Somatic Practices to Release Grief and Trauma
Maybe you’ve heard of somatic therapies, especially if you resonate with trauma and are searching for ways to heal. Yet many people who find their way to somatic work are quite unfamiliar with what somatic healing looks like and means or even what the word “somatic” even means.
“Somatic” means relating to the body and you can think of “somatic” interventions, techniques, and healing as “body-based” interventions, techniques, and healing.
Trauma, memories, and emotions live in the body. There are experiences we’ve had that we are cognitively aware of that impact and manifest in our physical bodies. There are even experiences we don’t have cognitive awareness of that impact and manifest in our physical bodies.
One of the most common examples I have been hearing in the last year is a general feeling of unease, difficulty sleeping, appetite changes, increased tension, anxiety, and depression with no obvious, known, or outright cause.
Upon processing verbally and exploring somatically, it’s often the impact of the collective trauma and grief we are living in that shows up in the body.
Whether we are actively experiencing a major life transition, a loss, increased stress, relationship issues, or challenging family dynamics or we’re simply trying to survive in the current state of our world, our body experiences these situations and helps us metabolize what we’re feeling.
On the one hand, this may feel overwhelming, especially if we aren’t in tune with our body’s signs, signals, and needs. On the other hand, with some practice, we can learn the language of our body and utilize it to help us move through heavy, confusing, or challenging emotions and experiences.
Below are a few examples of somatic practices that can help move through “stuck” emotions and release grief and other heaviness.
Be aware that everything below is a suggestion - you know your body best and it is likely helpful to navigate these practices with the support of a licensed therapist.
Step One - Body Awareness
Before engaging in intentional emotional release, it’s important to start a relationship with your body. How aware are of your body’s signs, signals, and needs? Do you stay in tune with how your body is feeling, what you’re sensing, how things are shifting? Before we can release, we need to speak the language of our body.
Somatic Practice: Learn the Language of Your Body
Review sensation lists to begin to learn how your body communicates. Have these handy, either printing them out or having a screenshot on your phone.
Example Sensation List:
Buzzing | Tingling | Warmth | Cold | Tense | Loose | Wiggly | Cloudy | Firm | Squishy | Stinging | Prickly | Racing | Pulsing | Slow | Still | Floaty | Weak | Empty | Dry | Icy | Dull | Achy | Irritated | Soothing | Grounding | Calm | Limp | Sluggish | Bubbling | Electric | Vibrating | Radiating | Alive
Journaling to Integrate
What am I sensing in my body right now?
Are there different sensations in different parts of my body?
What are my body’s typical signs and signals when I’m feeling: stressed, angry, depressed, lonely, sad, grief, joy, contentment, connection, hopeless, overwhelmed, at ease?
How often do I check in with how my body is feeling?
What do I already know about how my body communicates needs?
Somatic Practice: Body Scan
Now that you have a language with which to communicate, take at least 5-10 minutes daily to scan your body, body-part-by-body-part, to check in.
Remember, mindfulness entails both noticing and practicing non-judgment. As you scan, your goal is simply to notice what your body feels and what sensations are present.
Don’t add any judgment, positive or negative. For example, “I notice my neck is holding tension” versus “my neck feels tight, which is bad and means I’m not sleeping well.”
Journaling to Integrate
After each body scan, ask: what did I notice?
Are there certain themes around how my body feels at certain times of the day, around certain people, after engaging in certain activities?
Is there information these body scans are providing that feels important to take note of and tend to?
Step Two - Creating More Safety
Having a common language and basic awareness of your body is paramount to creating safety. In order to successfully navigate any emotional healing, including somatic healing, we need to establish safety, otherwise we’re simply creating more tension or trauma the body needs to process later.
Somatic Practice: Grounding
Grounding can look many different ways. Try a few if not all of these to see which resonate with your body and when.
Grounding might look similar to various physical exercises that help us activate our weight, like squats, lunges, pliés, or planks.
Grounding can also look like simply placing your feet on the floor or sitting or laying on the floor, feeling the safety of being supported by the floor beneath you.
Grounding might be connecting with nature, sitting or standing barefoot on the earth, touching trees, engaging with nature to help regulate the nervous system.
Grounding can also be more breath and sensation oriented, like box breathing or using the five senses to orient to the present moment.
Journaling to Integrate
After practicing various grounding techniques, which most resonate and why?
Are there certain grounding practices I would use when angry versus anxious versus calm? Why?
Somatic Practice: Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR)
Similar to a body scan, PMR uses a sequence of tensing and then relaxing muscle groups to help release physical and emotional tension.
You can utilize PMR as a body-based practice and/or you can in emotional intentions, such as tensing to collect the stress you’re holding and as you relax the muscles, visualize the stress leaving your body.
To do PMR, bring your awareness to different parts of your body in sequence as with a body scan, typically starting at the top of your head and traveling down to your feet.
As you become aware of each part of your body, you’ll tense the muscles in that area as you inhale and then exhale and release the muscles. Try tensing and relaxing each area three times before moving on to the next area.
Check out various guided PMR tracks as this may help maintain focus and calm.
Journaling to Integrate
What was I feeling and sensing before engaging in Progressive Muscles Relaxation?
What am I feeling and sensing after engaging in Progressive Muscle Relaxation?
When might I incorporate PMR throughout my day to support safety within my body?
Step Three - Releasing and Expressing
Now that you have a basis for somatic awareness, begin exploring which sensations need to mobilize, release, or inform.
Remember, you are the expert on your body - take anything here as a suggestion. Also, air on the side of going slower. Our bodies often communicate differently than our thoughts and understanding can take time and intention.
Somatic Practice: Riding the Wave
Pick a specific sensation that you’ve been noticing. Perhaps it’s a heaviness in your chest related to grief or a buzzing in your arms related to overwhelm. Perhaps it’s a stuck-ness in your hips that’s related to frustration or a warmth in your legs related to anger.
As you welcome awareness of this sensation, allow your body to move it out. The heaviness might be a sway, the buzzing a shaking, the stuck-ness a wiggle, the warmth a squeeze.
Try not to think about what to do but rather invite your body to move in response to the prompt, “if this sensation were to move, how would it move?”
Allow that movement to continue until you feel more comfortable with this expression. Now it’s time to “turn up the volume.” If the expression was a squeeze, squeeze harder; if it was a stomp, stomp louder; if you’re swaying, sway bigger.
With safety of yourself, others, and the environment in mind, allow your sensation and expression to gradually increase until your movement is as loud and big as possible, taking up as much space as possible (physically, emotionally, etc).
Now, once you’re at the true height of this expression, gradually ask your body to “turn the volume back down,” allowing the movement to transform as you need.
The sway might transition to a bounce; the stomp might be a tap; the squeeze might be a brush or rub; the wiggle might be a twist. Invite your body to recuperate after release.
Again, no need to overthink it. Even if your mind is unsure, your body naturally knows how to recuperate after a physical or emotional release.
After riding this wave back down, gradually settle into stillness. Do a body scan to check in on what you’re sensing and feeling.
Journaling to Integrate
What sensation and what part of my body was needing to release and express?
What memories, emotions, or stories emerged through this exercise?
Do I trust the wisdom of my body or does my mind often take over control?
How might I invite more body-trust?
In general, how am I feeling after recuperating? Is there more my mind, body, or heart needs to recuperate and replenish?
Somatic Practice: Dance it Out
Whether you’re someone who already enjoys dancing and finds it a cathartic expression or whether “dance” (“The D-Word,” I often call it) elicits its own range of nauseating emotions and memories, we can utilize expressive movement to support our physical, mental, and emotional well-being.
Especially if the thought of dancing to express emotions feels daunting, start small. Pick an experience or emotion you’d like to move through. This could be challenging like grief, anger, or sadness or something more comfortable like joy, inspiration, or hope.
Like with the Riding the Wave practice, simply begin by noticing what part of your body this emotion or experience lives in.
Ask your body, “if this emotion/experience were to move, how would it move?” Does grief move slow, heavy, and small? Does anger move abruptly, big, and sharp?
Use the list below to support a movement exploration of these emotions and experiences.
Example Movement Quality List
Big | Encompassing | Small | Shrinking | Slow | Subtle | Fast | Staccato | Heavy | Light | Rigid | Sharp | Abrupt | Flowy | Smooth | Sustained | Swinging | Controlled | Free
You can explore these movements in silence or select a series of a few songs - one to get some movement going, another one or two to really emphasize the emotion or experience you’re wanting to express, and a final one or two to recuperate and bring your movement and mood to a more neutral baseline.
If these practices were helpful or if you became stuck anywhere and could use some guidance, dance/movement therapy or other somatic therapies may be helpful.
Feeling out of touch with your body is a normal experience - most of us are not taught the language of sensation or emotion, even though that’s how we navigate and experience the world.
Allow your practice of somatic awareness to be gradual and know support is available if needed.
