Today’s guest is body-mind coach Laura Wieck. She is a licensed massage therapist, certified coach and mentor who is dedicated to helping massage therapists, body workers and holistic practitioners create thriving and abundant businesses. In today’s episode we explore the body-mind connection and learn how to listen to what your body is communicating with you so you can use that wisdom to make decisions to move you forward in your life.
Body-Mind Coaching
Body-mind coaching is the combination of massage or body work with a structured coaching conversation to help clients and help people address the physical and emotional aspects of their stress so they can live more connected to themselves, more connected to their community and more connected in their own lives.
Curiosity
We need to ask ourselves “how can I improve?” instead of “what’s wrong with me?” or “why can’t I do this?” We need to reframe it and come from a curious place with a positive intention and then seek the answers to what we’re looking for.
How does stress on the body impact the mind?
Our society idolizes thinking, knowledge, wisdom and logic to the point where the brain controls everything. The way we’re actually wired with this body mind connection is that it goes both ways. One of the main nerves that go from the brain down into the body is called the vagus nerve. 20% of input goes from the brain down into the body but 80% of input goes from the body to the brain. There is more information coming up then there is going down.
Enteric nervous system
We have a second brain in our body called the enteric nervous system that rests on the base of our pelvic flood. It controls the digestive track but it is also constantly picking up environmental data running through our body as well as chemical reactions and sending that information up to the brain. When your body feels off it’s sending a message to your brain.
In our culture where we have to think things through and be logical, when things don’t go our way and our body is sending a signal to us that we need to adjust we tend to fight that. Then we are out of flow and feel disconnected and it’s like our body and mind are fighting each other. We’ve been raised to be logical and make logical decisions but somewhere on that list is a line that says “this just feels right”. That line is your body talking and it carries so much more weight than you can logically come up with. The second brain in our body that’s sending information to our brain is collecting more information than our conscience brain can compute.
Gut feeling
When you have a gut feeling you can’t describe it’s because you don’t have the logical language associated with it. The gut feeling is more logical then anything your brain can come up with. Follow your gut instinct.
The feeling of purpose
Purpose is attached to the feeling of being free. There’s a freedom to it that’s very inspiring and elevated. It comes from the body first but it’s not just about positive affirmations and suddenly feeling perfect. You take it one step at a time. Find something that feels honest for you and make the shift from there. Your purpose is about feeling free to be you.
How to connect with Laura
For more information and show notes please go to annagoldstein.com/3. Thank you for listening and we’ll talk with you soon.