Meet Somatic Heart

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I'm a qualified and registered Somatic Psychotherapist, as well as holding a degree in acupuncture, a post grad in exercise medicine, and various qualifications in massage therapy.  

   I have always been passionate and deeply wanting to understand how emotions, trauma, and stress sit within the mind and the body. Never just to accept them for what they are they are here for ever now, but finding various ways to work with them and work through them. This was both for personal growth and understanding as well as how i could share this so that others could benefit and help too. 

  For me i do not see myself as a fixer or a healer but instead a guide and a helper, to allow each person to be able to grow, transform and move through experiences. While i can bring the experience and skills that i have learnt on my journey, this is now about your journey and helping you, not trying to do the work for you.

 My work integrates somatic psychotherapy with an understanding of biomechanics, nervous system regulation, and depth-oriented psychological inquiry. I am interested in how life experiences can impact both the emotional and physical aspects simultaneously but in different ways, and how change becomes possible when these are explored together. 

I work collaboratively, with careful attention to pacing. Therapy is not something done to you, but a process we explore together. The aim is to create conditions where new experiences of safety, agency, and embodiment can develop naturally.

The deeper understanding of the body and mind, both in the separate parts and also how they link together and the journey to starting to understand this, not just as 2 individual parts but how they are linked and influence each other has being a long one. This came from my childhood and teenage years practicing martial arts, and also then going onto coach gymnastics i got to ignite my passion for biomechanics and healing, spending majority of  that time working with injured or athletes coming back from injury.

This has include me spending 3 months living in a Daoist temple in 2015, and then again in 2015, where not only did i get to learn a lot about daoist views but also directly was able to study what could be known as daoist healing methods. While i was there the second time after years of practice and study i was able to qualify as a Tai chi instructor. Which has lead to me being able to teach various classes, one being at an MS therapy Centre, others to hospital and university staff, as well as using it individually within the clinic. I have later also had chance to be a live in student for one of my Tai chi and Buddhism teachers, giving me the opportunity to become his disciple and study these practices under guidance daily for 9 months.

Having loved the skills i learnt in China it sparked a path to study them even further so i came back and completed an acupuncture degree, with the majority on my study focus being upon mental and emotional health and using acupuncture to help. However, as i still wanted to understand the bodily impact more I then went on to do a post grad in applied sports and exercise medicine. Looking here on the impact of movement and exercise on the body and the influence that has on mental health and vice versa. To support this i got to study massively into kinesiology, biomechanics, as well as theoretical psychotherapy  

This then went onto me working in a clinic, as an acupuncturist and sports massage therapist.  While not exclusively working on this solely, the majority of people with complex health conditions, and often with a mixture of emotional, stressfull and traumatic events mixed in too. The flip side to this was due to the high leveled knowledge of biomechanics understands, i often had people coming in with complex physical injuries that i was able to work with but also on how these injuries impacted them as a whole, seeing their frustrations.

With this naturally leading me into studying the areas further looking into various somatic based practices before getting the chance to study on a Somatic psychotherapy program to keep taking my study further and to be able to keep growing and helping.