Your Body is Your Brain: Leverage Your Somatic Intelligence to Find Purpose, Build Resilience, Deepen Relationships and Lead More Powerfully

by Amanda Blake

This is a very good primer on somatics and how tapping into embodied intelligence can unlock and unblock personal potential. It also documents many of cases of how such bodywork can heal and trauma, both mentally and physically.

Embodiment is a discipline that is studied and practiced by an increasing population of professionals whose jobs involve improving the wellness, health and potential of clients through modalities such as coaching, therapy and movement.

As embodied facilitator Mark Walsh briefly explains in the following video, embodiment can be described as “the subjective, felt sense of awareness of the body from the inside-out”.

In the book are numerous case studies presented in detailed yet easy-to-read writing (a quality that I highly prize). Most of the cases document how individuals who were either mentally or emotionally stuck overcame their challenges by (re)learning how to position, posture or move their bodies. Some of these cases involve serious trauma, which were healed and overcome through the domain of the body also. Folks encountering such stories the first time will likely be fascinated or maybe even bewildered. To this, I say that none of the stuff in this book is of the “woo-woo” variety; you can find all of it backed or corroborated by the latest findings in science.

As I use somatic methods in my coaching, I was highly curious and eager to learn about the exercises and activities employed by Amanda and her colleagues. However, the book is vague on the actual instructional details of these methods, and shares only the broad steps… which will provide most somatic practitioners with a general concept of how they work. On this front, I recommend this book over most of Richard Strozzi Heckler‘s books, which provide virtually no instructional information.

Still, I had lots of learning from reading this book, and it was thoroughly worth my time. It heightened my motivation to enrol myself in a certified embodiment course some time soon.