Finding Security Within The Body
Our sense of safety occurs outside of our conscious awareness. This sense - known as neuroception - is spoken by the body.
The body instinctively knows the answer to the question “Am I safe?”
Neuroception is a fantastic system that the body can utilise successfully in times of immediate threat and danger. But it can be hijacked in many ways by past trauma or by ongoing stress.
Many people today are on high alert, in “fight or flight” mode and under a state of constant stress and assault from their environment. In the body’s terms, the answer to this situation and to feelings of safety is: No.
In these ongoing states of high arousal, it can be difficult to settle in the body and feel a sense of rest, calm and peace. Many people feel a sense of disconnection or lose touch with their body’s messages or their natural intuition.
In addition, there are many people today who live with sensitised nervous systems resulting from traumas of various kinds. In these cases, many people lose a sense of self and purpose.
When you do not feel safe, your body knows instinctively.
So, therefore it follows that the only way to develop true safety and security is within the body. Though this can be challenging at times, it ultimately leads to feelings of wholeness and reconnection.
SING by Patrick
FINDING SECURITY
SUPPORT OF SOMEONE YOU TRUST
Talking about your situation, thoughts and feelings with someone you trust is hugely beneficial for your wellbeing. Even being in the presence of a caring other calms the right amygdala, the area of the brain associated with fearful responses.
LEARNING TO TRUST THE BODY
Coming into an embodied way of being in your body that feels safe, is essentially the goal of finding a place of security for yourself.
You can work through the body’s natural processes for coming into balance - and security - through activating the parasympathetic nervous system and the body’s rhythmic motions.
For example:
Breath work (slow down your breathing, or breathe out into resistance, to activate the parasympathetic nervous system)
Chanting / singing (in a group is even better)
Drumming
MINDFULNESS
Engaging in mindfulness techniques helps the parts of the brain that identify sensations in the body come online. It also allows for the mind to become calmer and more able to tolerate difficult emotions and sensations, so that they can be integrated or released.
For example:
Yoga
Mindfulness meditation
Tai chi and other movement practices
THERAPEUTIC TOUCH
When we feel unsafe, our first basic human instinct is to seek touch. Contact with another helps to calm, comfort and reassure.
We have to pay attention to our natural needs, and find safe ways to calm anxious nervous systems.
Therapeutic touch is comforting, attuned touch accessed through a range of hands-on healing and bodywork practices. At Creative Soul Therapies we offer Reiki, EFT and Creative Kinesiology which all provide some form of therapeutic touch.
Reiki offers gentle, warm touch to the body and the chakras. In Creative Kinesiology we use gentle touch for healing as well as contact through muscle testing. EFT combines tapping, which activates the brainstem through rhythm, and mindfulness, to bring awareness to present sensations, thoughts and feelings.
Return to a sense of security in your body with bryony@creativesoultherapies.com