Latest / Love, Happiness and Success with Dr. Lisa Marie Bobby / Exhausted But Can’t Relax? How to Regulate Your Nervous System | Happiness | E537

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Exhausted But Can’t Relax? How to Regulate Your Nervous System | Happiness | E537 · Love, Happiness and Success with Dr. Lisa Marie Bobby

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Speaker 1: Quinns dot com slash lahs. Now onto the show, my friend,
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Speaker 1: let's talk for a second. Look. I know you tune
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Speaker 2: I have my hand at the bottom of the water bottle,
3:12
Speaker 2: so maybe at first it's academic stress. You add in
3:23
Speaker 2: financial stress on top of that, and then you add
3:26
Speaker 2: in family stress, you add in work stress, and I'm
3:29
Speaker 2: moving my hand up the water bottle, and essentially you
3:32
Speaker 2: can think about the water bottle like your body's capacity.
3:44
Speaker 1: My guest today is Liz to Newdo. You might know
3:48
Speaker 1: her as the Workout which she is a somatic exercise expert,
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Speaker 1: a feld In Christ trained practitioner. You and I are
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Speaker 1: both going to learn what that means today as we
4:01
Speaker 1: visit with Liz. But she's also the author of a
4:04
Speaker 1: brand new book out just this month called When the
4:07
Speaker 1: Body Speaks, How Somatic healing sets you free.
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Speaker 2: Essentially, your nervous system is like a communication highway between
4:15
Speaker 2: your brain and your body, and when you're stuck in
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Speaker 2: like a chronic fight flight state or in a chronic
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Speaker 2: freeze state, oftentimes people have a really hard time feeling
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Speaker 2: their body.
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Speaker 1: Liz has taught somatic work to more than two hundred
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Speaker 1: thousand students. Her framework has reached millions of people online
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Speaker 1: at this point. But what I want you to know
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Speaker 1: about Liz before we get into this conversation is that
4:39
Speaker 1: she teaches something that most of us, and honestly even
4:44
Speaker 1: most therapists, haven't really been taught, which is how to
4:48
Speaker 1: listen to what our bodies are already trying to tell
4:51
Speaker 1: us and then use this in really intentional ways to
4:55
Speaker 1: calm ourselves and support our healing and well being from
4:59
Speaker 1: the inside out.
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Speaker 2: And somatic exercises has really helped me reconnect to my
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Speaker 2: body signals and what they mean and then given me
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Speaker 2: the tools to respond appropriately without getting reactive or shutting down.
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Speaker 1: So Liz, welcome.
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Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Lisa, great to be here.
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Speaker 1: Thank you, and I am just so excited to get
5:32
Speaker 1: to know more about you and your work because I
5:35
Speaker 1: feel like you are in kind of a different space
5:41
Speaker 1: with your somatic work and also your background. So before
5:45
Speaker 1: we dive into questions, I'm wondering if you could just
5:47
Speaker 1: introduce our listeners to yourself and maybe even share a
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Speaker 1: little bit of your story and how you got here.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, I'm Liz. I'm also known as the Workout, which
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Speaker 2: on social media. I love it, and thank you, and
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Speaker 2: I discovered somatics at like a point of desperation in
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Speaker 2: my life. I am a childhood trauma survivor and I
6:13
Speaker 2: started having pretty bad sleep issues and chronic pain around
6:18
Speaker 2: the age of fourteen. Yeah, I knew I was way
6:22
Speaker 2: too young to be feeling that way and didn't have
6:24
Speaker 2: any like hard medical reason for those issues. When I
6:28
Speaker 2: went to the door, they were like, everything's fine. And
6:31
Speaker 2: so when I was twenty two, I went on this
6:35
Speaker 2: kind of feeling quest to try to figure it out,
6:39
Speaker 2: because you know, after about eight years of not sleeping well,
6:43
Speaker 2: it really does start to compound and affect your cognitive skills.
6:47
Speaker 2: And the chronic pain was getting so bad where I
6:50
Speaker 2: was like having a hard time going to work standing up,
6:53
Speaker 2: and I really tried everything. I went to doctors, specialists, chiropractors,
6:58
Speaker 2: physical therapists, and then I started getting more into alternative
7:02
Speaker 2: methods like acupuncture, yoga, meditation, cranio, sacral. I would really
7:09
Speaker 2: try anything, and finally discovered somatics. And when I first
7:15
Speaker 2: once my first felt in christ class, I cried afterwards
7:19
Speaker 2: in the bathroom because I felt so good. My body
7:23
Speaker 2: had never felt that much relaxation and that much ease
7:27
Speaker 2: before and after four classes, my insomnia was almost gone.
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Speaker 1: That's remarkable.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, so I was very you know, peaked when that happened.
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Speaker 2: And I have an academic background in psychology. I just
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Speaker 2: majored in it at university and that was part of
7:46
Speaker 2: my part of my healing quest as well. And I
7:50
Speaker 2: just really was, you know, like, oh my gosh, I
7:52
Speaker 2: wonder if I could kind of blend my academic background
7:55
Speaker 2: in psychology with somatics, and I kept studying it. I
7:59
Speaker 2: was a dancer as a child, so it was this
8:01
Speaker 2: really beautiful kind of merging of my two interests.
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Speaker 1: Wow, that's amazing. And you know, there are so many
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Speaker 1: different dimensions of wellness and healing, and I think that
8:13
Speaker 1: sometimes people in my space, you know, psychologists can over
8:17
Speaker 1: index psychological parts, which are so important, and there is
8:21
Speaker 1: a psychological and also emotional component here, but there's a
8:25
Speaker 1: physical component that is easily as important, and there's like
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Speaker 1: physical movement and experiencing, but also even biologically based elements,
8:38
Speaker 1: even things like nutrition can have such a big impact
8:42
Speaker 1: on the way we think and feel and behave. So anyway,
8:44
Speaker 1: I just want to validate everything you're saying. But also,
8:47
Speaker 1: and I hope that this is okay, and Liz, as
8:49
Speaker 1: we're talking, you'll find you know, I think that oftentimes
8:55
Speaker 1: my role in this podcast is to serve as an
8:58
Speaker 1: ally and even stand in for someone listening to this
9:02
Speaker 1: conversation who doesn't know what feldon Crist is and like,
9:07
Speaker 1: neither do I. As we were just chatting before we
9:10
Speaker 1: started recording, I just checked in with you. I was like,
9:12
Speaker 1: how do you pronounce this word? And so, you know,
9:14
Speaker 1: I try not to over prepare so that I can
9:16
Speaker 1: learn along with our friends. We're here with us, and
9:20
Speaker 1: so could we even start with that? Like what what
9:23
Speaker 1: is feldon Christ? How does it work? In the first
9:26
Speaker 1: four classes that you took? That a curag you're insomnia? Like,
9:29
Speaker 1: what the heck happened in there? Yeah?
9:32
Speaker 2: Absolutely, so I was. I was highly skeptical about feldon
9:36
Speaker 2: Christ at first because I had seen a class before
9:40
Speaker 2: I went to it and it looks like just a
9:42
Speaker 2: bunch of people rolling around on the floor and there
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Speaker 2: Frond all right, you know, coming having an academic background
9:50
Speaker 2: in psychology and then a dance background, I was like,
9:52
Speaker 2: I don't really get wow, okay with chronic pain with insomnia,
9:59
Speaker 2: and I was also quite associated at the time, so
10:01
Speaker 2: I really didn't understand how it was going to shake down.
10:07
Speaker 2: Felden Christ essentially is under the somatic umbrella. So there
10:12
Speaker 2: are different schools of somatic movement. There's EFT tapping, there
10:17
Speaker 2: is Alexander technique, Felden Christ's Body Mind centering, and some
10:23
Speaker 2: other schools. Feldon Christ is one of them. Felden Christ
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Speaker 2: really focuses on these tiny micro movements that release habitual
10:32
Speaker 2: tension out of your body. They're based on kind of
10:35
Speaker 2: biomechanics and principles about kinesiology, and they also like help
10:43
Speaker 2: with releasing stress and tension out of your body. And
10:46
Speaker 2: then I've really taken the work into developing Feldon Christ
10:51
Speaker 2: for nervous system regulation as well.
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Speaker 1: So okay, I'm trying to like just generate in my
10:58
Speaker 1: mind's eye and image of like what are we talking
11:01
Speaker 1: about here? So I heard people rolling around on the
11:04
Speaker 1: floor in their pajamas, which you know, okay, but then
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Speaker 1: micro movement, So like what would be an example of
11:12
Speaker 1: a Feldon cryst technique or intervention if I participate in?
11:18
Speaker 1: What might be something that I would be asked to try?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, So for example, I'll explain this verbally. You can
11:26
Speaker 2: lay on your back and you have your knees bent
11:30
Speaker 2: and your feet on the floor. This is the part.
11:33
Speaker 2: And one example is that you have your arms out
11:36
Speaker 2: almost like you're making a goal post with your elbows yep, okay, yep,
11:42
Speaker 2: with your elbows open wide to the side and your
11:45
Speaker 2: elbows on the floor, and and you can just gently
11:51
Speaker 2: allow the back of your hands to start to fall
11:54
Speaker 2: down to the floor and then come back up so
11:56
Speaker 2: your fingers are facing and you just repeat that movement
12:00
Speaker 2: over and over and over again. As you do that movement,
12:03
Speaker 2: the teacher is queueing you into kind of cues that
12:07
Speaker 2: really help you with your awareness, like how relaxed can
12:11
Speaker 2: your stomach be as you do this movement? How small
12:15
Speaker 2: can you make this movement? How can you feel your
12:19
Speaker 2: collar bones rolling as you do this movement? And then
12:23
Speaker 2: they also give you permission to be like really lazy
12:26
Speaker 2: and unambitious as you move, which for me as like
12:30
Speaker 2: a pertive good girl. That child was like very liberating.
12:37
Speaker 2: And they are like, at any point as you do this,
12:39
Speaker 2: you can stop and take a rest and let your
12:42
Speaker 2: brain rest, let your body rest, and then pick it
12:44
Speaker 2: back up when when you feel like it, And so
12:48
Speaker 2: it just gives you this sense of agency that other
12:51
Speaker 2: movement schools that are a little bit more structured or
12:54
Speaker 2: more kind of fitness oriented, like yoga doesn't necessarily give
12:59
Speaker 2: you that same level of agency as going through it.
13:03
Speaker 2: So for me, the first time I did that felt
13:07
Speaker 2: in christ class. That reinforcement of listening to your body,
13:13
Speaker 2: feeling the sensations in your body, and letting yourself move.
13:17
Speaker 2: There was no like correct way of doing but letting
13:22
Speaker 2: yourself move in a way that allowed you to be
13:24
Speaker 2: unambitious and lazy. What was I think what made me
13:28
Speaker 2: start buying that first? And because I had never been
13:31
Speaker 2: treated I'd never treated myself and my own body with
13:35
Speaker 2: that much respect, or had I been kind of directed
13:39
Speaker 2: by someone else to do that. Yeah, and that was
13:44
Speaker 2: just incredible. And you know what we've found through the
13:48
Speaker 2: science behind somatics is that that really helps people. Essentially,
13:54
Speaker 2: your nervous system is like a communication highway between your
13:57
Speaker 2: brain and your body, and when you're stuck in like
13:59
Speaker 2: a chronic fight flight state or an a chronic freeze state,
14:03
Speaker 2: oftentimes people have a really hard time feeling their body
14:07
Speaker 2: or even like being in their body. You're kind of
14:10
Speaker 2: in fight flight. You're often like mind racing so much
14:14
Speaker 2: that you can't access it, or perhaps you're you have
14:18
Speaker 2: to go to the bathroom while you're working, but you
14:21
Speaker 2: like put it off because you want to just keep
14:23
Speaker 2: going and like get this next task done. And somatic
14:26
Speaker 2: exercises has really helped me reconnect to my body signals
14:31
Speaker 2: and what they mean and then given me the tools
14:33
Speaker 2: to respond appropriately without getting reactive or shutting down.
14:38
Speaker 1: Right, that's incredible and so well, thank you first of
14:42
Speaker 1: all just for like taking us into this and what's
14:45
Speaker 1: happening in there. But you know, I could see how
14:47
Speaker 1: this was such a meaningful experience for you to I
14:51
Speaker 1: almost start developing a different type of relationship with your body,
14:57
Speaker 1: you know, given what it sounds like you've been through. Also,
15:01
Speaker 1: you mentioned being a dancer, which is by definition performative, right,
15:07
Speaker 1: like making your body show up in certain ways as
15:10
Speaker 1: a performer, and then coming back into this space where
15:13
Speaker 1: you're just noticing how it feels in a more compassionate way,
15:18
Speaker 1: tuning into it. But also I'm guessing that that there
15:21
Speaker 1: was very like a mindfulness component too, like when you're
15:26
Speaker 1: doing this very much in the present moment, just being
15:30
Speaker 1: in your body, what do my collarbones feel like? What
15:33
Speaker 1: does the floor feel like and that that in itself
15:36
Speaker 1: started soothing this trauma based activation that you had been
15:42
Speaker 1: carrying with you previously. Is that am I understanding exactly?
15:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's so well said. Yeah, that's very powerful.
15:50
Speaker 1: And it's also reminded me of the work Vessel vander
15:53
Speaker 1: Koch as you know, you know, the major researcher in
15:56
Speaker 1: this space, and his seminal work is The Body keeps
16:00
Speaker 1: the Score, talking about how our traumatic experiences are still
16:05
Speaker 1: alive in our physical bodies, whether or not we're always
16:10
Speaker 1: consciously aware of it. And I'm wondering if if that's
16:14
Speaker 1: where your work is going. It's like connecting those pieces
16:19
Speaker 1: for people.
16:20
Speaker 2: Absolutely absolutely, I think some people and a lot of
16:23
Speaker 2: the people that I've worked with, and this was my
16:25
Speaker 2: experience as well, I didn't understand. I didn't really So
16:30
Speaker 2: I'm a sexual assault survivor from childhood and adolescens. I
16:34
Speaker 2: had kind of blocked out some of the childhood experiences
16:39
Speaker 2: that I had, so I couldn't actually remember those until
16:42
Speaker 2: my thirties. But I did have one experience when I
16:45
Speaker 2: was fourteen where I got drugged in Mexico on a
16:48
Speaker 2: family education and that I definitely remembered that. So I
16:52
Speaker 2: knew I had PTSD when I started university and when
16:56
Speaker 2: I started on my healing quest. But you know, as
17:00
Speaker 2: I got safer, and as my nervous system became more
17:04
Speaker 2: regulated and I started feeling more grounded, I started having
17:06
Speaker 2: all of these flashbacks of what had happened to me
17:09
Speaker 2: when I was much younger, which now I realized I
17:12
Speaker 2: had just blocked out to protect myself because they were
17:16
Speaker 2: too traumatic for me to process at that time. But
17:18
Speaker 2: I was having all of these physical sensations and all
17:23
Speaker 2: of these health conditions that were arising from those experiences,
17:28
Speaker 2: and then also from not treating those experiences with talk therapy,
17:33
Speaker 2: with AMDR, with somatics. So for me, I really realized
17:39
Speaker 2: that I was a trauma survivor through my body symptoms
17:45
Speaker 2: escalating to the point that it made me so uncomfortable
17:48
Speaker 2: first and then almost worked backwards understand all of it
17:53
Speaker 2: cognitively and reframe the you know, kind of like my
17:58
Speaker 2: own guilt and shame around.
18:00
Speaker 1: Right, This is such a powerful point, and I'd like
18:03
Speaker 1: to just reiterate this for our friends who are here
18:07
Speaker 1: with us, because I think that for many people, this
18:11
Speaker 1: is the experience when you live through something that is
18:15
Speaker 1: so profoundly traumatic, particularly when you're a child or a
18:21
Speaker 1: fourteen year old, and Lis, I'm just so sorry that
18:24
Speaker 1: this happened. And unfortunately it is too common. I mean,
18:28
Speaker 1: so many women and girls, boys too, live through this
18:31
Speaker 1: kind of thing. And I think when it happens, you
18:34
Speaker 1: just try to keep going as best you can, right,
18:39
Speaker 1: and that you don't fully realize the impact of these
18:44
Speaker 1: experiences on you until later in life when you start
18:48
Speaker 1: having these strange symptoms happening. You can't sleep, your body's
18:52
Speaker 1: doing weird things, you're having these experiences. It might be ten, fifteen,
18:57
Speaker 1: twenty years later that you're like, okay, let's going going
19:00
Speaker 1: on and then going back. And I think that it
19:04
Speaker 1: is also true that well, I mean, there's research that
19:07
Speaker 1: substantiates this. But let me ask you about this more directly,
19:12
Speaker 1: that we know that in some cultures even there tend
19:18
Speaker 1: to be more somatic symptoms of distress or trauma than others.
19:25
Speaker 1: And if this is okay to ask, do you identify
19:29
Speaker 1: as Hispanic?
19:30
Speaker 2: Is that I'm Italian?
19:32
Speaker 1: Italian? Okay? Well, and I don't know if there's research
19:36
Speaker 1: around this, I would have to go back, but there
19:38
Speaker 1: are I know that sometimes Asian populations, they will almost
19:43
Speaker 1: invariably experience somatic symptoms, so stomach aches, headaches that they
19:49
Speaker 1: will go and seek medical attention for that are deeply
19:53
Speaker 1: rooted in these traumatic experiences that aren't necessarily a thought
19:58
Speaker 1: in their head.
20:00
Speaker 2: Like that is what was going on with you exactly. Yeah,
20:04
Speaker 2: it's important to address the cultural aspect as well, because
20:09
Speaker 2: different cultures are less open to therapy and therapeutic modalities
20:15
Speaker 2: for healing. I always think, you know, if something is
20:20
Speaker 2: happening with your body that doesn't feel right, you definitely
20:22
Speaker 2: want to go to the doctor first, of course, but
20:26
Speaker 2: you don't always want to stay there and just continue
20:29
Speaker 2: to go to appointment after appointment after appointment seeking answers.
20:34
Speaker 2: As like you're saying, a lot of what's going on
20:37
Speaker 2: is rooted in emotional reactions, and then your body has
20:42
Speaker 2: a reaction and over for example, with gut issues, you know,
20:46
Speaker 2: over time, the kind of like the habitual muscle tension
20:49
Speaker 2: that you're holding starts to contract the muscles in your
20:54
Speaker 2: abdomen and in your your so as muscle, and then
20:57
Speaker 2: that can contribute to unexplained stomach aches. And you may
21:00
Speaker 2: go to a doctor and think I have all these
21:03
Speaker 2: IBS symptoms, I must have, yes, And then the doctor's like,
21:07
Speaker 2: you don't have ideas, and that leads you really confused, right,
21:12
Speaker 2: and it's really important to seek out other forms appealing
21:17
Speaker 2: and just see if that yes helps you and gives
21:21
Speaker 2: you some relief.
21:22
Speaker 1: Totally. Well, thank you so much for saying that out loud,
21:25
Speaker 1: because I think and it sounds like you had part
21:26
Speaker 1: of this in your own story, you know, like, why
21:28
Speaker 1: am I feeling this way, like physically feeling unwell and
21:31
Speaker 1: going to doctors and like you're fine, which is so
21:34
Speaker 1: invalidating first of all, because you're like, no, I am
21:37
Speaker 1: having this experience. But then like, on a biological level,
21:42
Speaker 1: there isn't an illness that can be treated, but having
21:45
Speaker 1: to go in this other direction in order to understand
21:48
Speaker 1: that your body is being physically impacted but by a
21:53
Speaker 1: different mechanism. You know, it's not like you have a
21:55
Speaker 1: bacterial infection, but there's this active stress response, the legacy
22:00
Speaker 1: of trauma that's still showing up.
22:03
Speaker 3: This is so.
22:03
Speaker 1: Fascinating, So Liz, we need to take a really short break,
22:07
Speaker 1: so all pause right here for just a second. But
22:09
Speaker 1: on the other side of this, what I would love
22:12
Speaker 1: is for you to take us deeper into some of
22:16
Speaker 1: how this works. I mean, if we have a friend
22:19
Speaker 1: here with us right now just nodding and being like,
22:21
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, they're talking about my experience. What I'd
22:24
Speaker 1: love is for you to start painting a picture of
22:27
Speaker 1: what this healing process involves, what it looks like, and
22:31
Speaker 1: where people can begin. If that's okay with you. Absolutely,
22:45
Speaker 1: you have million dollar business ideas and the confidence that
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24:57
Speaker 1: my guest Liz to Nudo. Her book is called When
25:01
Speaker 1: the Body Speaks, How Somatic Healing Sets You Free and
25:06
Speaker 1: Liz right before we paused for our break. We were
25:09
Speaker 1: talking about just what can happen with people who have
25:13
Speaker 1: lived through hard things and how that shows up in
25:15
Speaker 1: the body. And what I'd asked is if you could
25:19
Speaker 1: start painting us a picture of what it looks like
25:22
Speaker 1: when people start working through this through the somatic techniques
25:27
Speaker 1: that you teach, and you know, maybe we could crack
25:30
Speaker 1: into this with personal stories. I mean, I'm happy to
25:35
Speaker 1: share some of my own or unless you want to
25:37
Speaker 1: share more of yours, but I'd love to give people
25:39
Speaker 1: real examples.
25:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, feel free to share what you've been
25:44
Speaker 2: through and I can relate in stuff.
25:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay. So I mean there I think are two
25:49
Speaker 1: parts of this. I am very, very lucky, and I
25:54
Speaker 1: know this. I mean, there's a certain type of privilege
25:57
Speaker 1: that comes with not being a cow but old tea
26:01
Speaker 1: trauma survivor, so that you know, I'm grateful for that.
26:05
Speaker 1: And I think that I have been through a variety
26:09
Speaker 1: of little tea traumas in my life, so you know,
26:12
Speaker 1: relational trauma or I think all business owners are carrying
26:16
Speaker 1: a certain degree of like business related trauma. And what
26:19
Speaker 1: I have noticed is that when I get activated or
26:23
Speaker 1: really stressed, or when there's things going on with me.
26:26
Speaker 1: I have trouble eating and I have trouble sleeping, and
26:30
Speaker 1: to this day, if I'm going through something hard, like
26:33
Speaker 1: I'll still deal with that. But I don't know if
26:37
Speaker 1: that if that's the same thing. I don't know if
26:40
Speaker 1: that's the same thing that we're talking about.
26:42
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, the body reacts really similarly to you know,
26:47
Speaker 2: like one very difficult traumatic experience as well as kind
26:52
Speaker 2: of like I would say, chronic stress or little tea
26:55
Speaker 2: trauma that compounds over a prolonged period.
26:59
Speaker 1: Right, probably a chronic stress person, yeah, honestly, And like
27:03
Speaker 1: I just keep going and going.
27:04
Speaker 2: And yeah, so I'll explain a little bit about what
27:07
Speaker 2: happens in the body when you go through that, and
27:09
Speaker 2: then what the healing process looks like as well. So
27:14
Speaker 2: when you experience stress over a prolanna period of time,
27:19
Speaker 2: it compounds in your body, especially when you're never doing
27:22
Speaker 2: anything to release that stress out of your body. So
27:26
Speaker 2: a small amount of stress is actually good for us
27:30
Speaker 2: in a short period of time. It builds resiliency, It
27:33
Speaker 2: helps you expand your capacity. But what happens for people
27:36
Speaker 2: is that I have a water bottle here and I'll
27:39
Speaker 2: show it, Okay, kind of give a demonstration is that
27:43
Speaker 2: they start experiencing these micro stressors over time. So I
27:47
Speaker 2: have my hand at the bottom of the water bottles.
27:49
Speaker 2: So maybe at first it's academic stress, right, and then
27:55
Speaker 2: you add in financial stress on top of that, and
27:59
Speaker 2: then you add in fly stress, you add in work stress,
28:02
Speaker 2: and I'm moving my hand up the water bottle. And
28:05
Speaker 2: essentially you can think about the water bottle like your
28:08
Speaker 2: body's capacity and you only have so much capacity. And
28:12
Speaker 2: when you start to stack all these low grade stressors
28:15
Speaker 2: that are still very very valid, like relationship issues, perhaps
28:20
Speaker 2: a betrayal in a relationship that will like add a
28:24
Speaker 2: lot of stress on though we don't consider it, you know,
28:29
Speaker 2: capital T trauma, it's still quite difficult and stressful to
28:33
Speaker 2: go through.
28:34
Speaker 1: So lo'z, what I'm hearing you say is that the stress,
28:38
Speaker 1: the things we live through, the hard moments, they're accumulative,
28:42
Speaker 1: they stack up over time.
28:44
Speaker 2: Is that it exactly? Yeah, So I'm holding a water
28:48
Speaker 2: bottle up right now, and if you think about your
28:51
Speaker 2: body's capacity to handle stress as this water bottle, you
28:56
Speaker 2: only have so much capacity before the water bottle starts overflowing.
29:01
Speaker 2: So for everyone who's listening, I have my hand at
29:04
Speaker 2: the base of the water bottle. So let's say we
29:07
Speaker 2: start with some small stressors. We have academic stress, we
29:13
Speaker 2: have maybe environmental noise. Maybe you live on a busy
29:17
Speaker 2: street over stimulation. Maybe you have and I'm moving my
29:21
Speaker 2: hand up the water bottle. Maybe you have financial stress.
29:26
Speaker 2: Maybe you have relationship stress. You have a fight with
29:29
Speaker 2: your boss at work. And the water just keeps filling
29:32
Speaker 2: up in the water bottle with all of this, and
29:34
Speaker 2: then perhaps you go through a difficult relationship and your
29:39
Speaker 2: experience of betrayal in a relationship that will cause a
29:42
Speaker 2: lot more stress in your body, and it just kind
29:45
Speaker 2: of starts to accumulate until the water starts overflowing out
29:51
Speaker 2: of the water bottle. You lose the capacity to handle
29:55
Speaker 2: more stress. And this is when you can think that
29:58
Speaker 2: you're kind of going into revival mode at that point,
30:02
Speaker 2: and you start to experience survival mode physiology. In survival
30:08
Speaker 2: mode physiology, your body actually deprioritizes anything that it deems
30:14
Speaker 2: not essential for your survival. So this concludes you were
30:19
Speaker 2: mentioning like difficulty with eating and difficulty with sleeping, like
30:24
Speaker 2: your gut somehow your body is like, ah, your gut's
30:27
Speaker 2: not important for survival, which is surprising, but some people
30:32
Speaker 2: will experience that they can't eat anymore, and that's very common,
30:37
Speaker 2: like they don't have an appetite, very common if you're
30:39
Speaker 2: in flight or flight physiology, same with sleep. Your body
30:43
Speaker 2: wants to divert all of its energy to your brain,
30:46
Speaker 2: to your heart, the functions that are absolutely necessary for
30:50
Speaker 2: your survival, and sovert's away from your ability to rest
30:54
Speaker 2: repair and restore naturally through sleep as well.
30:59
Speaker 1: Right well, And this makes so much sense because even
31:02
Speaker 1: on a deep like biological drive level, if your body
31:08
Speaker 1: is activated, it is experiencing itself as being in danger.
31:13
Speaker 1: That you know, human beings can go for extended periods
31:16
Speaker 1: of time without eating, and if it is not safe
31:20
Speaker 1: to lay down and go to sleep, you need to
31:21
Speaker 1: keep moving. Like that's like the physiological state that your
31:26
Speaker 1: body is in because it's trying to save your life.
31:29
Speaker 1: But what I mean, of course, what you're saying is that,
31:32
Speaker 1: especially if you're dealing with that chronically and you don't
31:36
Speaker 1: have a way of coming back into physiological safety, that
31:42
Speaker 1: can be very damaging you physically, also mentally and emotionally.
31:47
Speaker 1: So thank you for illustrating this. But then I mean
31:53
Speaker 1: again for somebody like me who is kind of like
31:56
Speaker 1: simmering and chronic stress most of the time. Apparently, as
31:59
Speaker 1: we have establish this conversation, like you know, we're asking
32:03
Speaker 1: for a bread here, los, but like, where do you
32:06
Speaker 1: begin like starting to come back now, especially you know,
32:10
Speaker 1: my life and probably many people listening, maybe even your
32:15
Speaker 1: life right now. I mean, my goodness, you have this
32:17
Speaker 1: book launch. I'm sure you're so busy. Like, if the
32:21
Speaker 1: reality of your life is objectively busy, stressful, you can't
32:26
Speaker 1: quit your job or give away your children or like
32:28
Speaker 1: go on an extended vacation, how do you begin to
32:31
Speaker 1: bring it back together?
32:34
Speaker 2: Essentially, your nervous system there's a spectrum, right, so we
32:38
Speaker 2: have fight flight, which is called sympathetic activation, and then
32:42
Speaker 2: we have this like then we have on the other
32:45
Speaker 2: side of the spectrum. Let me say that again. Actually, sure,
32:49
Speaker 2: so your nervous system exists on a spectrum. You have
32:52
Speaker 2: flight flight, which is sympathetic activation, which essentially we can
32:56
Speaker 2: kind of think about as like your nervous system staying
32:58
Speaker 2: on feel wired and tired, you'll keep going. You may
33:02
Speaker 2: experience workoholism, you may be overscheduling yourself, you may be
33:07
Speaker 2: kind of doing some numbing behaviors during your downtime, but
33:11
Speaker 2: you're never really like powering off. You're kind of stuck
33:14
Speaker 2: in on mode. And then we have at the other
33:17
Speaker 2: side of the spectrum, we have freeze physiologically, which is
33:20
Speaker 2: where you feel really heavy, lethargic, exhausted all the time.
33:24
Speaker 2: You have a hard time getting out of bed. You
33:27
Speaker 2: may like have a really hard time even doing some
33:30
Speaker 2: simple simple tasks like taking a shower, simple self care
33:34
Speaker 2: may start to feel almost impossible when you're in creed.
33:39
Speaker 2: And then you have functional freeze, which is kind of
33:41
Speaker 2: a blended state where you're in fight flight during the
33:43
Speaker 2: day and then at night you can get all your
33:46
Speaker 2: tasks done, and then at night you come home and
33:48
Speaker 2: you crash out. Like you are just sitting in bed
33:52
Speaker 2: or sitting on the couch for four hours, you can
33:54
Speaker 2: really have enough energy to cook or to even like
33:56
Speaker 2: make a decision. With that, yeah, you go. A lot
34:00
Speaker 2: of women today identify with that, and I've noticed that
34:05
Speaker 2: a lot of people who have experienced long term chronic
34:08
Speaker 2: stress are living in that functional freeze place. And then
34:12
Speaker 2: we also have this Goldilocks place, which is in the middle,
34:15
Speaker 2: which is your ventral vegus or your ventral vagel system,
34:19
Speaker 2: which is like where you feel open, harmonious, balanced, playful, spontaneous, social,
34:26
Speaker 2: your body's relaxed but not exhausted. And what somatics does
34:33
Speaker 2: is it reinforces this ventral vagel state. So regardless of
34:37
Speaker 2: whether you're in fight flight freeze or functional freeze, when
34:40
Speaker 2: you're doing somatic exercises, you're practicing this ventral vagel state
34:46
Speaker 2: over and over and over again. And as you do that,
34:49
Speaker 2: you're building new neural pathways that are taking you out
34:54
Speaker 2: of survival mode and putting you into a physiological homeostasis.
35:00
Speaker 2: And the more you practice that, it's similar to weightlifting, right,
35:04
Speaker 2: the more you lift weights, the stronger the muscle becomes.
35:07
Speaker 2: The more you practice somatic exercises, the stronger these new
35:11
Speaker 2: neural pathways become. And that's how you can start to
35:14
Speaker 2: shift out of a chronic state of survival, regardless of
35:19
Speaker 2: what flavor it has, and into you know, a more balanced,
35:23
Speaker 2: relaxed place.
35:27
Speaker 1: That sounds kind of amazing, but also thank you just
35:30
Speaker 1: for giving us examples of, you know, signs that you
35:35
Speaker 1: might need to do this type of work, because even
35:38
Speaker 1: like just what you're describing, you know me coming in
35:41
Speaker 1: at the end of the day is like, I don't
35:42
Speaker 1: want to talk to anybody. I just want to like
35:44
Speaker 1: sit here and watch a show and decompress. That that's
35:48
Speaker 1: actually a sign that you are having this like chronic
35:52
Speaker 1: stress kind of thing, and and that the alternative and
35:55
Speaker 1: that we're we're managing this in a different way. But
35:57
Speaker 1: what you just talked about, like to be playful and
36:01
Speaker 1: feel like sort of re energized and you know, emotionally
36:04
Speaker 1: connected to others, Like all of these good things can
36:06
Speaker 1: come through having a more intentional, somatic practice to bring
36:10
Speaker 1: ourselves back down again. Okay, so I feel like we're
36:16
Speaker 1: closing in on the big reveal here, Liz. On the
36:19
Speaker 1: other side of the next break, I'm going to ask
36:22
Speaker 1: you to walk me through some of these exercises so
36:25
Speaker 1: that we start illustrating some of the techniques that you
36:28
Speaker 1: are teaching in your book and in your work, and
36:31
Speaker 1: then we could talk about, hopefully at the end, what
36:34
Speaker 1: else to do to make this more of a substantial
36:37
Speaker 1: practice for people who want to continue leaning into this work.
36:40
Speaker 1: Does that sound good to you?
36:41
Speaker 2: That sounds great.
36:54
Speaker 1: Okay, So we're back with my very special guest, Liz
36:57
Speaker 1: ten dudo. She's here to share her mission and her
37:01
Speaker 1: message with us that she goes into deep detail and
37:05
Speaker 1: her new book, When the Body Speaks Awsmatic Healing Sets
37:08
Speaker 1: You Free. But just before the break, you know, we
37:11
Speaker 1: were talking about the importance of this work, what it
37:14
Speaker 1: looks like when chronic stress is rampant, and where I
37:19
Speaker 1: left this is for you to begin providing us with
37:22
Speaker 1: some examples of what it actually looks like in practice
37:26
Speaker 1: when people begin handling this differently, and of course the
37:31
Speaker 1: somatic pieces, things that maybe are easy techniques any of
37:35
Speaker 1: us could start experimenting with even today, but also maybe
37:40
Speaker 1: a discussion of the interplay between the type of work,
37:46
Speaker 1: the techniques that you advise, and when it is also
37:49
Speaker 1: important for someone to be thinking about clinical intervention, psychotherapy,
37:55
Speaker 1: trauma focused treatment in conjunction with what you're talking about,
38:00
Speaker 1: because there is a lot of overlap.
38:02
Speaker 2: Does that sound great? Yeah, that sounds great.
38:05
Speaker 1: Okay, So yeah, where do you start? You know, a
38:10
Speaker 1: garden variety of stressoholic like me, let's start there.
38:16
Speaker 2: Well, I think people tend to either be you know,
38:19
Speaker 2: more drawn to starting with talk therapy or more drawn
38:22
Speaker 2: to starting with body based modalities. And I do think
38:26
Speaker 2: if you have experienced chronic stress or if you have
38:29
Speaker 2: experienced trauma, it's important to do both. They don't necessarily
38:33
Speaker 2: have to happen at the same time, because that can
38:35
Speaker 2: be a lot of healing work for people to do
38:37
Speaker 2: all at once and maybe impractical for them, But it
38:40
Speaker 2: is good to kind of touch on both at some
38:43
Speaker 2: point in your healing journey. If you can do both
38:46
Speaker 2: at the same time, great, But for me personally, talk
38:51
Speaker 2: therapy was crucial and still is crucial for me in
38:55
Speaker 2: terms of reframing the trauma that happened to me, understanding
39:00
Speaker 2: kind of some of the family patterns that may have
39:02
Speaker 2: contributed to that trauma. I did IFS therapy and that
39:08
Speaker 2: was crucial for me to understanding my different parts and
39:11
Speaker 2: how they interact and you.
39:14
Speaker 1: Know, and quick plug listeners. I had the great privilege
39:17
Speaker 1: of speaking with doctor Dick Schwartz on the show about
39:20
Speaker 1: IFS and how it works and what it is. You
39:23
Speaker 1: can look back in my feed to understand what Liz
39:25
Speaker 1: is talking about, but that that's a very powerful modality
39:28
Speaker 1: and that was part of your healing process.
39:31
Speaker 2: That was a crucial part of my healing process from
39:34
Speaker 2: because I had CPTSD so or had CPTSD so complex trauma, yeah,
39:41
Speaker 2: and which for anyone who doesn't know, is just trauma
39:44
Speaker 2: that happens over and over and over again to the
39:47
Speaker 2: point of it compounding. And then I've also done EMDR
39:51
Speaker 2: with my therapist, which I loved, and I think that
39:54
Speaker 2: is really really helpful. And then you know, there's the
39:58
Speaker 2: whole somatic component for people. For most people, addressing the body,
40:04
Speaker 2: the stress and the trauma that's stored in the body
40:06
Speaker 2: is often the missing link for people. Most people know
40:11
Speaker 2: now about therapy, they even know about different therapeutic modalities.
40:16
Speaker 2: A lot of people know about AMDR, which is a
40:18
Speaker 2: fantastic bottom up process way of processing trauma, but somatics
40:24
Speaker 2: is often the missing link. So if you are someone
40:26
Speaker 2: who has long term physical pain that's not attributed to
40:29
Speaker 2: an accident, Let's say you have chronic back pain, or
40:32
Speaker 2: you have migraines you know more than once a month,
40:35
Speaker 2: or you have frequent stomach aches, or you're clenching your
40:39
Speaker 2: JA right now, or you know your shoulders are always
40:42
Speaker 2: up to your ears, or you notice in photos that
40:45
Speaker 2: your posture is super slumped, right, that is a a
40:49
Speaker 2: kind of a key to help you to know that
40:51
Speaker 2: you're storing a lot of tension in your body, probably
40:55
Speaker 2: from chronic stress or trauma, and somatics will really really
41:00
Speaker 2: help you release that habitual tension, regulate your nervous system,
41:05
Speaker 2: and find a lot more ease in your body, because
41:08
Speaker 2: you can't really be out of survival mode if you're
41:13
Speaker 2: physically still in absolutely survival mode. So no matter how
41:17
Speaker 2: much mental emotional work, mindfulness work you do, if your
41:21
Speaker 2: body's still really tense, or you're still you know, feeling
41:25
Speaker 2: a lot of physical pain in your body, or you
41:28
Speaker 2: can't sleep well, it's just reinforcing that survival mode. So
41:32
Speaker 2: it's often a piece of the puzzle for people that
41:35
Speaker 2: when they discover it, they're like, oh my gosh, I
41:38
Speaker 2: feel better now.
41:39
Speaker 1: Well that's true. And so just just to interject for
41:44
Speaker 1: our listeners who for whom psychotherapy might also be a
41:49
Speaker 1: very important part of this, is that in evidence based
41:53
Speaker 1: trauma focused psychotherapy, there is actually a neurological metabolism that
42:01
Speaker 1: takes place over time. Traumatic life experiences are encoded in
42:06
Speaker 1: different parts of your brain than regular memories, and some
42:10
Speaker 1: of the therapeutic modalities that Liz is just talking about
42:14
Speaker 1: seek to bring back into conscious access the memories so
42:20
Speaker 1: that you can actually transfer them into a different part
42:24
Speaker 1: of your brain, which I know sounds so insane, but
42:26
Speaker 1: that's what's going on there. And until you do this,
42:29
Speaker 1: the old trauma that is stored in the different part
42:34
Speaker 1: of your brain, like the before treatment part of your brain,
42:37
Speaker 1: will actually be reactivating your nervous system, your memories, your
42:43
Speaker 1: emotions until this metabolic process happens. And so all of
42:47
Speaker 1: the therapeutic approaches that Liz mentioned are fantastic. Additionally, and
42:53
Speaker 1: I'll just say this, there's a lot of research to
42:56
Speaker 1: support the efficacy of psychedelic treatments in this as well.
43:00
Speaker 1: And I am based in Colorado and have had the
43:03
Speaker 1: great privilege of connecting with different psychedelic treatment providers. I
43:07
Speaker 1: know that it sounds kind of out there, but the
43:10
Speaker 1: research is really significant, and I would invite you to
43:13
Speaker 1: go back into my podcast feed and look for an
43:16
Speaker 1: episode on this topic by doctor Scott Shannon, who is
43:20
Speaker 1: a just foundational researcher in this space to learn more
43:23
Speaker 1: about it and what it is, and also to understand
43:27
Speaker 1: how to potentially get connected with a legitimate, qualified, appropriate
43:33
Speaker 1: treatment provider, because there are there's light and dark in
43:37
Speaker 1: that space as well. So I just wanted to mention
43:39
Speaker 1: that to people who need to do this part of
43:42
Speaker 1: the work as well. Okay, so let's now take us
43:47
Speaker 1: into what is missing in I think more conventional treatment
43:52
Speaker 1: approaches that the somatic work seeks to fill. Even if
43:56
Speaker 1: someone does the neurological based trauma healing, what is left
44:01
Speaker 1: over and then what does it look like in practice
44:03
Speaker 1: when someone does begin using these techniques, Where do you
44:07
Speaker 1: advise even starting with that?
44:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, essentially the gaps that it fills are just really
44:13
Speaker 2: coming back into contact with your body and your body
44:16
Speaker 2: signals and being able to sense your body without sliding
44:20
Speaker 2: into kind of anger, irritability, or a shutdown state. I
44:25
Speaker 2: think specifically for women, there's a lot of programming around
44:28
Speaker 2: our body and a lot of us don't necessarily have
44:31
Speaker 2: the healthiest relationship with our body understandably, so right, We've
44:35
Speaker 2: been given so many, so much messaging over the course
44:40
Speaker 2: of our lives for how our body should look, how
44:42
Speaker 2: it should feel, and somatis really helps you like think
44:48
Speaker 2: of your body as a place of healing, movement as
44:50
Speaker 2: a place of healing. Ancient cultures knew this, so you
44:54
Speaker 2: had Chigong in China. You had tribes in Africa who
44:59
Speaker 2: were doing kind of like grief processing through undulating movements. Altogether,
45:04
Speaker 2: you have the whirling Dervish in the Middle East, and
45:07
Speaker 2: all of these are body based practices that are kind
45:10
Speaker 2: of rituals for healing in ancient cultures, and in modern
45:15
Speaker 2: society we've just like completely disconnected from that, and we
45:19
Speaker 2: really beat our body as like a workore, and so
45:22
Speaker 2: it's really important to get back in that healthy relationship
45:25
Speaker 2: with your body.
45:27
Speaker 1: Yes, this is a question, you know as you were
45:29
Speaker 1: mentioning these different types of practices. What I also know
45:32
Speaker 1: from my experiences as a psychologist is that those are
45:35
Speaker 1: also practices that induce an altered state of consciousness.
45:41
Speaker 2: Is that part of this definitely definitely like letting your
45:47
Speaker 2: brain turn off and being really in this place where
45:52
Speaker 2: you're sensing yourself or you're feeling your emotions through your body.
45:56
Speaker 2: I've never done psychedelic therapy, but I've heard such great
46:00
Speaker 2: things about it, and I would imagine that it has
46:03
Speaker 2: a similar effect where your conscious brain can turn off
46:07
Speaker 2: for a minute and you can really access these different
46:12
Speaker 2: states of being that help your nervous system relax and
46:16
Speaker 2: find safety.
46:17
Speaker 1: Are there specific things that people can just do as
46:22
Speaker 1: part of their daily routine to access some of this
46:26
Speaker 1: or in your experience, is it a more comprehensive program
46:32
Speaker 1: like the one that you went to like or maybe the.
46:37
Speaker 2: Answer is it depends.
46:38
Speaker 1: I mean sometimes different people need lift different like levels
46:42
Speaker 1: of I don't know if the intensity.
46:46
Speaker 2: Is different levels of somatic release and standing. Yeah, I
46:54
Speaker 2: would say if you're experiencing, if you feel like you're
46:57
Speaker 2: in one of those states fight flight freezer, functional freeze,
47:01
Speaker 2: a comprehensive program would work best for you because it
47:05
Speaker 2: will really take you through a step by step process
47:08
Speaker 2: where you're able to engage with somatic work in a
47:12
Speaker 2: way that is slowly building on itself so that you're
47:16
Speaker 2: never experiencing overwhelm or retraumatizing as you're going through it. Yeah,
47:21
Speaker 2: very important.
47:22
Speaker 1: And so then just a painted picture, what does that
47:25
Speaker 1: look like if someone was going to say yes to that?
47:30
Speaker 1: What are just and maybe it looks a little different
47:32
Speaker 1: for different people depending on their.
47:33
Speaker 2: Way I teach it is that essentially we start with
47:37
Speaker 2: exercises that relax your body and release habitual muscle tension
47:42
Speaker 2: and your superficial muscles first, so that looks like a
47:46
Speaker 2: lot of rocking. It looks like movements that utilize bilateral stimulation.
47:51
Speaker 2: It looks like these tiny movements that help you repattern
47:55
Speaker 2: your movement pathways into using smaller muscles to not using
48:00
Speaker 2: your huge muscles to just push through anymore.
48:03
Speaker 1: Okay, from all right, and that's what we were talking about,
48:07
Speaker 1: Like laying on the floor with a goal post, rolling
48:10
Speaker 1: around on your pajamas.
48:12
Speaker 2: Those an exercise that we can all together that it
48:18
Speaker 2: really makes for any nice feel activated. But from there
48:23
Speaker 2: those big muscles, then we start to get into the
48:25
Speaker 2: deeper layer of muscles that are more your fire flight response.
48:29
Speaker 2: So we have the massier muscle in your job and
48:32
Speaker 2: the soas muscle, which is a large muscle that connects
48:35
Speaker 2: your upper body to your lower body and a lot
48:37
Speaker 2: of somatic work is called like the muscle of the soul.
48:40
Speaker 2: It both of those muscles in terms of your survival response,
48:45
Speaker 2: they kind of automatically clench when you kick into fight
48:49
Speaker 2: or flight, and it's really to help you fight or flee. Right,
48:53
Speaker 2: So if a bear is coming your job, your mass
48:56
Speaker 2: muscles and your jaw will clench, and your sauce muscle
48:58
Speaker 2: will clench because those are thels that are involved with
49:01
Speaker 2: either like curling into a ball or running away from
49:05
Speaker 2: the situation or fighting back. So yeah, so step two
49:11
Speaker 2: in my process is to release the tension in those muscles. Specifically,
49:16
Speaker 2: the so as muscle is often quite quite tense for
49:18
Speaker 2: people and they're completely not aware of it. And you
49:21
Speaker 2: don't want to just like jump into releasing your so
49:23
Speaker 2: as right away. You want to release the habitual muscle
49:27
Speaker 2: tension first for you just jump into a so as
49:31
Speaker 2: released Because it can be painful for people, but the
49:34
Speaker 2: way that I teach it is not painful. So don't
49:37
Speaker 2: go to a massage therapist and ask them to dig
49:40
Speaker 2: into to your still as a muscle unless you want
49:42
Speaker 2: to cry. That's a whole lot of pain. It does work,
49:46
Speaker 2: it's very painful. So the way that I go through
49:49
Speaker 2: it is is in a way that is for people
49:52
Speaker 2: who survived trauma or chronic stress that it's not overwhelming
49:56
Speaker 2: or reach trumpa anyway. And then the third step in
49:59
Speaker 2: my process is regulating the nervous system. And the fourth
50:02
Speaker 2: step is integration so that you're not just kind of
50:05
Speaker 2: like left on a limb hanging that we can kind
50:07
Speaker 2: of bring it all back together. The goal is really
50:10
Speaker 2: so that you can experience difficult things in your day
50:15
Speaker 2: and you have all of these practical tools to be
50:18
Speaker 2: able to emotionally regulate through movement or to even just
50:22
Speaker 2: understand what your body's feeling and be able to release
50:27
Speaker 2: that stress or that tension out of your book. Okay,
50:33
Speaker 2: do you want to try it? Do you want to
50:34
Speaker 2: try and exercise? Yes, I'll talk us through. We can
50:39
Speaker 2: do it seated, and so wherever you're sitting right now,
50:43
Speaker 2: you just want to come to mid chair or mid
50:46
Speaker 2: sofa you want to have Okay.
50:49
Speaker 1: All right, friends tuning in. I'm only doing this because
50:53
Speaker 1: I am expecting that we're all going to do this together,
50:56
Speaker 1: so you do it with me. Okay, all right, I am.
50:59
Speaker 2: I am back on my chair, grasped ankles hip the
51:03
Speaker 2: hart to start, and you're gonna your first finger and
51:07
Speaker 2: place it in between your eyebrows and then you're just
51:09
Speaker 2: gonna swipe up to your hairline and then back up
51:14
Speaker 2: and come back to your eyebrows. So we want to go,
51:17
Speaker 2: you know, know, directionally from the base of the eyebrows up
51:20
Speaker 2: to the hairline, lift up and come back.
51:24
Speaker 1: Gosh, this you know what's so interesting? When my son
51:28
Speaker 1: was a baby and I would try to get him
51:32
Speaker 1: to go to sleep, I would I would do it
51:34
Speaker 1: the other way. I would just like stroke my finger
51:37
Speaker 1: on his forehead and his little eyes. He would always okay, okay.
51:45
Speaker 2: And as you're doing this, at any point, if your
51:47
Speaker 2: arm gets tired, you can rest your arm and then
51:50
Speaker 2: just pick it up. Okay. Again, we'll repeat this for
51:53
Speaker 2: about like fifteen more seconds. And who see how unclenched
51:59
Speaker 2: can your job be? Oh, this jaw, it's almost like
52:05
Speaker 2: as though you're drooling as you're doing this movement.
52:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've never done this before.
52:13
Speaker 2: I'll relax in the hand on your leg, so can
52:16
Speaker 2: you have a soft hand? Was that hand?
52:20
Speaker 1: I didn't. I didn't put my hand on my leg.
52:22
Speaker 1: It's on my legs.
52:23
Speaker 2: And a lot of people will hold tension in their hands.
52:25
Speaker 2: We just want to see how relaxed can that be?
52:28
Speaker 2: Now unclenched? Can your belly be? Okay?
52:31
Speaker 1: I was clenching my belly? Interesting? Interesting, I did not
52:34
Speaker 1: notice that until you directed my attention.
52:38
Speaker 2: Just wanted two more And as you're ready, you can
52:40
Speaker 2: bring that to a pause. I take your tie and
52:44
Speaker 2: then we'll just sit with it for a second, see
52:47
Speaker 2: if we feel a little different afterwards, you might feel
52:53
Speaker 2: a bit more relaxed. Maybe that stimulates one of your
52:59
Speaker 2: creamial nerves that connects down to your brainstem, which is
53:04
Speaker 2: a part of your body that is largely involved in
53:07
Speaker 2: your fight or flight response. So I mean you feel activated.
53:11
Speaker 2: You can do that exercise and it'll kind of give
53:13
Speaker 2: you this immediate sense of relaxation. That was just a
53:18
Speaker 2: quick one minute exercise. I do that sometimes, like when
53:21
Speaker 2: I'm waiting in line or in traffic and I'm just stopped.
53:26
Speaker 2: I'll sometimes do that if I'm feeling stressed out. And
53:29
Speaker 2: then what I teach is like an average of five
53:32
Speaker 2: to ten minutes of somatic exercises that are sequenced out
53:37
Speaker 2: for specific results. But that's the quick sample.
53:41
Speaker 1: That amazing. No, I love it. That was very soothing,
53:47
Speaker 1: and I'm just I'm already imagining in my mind's eye
53:50
Speaker 1: my children be like, Mom, what are you doing now?
53:53
Speaker 1: Because I'm going to stop doing this in.
53:54
Speaker 2: Weird places, please, Okay.
53:57
Speaker 1: And so if people wanted to learn more, so obviously
54:01
Speaker 1: you have your book, which I'm sure is like the
54:03
Speaker 1: explainer that goes into all of this. But I think
54:06
Speaker 1: what's also true about this work is that it can
54:08
Speaker 1: be difficult to like hear about it and know what
54:13
Speaker 1: it is or how to do it. So do you
54:15
Speaker 1: have other resources that take people into I mean videos
54:19
Speaker 1: or tutorials or I mean honestly, like, are you doing
54:23
Speaker 1: in person kinds of things of people as well for
54:26
Speaker 1: the deeper parts.
54:28
Speaker 2: Of this or yeah? So I have both online courses. Yeah,
54:34
Speaker 2: and oh okay, you know they're kind of thirty sixty
54:38
Speaker 2: or ninety day journeys in the online course, So stress
54:41
Speaker 2: and trauma, there's another one for healing your nervous system.
54:44
Speaker 2: There's another one for lowering cortisol. And then my app
54:49
Speaker 2: has all of my courses on it and also have
54:51
Speaker 2: like seven hundred and fifty somatic exercises in a library
54:56
Speaker 2: for very specific things like if you are overstimulated, if
55:00
Speaker 2: you have mental exhaustion, if you know you're having gut issues,
55:06
Speaker 2: they're very If you want help with emotional regulation or
55:09
Speaker 2: anger release, there are movements to process those emotions through
55:15
Speaker 2: movement there give everyone a daily nervous system reset on
55:18
Speaker 2: that app as well.
55:21
Speaker 1: Amazing. Okay, so what is your app called.
55:24
Speaker 2: It's called embody right, and you can get it on
55:26
Speaker 2: the workout which dot com?
55:30
Speaker 1: Okay, embody is it also like on the Apple.
55:35
Speaker 2: App Store or you can get it from our website
55:38
Speaker 2: now because we've had some we sometimes have. We don't
55:42
Speaker 2: want to blow it out and make it have too
55:44
Speaker 2: many people in it to the point where we care everyone.
55:47
Speaker 2: So just on the website right now. If you try
55:50
Speaker 2: to get it on the app storre, it'll be like
55:51
Speaker 2: you need an invitation and say get in.
55:54
Speaker 1: Okay, so the workout which dot com to get the app?
55:59
Speaker 1: That's z so amazing, that's incredible. And then very lastly
56:03
Speaker 1: for our friends, just for whom this might be a consideration,
56:06
Speaker 1: would you advise if someone is going through trauma treatment
56:12
Speaker 1: to be talking about this with their therapist and kind
56:15
Speaker 1: of looping their therapist into what they've started, perhaps getting
56:19
Speaker 1: support around through your solutions or how would.
56:22
Speaker 2: You recommend that? I mean, I always say like, definitely,
56:25
Speaker 2: if you want to talk with your therapists, you definitely should.
56:28
Speaker 2: You know your body best, so if you're experiencing sleep
56:31
Speaker 2: issues or you know, like stomach aches, headaches, have a
56:38
Speaker 2: lot of pain in your body, like it is quite
56:40
Speaker 2: safe to do. Don't necessarily need to get other people's
56:45
Speaker 2: permission to do it if you want, you definitely can.
56:49
Speaker 2: I would say the things that we really advise against
56:52
Speaker 2: is if you are suicidal or you have suicidal ideation,
56:56
Speaker 2: robotics is not the right thing for you to be
56:59
Speaker 2: doing right now. It's better therapists and skipsomatics for now.
57:06
Speaker 1: Yes, And just so to explain what Liz is talking
57:09
Speaker 1: about here, and you actually mentioned this list that the
57:13
Speaker 1: physical connection and potential to reactivate old trauma is very real,
57:20
Speaker 1: and outside of having a container and support systems, people
57:26
Speaker 1: can get flooded. It can be too much, and that
57:29
Speaker 1: can activate impulses to self harm or even commit suicide.
57:37
Speaker 1: I will also say, as a therapist who I do
57:41
Speaker 1: not specialize in trauma. My area of specialties really relationship growth, love,
57:45
Speaker 1: happiness and success. But because trauma is so prevalent in
57:49
Speaker 1: our culture unfortunately, I mean, there's always a need to
57:52
Speaker 1: be sensitive to this. But as a therapist, what I
57:54
Speaker 1: would also ask is, if you are in a relationship
57:58
Speaker 1: with a therapist, is really important for them to know
58:02
Speaker 1: the full picture of what you're engaged with, particular with trauma,
58:05
Speaker 1: because the physical manifestations of trauma are just such an
58:09
Speaker 1: important piece of this and if you're compartmentalizing things and
58:14
Speaker 1: not telling your therapists that you're experiencing certain physiological symptoms,
58:19
Speaker 1: they won't have a full picture of what's going on
58:22
Speaker 1: or how to be able to help you. And so
58:25
Speaker 1: ideally your therapist is asking about this also asking questions
58:30
Speaker 1: like what is your relationship like with alcohol or substances,
58:34
Speaker 1: or you know, what else are you doing to take
58:36
Speaker 1: care of yourself, but also just to be offering this
58:40
Speaker 1: up because otherwise it can get compartmentalized and your therapist
58:43
Speaker 1: can't help you all the way if they don't really
58:45
Speaker 1: know the full picture. Does that make sense because otherwise
58:48
Speaker 1: I think if people just consider that it's like psychological
58:54
Speaker 1: or things that we want to articulate or verbalize or
58:56
Speaker 1: gain insight around, that's not the whole story.
58:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you definitely want to look into who you're
59:03
Speaker 2: training with as well. You know, for me, I have
59:05
Speaker 2: fifteen years in experience with teaching full time, so I
59:09
Speaker 2: am very experienced with this. We have a very high
59:12
Speaker 2: success rate, and we also have support for all of
59:15
Speaker 2: our students. That's why we don't put stuff like public
59:17
Speaker 2: facing on the app store for well, because we want
59:20
Speaker 2: to make sure if people do email in that we
59:23
Speaker 2: can support them and refer them to resources if they
59:27
Speaker 2: need it. So you definitely want to do don't just
59:31
Speaker 2: like do somatics off of YouTube. I know it's very tempting.
59:35
Speaker 2: You could try like what exercise if you want, but
59:38
Speaker 2: you definitely want to look into who you're training with,
59:41
Speaker 2: how much experience they have, and make sure that there
59:44
Speaker 2: is some sort of support system at least the email
59:48
Speaker 2: that you can reach out to and get support if
59:50
Speaker 2: you need to. Amazing.
59:54
Speaker 1: Oh right, so, Liz, I know we're at the end
59:56
Speaker 1: of our time here, but just just to recap, the
1:00:00
Speaker 1: book is when the body speaks how somatic healing sets
1:00:03
Speaker 1: you free, Liz to Neuto and your your alias is
1:00:08
Speaker 1: the workout which and your website and like where can
1:00:12
Speaker 1: people connect with you and then we can can facilitate.
1:00:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, my website is the workout which dot com. The
1:00:20
Speaker 2: book is the workout which dot com. Slash book has
1:00:23
Speaker 2: links for international folks as well and on Instagram. At
1:00:28
Speaker 2: the workout which with an underscore at the end, you
1:00:31
Speaker 2: can DM me the word release and I will one
1:00:36
Speaker 2: minute exercise to try. You can just have on your
1:00:39
Speaker 2: phone and check it out and see if.
1:00:41
Speaker 1: You like it okay the workout which underscore dm her
1:00:45
Speaker 1: with the word release and let the relaxation begin.
1:00:51
Speaker 2: I love it well with us.
1:00:52
Speaker 1: This has been such a fun and interesting conversation. I
1:00:55
Speaker 1: already feel more relaxed after having hang out with you
1:00:58
Speaker 1: for a little while and can't wait to to continue
1:01:00
Speaker 1: the journey.
1:01:01
Speaker 3: Thanks so much, Lisa.
1:01:16
Speaker 1: My friends, if you are a regular listener of the show,
1:01:18
Speaker 1: you know that I love ideas. They are so fantastic,
1:01:24
Speaker 1: so inspiring. And it is also true that the people
1:01:29
Speaker 1: who create the most success in life, meaning they get
1:01:35
Speaker 1: the outcomes that they want. They're not just introspective. They're
1:01:41
Speaker 1: not just in contact with their feelings. Although both of
1:01:45
Speaker 1: those things are great, the difference between people who actually
1:01:49
Speaker 1: do the things is that they are intentional and they
1:01:54
Speaker 1: are taking action. At my practice, Growing Self, that is
1:01:59
Speaker 1: what we are all about. We help growth oriented people
1:02:02
Speaker 1: like you bridge that gap between insight and impact. We
1:02:09
Speaker 1: are licensed therapists who also practice evidence based coaching psychology,
1:02:15
Speaker 1: which is something that most therapists never learn how to do.
1:02:20
Speaker 1: That's why working with us is really different. At Growing Self,
1:02:24
Speaker 1: you'll get the depth you need and that you want,
1:02:27
Speaker 1: but you'll also get the clarity to move forward because
1:02:32
Speaker 1: maybe you don't need to air quote heal, Maybe you
1:02:37
Speaker 1: don't need to process or unpack. Maybe you need a
1:02:42
Speaker 1: plan that is going to help you move forward and
1:02:45
Speaker 1: fulfill your potential. If this approach is sounding like a
1:02:50
Speaker 1: breath of fresh air for you, I'm so glad you're
1:02:53
Speaker 1: here and getting started is so easy. Just come to
1:02:56
Speaker 1: my website growingself dot com, schedule your free console Haiti,
1:03:00
Speaker 1: and that, in itself, is you taking action to move
1:03:05
Speaker 1: towards the person you want to be. Schedule that first appointment.
1:03:10
Speaker 1: You're already on your way.