs are constantly processing and dumping out the trash, my energy is finding connections and repairing wounds. Sometimes it might take me longer than you think it should to resolve an issue, and I might need help, but I am always trying to move towards equilibrium.
Everything is connected and everything needs to move a certain way.
When things don’t move, everything has to work harder, all the surrounding tissues take up the slack for the part that’s not moving. This is true in the physical body within each system, between systems, and includes connections between the physical body, the emotional body, and the energetic body. A stuckness in one place impacts the whole.
I am built to process protein, fruits, vegetables, and fat.
Anything else (like grains, processed foods, alcohol, sugar, etc) takes extra work and has the potential to cause inflammation. If your body can handle those things, great, but if you aren’t getting better, take a look at what fuel you are giving your body and how your body feels when you consume it.
My gut and brain are closely connected.
The gut biome balance influences how good my brain feels. The gut produces 80% of the serotonin and 60% of the dopamine that my brain needs to feel good. To improve the mood, improve the food.
Pain doesn’t always mean what you think it means.
We are hardwired to move away from pain, but sometimes pain messages can get scrambled and confusing.
Here are the two most common ways pain gets scrambled:
Often the place that hurts is not the problem. Frequently, the part that hurts is the part that is moving too much to compensate for a part that isn’t moving somewhere else. Other times, it’s because a nerve is getting irritated closer to the spinal cord, but because of the way the nerves are designed the brain can only register the endpoint of the nerve, so the symptoms are far away from the cause.
Sometimes, pain is because you are asking me to do something I am not strong enough to do yet, so I have to use muscles that aren’t intended for that job.
I was built exactly the right way, to experience a full spectrum of emotions, feelings, movements, and connections. I am perfectly imperfect by design. Anyone who says otherwise is either trying to control you or sell you something.
Let this statement really roam around your body. Especially those places that you are self conscious about. Too big/too small (insert body part here)? Says who? What do they get out of you feeling bad about your body? Too loud/ too quiet? Says who? What do they get out of you feeling bad about your voice? Feel free to keep going.
Did you notice any changes in your body as you read?
Maybe your heart sped up or your breathing slowed down. Maybe one of the sentences made you feel happy or sad or angry. Remember, that any changes you might have noticed are all simply data your body is giving you, none of it is “bad,” and if you didn’t notice any changes at all, that’s good data too.