in somatics sessions, we use practice & bodywork for healing & transformation. we may work with sensation, gesture, touch, breath, movement, emotions, storytelling, memories, imagination, and conversation to better understand your body’s current knowledge & patterns, and to expand your access to resilience, integrity, choice & power. my practice centres queer people & people engaged in liberation, healing, and cultural work.
as a politicized practitioner whose somatics is cultural*, my commitment is to supporting your embodied liberation through respectful perception, increased nervous system knowledge & resilience, skillful consent, and access to a wider range of self-awareness, sensations, experiences, relationships, choices, and responses, even within the real constraints of the capitalist, colonial cultures we live within.
i believe that all our work is in some way trauma healing. we live within many systems of power & oppression, and both oppressor and oppressed positions shape our bodies in their own dehumanizing & alienating ways that cut us off from our deepest wisdom, truest selves, and right relationships. when we are working with our bodies, we are working with these shapes, as well as with the shapes of inherent healing intelligence all bodies hold, informed by the specific inheritances of our lived experiences, including place, history, community, power, and relationships. i am also trained & experienced in working with trauma as more traditionally defined, from specific incidents and ongoing situations of harm.
ways to work together
in each & every session, we will take time to arrive in our bodies & shared space, align on intention & direction for the day’s work, engage specific practices &/or bodywork, and close the day’s work.
this image is by cedar mccloud
i ask clients to cultivate their personal somatic practice alongside our sessions. we can use tarot as a frame or as part of the weave for any somatics session! i offer three paths for somatic work:
spark & sustain:
up to 7 sessions for individuals, dyads, & triads
a single session or brief series of sessions focused on a single question, situation, pattern, struggle, or issue, intended to spark a shift & offer tools that you can continue sustaining on your own. individual sessions are ~60 minutes; dyad & triad sessions are ~90 minutes. dyad/triad sessions are a great way to share costs for personalized support & develop sustainable shared language, practice, and culture within your own relational webs, and to contain & shift relational patterns that aren’t working for you. (please note: i do not offer conflict mediation!)
you can book an individual one-off via calendly here. to schedule a dyad/triad session, please email me at hannah @ bodywitchery.com.
tides & transformation:
open-ended, steady bi/weekly sessions for individuals
a consistent weekly or every-other-week session space that belongs to you for as long as you want/need it, where we cyclically reevaluate the purpose & impact of our work together & realign on your current commitments & needs. open-ended individual work is useful for anything you don’t want to or cannot rush to change, including chronic conditions complex trauma from childhood &/or systemic oppression, and the everyday realities of being human. sessions are generally ~60 minutes.
you can email me at hannah @bodywitchery.com to check availability or schedule a vibes check.
lineage & legacy:
consultation & mentorship for practitioners
support & skillsharing for your study & work paths, which many of us make by walking them≛ for the first time (oftentimes too alone). i offer professional/practice consultation sessions for practitioners, facilitators, and students of somatics/bodywork/facilitation, centred on the questions & needs you bring to session. common themes include pathways to practice outside social work/psychology/policing, navigating power & privilege in relationship with clients, working with non-monogamy & BDSM, trauma-informed work, somatics in the virtual realm, and best practices for embodied, relational facilitation. sessions can be 60 or 90 minutes.
as of august 2023, i am on parental leave with an undetermined return date sometime in 2024. i will be prioritizing returning moonwork participants & clients when i reopen my practice, but you can keep an eye out here or on instagram to see if/when i am open to new clients!
you can check my fees page for info about rates!
*“cultural somatics” was coined by resmaa menakem & can also describe generative somatics lineage, which understands systemic oppression as collective trauma shaping
≛”making the road by walking” comes from paulo freire’s liberatory pedagogy.