Do you remember reading a pop culture fact in the mid 2010's that said if you do a Superman pose in the mirror before a job interview, your confidence and outcome improves? If not, this is the paper published in 2015 that tested whether "engaging in expansive (vs. contractive) 'power poses' before a stressful job interview [...] would enhance performance during the interview." It turns out, the results were quite promising: participants who did engage in expansive poses before a job interview "performed better and were more likely to be chosen for hire." (Disclaimer: despite supporting the point I'm trying to make, this one piece of research is not sufficient to claim this to be universally true. It's just a lovely example of what I'm about to share.)
Well, that piece of research hits very close to home. Just a few days ago I did my quarterly meet-up with two dear friends and we sat down to explore how our personal Q3 had gone and what our hopes were for Q4. One of the things we had all felt in Q3 was shame. We decided to do a little somatic exercise together: we walked around the room with sad music and embodied the feeling of shame. We let it weight on our shoulders, tighten our chest, round our backs and bring our head down. We really allowed shame to physically live in our bodies, and our bodies contracted as a result. Tears swelled up in my eyes. Then, gradually, we took ourselves out of shame, giving ourselves compassion and embodying the self-directed cheerleader energy we want to bring into Q4. Our backs started naturally straightening, our chest puffed up, our heads held themselves higher. We forced ourselves into bigger, taller, more confident postures, and the effect was immediate. We changed the music to something more uplifting and we were able to change our emotional state.
This brings me to a point that I've been thinking about since I've started working with bodies and studying somatic psychotherapy, which goes deep into emotional and energetic blockages showing up as body armours. Emotional states often show up as changes in our body and posture. You may have noticed how, during difficult periods, some people experience changes to their posture, their pace, their voice and their facial expression. On the other side of the same coin, you may have noticed how during happy streaks, some people walk the world with a tall back and a giant smile on their face. Now imagine asking that happy person to walk around with a hunched back for 30minutes, a sunken chest and shoulders rolled forward. Chances are they might start feeling a little helpless and sad.
There was a study in the 80's in which subjects who were holding a pen between their teeth (which activates the same muscles as smiling) "reported more intense humor responses when cartoons were presented under facilitating conditions". In short, forcing a smile on your face might make you more prone to finding joy in daily life. For transparency's sake, I feel compelled to share that this study was also contested and is not universally true. It simply represents the way our body and emotion are in constant dialogue and tweaking one can kickstart the process of changing the other.
What does this have to do with Shiatsu and somatic therapy? Well, everything. We have inhabited our bodies for so long that we're not even aware of the way we hold ourselves in space anymore. Sometimes, for a number of reasons, you might want to look into your physical-emotional state and make some changes. In this case, "fake it 'til you make it", or more so exploring different ways of being, might work just fine. I'm a huge believer in giving people agency over their healing and becoming proficient at listening to their own body's language. That said, sometimes the armours are so deeply rooted that you might just need external help to make the changes you desire, and allow yourself to show up in the world with more vitality and energy. That's where body-based therapies come in handy :)
If you want to know more or would like to book a Shiatsu session with me in Lisbon, just message me on social media or via the form below - I'd love to hear from you!