A focus I have, as a somatic empathic practitioner, is the power and control through function. The lens or viewpoint is through functional movement, functional processing of information internally of the environment that stimulates action, reactions and expression.
This lens includes the past, present and future potential. It is also not exclusive to one function or another as my view is on the effects and potential for whole functional integration learned through social conditioning. The conditioning of the functioning movement, language process and relationships to emotions that are responses to thinking patterns and the felt senses that are spontaneous to actual experiences happening in the moment. The patterns I use are to retrain the brain through functional guidance that easily expands the conditions holding someone in a belief system constraining their potential for increasing mobility and flexibility. This includes the thinking constraints in functional movement or relationship interactions, internal or external.
A core function that is the power and control system of human function is breathing. This morning I have a workshop introducing movement patterns through the skeleton to expand the individual consciousness of each participant. They will all be starting from their own unique social conditioned experience. This suggests there isn’t a set pattern that will integrate a full range of functional movement that will be the exact same. Often, I will run into comments like, ‘that’s not the way I was taught in …………. ‘ You can fill in the blanks from your own experience. It seems other modalities focus on telling students that there is only one way you can breathe, meaning I hear it from those who have gone into agreement with that limited clarity of facilitators who believe what they are sharing with their students, until they themselves advance their functional body awareness of full mobility. Our social conditioning is such a right and wrong culture. I had a Pilates instructor participate as a student in a class, sit up from the lesson and began to have a disagreement. Four years later, they advertised the same workshop from my perspective and patterns. They were not ready to take in the patterns to explore and expand their consciousness at the time of my workshop, yet 100 percent believed they were right and I was wrong. This is a pattern that I now recognize as social conditioning. Each modality is locked into a belief system of right or wrong ways of functioning until challenged. Unfortunately, it’s also the instructor’s ability to integrate what they are hearing and how they interpret it that shifts the original clarity of the method and conforms it into a lesser consciousness.
This is on my mind as I enter the workshop today. I recently did a series on rolling with the ribs, and I ran into someone whose fear skyrocketed with the shift in how they were breathing. It interfered with an activity they had been doing that was locked in. The fear was so great and behaviour so locked in, they couldn’t be spontaneous. Instead of self-reflection to question their limiting belief to free up their fear, they believed any other movement patterns had to be wrong. They wanted to tell me that twenty years of practical application of Feldenkrais was wrong, as they had a Yoga instructor teach them that this was the way to breathe, and from what I heard is they believed it to be the only way in every activity. Breathing is life. Literally. There is no one way. It depends upon the activity. It also depends upon available skeletal movement function. This person was hyper-focused on the diaphragm and lacked internal felt sense, or image of the skeleton, nor the relationship to the other bones in the body that counterbalance the rib movements. Afterall, the diaphragm could not possibly counterbalance the weight of the skull nor support the mild fluctuations through the vertebra. Let’s get real here for a moment. So here’s my answer. Back to the basics and begin with the skeleton. That’s a joke, as that’s the only thing I do.
I will focus on the connection between the skull and pelvis, which is: the spine, rib cage, shoulder blades, breast bone and clavicles. I asked Ai for an image, and they can’t provide an accurate one. Even the earlier anatomy images are disappearing online and being replaced with terrible ones that aren’t necessarily correct. This is not a good sign for future learning.
Renee is a Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner – since 2007
There are 31 daily actions to participate, and explore in this integrative experience of goal setting. These goals are different than the typical pressurized canned model of making goal statements designed to push through fears to take action on outside strategies to achieve an outcome. This goal pattern has a focus on changing behaviour from the inside out, and not the outside in. The inside focus first is aligned with core values and has an essence in expanded learning and connection to conscious awareness, while the other has a focus on outside strategies to achieve influence. The focus on somatic goal setting is active mindfulness that expands the interconnectedness to spontaneous reactions to environmental stimuli at the level of the five senses, while the focus on outside strategies is a mental focus that has been the existing patterning in social conditioning that eliminated the somatic learning patterns of early learning. It combines contemplation first to identify the value needs (intention) as the core influence. The process creates a new pattern for learning behaviour that increases self-actualization with a change in process inner behaviour with patterns connecting the meanings of the words inspiring reactions, responses and motivation. Its focus is from the inside, with growing confidence based on increasing personal worth and self-value instead of outside strategies for personal gain with a false bravado. Somatic goals can inspire an increase in self-value that leads to a felt expression of abundance that is embodied, while the old pattern of goals develops a type of confidence that has a limited viewpoint and is dependent on strategies to generate confidence. This limited viewpoint is usually on wealth and fame, which are only two life areas. One embodies function, and the other fragments it.
Somatic Goal Setting Daily Action Example
Example of a doable daily action for integrating balance through inner and outer actions in the environment using intention that includes a focus on defining core values and becoming comfortable with feelings.
Read more on the Fire and Water Somatic Goals Setting Program – Visit
Fundraiser for building a Culture of Values through educational components and integrating them into educational institutions and organizations.
Remember, a Culture of Values from this perspective is not a religion. It is a model of integrative learning to enhance organized learning in institutions, organizations, parenting and childcare. It is not exclusive to one demographic. Rather is designed for all functioning people of all ages.
This first workshop for the Inside Awareness Center for Somatic Learning will be a fundraiser for building the Culture of Values educational programming to bring focus to the needs for maintaining the early learning patterns and partnering them with the current system that is oriented from the perspectives of adults contained within an institutionalized system. These early learning patterns here are not the typical strategies from an adult perspective of coming up with strategies to implement into a system. It is the actual patterns of integration for developing the inner processing capabilities for a child to develop into a healthy functioning adult in society. Education currently has a focus on memorization, solving puzzles with strategies and debate conversation entrainment. These educational programs will introduce the needs of the students who have retained their dominant sensory input as a form of viewing and processing incoming worldly information, and will strive to balance out those who are dominant analytical thinkers. These learning patterns will focus on developing a healthy inner and outer understanding of behavioural relationships between the elusive inner body responses in functional responses to any stimuli. This will be through transparent guided patterns designed in the same model of early learning in babies who have no input from adults intellectually in learning how to roll over, sit, stand, walk and talk. These abilities are inherent and not transmitted through an adult’s outside influence. These programs will integrate seamlessly into existing programs designed to increase recognition of inner responses for the ability to self-monitor and process reactions. This model has been initiated by a somatic empath who has recognized a gap in social conditioning while in a journey of self-discovery to find clarity and learn how to navigate in a world that has been educated to project outward from a dominant thinking behaviour, instead of having increased clarity and understanding of their inner process for creating healthy habits for good relationships and lifestyles later on. The intent for the educational patterns will be to create a healthier relationship and lifestyles that have less conflict and increased shared values.
Participation & Contribution
Renee Lindstrom, Founder of Inside Awareness Center for Integrative Somatic Learning, is seeking business partners, sponsors and those interested in supporting a model of education that will redefine behaviour through clarity, understanding that retraining the brain along with the subtle inner body responses that are one. At some point in history, the body systems became isolated and separated in people’s minds. The compartmentalization has fractured full function and understanding of the inter-relationships between felt senses, physical transitions, emotional responses, and finally the inner process for creating thoughts. For those who would be inspired to join this project, please express your interest and how or what you would like to contribute. Email is the best form of connection due to personal obligations to long periods of time with the phone turned off.
Contact to express interest or Donate
Let’s build a Culture of Values Educational system together
*Please note that there will be a component of training the trainers and mentorship available in the mix later on that you may have interest in if you’re an existing practitioner. This could be your entry point into this amazing project. If you’re a seasoned veteran, you may be valued as an advisor if you can connect to the potential through your experience. At this point, the essence of the material is at a stage of not be reinvented by new strategies that haven’t been through the apprenticeship of application.
by Renee Lindstrom, Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner,’07
Cultivting awareness through felt sense movement guidance
Before an Awareness through Movement workshop yesterday that had a focus on the jaw joints, I wrote a short blog post to put myself into the mindset of the intention for the upcoming lesson being introduced. I write spontaneously as though through some elusive inner direction. This simply means I do not have an outcome in mind when in free writing mode.
Arriving at the workshop space and while setting up the room, I was approached by someone ahead of time who inquired if this workshop would benefit them. They mentioned their jaw experiences that I was able to confirm it would be, all the while thanking whatever inspiration it was to have me free write on it before coming. It seems the statement from that post about creating a safe environment was going to be the dominant theme of the workshop! It was the intention, only I didn’t know it at the time of writing that statement. I did my best to create a deeper opportunity for the experience of safety so that the participants could release their habitual holding behaviour in their jaws they have patterned to protect themselves and their jaws. By this point, it is their protection!
I slowed my roll down (flow of words) and began to guide participants with more words than usual to give functional reassurance. Needless to say, it was a powerful workshop for many. I wondered partway through if everyone was benefitting, or not, due to the wordiness in the verbal guidance. Remember that the guidance is not focused on cognitive strategy thinking patterns. Rather, it is all practical micro movements, yet the focus is on the somatic senses. Basically, it is helping people to tap into their felt sense awareness using some of the five somatic senses we all have, yet ignore.
While I was focusing on creating a safe environment and the patterns, the participants did experience something as beneficial takeaways. I heard about this after that reassured me that everyone benefited from my decision to use words to support a deeper inner reassurance for them to test out the patterns I was talking them through. It was a reminder that Awareness through Movement is just that, ‘awareness.’ It is not rule-oriented, which shuts the door on one’s expanding conscious awareness, no matter what way you look at it. It is open exploration with a curious mind. That is what I heard as feedback. Many responses of how much people took in that they had no connection with before the workshop. That is what brings me joy. To hear the feedback that the participants discovered something new within, increasing their potential. It’s called self-discovery. In a nutshell, that’s what I facilitate, a practice of self-discovery.
For information on the next class series or workshop, hit link below.
by Renee Lindstrom, Author of the Somatic Archetypes
Audio for listening, in Authors voice
Here are some examples of the Author’s personal intentional goal-setting boards going back to ’14. Greater Victoria presented the community with free magazines and newpapers at pick up stations, whereby viewers could pick up copies each month. They were a treasure trove of topics, pictures and words to cut out for all genres for creating collages.
When this author began creating collages, the creativity was simple and lacked the in depth connection to the seeds of inspiration and skillset. Without giving up due to these lacks, they became more elaborate, skilled and creative. Unbeknownst to the Author, an organic integration occurred during this dedicated process. It translated into living actions and character, including the development of a more playful personality. It was a transforming life pattern.
This Author has what she calls a Somatic Heart expression and receptor, and it was covered by years of experiences with others who have no skill sets in recognizing this quality or in interacting with those who have this organic attribute.
Somatic Heart
Each seasonal or yearly intentional goal-setting activity reintegrated this inner connection to the warmth and playfulness of her heartfelt expressions and receptivity. It was a quiet and creative time to be thoughtful and take affirmative action for what she wanted and not for what she didn’t want. It was a subtle shift and possibly the most meaningful. This is not something she would have learned in a Tony Robbins or Jack Canfield program, as the approaches are completely different. One focuses on strategies and the external ego focus, while this is an active practice that leads into the depth of meaning in the core responses before expressing it outwardly to the world.
This approach is unique and individual and taps into core values, while there can only be one Tony Robbins and one Jack Canfield, with others duplicating them over and over. This approach presents the possibility for being authentically oneself and presenting the world with a face that shines from this alignment of self on the inside and expressed outwardly for others to connect to. This is what Tony Robbins did to become the person he is today. He is presenting as his authentic self and tapping into the needs of thousands. The problem is, it can only be done once to the levels of success he has experienced as he is the model, while this approach is an integrative learning model that each individual can integrate as a learned behaviour pattern that focuses on direction, making choices and decisions connected to an inner value system.
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This pattern of goal setting begins with a target intention that is overall for a period of time. It expands into doable size chunks, breaking the goals down into logical personal steps for achieving success by taking actional value based movements forward. The difference in this approach is in the actions for checking inward to connect to one’s core values, before taking a socially conditioned assertive approach. This means the assertiveness in this approach connects to self-value and esteem that emanates a different type of assertiveness. It is assertiveness that is more naturally mindful, self-connected and trustworthy. The aggressiveness from a socially conditioned action has potential for disconnection of self and energetically presents with less trustworthiness. This seems to lead to a sales job that is followed by justification. The Somatic Heart expression of this Author then suggests that goal setting that begins with an inner self connection with a focus through trained mindfulness and focus of attention can tap into one’s inner strength and courage to have grounded ownership of their goals that are centered in core values. An individual system within one, and not the goals of someone else’s storyline.
In an earlier post titled Be the Master Creator of your 2026 experience the pattern for creating goals was introduced as is the Somatic Archetypes. These Archetypes are the perception filters that are individual for each person. Consideration of these Archetypes are missing in the earlier goals step patterns that was compared to this approach. This pattern of goal-setting begins with this consideration.
This Somatic Archetype Goal Setting program is an educational system of somatic learning:
sets an overall goal intention
breaks it down into logical and actionable steps over a period of time as an integratable pattern
taps into your Somatic Archetype for personal learning and integration of understanding of unique differences
The benefits of this Somatic Goalsetting program are:
integrative learning happens natural that creates new habits that are productive to personal lifestyle goals
action steps develop skills to increase personal courage and self-confidence naturally
introduces a core value system that is unique to the participant
creates new beneficial habits for taking self-connected and self-directed lifestyle actions
by Renee Lindstrom, Author of the Somatic Archetypes
Follow along with Audio, or listen
The responses of the Somatic Archetypes are triggered by the environment. The Fantastic Five, sight, sound, smell, touch and taste, motivate responses and actions influenced by the elusive and solid experiences in the environmental landscape. The focus of Feng Shui is to create a balance of yin and yang energies. (masculine and feminine) If there is too much yang, the somatic responses will be aggressive to match the energy. Too much yin will encourage depressed states to match the energies. Therefore, the purpose of Feng Shui is to create an environment that will support all the Archetype needs for balance, harmony and motivation.
It would be in the best interest to learn your dominant Archetype senses to provide articles, furniture, fabric, and sound to please your dominant senses. When you share a space, consider every person’s Archetype. This would improve relationships and benefit connections. The value in this suggestion is that each person will view the space through their own somatic lens and the needs that may accompany them. An artist’s dominant sense will be inspired by patterns, shapes, textures, pictures, colour schemes, etc. A Perfumeurs dominant sense of smell may be inspired by fragrance, flowering plants, herbs and spices in the home. Consideration of each person is as important as balancing the space to meet everyone’s needs.
Observing the environment from a Feng Shui perspective would also look at the alertness needed for each separate environment. The alertness levels would need to be higher at work, and lower at home, or in a meditation space. Each location would be viewed for the messages that are obvious in the landscape, and adjustments would be made to the overall environment that would support each Somatic Archetype. These Archetypes are:
Sight
Beauty
Smell
Fragrance
Touch
Textures
Sound
Sound
Taste
Flavours
The Somatic Archetypes are the senses of perception in the environment, where their stimulus will determine the tone of how the information is perceived. For example, if an environment is cold, empty and grey, and a person experiencing it has a dominant visual sense, these features would increase the chance that the tone would be a cool and disconnected state versus a warm connected one. This influence is elusive, and it shapes the emotional response that affects mental and physical responses. It is as potent as how someone communicates their responses in a dialogue with you. The environment, in essence, is communicating silently with your somatic senses.
I offer Feng Shui consultations that explore the environment. This focus of attention is woven into the personal and group somatic communication and movement sessions, classes and workshops. This topic pairs well for increasing the quality in relationships and functional movement.
Please investigate the classes and a personal session or consult:
by Author Renee Lindstrom of The Somatic Archetypes
Audio above at link to listen or follow along while reading
The Archetypes
This introduction to defining these five senses includes both the noun and verb uses of these identifiers. It begins with a noun to describe sight, sound, smell, hearing and touch using a pattern that refers to conscious awareness for the intention or purpose to perceive and regain their felt sense.
As a Feldenkrais Practitioner, teacher and mentor, I have experienced these fantastic five somatic triggers as the core receptors of environmental influences that stimulate inner functional responses. These receptors are the beginning of any and every response that travels through the body, back and middle brain, and finally to the prefrontal cortex last. It happens quicker than one can track and control. The only thing that can be controlled is mental function and the information going in. Even thoughts of memories can influence and activate these five senses, suggesting there are internal and external sources of environmental influences. These five Archetype patterns for functional integration of the environmental stimulus that triggers receptors are introduced below. An important point to consider is that these Archetypes stimulate each other’s sensory awareness prethought. They have their own expressive language.
The Artist
The Visionary
Most babies are born with the gift of sight. Sight is through the beautiful body design of vision that includes the lens that takes in the world. Artists take in the world and interpret it through their unique abilities. An example, developing the quality of one’s eyes that was present at birth, would be the experiences of meditation. Mediators have spent time and energy softening their eye habits from which to take in the world, to retrain their brains that have developed a harsh and critical focus looking at the world. A subtle yet profound shift in quality of life.
The eyes are located in the head in direct contact with the brain.
The Musician
The Vocalist
A musician has developed their sense of hearing in an advanced way to differentiate musical sounds and notes. The universe is filled with musical tones that formed early music perspectives. There is a belief that primordial creation began with sound in some Eastern philosophies, such as Hinduism. This sense is as important as sight, touch, taste and smell. A sense that may be taken for granted until it is dimmed. It inspires and motivates action. For example, music. If a piece is playing, it will either heighten moods or it will create agitation. It can even inspire movement through dance spontaneously or provoke immediate frustration and annoyance. This is a hidden influence of behavioural responses. Hidden suggests unconscious awareness or taking this sense for granted. If sound is a dominant sense, the tone of voice or sounds a person will make will be another hidden environmental influence in controlled or spontaneous responses.
The skill to hear vibrations is a gift that translates into the health and well-being of individuals and relationships.
Sound is received through the ears that are directly connected to the brain.
Sound is expressed through the mouth, yet originates from below the head in the voice box at the base of the neck in the front.
The Somatic
The Toucher
A baby will be sensitive to the somatic touch of all the textures and levels of denseness of articles and items they come in contact with. Their skin is receptive and a source of information. The hands are known to make a larger map inside the brain of neuro-pathways as the baby gathers this intel through touch. The skin is an organ that covers the body. As a receiver, the skin responds to what the other senses are hearing, seeing, smelling and tasting. When these senses send signals to the brain, it sends signals to the skin that responds immediately. It happens faster than any identifying label or word in our common vocabulary to describe it. This somatic sense is at the core of function and integrates all the senses. The other senses influence one another similarly, yet the somatic sense of touch encompasses them all and is a source of awareness that can be conscious or unconscious. This is the Milky Way of our universal responsive experience to explore and investigate.
Touch encompasses the whole body through skin contact with solid surfaces, and elusive and unsolid influences like the wind, heat, cold, water, and emotional waves emanating from people and animals
The Perfumeur
Scent Enthusiast
Dual Activation of Scent Responses
Digestion
The sense of smell is a powerful activator. It is how a baby senses their mom and begins to locate their food source. The connection continues through life as smell is what activates the taste buds to create the ability to taste flavours. Smell will activate taste buds to taste flavours and begin the function of processing and digesting foods even before it is put in one’s mouth. It activates the stomach to receive the food with the right digestive enzymes and stimulates the organs to prepare for processing it through the gut. Digestion begins before putting food in one’s mouth and chewing.
Attraction
Scents create attraction that is confirmed through generations of creating special perfume scents for both males and females. Scent is a silent expression of attraction and a powerful expression for mating. The sense of smell will be one of the first unconscious expressions that will attract a person to another. This personal scent will only attract a few matches. It will not attract the general population. It is like a mother who has a connection to the scent of their child. You will often see them smell their child’s head. It is a form of expression and affection.
Scent is through the nose, located between the eyes and mouth on the head and direct link in the brain
The Taster
The Supertasters
The mouth function is the first dominant sense used at birth. Immediately, a baby begins to feed long before being able to focus their eyes on objects. The ability to suckle at birth is an inherent functional action of survival. When a baby begins to receive new foods to explore from three months on, their taste buds stimulate conscious awareness of different tastes. Some of these babies will have a stronger taste sense and be able to differentiate flavours. Many of those with this ability become tasters of fine wine and foods to classify them in the industry, or become critics of them for the benefit of others. However, it is the sense of smell that activates the taster buds.
The taste buds are in the mouth, on the surface of the tongue located in the head close to the brain
Early Somatic Development
Most babies are born with the gift of training their mental patterns to process information to fit within their social structures. This suggests that they learned the conditioning of those in their surroundings. I call this an environmental influence. It is a lifelong influence that is passed down to future generations. It’s taken for granted. When this thinking behaviour is taken for granted, it doesn’t include insight, especially if the educational system guidance is using the same patterning. The person sitting in meditation is retraining themselves not to attach to the random pre-conditioned thoughts and reactions that are arising. This begins to create a gap between the thoughts that leaves space for silence. It is in the silence that recognition unfolds, and one begins to recognize who they are outside the social conditioning of their family, friends, peers, etc. It is a profound experience to tap into the real person inside the layers of trying to belong and be what others want you to be.
Through the practical development and experience of Feldenkrais, I have discovered that there is a similar experience, as described in meditation. The difference for me as a student, practitioner, teacher and mentor is that it takes this meditative experience to the next level. It is in living action while in the engagement with day-to-day interactions and actions.
It is through the:
freedom of eye movement patterns that are spontaneous
sounds in the environment and inside your functioning body and thinking brain
touch of solid objects for feedback, and the elusive waves in the environment
smell stimulates attraction or warning, and stimulates digestion
taste, a somatic receptor, like touch and starts digestive functions, like smell
Patterns that have been lost through reactions of a lifetime of social interactions and conditioning. It adds the component of awareness and spaciousness, which increases windows of tolerance in ongoing daily activities.
The Thinker
The Intellect
Thinking is not a sense. Often, it is confused with the ability to hear, using the term auditory. However, thinking is a separate inner function for processing information that has been learned through social conditioning. Anyone using auditory to describe thinking is minimizing the ability to hear sounds separately from the ability to think and obtain memories from which to understand and process information.
Thinking is also a separate function from seeing, smelling, touching and tasting. However, thinking puts thought forms into statements that often reflect belief systems, opinions, and perspectives. These beliefs, opinions and perspectives are taken from long and short-term memories of past experiences and learned conditioning of our individual and unique social and cultural conditioning.
Mindfulness through thought patterns
coming out of the shadows of projections into the lighter qualities of present moment clarity
Memories are the past that shapes thinking patterns in the present and future.
Thinking in the present through the experience of the fantastic five senses and expressed somatically, not thought projections, can be conscious awareness in the moment that redirects and retrains thought focus.
The fantastic five senses can be a focus of attention for determining the value needs for creating the future using intention to create motivation.
These fantastic five somatic archetypes are at the core of Inside Awareness Center’s Integrative Learning programs. These programs are somatic dialogues, somatic movement and function, somatic spaces with support programs that are environmental influences in relationships, behaviours and function.
Inside Awareness Center for Integrative Somatic Learning 