Hello friend,
So glad you're here today.
I'm Hannah and today I'm going to guide you to get in touch with your felt sense.
The felt sense is an incredible way of getting in touch with your nervous system and just checking in the state that we're in and just where we're at at this moment of time.
When we are stuck in trauma or addictive type of loops,
Often the nervous system is stuck in a state of fight or flight or freeze and we're just trying to regulate with our behaviours,
Our coping mechanisms like taking drugs or drinking alcohol or engaging in other types of behaviours between those states.
But the truth is that when we're in those loops,
We never move back to states of safety.
So working with the felt sense can be an incredible way of bringing your nervous system step by step to safety.
But today we're just gonna get in touch first with your felt sense just to explore a little bit to find out how does it feel like because it takes some time and practice and training to get into the sensation of what is our felt sense and how does our body actually communicate with us.
So we're just gonna get in touch with the sense of grounded and don't put any pressure on yourself.
Those things take time and we're not looking for the perfect way of calm and grounded.
We're just somehow getting in touch with a sense of calm.
So let's begin by settling yourself in a position that you are in,
Your chair or maybe you're lying down somewhere.
Just feel what parts your body is touching the ground or the surface you are sitting or lying on.
I invite you to soften your gaze or if it feels right and safe for you right now to close your eyes.
Just bring attention inside of your body.
Take a few nourishing breaths and try to extend the exhale every time because that is activating the healing part of our body,
The vagus nerve.
Just gently inviting with each breath.
Just gently inviting with each breath.
Just know that your body will decide by itself if it's okay to relax a little bit more and to arrive here in this moment.
Now that you've drawn your attention to the inside,
Just notice how are you holding yourself.
I find it really helpful to just put attention on your muscles.
Just sense are there some muscle areas in your body that are very tight?
Are they relaxed or loose?
Or maybe they feel heavy?
You can also draw a little bit of your attention on your heartbeat.
Does it feel calm and regular or a little bit heightened?
More of a stronger heartbeat?
Just observe how you're being held today by your body.
You might feel loose and comfortable or relaxed or tight and anxious or wound up.
Just observe how you're being held today by your body.
Or tight and anxious,
Wound up.
Or maybe even depressed and kind of numb and frozen.
And that's okay too.
Today we're just here to explore and just be open and curious about the different ways our body is communicating with us.
So ask yourself if it would be okay to find a memory where you felt grounded.
But we're not searching for this I'm super relaxed type of grounding.
Just the sense of managing,
You know?
The sense of I'm okay.
Life is okay.
I'm getting things done.
Things are flowing.
And if it's really difficult to access this kind of memory then you can just imagine it.
How would you feel if things are flowing and you wouldn't manage?
Where would you be?
What would you do?
Notice what's happening in your body when you connect with that imaginary vision or that memory.
Where does this nice,
Calm place live inside of your body?
Maybe it has a specific area in your body and maybe you're noticing that this area holds other experiences too.
It might be your heart,
Your breath,
Your shoulders,
Throat or jaw.
Just notice the sensations and where it lives in your body and how your body is holding you right now.
Maybe your body may begin right now to shift into the felt sense of grounded and calm and managing.
And often there's a kind of phrase or word or picture or even a body gesture like open arms or.
.
.
Yeah,
Just some gesture that's capturing the experience that you're having.
That's kind of putting this whole experience in just this one word or gesture or picture.
When we work with the felt sense we call this a handle.
And often handles are quite childlike poetry type of words or pictures.
They're not really clear.
They can be wibbly wobbly green or floaty blue.
And we're just welcoming that because our body communicates for colors,
For sensations,
Through movement,
Through ideas and pictures.
They're just coming up.
We're just welcoming it.
Try and be connected to that experience and that memory.
And you might find it helpful to just give yourself a hug or put your hands on the place where you were feeling or where this experience is living inside of your body.
You might just stay with that for a little bit.
Just receive.
As we are rounding things up and you can slowly start to come back to the present moment and open your eyes I'd just like to say that if nothing came up and it was really difficult for you to access this there's nothing wrong with you.
Working with the felt sense requires some time and practice and we need to get more in touch with the ways our body is communicating with us and especially when we've gone through some traumatic experiences or are in addictive loops it can be quite difficult to access that because we're in the state of numbness of dissociation away from our body.
So this little experience can just be a great practice for you to one step at a time doing this more often and often to get in touch with your felt sense to then be able to work with it.
It teaches you so much about your body and after some time you'll notice that your body is just trying to protect you and whatever behavior you're doing all those behaviors,
They might harm you now but initially they were protective.
So we are trying to connect with that in a positive sense and learning to protect ourselves to move ourselves back to safety so we don't have to engage in those behaviors anymore.
I hope you enjoyed today and if this session was helpful to you please leave a review or leave a comment I so so much appreciate that to hear from you and if you want to find out more about my work I'm Hannah I'm a neuroscientist and a felt sense polyvagal model practitioner I work with people who have experienced trauma and are going through addiction and together we are working on moving the nervous system back to a state of safety and I do that with the felt sense model and also some creative art expressions to just have embodiment of how we can express our shifts and our ways of being without words I hope you have a great day and I see you soon
