Unwind your Spine with Somatic Movement

In our culture and in these times, practices for deep recovery are priceless. Cumulative stress may come from working too much, carrying an excessive emotional load, societal oppressions, financial insecurity, confusion about the future and intergenerational trauma. Some things we have control over and other things are not in our control. To keep staying the path, we need to find our resource wells. These are practices or places that provide a felt-sense of spaciousness, safety and support. Even if for a few minutes or half a day, experiences of “okay” and “enough” remind us of our inherent resilience. Head spirals is a somatic movement practice for deep recovery through spinal unwinding.

systems sensing

Unwinding is a felt-sense term that is more experiential than anything. There is also a growing body of research that reveals how self-guided unwinding effects our neurobiology by eliciting both changes in our tissues and autonomic nervous system. Unwinding practices feel like your inner body is releasing excess tension and strain and giving back a softer, easier feeling and thinking state. Somatic Groundwork unwinding uses several different techniques that each involve systems sensing. One of these systems is the fascial matrix. Another primary system in Somatic Groundwork is that of connecting to ground and gravity and space, our primary system of support.

sensing into fascia

Sensing into fascia is a primary way to create shift in our autonomic nervous system. Our autonomic nervous system has a global effect on our emotional and mental states as well as to the quality of our tissues, or fascial system. An effective way to alter the tone of our nervous system, specifically to calm arousal (heightened activation) and elicit the rest and digest processes of our parasympathetic nervous system, is through sensing fascia. One Somatic Groundwork technique for unwinding is called rock and roll. Rock and roll is part of a yielding process that involves rhythmic rocking and soft body rolling in organic phrases of movement and rest.

Enter head spiral for spinal unwinding. Try this 13 minute practice with me from a bed or on the floor.

rock & roll spinal unwinding

With a focus to unwind your spine, a whole body experience unfolds. Somatic Groundwork unwinding is like self-massage therapy with movement. Due to a high density of sensory receptors embedded within the tissues of our fascial system, somatic movement is one of the best pain relievers that is “administered” to our self, by our self. The fascial matrix is a sensory fabric with over 200 million interoceptors and proprioceptors. Interoceptors monitor our inner body processes and proprioceptors monitor the relationship of our body organization with our environment.

Rock and roll techniques bring mindful attention to sensations like weight releasing, rolling points of contact, inner shape changes and push forces. As we track these sensations in movement, we directly participate with both interoceptive and proprioceptive input and alter the quality of information integrating in higher brain centers. What we monitor, we modify. Somatic movement and inquiry teaches sensing skills to help us move and feel better from the inside out.

If you are a movement teacher or therapist and want to weave somatic movement into your craft (through both the art and the science) take a look at our somatic teacher training: Interdisciplinary Movement & Somatics.