16/09/2026
It could be easy to think that tightness or muscular holding is our body being uncooperative with us.
Alternatively, we can sometimes understand this as our bodyโs response to experiences of stress or overwhelm. This bracing, may have once been useful in helping us manage an experience but it can sometimes become a familiar pattern of holding that continues over time.
Rather than trying to force these patterns to change, we can approach them with curiosity and compassion. As we develop greater capacity to notice and stay with our experience, we can begin to explore what the holding might be communicating, what it has helped us with and whether it is still serving us in the same way.
In somatic therapy we do this slowly, gently and with patience and respect for the ways our bodies have adapted to our experiences.
