We were so happy to reconnect with an old friend from South Africa recently. Wendy Young is an incredible and gentle soul. Her wealth of experience and deep intuition combine to bring peace and clarity to her clients and everyone she meets. Here, we share her beautiful guest blog on Body wisdom – a key to sustainable wellbeing. We are in the process of co-creating some exciting retreat offerings with Wendy and look forward to sharing more soon!
“Awareness of our body and its wisdom is an empowering ability that we are all born with. However, as we grow into adulthood, we tend to lose connection with its messages. This natural ability becomes blocked by childhood conditioning, limiting beliefs and self-perceptions, and residual past trauma.
When we learn how to deepen our connection with our body – which is a powerful form of tapping in to our intuition – we can access clarity and inner knowing quickly and easily in stressful situations. Tapping into our full body presence is how we awaken our creative potential, and also how we cultivate greater ease and joy as we navigate our inner and outer worlds.
Listening to the spontaneous signals that our bodies send throughout the day – gut feelings, tugs at our hearts, tense neck and shoulders – sounds like a simple practice. As a species, we’ve been doing it for millennia. Early humans depended on this full body wisdom – somatic intelligence – in an instinctive way.
However, most of us are cut off from our soma, our body. We shut out physical and emotional sensations – all of our feelings – due to past traumas. Limiting beliefs about ourselves and our bodies colour our perceptions about what our bodies are trying to tell us. We are also distracted by our environments: the fast pace of life, our digital gadgets and the unsettling state of the world.
Our reactions to body sensations can sometimes be overly vigilant because our mind may be thinking that what is happening now is similar to a past traumatic event. This locks us out of the present moment and leaves us vulnerable because we can’t accurately sense what the rest of our body is telling us. Unfortunately, if we can’t feel present-moment sensations, we are relating to the present moment through old patterns of fear, shame, anger, anxiety or sadness.
Learning how to feel and listen to the full range of our bodily sensations nurtures our relationship with our own inner self and with others. This deeper sense of connection flows over into our connection with our environment and all of Life — heightening our sense of belonging. Listening more closely to what our body needs in each moment supports physical and psychological healing, as well as a sustainable state of wellbeing!
When we return home to feeling our body from the inside again and again, we access the nourishing flow of life force energy (prana) within and around us. We open more expansively to all of Life and our unique gifts flow through and from us into the world. Accessing our most valuable resource – our body – cultivates trust, presence, freedom and joy.
How do you feel and sense your body right now? What kind of relationship do you have with your body? Can you hear your body’s wisdom and feel its vibrant aliveness?
Remember to return home to your body, feeling it in the chair and on the ground, feeling it from the inside and being more open to receiving any sensations and messages.”
A short break at Eco Retreats is the perfect way to let go of distractions and create space to tune into our bodies and what they have to tell us. Remember, our upcoming season starts on April 1st – check out our beautiful photos and video and book now to secure your spot today!
We look forward to sharing more about upcoming retreats with Wendy soon! Wendy has been in private practice for 20 years and her experience reaches across Yoga, Tantra, Buddhism, Vedanta and Ayurveda combined with the western practices of Somatic Intelligence, Transpersonal Counselling and a range of Healing Modalities. If you feel called to deepen your body wisdom, Wendy also offers 1-1 somatic counselling sessions to explore past traumas, conditioned beliefs and present life challenges. This therapeutic approach strengthens the connection between the mind, emotions, body, soul and the interconnectedness of Life. Wendy works directly in harmony with her clients’ nervous systems to facilitate a process of healing and awakening from personal and collective wounds. Take a look at her website and email wendy@wise-living.co.za / call 07388 491 990 for more information and to book a session.
We look forward to welcoming you here soon!
love
Margaret
