Welcome to Scientific Somatics! I’m an academic scientist (Structural Biology) transitioned to somatic educator (Feldenkrais Method) working on Treaty 7 Territory, Canada. My somatic education practice is named SOMATI.CA, located here.
Somatic education is not the education of the body (as opposed to the mind). Somatic education is a way to undo the detrimental effects of considering that body, mind, and local environment are separate from each other. The experience of living in a body, is what we (somatic educators) mean by soma, and it necessarily unifies mind, body, and environment. Soma, in this sense, is your whole self, the actual thing that moves through space and time.
Unfortunately, the choice to recoin the word “soma” leaves an ambiguity. Therapeutic discliplines that regard mind (psyche) and body (soma) as different things can attempt to unite them. One can “embody” a thought process or a social phenomenon, in this sense. The goal of Scientific Somatics is to emphasize how the naturalistic worldview is inconsistent with the notion that mind, body, and environment can be differentiated, and how somatic educators help individuals to update their understanding of themselves.
Join me and my community of peers as we help undo the mind-body-environment split with first-person experiences of reality.
In the meantime, tell your friends!