Deep/Somatic/Embodied Listening and Awareness
Defining Statements
“What we practice at the small scale sets the patterns for the whole system”
- Adrienne Maree Brown, Emergent Strategy
- Adrienne Maree Brown, Emergent Strategy
“History is not the past, it is the present. We carry our history with us. We are our history.” (James Baldwin, cited in Menakem 2017, p. 3)
“We need to begin with the body…” (Menakem, 2017, p. 10)
“...our deepest emotions - love, fear, anger, dread, grief, sorrow, disgust, and hope - involve the activation of our bodily structures.” (Menakem, 2017, p. 5) Body “is where we experience most of our pain, pleasure, and joy, and where we process most of what happens to us.” (Menakem, 2017, p. 12)
“We need to slow ourselves down and learn to lean into uncertainty, rather than away from it.” (Menakem, 2017, p. 13) “...just notice what you’re experiencing without doing anything about it. [If there is constriction, for example,] [d]on’t try to undo the constriction. Don’t try to hold onto it, either. Just watch your body closely and notice what sensations, impulses, and emotions arise.” (p. xiii) “...explore it - gently. This requires building a tolerance for bodily and emotional discomfort, and learning to stay present with - rather than trying to flee - that discomfort” (p. 14). Sometimes, deep, somatic listening and awareness practices can “involve simply stopping and noticing,” while other practices “involve doing something more - sensing, imagining, moving, or activating your body in some other way” (p. 31). Some practices are relational, acknowledging both one’s own and other’s lived experiences. By feeling-sensing-listening deeper into one’s own body, one can harmonize with other bodies; regularly talking with trusted others about these somatic experiences are helpful (Menakem, 2017). Relationally, this deep, somatic listening awareness can involve active listening: “describing an event that had meaning for you, while the other person listens with caring, full attention, a calm presence, and a settled body. This might involve both of you letting you tremble, cry, sway, shake your head, or move your body in some other way...Being an active listener involves not interrupting; not making judgements; not asking questions other than to make sure you understand; not giving advice or offering explanations; and not jumping in with a story of your own” (pp. 177-178).
“We need to begin with the body…” (Menakem, 2017, p. 10)
“...our deepest emotions - love, fear, anger, dread, grief, sorrow, disgust, and hope - involve the activation of our bodily structures.” (Menakem, 2017, p. 5) Body “is where we experience most of our pain, pleasure, and joy, and where we process most of what happens to us.” (Menakem, 2017, p. 12)
“We need to slow ourselves down and learn to lean into uncertainty, rather than away from it.” (Menakem, 2017, p. 13) “...just notice what you’re experiencing without doing anything about it. [If there is constriction, for example,] [d]on’t try to undo the constriction. Don’t try to hold onto it, either. Just watch your body closely and notice what sensations, impulses, and emotions arise.” (p. xiii) “...explore it - gently. This requires building a tolerance for bodily and emotional discomfort, and learning to stay present with - rather than trying to flee - that discomfort” (p. 14). Sometimes, deep, somatic listening and awareness practices can “involve simply stopping and noticing,” while other practices “involve doing something more - sensing, imagining, moving, or activating your body in some other way” (p. 31). Some practices are relational, acknowledging both one’s own and other’s lived experiences. By feeling-sensing-listening deeper into one’s own body, one can harmonize with other bodies; regularly talking with trusted others about these somatic experiences are helpful (Menakem, 2017). Relationally, this deep, somatic listening awareness can involve active listening: “describing an event that had meaning for you, while the other person listens with caring, full attention, a calm presence, and a settled body. This might involve both of you letting you tremble, cry, sway, shake your head, or move your body in some other way...Being an active listener involves not interrupting; not making judgements; not asking questions other than to make sure you understand; not giving advice or offering explanations; and not jumping in with a story of your own” (pp. 177-178).
Somatic listening can occur with others, other humans and more than human beings. We can engage these deeply embodied, relational listening practices with the land we tend, the seeds we plant, the plants and food that grow, and the bugs, microbes, birds, our ancestors, and other beings who share presence with us in the garden. Robin Wall Kimmerer (2016) encourages folx to ask the question “Does the earth love you back?” because “that would mean that the earth had agency and that I was not an anonymous little blip on the landscape, that I was known by my home place.” As we engage in somatic listening and awareness practices in the garden, we come to know ourselves in our garden place and come to feel-understand how we are known by our garden place.
Here’s how (actions) we’ve done it before:
Here’s the ‘how’ we are interested in doing it in the upcoming season(s):
(We're in process, check back soon!)
- Collective practices of somatic awareness when gathering
- Encouragement for individual practice
- Explicit culture building of taking breaks and tending body/self
- Some buddies/teams have had practices to start their work times together
- Altar building and ceremony
- Harvesting Practices
Here’s the ‘how’ we are interested in doing it in the upcoming season(s):
(We're in process, check back soon!)