What are the Stages of Somatic Development?
This journey can be extremely humbling.
Especially when we identify as “big-clever-adults” with complex thoughts about politics, human behaviour, etc.
It’s confronting to realise where we’re actually at — that many of us (me included) were never taught how to be somatically intelligent.
We might have a PhD in Cerebral Intelligence but be at nursery level in Somatic Intelligence 😬
As one of my teachers said: “You can keep waking up and eating cereal, but that doesn’t make you an adult inside” – lol
But never fear! So many of us are in this developmental journey together.
Be honest and see what stage your at 👇🏽
Lemme break it down for ya..
14 Stages of Somatic Intelligence:
Thinking your body’s just a brain taxi. Health stuff feels random. Emotions = annoying. You’re breathing, right? So what’s the issue?
Learning about the nervous system and immediately trying practices to regulate the sh*t out of yourself so you can just keep going.
Coming into contact with sensations, your breath and the felt sense of your experience. Realising: oh… this body has its own wisdom as an organism.
Building relationship and capacity. With your body, with safety, in your nervous system. Seeing: Wow, I only ever thought my feelings before — or been in shutdown / overwhelm with them.
Coming out of functional freeze and disassociation. And yeah… it feels worse at first. Because now you’re actually feeling. Welcome to being alive (dorsal healing).
Understanding every sensation and experience just wants to be held and felt so it can complete and transform — that feeling is CONSCIOUSNESS
Feeling EVERYTHING – true aliveness! PRESENCE. Mad embodied epiphanies! Full body clarity. Magic.
Facing the biggies: Fear, Shame, Anger etc. Not with cathartic force but with capacity for the full spectrum.
Relationships shift. Internal safety to embody your true self, stay in connection, and hold boundaries (ventral healing).
New relationship with rest. No longer just collapse or burnout, but luscious restoration. You feel safe to soften (healthy parasympathetic capacity).
Your health shifts. Digestion. Immune system. Hormones. Energy. Your body starts trusting you back.
New relationship with action. No longer driven by force or panic, but clean mobilisation energy. Creative life-force can flow through (healthy sympathetic capacity).
You unlock new levels in work, purpose, and leadership. New neural pathways open up. There’s safety to take bold action and risks. Creativity flows. Focus deepens. Confidence feels embodied.
You trust your body and aliveness. Radical acceptance that your body is the key to your fullest expression — if you listen, respect it, and move together. Presence becomes natural. Emotions move and integrate with ease.
It’s a messy magical journey that is SO worth it.
Reply to me with what stage you feel you're at – I'd love to hear & respond!
And finally… wherever you’re at on the path, keep going 🙏🏽
