Lesley Movemets Afoot:
I was once a movement trainer at a fancy gym on the upper east side of NYC. Clients would come to me after their session to work on specific issues.

I was watching a man do 100 crunchers with lousy form. He came to me afterwards complaining about his back.

When I tried to cue him to connect his abs to his posture (he had a swayback), he hadn’t a clue.

Fitness without awareness can exacerbate an injury. How you connect your thoughts can affect your form. I never teach exercise, especially abdominal work, without connecting to your breath and finding cues/imagery to make real change in behavior. It is the key to a client’s progress.

Martha:

It frees me up from having to do a routine workout. A somatic approach involves paying attention while we exercise. This awareness doesn’t always come easily but the benefits are great.

Like you mentioned – awareness can keep us from getting injured.
It also helps us deepen the quality of the work – so in turn it can save time. If we do the right thing well we don’t necessarily need to repeat it one hundred times.

Once I am tuned in I can also change the workout, play with it, fine-tune it to my needs of that day. It is creative and fun. It also can easily be mood stabilizing or mood changing, especially if I have great music too!

It is hard though – my dad prefers to save time by watching TV while exercising. This is efficient and its great that he exercises at the age of 87 but he doesn’t change or improve (reduce pain, get stronger in the “right places”) when he’s tuned out of himself and into the TV.

“Somatics” involves tuning in. The reward is it gives me power, the power to make choices in alignment with my body-mind-spirit-emotions-psyche connection.

Lesley:

A somatic approach is what top athlete’s use. Published research has shown the importance of how the athlete (and now you) can use the mind to make change in the body. Through the practice of training the mind, we can make change. The practice includes skills of concentration, understanding functional anatomy and the use of imagery/feeling and emotion.

When I am able to concentrate on my inner self with movement, this is one of the best meditative practices for me. Especially with our minds so cluttered with all the things that we need to do, the practice of focusing my mind while I exercise is a stress releaser.
Martha:
Great point Lesley –

I feel often deeply relaxed as well as nicely activated by the somatic approach. I feel that how this happens also explains the difference between the mind-body connection and the body-mind connection.

While several cutting edge systems of movement and exercise asks that you to use your mind to control your body (mind-body connection), the somatic approaches guides you to pay attention to your body to center and enliven your mind.

What’s great about Movements Afoot is that you use both approaches. At Center for Kinesthetic Education we teach these methods to kids as well as to adults!