Introduction to Episode

Dr. Alice Kerby teaches us that somatic simply means of the body, and she shares with us her journey to using the somatic experience to heal trauma.

Podcast Episode Summary

So many aspects of our lives bring us out of the body and we can turn to unhealthy coping mechanisms. Dr. Alice Kerby works with sober and sober curious women to help them be in their body. 

Dr. Alice started as a massage therapist, then she became a doctor of physical therapy. Now, she is working on earning her Somatic Experiencing certification through SETI. In this episode, we discuss using the somatic experience to heal trauma. We discuss Bg T and little t trauma and how the body responds to it. We discuss a little about new brain research and how that has affected our knowing about how trauma lives in the body. And, later, Dr. Alice walks us through a guided technique to get back in the body.

Quotables

“I want to be moving.” [reflecting why the somatic path]

“Looking through external things to make us feel better.” [on one way somatic experiences can support us in our journey]

“I can walk around present in my body.” [a result of living the somatic experience]

Trauma Tips - first have a practitioner to work with! 

1. Build your awareness
2. Recognize it’s hard to be the observer 
3. Learn to know when you do feel good in your body 

Recommended Resources

• See Dr. Alice’s work at kerbymethodconsulting.com. 
• Here’s the Facebook live we did last year https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1596804017144650. 
• Here’s a link to Janine Wirth’s episode on Trauma: https://michellelasley.com/captivate-podcast/the-trauma-whisperer-janine-wirth-talks-about-trauma 
• Find out more about Dr. Peter Levine here.
• Rick Hanson, Being Well (podcast) https://www.rickhanson.net/being-well-podcast/
• SEI Somatic Experiencing International: https://traumahealing.org 
• Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps Score, https://www.besselvanderkolk.com. 

For more information about Michelle, Balance Shared, events, and projects, please visit www.michellelasley.com. 

Michelle Lasley 0:02

Hi. This is Michelle Lasley with balanced shared a space where I truly believe we are better together. My guest today is Dr. Alice Kirby. She uses the pronouns she her hers. Dr. Alice is a Doctor of Physical Therapy, a health consultant, holistic health practitioner, and Somatic Experiencing practitioner and training. She uses her decades of experience and training to focus on the stress response from an autonomic nervous system, and physiological perspective. She specializes in working with sober and sober curious women who are seeking additional tools to manage stress, increase a sense of calm and move forward in creating their lives. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Alice Kerby 0:47

Thank you so much for having me.

Michelle Lasley 0:50

You're welcome. So can we talk about the somatic experience first?

Alice Kerby 0:55

Yeah,

that's one of my favorite topics.

Michelle Lasley 0:57

Oh, awesome. What I have heard, this term has been coming up more, I've been meeting more people who like to use this as one of their modalities. But what does it mean? What is it?

Alice Kerby 1:08

Sure, so there's a couple, there's a couple of things I'll say about it. So the word somatic just means of the body. And so there are all different types of trainings for there's like somatic yoga, or there could be somatic meditation. And so we'll see that word and in front of a lot of different trainings. And so I like to really differentiate between the somatic experiencing, which is a, like a registered trademark of the work of Dr. Peter Levine. And it's through the the program that I'm in currently, it's a three year training to become a Somatic Experiencing practitioner. So it so it is, it is a little bit, it's a lot more involved in detail than, you know, someone who's maybe just doing like somatic body work, because that essentially just means they're doing work of the body. And I know I've been involved in courses that were much shorter and much less detailed. But this work is essentially how to deal with trauma, how to assess trauma coming from a physiological perspective, and through the somatic experiencing trauma Institute or setting. So it's a very like regulated program, you do three years of training, and you have to do X amount of case consults and your personal sessions. And so there's a whole paradigm that comes with it. So that being said, somatic experiencing in a way that, that this program is teaching it and that I use it in that I'm practicing it based on this work of Dr. Peter Levine is it's working with the nervous system and working with the autonomic nervous system to heal trauma. And I talk a lot about healing and working with anxiety and stress and overwhelm in relationship to that, because I think sometimes when people hear trauma, there's some confusion about and I think we talked about this before, about like trauma with the capital T when there's these really big major life events of I mean, we could think of any like abuse as a child or major car accidents, or, you know, your house burns down anything like that, like those are definitely we can all agree quite traumatic. But then we also have trauma with maybe a little T, or a lowercase t where it's events that our body or our nervous system will perceive as trauma, even if maybe consciously or cognitively, we know it's not that big of a deal. Like maybe we're in a fender bender, or maybe as a child, we,

gosh, I'm blanking, like maybe we were, we were a neighbor's dog would bark at us really loud every day, and maybe the dog would never hurt us. But it would alert our system so that we would be on guard and we would have this physiological response to trauma. And so that's where I like to also talk about anxiety and overwhelm, because I think more people relate to those things. Because somebody will be like, well, I don't really have any trauma, I'm fine. But then maybe every time they see a dog, they have a heightened stress response, they need to turn around the other way, their life force has completely shut down, and they're not able to respond to that situation, had they not had that experience as a child. So Somatic Experiencing work. You know, we it's not a thing where you go in and try to go head on into trauma, it's actually learning to work with the physiology through the language of sensation, to start touching in and tapping into what's actually happening in our body. Because these, these trauma patterns can get stored in our physiology, and then we, we respond in a way that maybe we're still under trauma, or it's like these, these physiological loops don't get completed, maybe because we'll have a trauma response where we tried to run or we tried to get away from the dog, you know, for that example, and we were not able to so now we have this incomplete trauma response so that every time we see a dog, our systems like oh, and it responds in all of those, you know, hyper aroused states or prolonged or hyper sympathetic states, like the sympathetic nervous system the fight or flight system. And so as somatic experiencing, we can go in and start touching into the body and start teaching and working with how to feel what's actually happening in the here and now. And then through doing that work, we're able to slowly bring awareness to some of these places that might have these closed loops or might be cut off or that we're, unconsciously or subconsciously continuing to repeat patterns like this without without really understanding why or how to stop it because it's in our body. So se Somatic Experiencing works with the physio physiology and with the body by going in and helping us to start feeling through the language of sensation. So it's not necessarily based on emotion, although that can come into play. But at its most basic level, it's really, what am I noticing in my body right now? Like, am I Is there a sense of expansion or contraction, and as we're able to come more and more into our bodies, than we're able to, to navigate some of these closed loop? Or to close some of these loops and these open loop patterns so that we can resolve the trauma and move forward more as this whole person with our lifeforce, like really able to search through us instead of being closed off, and all these areas where there's some sense of, of a traumatic incident in the past.

Michelle Lasley 6:18

Right? Oh, my gosh, that's so neat. I love that we have so many different modalities to turn into. So, you know, if we're stuck in a things not working, then we go to this other thing. So you started, I mean, you you're a Doctor of Physical Therapy, a health consultant, and now you're adding the somatic piece to it. So can you I'm curious, what got you to adding this modality?

Alice Kerby 6:43

Sure. And I will say, Sorry, I'm gonna try to keep my responses not quite so long. But I do I love talking about this work. And so prior to becoming a Doctor of Physical Therapy, even I was, this is where some of the holistic health consulting or holistic health practitioner piece comes in. I studied Chinese medicine, I spent many years studying meditation. I was a massage therapist, and I decided when I was 30, that I wanted to go back to school and I wanted to be a doctor. And you know, I looked into various routes to that I went through my four years of undergrad and I was pre med, I realized I didn't want to be a doctor and physical therapy was a really good fit. Because there I'd always been really interested in the nervous system. And so I was dabbling with idea of doing neuroscience PhDs and I interviewed for a couple, but a lot of those really worked with animal models, and with a lot of research, and I knew I wanted to be moving. I wanted to be with people and just moving physically, I don't like to sit too much at a desk, pause for a second.

Michelle Lasley 7:46

Yeah. So as we're doing this interview, I am seated at my desk in my upstairs office, and Dr. Alice is very clearly standing in her workspace, just to kind of highlight this need, I guess.

Alice Kerby 8:01

Definitely. And I'm glad Feel free to interrupt anytime, because I try to keep things short. And I just I get going. Yeah, and I love I have the standing desk, it cranks up, my boyfriend got it for me because he has one and it was such a awesome thing. He was like you need this, your posture is terrible. Your neck always hurts and is. It's wonderful. There's a squishy mat, and it's Yeah, I highly recommend it. And they're not that expensive couple 100 bucks.

Michelle Lasley 8:25

Nice. So anyway,

Alice Kerby 8:26

that was like my background. And then I went to this Western medical training for seven years and decided to be a PT because I could do that movement piece. And then the somatic experiencing work came in about three years ago, I was a pretty active, I was drinking a lot. And so I'm pretty comfortable using the term alcoholic even though it's not my favorite word to describe like my relationship with alcohol. But I will Yeah, I was drinking way too much. And it was starting to really create a lot of problems in my life and my relationships were breaking down, and my stress and anxiety were through the roof. And that was a big reason why I was drinking, because I was trying to figure out a way to calm down and I see this a lot in the women I work with now it's like we're looking for that external thing to make us feel better. So around the time that I got sober and I stopped drinking and started doing some recovery work. I also started working with a therapist and she I just happened to find her I didn't know that she did Somatic Experiencing I'd never heard of it. But we started doing this work together and and I was like what is this this is so cool. Like I can feel my body. I can be in my body I can walk around present in my body. And for me as like a newly sober person who'd been self medicating with alcohol and really checked out. It was like this huge world opened up for me and it really helped me to to want to stay sober. Because I know a lot of times in early sobriety there's you know, issues with it's hard to give up a substance and addiction is very difficult. You know, it's not an easy thing, but doing this work in conjunction with my recovery. work was phenomenal for me. And it helps so

much.

Because I wanted to like be in my body because as soon as I got those little tastes of being present, it was it was like a whole world opened up. And I became aware of my internal landscape. And suddenly I had all of these tools to not suddenly it was over time. But sometimes it would feel suddenly, like I knew how to manage things in the moment. So after working with her for about nine months, she's like, why don't you go take the training? You're so into this? And so I did. And so now I'm in my intermediate year of the three year program. So I have three, I think, four more courses to go. Oh, nice. Yes, yeah, it's awesome work. I

love it so much. What are you most looking forward to getting out of it? Like when graduation day happens? I think being able

to call myself a full fledged practitioner. And then just having accumulated more skills and knowledge like we are, we've done a little bit on accidents. But I know we have a segment coming up on motor vehicle accidents in our next class. And I believe it's in June, if it's still happening. And so I'm really excited to learn about that. Because as a physical therapist, like working with MBAs and people that are in car accidents is such a big part of what we do. And so I'm always really interested in how I can pull this trauma work into what I do as a doctor physical therapy as well.

Yeah,

but just yeah, more knowledge being more solid. And what I'm doing having more experience, the trainings are so much fun, too.

Yeah,

yeah.

Oh, I'm glad you found a passion that really aligns with you. Me, too.

Thanks.

So,

I'm curious if we could dig into a little bit about trauma living in the body. This is a newer concept to me, and I have Dr. basals book over there, I'm not even going to pronounce his last name. And some of the other people I've interviewed on the podcast, we've talked about this. And so I'll link different episodes in the show notes. So we can get like little glimpses of this trauma, trauma speak from different angles. But can you kind of so let's go to the dog app analogy that we that you you shared. So you know, let's say kid walking home from school every day, neighbors got the dog, and every day the kid feels scared, maybe freezes a little bit. And this happens for I don't know, a year year or something. And then maybe the dog moves and then life goes on. And and now something happens. So like, how does, how could that show up in a person's body as an adult? Sure. So

with with that specific example, the person could, every time they see a dog, or maybe every time they see this certain type of dog. And what's interesting about this, too, is that the person may not even have like a conscious memory of this going on as a kid. Maybe it happened when they were really young. So they don't really have a memory of being scared by a dog. But because the trauma can be held in the body, and in the nervous system, whenever they see. Let's say it's like a malty, like a kind of a cute little dog, even their body will react in the same way. So typically, a lot of times those reactions and not always, maybe it'll be a freeze maybe that they can respond with a freezer a shutdown. So they'll start to notice those same, like physical symptoms of a freezer shutdown, maybe their heart rate will get really slow. Maybe they'll feel a sense of heaviness or collapse. Maybe they will have difficulty engaging in conversation because it's almost like they kind of blank out or go into a shock response. Or conversely, maybe they have a heightened response, where maybe their sympathetic nervous system is overstimulated when they see this dog because that was the reaction that got stored in and that got linked to this pattern that got linked up. So then maybe every time they see it's this cute little Mounties, their blood pressure is like going up, they're sweating, and they've got, you know, a racing heart. Maybe their shoulders are hunched up and they have this anxiety and they don't know why.

Awesome. Okay, I want to take a little break. And when we come back, can we dig in into a little bit and how you can unpack that? Sure. Awesome. I love aligning my days with nature's rhythms, and I made a tool to make it easier. I would like to introduce you to my moon deck. My moon deck is a perpetual calendar, a calendar that never expires. This 86 card deck with booklet will allow you to lay out your day, week or month and overlay the sun and moon with the elements and with the celebrations from the Wheel of the Year. This tool drawn and created by me. Michelle Lasley will be your fun, whimsical and practical tool to see how nature and its rhythms can support you. If you want to learn more and get your own deck today, visit www dot Michelle lasley.com slash moon deck. I can't wait to help you align your time with nature and my perpetual calendar the moon deck Welcome back. Okay, so we have the now adult, who experienced the little t trauma with the dog that frightened them years and years ago. And so you work with your client then to identify where that is in the body. So a piece of his sounds very clearly, you know, just mindfulness and awareness, like being able to recognize that, can you kind of share what that would look like, you know, as as you start to unpack where that lives in the body to be able to help someone be free of those traumas?

Sure. And I will say just about the awareness, there's a, there's a certain part of our brain called the insula or the insular cortex that they've done MRI studies on,

where is that in the brain? Oh, gosh, that's

a great question. I don't know. Because the answer, I'd have to look at a picture. But you can look it up. It's called the insula or insular cortex. But some of these studies are really cool, because when we go in and start practicing this awareness of our body, what they found in MRI studies is that when somebody is aware of the sense of being cold, the insula will light up. But if they're just feeling cold, and they don't have that awareness, it doesn't light up. And so they're finding that I have a great quote, If I can find it, oh, I thought this was an A, one of the research articles they were doing on the insular cortex is that subjective feelings are based on the active interpretation of changes in the physiological conditions of the body. So what that saying is that our feelings can often come from our awareness of our physiology. And so it isn't just like, we feel something in our body responds, it truly can be, something's happening in our body, we have an awareness of what's happening in our mood will change or our feelings or our emotions will shift. so fascinating. I think that's so fascinating. Yeah, so I like to bring that up. But then you asked how we can start to unpack it. So I think we're practicing this work it is, especially if you're just trying some things out at home, and you're working things anytime you're working with trauma. A, it's really good to have a practitioner, so I don't ever recommend someone goes and sits in a room and tries to like dig into the depth of their trauma on their own, I don't think that's smart or, or that effective, really, and it can be harmful. But you can start learning how to tap into your internal world and practicing this interoception that lights up the insular cortex that I was just talking about. And so you can start to be aware of sensations in your body and just starting to, to become familiar with experiencing sensations and, and like thinking in this way and feeling in this way. That's a really, really good place to start. And I often recommend people start with this when they feel good, or when they feel you know what I use the word good kind of subjectively in quotes, but I use it to get a point across, like when you feel most like yourself, or when you feel particularly grounded, go ahead in and go into your body. And notice like, oh, like what sensations are happening now that I feel, you know, like myself, or I'm feeling expansive, like what's going on in my body and start exploring the inner world. And that may seem counterintuitive to like working with trauma, but it's it's much more fun to start practicing feeling when we do feel good versus, you know, when you're having the worst day ever and your anxieties at a 10 go in and notice what you feel you can do that. I mean, it's, it is useful, but it's not the best way to start a we're not going to like it, we're probably not going to do it. And it's really hard to go in and practice being the observer, you know, and to be curious when we're all heightened up. But when we feel good,

ah, let's enjoy that. Let's

pause on that. How like, get to know what the what is good for you and your body. So that's one of my favorite ways that is my favorite way to, to practice and to start

awesome, I love that you are really inviting people to to turn to a professional or some other help as well. Because when we do any of these things, I think if we do it without a guide, it can be an unnecessary risk.

100%

so you shared a little bit about your sober story. And so you you also specialize in working with other women who are kind of going through that. I would imagine part of it stems from like a wanting to give back but can you kind of share what else went into this focus?

Sure.

Yeah, it was definitely something when I started my business and really started doing more specific consulting this way and I also work you know, I consult with companies and things like that, that doesn't have this focus but for my individual clients and for the like the group work that I do I really I love working with I love working with sober women who want to move forward and who are interested in trying to find other ways to like expand really to expand their lifeforce because An a this work make this work makes so much sense for people who have had addiction issues for people who have been like, checked out, or who have spent so much time trying to disconnect from the body. Like, yes, it's great to remove the substance. And there's certainly wonderful recovery programs out there. But it's like, Okay, once we've, once this substance is removed, then you know, all the reasons that we were trying to check out in the first place, sort of come to a head and come to light. And so if we can start really, if I can help facilitate this for people or do some education, and help them just like my therapist helps me to like come in and like start noticing when I feel good, until and to start noticing when your lifeforce can actually be like flowing through you, and you're going through the world like alive. I mean, it's such a wonderful way to be in the world. So I'm just yeah, I'm I know how much it can help in in the recovery process. And I know, I think it's twofold. I think it's like being able to understand when you really do feel good, like we were just talking about and then also to help, like you were saying unpack some of those things, or some of those reasons that we were reaching for the substance in the first place. Because in our society, we're not ever taught how to deal with trauma, or even how to really handle anxiety or stress. So I think if it's come to such a point where you you've created an addiction, or you've you know, been led to an addiction, because you can't stand being in your body, because you had all these things happen, or or enough stuff happened that led you to this place, it's like, well, let's start with retraining the systems so that we we know how to work with some of the trauma so that you can feel good internally, and there's no need to reach for this external substance. Oh,

I love that. Do you have a vision of what our world could look like? If it were more full of more aware people?

It's such a good question. You know, I don't it's not something I sit around and think about, but it's definitely something I think I, I believe in, which is why I'm so passionate about this work and about opportunities to share it. I mean, I think we would be less reactive, I think we'd probably have more compassion for each other. And I think if I think things would maybe go a little bit slower, like if we're actually responding from a place of being in our bodies and of being present, I think, be I feel like there would just be a different like, energy, it wouldn't be so rushed and hurried. And we have to do this and that and our kids need to be attend activities. And, you know, we've got to, we've got to plan every second of the day, and productivity is the king, it's like, I think we would take more time to really delight and enjoy and our human experience. And I think that would benefit everyone.

Very much in alignment with that. Yeah, what is a simple tool people could do without having to go to an outside guide, to be able to just begin that journey of awareness of being in their body.

Oh, definitely, we could do a little, we could do a little quick sensation practice. Oh, that'd be great. Okay,

so just disclaimer, if you're driving, we'll do it later. Yeah, thank you for that, because I was getting so excited, I forgot to say that.

And I do a ton of this stuff on like, I do a lot of Facebook Lives. And I have a group of everything, not to over pitch myself. But I do a lot of free education with tools like this, because

that will drop all those links in the show notes.

Awesome. Thank you. Um, so we can do just a bit of a grounding and orienting practice. So go ahead and just take a minute and if you're listening at home and for you, Michelle, just you can even close your eyes if you like and I want you to feel your feet on the ground. And really just come into contact and I'm even closing my eyes come into contact with the different parts of your feet on the ground, whether you're sitting or standing. And just notice the sides of your feet and your heels, your toes, and maybe push into the ground a little bit with your feet. And then notice your bottom and the chair if you're sitting. Notice the support of the chair on on your bottom and on your back.

Notice both with the chair and with the floor. Notice those pushing back into you just see what it's like to be to be held and to be supported by the chair and to be supported with your feet on the floor.

And then I want you to see if you can find an area in your body that feels warm. So you can do a scan you can scan from your feet up since we started with the feet and just see if you can locate a place in your body That feels warm. Maybe there's more than one place, that's fine. Just try to pick one that you can focus on. And be curious about this warm area, and spend a little time with it. And see if you can curiously observe what's happening in the warm area without any kind of labeling or a story or anything like that. Just really notice the sensation of the warmth. Notice if there's any movement associated with it? Or is there a quality of stillness? And as you as you notice that you can begin to track it, if it starts to change. Is it becoming larger? or smaller? Or is it staying the same? You could see if there's any shape or color associated with this warm area,

just spend a little time just noticing it being curious.

I'll try just one more thing, where I'd invite you to find an area in your body that feels cool.

or cold

or less warm. clinic again,

just notice it.

Was it a large area to the small area?

Is there movement associated with it.

And then you can see if you can hold the the cool area in the warm area in your attention and awareness at the same time. Notice if that's challenging,

to be aware of both.

Maybe it's easy.

And are you able to track both to see what's happening with both and to have a

an awareness of both at once.

Again, just just being that curious observer of your own internal world. And then when you're ready, you can bring your attention, just briefly back to your seat and back to your feet. And slowly open your eyes. And then with that awareness in your feet, just take a moment and use your eyes to orient to your surroundings and let your eyes just be drawn naturally to what they're drawn to. Don't try to do a strong gaze just soft gaze. See what comes into your field of vision and what's pleasing for you.

Yeah, so little starter.

That's awesome. I've never done the hot cold before. So that's very different. And I tend to be one of those people who have cold extremities, same fingers. Yeah. And I don't know, some have argued that it's my Pitta dosha. So I noticed my heart was probably the warm as my heart, my chest area was probably the warmest. And my nose is feeling cold. It's a cold, spring, rainy day in the Pacific Northwest. And so very, very much in line with that. And as you you asked us to bring those two together, my nose started to warm up.

Oh, that's interesting. That's neat. Cooper. Fascinating.

Thank you for letting me share that.

Yeah, I love hearing what happens for people it's in, it's just a practice to start being aware of what's going on in our body because we don't pay attention most of the time. And it really is this whole neat exploration we could do any time of the day.

Right? Right. I love that as as awareness and mindfulness practice, like really just centering ourselves in the body and anything that we can do to exercise our observer, the director, which, for me, is all about making smarter, wiser choices, being less reactive to the world around us. I really love this idea of a grounded individual, you know, grounded individuals walking in the in the world. And then when we want to be fired up that we're making really selective conscious choices about that. So thank you for that exercise. That was really great.

Oh, you're welcome. Thanks for letting me share with you and your audience.

You are welcome. So is there anything special that you're working on right now besides finishing up the school?

I'm finishing up Yeah, my program and then I always have. I always have something going on. And I think this will come out in the fall you said so I'm not sure what It'll be happening. But definitely check out my website I tend to do, I have a couple of little free free things on there that you can access. I've got at least one little five day course, that's an email directed course. But it comes with videos with different practices every day. So you can access that on my website. And then I will probably have some kind of a larger 30 day paid course happening as well. I usually run those every, every few months. I've got a signature course called sober and calm. So that that goes on frequently. And yeah, it's pretty great. It's a lot of these tools around also like ways to practice. So variety in ways that feel really authentic and true for each individual.

Oh, I love that. That's so awesome. What, what are. So we did this really great, quick grounding meditation exercise. Are there maybe three tips, other tips that people could take with them as they're practicing their day to day? awareness?

Yes, I'm trying to think of 311 is definitely just start practicing, noticing when you feel good, better, more like yourself. And really, I can't, I can't stress that enough to take time. Because what happens a lot of times is will, will be like, No, I'm okay, I'm fine. Everything's good. And we skip over that. And we're on to the next problem that we're trying to solve or the next thing that we're trying to do. So the biggest thing is really to take, take the time and start exploring your body on that sensation level, like like we just did a little bit and notice what's happening for you when you feel good and more like yourself, because that teaches your system, you can feel that way more and more and more. And Rick Hansen has a really great three step process around this where you, you go in and feel feel what's happening for one to two breaths, you notice the sensations. And then his third step with it is to ask yourself, what is meaningful or significant about that for you. And I like that a lot. It's not something I do really in my work, but he's doing a lot of amazing things around happiness and well being. So he's always a great person to check out. Unfortunately, he doesn't pay me to say that or anything, but

he's, he's

a good one.

And we link him anyway. Yeah, he's, he's

great. He's got a cool podcast, and he's just doing really good work in the world. That's awesome. So that's, that's number one, I would say the second one is to start engaging your five senses. And this is another practice you can do. And again, I talked about this in my little mini course, it's one of the things we spend the day on is, what do you what do you seen? What do you smell? What do you hear? What do you taste? What What do you feel in your skin. And anytime, especially if you're in ruminating thought patterns, or you're having anxiety, or you can't slow your mind down, don't even try, just bring it back into your body. We've got these five senses, we can use them. And if it's overwhelming to start with your vision, I'd say Close your eyes and start with your ears. And just take you to take five minutes. You can do it anytime throughout the day. And that's one of the biggest things I teach too, is that this doesn't have to be this thing that you need to like do an hour every day. And it's very serious. It's

like this is

your body. You have it with you all the time. So take a couple minutes here and there throughout your day and like start practicing these resets because it retrains our retrain our system. And then the third thing

What do I usually tell people, I

think, any kind of, I think movement is a really big tool that I like to use a lot.

And

I think move trying to do some movement where it's less structured, and where we're really just noticing how our body wants to move in space. And to take again, you can take a few minutes, you can do it with music without music start like usually I'll have people start with an arm or a hand and just, I'm just doing it now like what is your arm going to do? What is your hand what to do, and then bring it to the rest of your body. And you can go in a room and close the door if you feel silly, but it's another nice way to just start experimenting with our bodies and to start getting to know ourselves and asking our physical form, like what do you want to do right now? And if you're not sure, great, be curious about it. Try a few things. But it's again, it's just a simple thing. And any kind of movement will reset our systems. If you're having a tough day. Any kind of like physical movement, especially if you can get outside and just move around. be playful with it if you can, you know we will move into so joyful. So yeah, those are my three. Oh,

that's great. Thank you so much for taking the time to share your wisdom with us today. I'm so grateful.

Oh, you're so welcome. Thank you so much for having me. It's

a lot of fun.

You are welcome.

Balance shared is produced and edited by me Michelle Lasley, the instrumental music grass by Silent Partner is from the YouTube Audio Library. If you've enjoyed today's episode, leave a review especially on Apple podcasts. If you've loved the messages of CO creating a better future and digging into ourselves. Maybe you'd like to become a supporter. Email Hello at Michelle Lasley calm to get your sponsorship guide. Thank you for listening to this podcast. This is Michelle Lasley with bounce shared a space where I truly believe we are better together.

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