Somatic Coaching

A Holistic Path to Healing, Self-Discovery, and Nervous System Resilience

In today’s fast-paced world, it’s easy to feel burned out, overwhelmed, and stuck in cycles of stress and perceived pressure. You may be familiar with their associated sensations, maybe you’ve felt them within your body, like a tightness in your chest, racing heartbeat, a pulling back or a constant heaviness that lingers or bounces back - no matter what you do. 

The sensations held within your body, are the basis of what we work with in Somatic Coaching. 

Somatics is a term quickly becoming one of the latest buzzwords and is often used in many different ways and contexts. Somatics, itself, means ‘relating to the body’. Modalities like yoga, kinesiology, reiki, breathwork, and massage are all inherently somatic. However, things differ in the approach to working with the body and connecting with the experiences in the body.

Here, we’ll explore somatics through the context and approach of Somatic Coaching. 

What is Somatic Coaching?

Somatic Coaching is a gentle, body-led, nervous-system based approach to navigating life’s challenges. We work with your body to not just talk through the challenges you’re facing; but to allow them to shift, process, and rewire on a deep, embodied level whilst moving toward your desired outcomes. 

Somatic Coaching bridges the mind-body connection by guiding you to tune into your felt sense—the deeper sensations and signals within your body. Through this, we help you release stored tension, process unresolved experiences, and move toward a more embodied way of being.

Understanding Somatic Coaching

Every Somatic Coaching practitioner approaches this work differently, and may work with different tools and techniques. 

Some practitioners may take a top-down approach - prescribing certain Somatic techniques to soothe the nervous system and shift our state. This may include prescribing nervous system regulation exercises, emotional release techniques, mindful movement, tapping, shaking, body scanning or breathwork. 

Other Somatic Coaching practitioners may follow the body’s lead by choosing a bottom-up, present-tense approach.

A bottom-up approach is where we get curious about the state of your nervous system and attuning deeper into your felt sense at this present moment in time. Rather than digging for the root cause, we take the approach that the body will let what is ready to be known or processed to surface naturally. We let the body lead the way following its subtle felt sense cues, rather than getting stuck in the past or in the mind. This may look like noticing the instincts, impulses, sensations, emotions, movements, memories, or images that naturally arise as you attune to your body. 

As you are guided through this process, layers of tension that you’ve held onto and stored begin to release and your body may start to instinctively move, breathe or express what is needed in that moment. It’s a process of trusting your body’s natural intelligence and wild wisdom, where the nervous system reorganizes and rewires itself without the mind’s interference. This cultivates a greater connection to stability and ease from the inside, out. 

The Body’s Intelligence

Our bodies are more than just our physical self; they’re intricate systems that store emotions, thoughts, experiences, energy, and wisdom. Every experience you’ve ever had, whether joyful or painful, leaves an imprint in your nervous system, shaping how you move through the world. 

Somatics works with your implicit memory - unconscious imprints stored in your nervous system that shapes how you respond to stress, relationships and experiences. When moving through the world, your nervous system intelligently responds by activating fight, flight, fawn, freeze or collapse responses (or a mixture of them) to support you. 

However, when trauma or event(s) that overwhelm your ability to respond happen, your natural stress response doesn’t get the opportunity to complete itself, and becomes trapped in the body as unprocessed material. This somatic residue often impacts how you feel, react and navigate life. Working somatically is meeting this somatic residue and allowing it to move through, process and rewire within the nervous system.

When this happens, it gives space for your body’s resilience and blueprints of empowered ways of being (that are often lying dormant or suppressed under layers of stress and tension) to come back online. So you can respond in a way that feels more intentional and authentic, and feel more stable no matter what life brings your way.  

Why Traditional Mindset or Life Coaching often falls short

Traditional coaching often focuses on evaluating and adapting one’s mindset, limiting beliefs and strategies to overcome challenges and move toward a future-oriented goal. While traditional coaching can provide valuable insights and awareness, it often overlooks the body’s role in how we feel and experience life. 

Many of the tensions and stress we experience are stored in our body and can be felt in inhibiting our ability to move forward. Sometimes it shows up as the feeling of apprehension, resistance, a pulling back when moving towards achieving big goals. Somatic Coaching helps explore and process these sensations, and build deeper self trust, capacity and resilience in life itself.

I see Somatic Coaching as a bridge between, and complementary to a traditional talk-therapy or coaching approach - addressing the gap by working with and being in connection with the body’s natural intelligence. 

Benefits of Somatic Coaching

Somatic Coaching brings you back into coherence with the wisdom of your body, and reconnects you to honouring your humanness. It is a reminder of what is already available and accessible within you; your body’s natural intelligence that knows exactly how to heal itself.

Some of the benefits of Somatic Coaching include:

• Deeper understanding and self-compassion for yourself and others

• Greater self-awareness and capacity to process bodily sensations and feelings

• Processing stuck unprocessed life experiences

• Greater capacity and resilience to handle stressful and challenging moments

• Better able to return to a state of nervous system regulation

• Discernment and knowing what is right for you

• Deeper self trust and better able to tune into your intuition

• Feeling more confident and embodied within yourself

Who Can Benefit from Somatic Coaching?

Every body can benefit from Somatic Coaching. Particularly if you feel you have ‘hit’ the invisible ceiling from experiencing talk-based therapy/coaching or experiencing lingering strong sensations or heaviness in your body. 

Somatic Coaching can be a refreshing and gentle way to experience support for:

• People who tend to overthink or get stuck within their mind, 

• People experiencing burnout, 

• Those struggling with anxiety or overwhelm, 

• Highly sensitive or neurodivergent folks, 

• People recovering from trauma or highly stressful life events, 

• Those seeking personal growth or greater confidence in themselves  

Common Challenges that Somatic Coaching Addresses

Somatic Coaching is an approach that can support almost any challenge that creates a sense of activation, trigger or response within the body. If there is a specific topic that you are looking for support with, it may be helpful to find a relevant practitioner who resonates for you. 

Some examples of challenges that Somatic Coaching can support with:

• Chronic Stress and Burnout

• Anxiety and Overwhelm

• Feeling stuck or emotionally heavy

• Feeling disconnected from your authentic self

• Decision-Making Struggles

• Grief

• People-Pleasing and Boundary Issues

• Healing from past trauma or difficulty

• Procrastination or avoidance 

• Low self confidence 

What to Expect in a Somatic Coaching Session

As a Somatic Coach, I do not see myself as the expert of you and your nervous system, rather I see myself as a guide helping you to navigate your own bodyscape. I often see Somatic Coaching sessions as an exploratory journey, where we walk together with curiosity around what is present and coming up for you. Each session often looks and feels different to the next. 

There is no linear or step-by-step formula for a Somatic Coaching session. When we work somatically, it is an intentionally slow, gentle guided process - to not overwhelm your system. A Somatic Coaching session with me often includes elements of:

• Supporting the body to come into a sense of stability or grounding. 

• Reconnecting to the present moment or connecting to sources of support

• Noticing what’s present at the level of the body as we speak to your chosen topic/challenge

• Following your body’s cues in what wants to happen next or how it wants to metabolise undigested life experiences or activations by following sensations, emotions, images, memories as they show up 

• Lots of space for integration

I also give my clients the choice of experiencing Reiki Energy Healing and Australian Bush Flower Essences to deepen their experience and receive further energetic support.

The work we do in session is often subtle, yet transformational. There may be moments that might not make logical sense, but the true magic of Somatic work happens when we allow for the rational mind to step aside and let the body lead. 

Preparation and Aftercare

There is nothing you need to prepare for a session, just arriving as you are with an open mind and heart. After a session, it’s best to give yourself plenty of space and time to integrate the experience and rest. 

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Q: Is Somatic Coaching like therapy? A: Somatic Coaching is not a substitute for therapy or deeper psychological or medical support. While Somatic Coaching may support processing elements of the past, it focuses on moving forwards in supporting new embodiments, ways of being and the future you want to create and experience.

Q: How many sessions do I need? A: Growth and healing takes time, and when we work with the nervous system we particularly want to move slowly and gently. I usually recommend at least 4-6 sessions to expereince progress and noticeable shifts, and assessing from there when it may feel complete. Everyone’s timeline and process is different, and there is no one size fits all to the ‘right’ number of sessions. 

Q: Is there any physical movement involved? A: When we follow the instincts and impulses of your body, sometimes there may be small, subtle gestures that want to come through to be expressed. Sometimes there might not be any movements. I always give the option for my online clients to turn their camera off if they feel uncomfortable with expressing their movement on-screen. With my in-person clients, I offer the option of me turning away if they feel uncomfortable. You always have choice in our sessions to help you feel more supported and comfortable. 

Want to experience Somatic Coaching?

If you’d like to experience this body-led, gentle approach, you can here on Bodhi Holistic Hub. I have online and in-person sessions available in Brisbane.

 This guide was written by Rhiannon Whiardjo, a Bodhi-vetted practitioner & Somatic coaching expert.