Release Old Stress and Traumas in Your Body Through Somatic Movement: An Interview with Susan Kullman
There have been more and more recent discoveries on how old traumas that happened as far back as our early childhood can affect the way we respond to stress in our adult lives. Our body’s own intelligence sometimes sets off autonomic overreactions to triggers outside of our body, without us being aware, and stress occurs.
I had the pleasure of meeting with somatic movement expert, the deeply spiritual Susan Kullman to find out how we can tap into our body’s own memory and resolve those stored traumas. Susan is a certified spiritual life coach, somatic educator, yoga therapist, dancer, and author, who has empowered others to live a life of intentional health and wellness. Susan’s passion in teaching comes from decades of study in wellness practices, and her love and deep understanding of the body and its soul.
Q:
What is the foundation of somatic movement?
A:
The word Somatic came from the Greek root Soma for body, and it means through the senses. Native Americans were really the first ones to use somatic movement to sense into the body’s own wisdom. It’s an ability we all have that lives in our back brain. We are just steered away from all that with the advancement of technology and our values around the intellect in this country. Somatic is our ability to focus on that part of our brain, where our primal senses are, our animal body. Just like how animals can sense, we can too. It’s just that in our society, we are often told we are too sensitive and made to feel that we are different when in reality, our sensitivity is a special gift and tool to help us navigate through life.
There are many different types of somatic work. I’ve been a dancer my whole life and all of dancing really is somatic movement. If you are a trained dancer then the kinesthetic part of your brain is trained to create the movements with your body. You have to feel which muscle you need to ignite in order to move this way or that way. So that is one way to look at somatic movement.
Somatic work for the wellness industry and my approach to somatic movement is going into the body to dissolve stress and re-pattern functional movement. I had studied and practiced with Liz Koch extensively as well as James Knight who is the creator of Gentle Somatic Yoga®. There are different movements for different parts of the body that can help release chronic tensions. It can help arthritis, create functional movement patterns, can help symptoms of Parkinson’s, and help athletes with muscle balances. And that is really my approach to somatic movement work.
Q:
What was your personal journey that led you to somatic work?
A:
So I actually started out my career in banking, very different from what I’m doing now. But I’ve been an athlete my whole life. I’ve been a dancer, competitive swimmer, worked out, just always involved in working the body. I can’t remember a time in my life where I didn’t have some kind of physical activity to go to, starting when I was three. I basically went into banking because I had studied business in college when my dad said to study business, that’s how I will always have a paycheck. It was never that exciting for me but I did it anyway. I knew what my passion was but never thought I’d be able to make a living doing it. That “do what you love” mindset just wasn’t there back then, at least not in my household.
But I started teaching aerobics after work as a side gig, when the owner of the gym I was going to spotted me and thought I should be a teacher and put me through their training program. So I became an aerobics teacher pretty organically and was teaching one day a week. Then when another teacher left for maternity, I took over her class and started teaching on another day of the week. It evolved from there—I started teaching more and more and was getting referrals from students, so I started a business from there, teaching one-on-one at people’s houses.
When all that work and training left my body more stiff, someone suggested that I should take up yoga. So I started taking yoga with the intention to become more flexible. I met an amazing yoga teacher who is very spiritual and I learned yoga through Taoism rather than Hinduism. At the time Somatic wasn’t even a word anyone was using, but she was teaching somatic yoga before somatic yoga became a thing.
After that, I just got deeper and deeper into it, and started to learn about food and the psychology of eating. Then I became a spiritual life coach in around 2007 and learned in depth about emotional intelligence, the neurosites behind it, and the energy of emotions in the body. Through working with people in the industry and having different coaches myself and learning about energy medicine, it just became my way of life over the years. And it was all through personal experience. No one sold me on it. I was just very intrigued because I felt the difference in my life.
Q:
Why is the psoas the most important muscle of our body, in a spiritual sense?
A:
The psoas is the deepest muscle in the human body. They call it the human tenderloin. In order to touch our own psoas we would have to cut ourselves open through the front and move over the organs, because it’s attached to the inside part of the spine. So we can’t get to it from the back, we can only get to it through the front. That means we need to sense so deeply into our own center to feel it and tap into its wisdom.
I had trained with Liz Koch in depth for the last six years on working with the psoas. She was the first person I know of who called the psoas a bio-intelligent messenger. While the biomechanical model is that the psoas is recruited for stabilization—if we have a supple and buoyant psoas, biomechanically, that means we have a free spine. And having a free spine means we have a healthy central nervous system, which is located in the spine. On a spiritual level, if we want to work on self-actualization through the body, we would also want to work with the psoas because it tells us what’s going on in core integrity. But it’s very intriguing that whether we think of the psoas from a biomechanical level or a spiritual level, they both take us to the same place. So it was stunning to me when I found the psoas, being an athlete and dancer all my life then a spiritual life coach, how it had connected all the areas of my work. Working with the psoas is truly all encompassing.
“There are also times as I am doing the movements I feel tension in certain areas I didn’t know I had. As the tension starts to dissolve, sometimes memories of old stress patterns come up. And that’s really all they are, stress patterns that get imprinted in our body. Through the movement explorations of somatic I get to repattern it, unraveling it.”
Q:
What are some of the spiritual breakthroughs you’ve personally experienced through somatic movement?
A:
I think everyone has a different definition of spiritual; for me it means consciousness. It means I’m becoming aware of something that was previously unconscious, when things get revealed.
With somatic practice, I find that there are moments where I can sense a certain movement would bring up a certain memory or an image, or a thought. It would then help me identify why my body can’t move a certain way, or maybe neurologically I feel I can’t be that way, or maybe there was trauma there. Most of the time there were old memory patterns. For example, I would all of a sudden want to do a certain move and sense why I would suddenly want to do that. So if I wanted to go into a protective posture I would ask why I feel the need for protection. Instead of judging myself for it, I allow myself to fully express it and relax into it.
We have old memories embedded into the fabric of our fascia that we are just not aware of. One time, I had brought up an old memory of my grandmother receiving the news of the death of her brother. I realized that at that moment she had moved into a gesture upon her shock. My memory of that instant is associated with a feeling of a kind of trauma, because it was my first experience with death. It was a gesture that I would often do without knowing why I do it. I didn’t know it then but my energy had enmeshed with hers because I was so scared to see someone I love so dearly that upset. When I realized I was mirroring my grandmother’s reaction in my body, I was able to say that it was hers and not mine and was able to let go of it.
There are also times as I am doing the movements I feel tension in certain areas I didn’t know I had. As the tension starts to dissolve, sometimes memories of old stress patterns come up. And that’s really all they are, stress patterns that get imprinted in our body. Through the movement explorations of somatic I get to repattern it, unraveling it.
It’s not something we even need to analyze or buy into why that memory is in our body, because we don’t always want to go there. I will explain it sometimes to my students so that they are not blindsided by some of the emotions that might come up after practice. But the point is not to go and look for it and just allow whatever comes up to come up on its own.
Q:
5. What types of classes or programs do you offer?
A:
You can get a lot of information from my website. I offer many classes and workshops. All of my programs are live and interactive over Zoom, though recordings are available as well.
I have a few weekly classes on somatic movement where I teach people how to move freely and become more buoyant. They learn toning, fascial fitness, and overall deep mindful movements that increase awareness of their body. It’s for anyone who wants to slow down, connect with their body, and to move better as we age. My average client is 45 years of age and older.
I have 6-week workshops such as Gentle Somatic Yoga and Psoas Rehabilitation; I also have a year-long Whole Life Transformation workshop with 12 different modules, which is a combination of somatic awareness, emotional intelligence, self-mastery, and spiritual awakening. That particular workshop will be limited to 25 people and we would meet once a week. It is for someone who really wants to go through the transformation of the mind-body connection and go deep into their consciousness and unlock the body’s wisdom. You can find more detailed descriptions on my live workshops page. And of course I offer private sessions for people who want more one-on-one attention. They can book a free 30-minute consultation with me so we can get to know one another first.
Susan Kullman is a certified spiritual life coach, somatic educator, yoga therapist, dancer, and author, who has empowered others to live a life of intentional health and wellness. Susan’s passion in teaching comes from decades of study in wellness practices, and her love and deep understanding of the body and its soul.
From an early age, she had spiritual experiences, profound insights, and a deep affection for human potential. She has since been using spiritual information and practices to inspire others. Along her journey, she has found that true wellness comes from connection and balance – connection to nature, others, and most of all, to one’s own heart and passions.
Susan has successfully used the techniques and practices described in her book, Commit To What Is, to help transform her own life, and is passionate about sharing her knowledge with students of all ages. She has an extensive background in a wide range of practices that open our bodies and restore our physical, emotional and psychical balance.
Working with Susan will open your body, your heart, and your mind, to the energetic life force that animates you and all of existence.
When you meet Susan Kullman you immediately get a sense of her incredible energy, and can’t help but think to yourself, “I hope it’s contagious.”
You can connect with Susan on Instagram, Facebook, or through her website.
