For some of us, people-pleasing a phrase that’s loaded with shame, self-criticism, resentment or confusion. 

For others, thinking about people-pleasing evokes thoughts like:

“Why am I like this?”

“Why does setting boundaries feel so impossible for me?”

or maybe even

“I like pleasing others, I have no problem with it.”

For some, the act of asking for and receiving support is deeply charged. We’ll work with this somatically over time for many sessions.

For others, receiving support is familiar -  but deepening into new kinds of support becomes nourishing and stabilising.

The truth is, we are biologically wired to receive support – from ourselves, from others, from our ancestors, and from the natural world.

In a culture that celebrates positivity, productivity, and independence, it’s easy to internalise the belief that certain feelings mean something’s wrong with us. ⁣

That we should move on, bounce back, or “𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘭𝘦𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘨𝘰” faster than we actually can.⁣

Feeling stuck, confused, overwhelmed or frozen lets us know that the nervous system is in a state of freeze. ⁣

Freeze states do not thaw through more stillness. This means, they’re not experiences we can meditate our way out of. ⁣

As a somatic coach, I don't just support my clients to "heal" from the emotional and nervous system impact of past experiences. Yes—I support you and your body to digest and metabolise the residue of past experiences. AND—a huge focus of somatic coaching is reconnecting with your most instinctive ways of being.

I had been trying for YEARS to resolve my self-doubting, self-criticising tendencies at the level of the mind. Through talk therapy, a degree in psychology, post-graduate study in psychotherapy, thousands of hours of meditation, affirmations, attempting to "manage" (control) my thoughts.

What I didn't know, is that thought patterns and beliefs are held in place in the body—by somatic residue from past experiences and by nervous system patterns.

If you’ve ever thought, “Why can’t I just get it together?" or felt like something was wrong with you for feeling so much, let me tell you: you’re not alone. Many of us deep feelers carry the belief that we’re flawed because we feel so different to the people around us.⁣

But here’s the truth: you make perfect sense.⁣

These experiences aren't flaws, they're a reflection of your deeply feeling nature.⁣

Until we land in the knowing that every single part of us makes perfect sense & every feeling, reaction & limiting belief holds wisdom for us to integrate—we’ll never get off the healing merry-go-round. ⁣

When we're living with an ongoing incongruence, misalignment or inner conflict, all the wellness practices in the world can't help us.

If I could time travel and share one piece of wisdom with my younger self, I know what it would be. 

I would tell her that I’ve discovered there’s one thing worth pursuing more than anything else in this life. 

There’s one thing, that once you start to cultivate it, will help you to experience a sense of peace, an absence of tension, beyond what you thought possible. 

The last few weeks have been a time of death and re-birth for me.

Two weeks ago, nature, speaking to me through my body as she does, told me loud and clear that something very precious to me had to come to an end.

While lots has unfolded in between which I’ll get into soon, this ending created the space for the most beautiful, unexpected re-birth. The ending created space for something far more rich and alive to be born.