Creation Story of Embodied Living

My beautiful brain has been a constant source of amazement. Curious, with a hunger to learn and explore. I came to coaching in order to learn more about how the mind works, mine and others. 

In the world we live in, the brain is revered over the body. We learn to hustle. Work hard, play hard is the motto, achieve more, find success. We try to think and strategize our way through life. We let our brain override what our gut tells us, we analyze, we rationalize, we obsess and get trapped in thought loops. We try to figure things out. 

And while all these are traits that are important to have, they are not the only ones.

Disregarding and disconnecting from our body, it can lead to stress and overwhelm. It is like the outside noise is getting so loud that we can’t hear the softer signals of our bodies any longer. We get caught in a pattern that is hard to break.

I was a stay at home mom, constantly juggling all the activities for three involved children, a house and garden to take care of, and a successful husband to support. I added volunteer work and other engagements to make myself feel more ‘valued’ by society. I struggled that I didn’t have a paying job. And I forgot about my deeper needs. All the being here for everyone else left me exhausted and empty. I tried to fill the void with stuff. Stuff that I enjoyed having and brought me some satisfaction only to realize that the external fulfilment never lasted.

To my surprise I saw a similar pattern in the women who I thought had it all, family and a successful career!

They as well had lost the deep connection to themselves which was often reflected in a loss of intimacy in their relationship. They experienced a low level of sensual energy and a loss of desire in general.

Like many I have overridden emotions and sensations because they were making me feel things I didn’t want to be true. And I have gone numb because all of it was too overwhelming.

Something had to change. But I couldn’t think my way out of it as much as I tried.

Our bodies are naturally equipped to handle stress in many forms. However, the regulating system was created thousands of years ago and many of us no longer have the capacity to deal with it like we once did. We suppress our stress response in order to go on with our day and the stress gets stored in our body. We only pay attention when our body screams loud enough. Either by getting all sorts of ailments or depression. 

My vitality had gone, my libido was at an all time low and I didn’t want to feel like that anymore.

I needed and wanted help to feel again.

I needed guidance to drop out of my thinking, pragmatic mind into my feeling body. I needed help to relearn to access the answers in my body. I had to be coached and mentored through the process of unlearning old patterns. I had to be reminded over and over again that I needed to move, to connect to my root.

I needed someone who could hold a safe container for my journey into my body, where I had full permission to experiment. 

It was such an immense relief to be held and feel safe!

And while after many years of being on this journey and mentoring other women who enter or are in the midst of theirs, I still have someone who has her hand at my back and holds me when I need it! Because my brain is a strong force and wants to take over forgetting that it is a partnered dance!

The Embodied Living Framework was born from years of being a seeker and explorer of the connection between body and mind. Body and mind of a woman in a woman’s body. Of feeling lost in the maze of who I was told to be as a girl, a woman at any age, carrying old ingrained patterns and influenced by societal conditioning.

The Embodied Living framework was born from living a lot of life and learning to find words to put to my felt experiences. At times I thought I had to fix or better myself but after years of self development I’ve come to understand that there is nothing that needs fixing. Everything I am and feel on deep levels is who I am. So, the Embodied Living framework offers a roadmap to expansion, inclusion and a joyful claiming of all that we are as women.

Being women living a full and vibrant life at any stage. Knowing the journey is never straight, that we have to descend into the dark in order to bloom and grow, that this too is part of our human condition, and as much I would love to see less pain in other women, especially my daughters, I know it’s part of every woman’s individual journey to be and own all of her brilliant facets. It’s the journey of discovering how we uniquely express ourselves and find how to live in alignment and flow.

I grew up moving the physical body and finding tremendous joy in doing so. It allowed me to just be. Yes, there was a structure I had to follow. But within the structure I found freedom of expression. As I got older it became my way of escaping the tribulations of being a teenager and as I got older again, the exploration became also one of moving my emotional body.

Deeply and intimately connecting to what occupied and moved me internally made me curious how this manifested externally, in the physical body.

Being a physical therapist has trained my eye and body to perceive more than most people do on a regular basis. Having had my hands on many bodies from old to very young, I learned to feel and read sensations in others. High or low muscle tone, tensions and stuckness as well as well-being. Not only could I feel with my hands, but I had the corresponding sensations in my own body. After a while it was enough to look at people to know.

In continuing my education, I explored sensuality, pleasure, female sexuality and space, the within as the without. What I found looking at the women around me, made me sad and angry and left me feeling disempowered.

In most women I could feel energy raising from the chest up. From the chest down, belly, hips and legs, vitality and aliveness were not detectable. The women were disconnected from their root. This was true for all of them regardless of their age, their body shape or beauty.

I remember conversations with other women about their daughters only having an advantage in life and love if they were good looking. Conversations about them having to work harder and act more like their male counterparts. 

How could this be that we, women, had to shape ourselves into something we weren’t? That we had to learn to disregard our emotions and our bodies. Why could we not be accepted as being different from men but of equal value? And sadly, many years later not much has changed. 

I was and am convinced that if women can reconnect their body and mind, be radiant in their physicality and use their brilliant minds, they can get anything they desire. 

I was and am convinced that if we women can find a way to balance living in a masculine world with our feminine needs. No longer denying our innate, genius body wisdom, no longer sterilizing our bodily functions, like menstruating, giving birth, being in menopause, for society's convenience. 

Many of us enter midlife and beyond and the challenges are still here. Marginalized, we are told our worth is diminishing because we are no longer of childbearing age and our bodies are changing. 

Many years ago, when I was part of a Leadership training we had to swing off a platform high up in the trees and while doing so, letting go of what was holding us back.

I let go of having to conform. I let go of conforming to whatever this society and patriarchy has in mind for me as a woman. I wanted to be fully me, exploring the mystery of what it means to be a multifaceted woman.

I had to change the rules for myself. And make my own. As I believe every woman has a right to do. At any age, at any stage in her life. And she can recreate them over and over again.

I learned that holding this vision in my head wasn’t enough. I had to fully experience it in my body. Connect the body and the mind for it to manifest.

One of my mentors talks about playing all 88 keys, another talks about embodying the many facets of the feminine. And yet another talks about fully owning the Go (the masculine within us) and the Flow (the feminine within us) and creating a dance between the two.

All this has been an ongoing exploration, never ending or stagnant as I am changing and expanding my understanding of who I am and of what I want.

We hold ancient wisdom in our bodies. There are ways to reconnect, to uncover and to expand what is hidden deep within. Each woman in her own particular, authentic way, not following a prescribed path, just suggestions.

I know that I have come full circle. Once estranged from my root, numb, stressed and overwhelmed, I found a way to live how I deeply desired. While no longer connected to the pull of the moon, I am now more aligned to the cycles of nature, intimately in touch with the sensations my body generates, the source where I make my decisions from.

Embodied Living is my offering to you, my invitation for a new paradigm of living, connected to your root, connecting body and brain. It is an exploration and expansion, to cultivate your radiance, to follow your yearning and longing.

With love and pleasure,

Theres