Let the Body Lead – Trusting Your Inner Compass

In a culture obsessed with control and achievement, this series explores the power of surrender—not as giving up, but as a courageous opening to inner transformation.

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In the last blog, we entered the liminal space: that tender threshold between what was

and what’s not yet. A space of disorientation, yes. But also of immense potential.

This is where transformation happens.

If that sounds poetic, it is. But it’s also scientific.

In ecology, there’s a term for the space between two ecosystems: the ecotone. It’s where forest meets meadow, where river meets land. And research shows that these edges are where life thrives most.

The ecotone is bursting with biodiversity. Species from both environments co-exist here. New life forms emerge that can’t survive elsewhere. It’s chaotic. Dynamic. Alive with possibility.

The same is true in us.

When we reach the edges of what we know—when we’re lying awake at night with anxious thoughts, sitting in a doctor’s office with a new diagnosis, or staring into the unknown of a major life change—our systems feel disoriented. We’re tempted to retreat, to strive harder, to figure it out. However, if we can endure the discomfort and let the body lead, something else becomes possible.

Something more true than what effort can create.

When Thought Can’t Take You Further

You know that moment when life throws you a curveball—an unexpected diagnosis, the end of a relationship, a career crossroad—and suddenly your usual strategies just don’t cut it? Your mind scrambles for a fix, reaching for plans, pros and cons lists, anything to regain control.

But sometimes, the way forward isn’t about fixing the problem. It’s about consulting a deeper kind of wisdom.

The body isn’t just a vehicle—it’s a sensory organ. A perceptive, present, and wise communicator who picks up on things long before the mind can catch up.

It speaks in sensation: a tight belly, a fluttering chest, a sense of grounding in your feet.

It communicates through breath, instinct, and subtle shifts that whisper, “yes,” “no,” or “not yet.”

It doesn’t deal in spreadsheets or timelines. But when we slow down enough to listen, it offers something more honest: felt truth. A deep, trustworthy knowing that can't always be explained—but can absolutely be followed.

This blog focuses on the body’s compass through the gut/brain—your enteric nervous system. It’s home to over 100 million neurons and operates in close relationship with the vagus nerve, particularly its dorsal branch. This branch plays a vital role in regulating gut function, digestion, and the subtle 'gut sense' that alerts us to safety or danger without a single thought.

When the dorsal vagal pathway is dysregulated due to chronic stress or trauma, it can lead to symptoms like shutdown, digestive issues, or disconnection from one’s own instincts. But when it’s supported through awareness, gentle breath, and embodied movement, it becomes a bridge to grounded presence and clarity.

I’ve seen this in practice. One client had been waking every morning with stomach cramps and nausea, convinced she had a serious illness. But through a combination of somatic breathwork and simple pandiculation movements, she began to reconnect with her gut's deeper messaging. What was once dismissed as “just anxiety” revealed itself as a compass: a warning system that had been blaring for years.

Another client, a high-achieving teacher on the brink of burnout, discovered her chronic digestive upset wasn’t food-related—it was boundary-related. Her gut “spoke” through discomfort every time she said yes when she meant no. As we brought awareness to this pattern, her symptoms began to shift.

You don’t have to plan your entire life in your head. Your body is already in conversation with the world. The felt sense is how your instinctual body joins that conversation.

So instead of only relying on cognition, consider tuning into the full sensory intelligence available to you. The body isn’t a backup system—it’s an essential source of guidance.

Movement as an Act of Listening

Not all movement is about doing. Some movement is about listening.

When we soften effort and tune into sensation, movement becomes a conversation with the body. A way of asking:

• Does this situation smell right?

• Does this relationship feel nourishing?

• In which direction does my life force energy flow more naturally?

• What feels aligned—not just mentally, but bodily?

And then, letting the body answer.

Two gentle, research-informed practices I often share with clients, especially those coming out of freeze, fatigue, or chronic tension, are pandiculation and PNF (Proprioceptive Neuromuscular Facilitation).

Pandiculation – The Body’s Built-In Reset

Pandiculation is more than a luxurious morning stretch. It’s a built-in, biologically

intelligent reset mechanism for your nervous system. And when practiced with awareness, it becomes one of the most effective tools we have to release chronic tension, reduce pain, and restore natural movement.

This instinctive stretch–yawn–contract–release pattern is so foundational to our well-being that fetuses have been observed pandiculating in the womb. Cats do it. Babies do it. We did it—until our sedentary lives and stress-based patterns taught us to override it.

Pandiculation works by sending biofeedback to the nervous system about the level of muscular contraction in the body. It resets the gamma loop—a reflex arc in the spinal cord responsible for regulating muscle tone. This gentle contraction–lengthening–release allows the brain to relearn how to relax muscles that have been involuntarily held tight, often for years.

What this means in practical terms is powerful:

• Improved posture

• Restored flexibility

• Decreased pain

• Reduced tension

• A nervous system that no longer mistakes bracing for safety

It’s especially helpful for those who know how to contract—how to push, strive, and hold it all together—but are less familiar with the art of release. Pandiculation balances both phases, offering a powerful tool for neuromuscular repatterning.

Rather than stretching passively or manipulating the body from the outside, pandiculation re-educates the system from within, through conscious movement, breath, and felt sense.

As Thomas Hanna, founder of Clinical Somatic Education, discovered:

"Voluntary pandiculation is the most efficient and effective way to release chronic tension, relieve pain, and restore control."

It’s not a luxury. It’s a biological necessity, on par with movement and nutrition.

And when we reawaken this capacity, the body doesn’t just feel better. It remembers itself.

PNF (Proprioceptive Neuromuscular Facilitation)

Despite its clinical-sounding name, PNF is a deeply intuitive, somatic technique that uses gentle contraction and release to restore balance and safety in the body.

It works by engaging a muscle group through a conscious contraction, then slowly releasing it. This activates specific neuromuscular reflexes, particularly the Golgi tendon organs, which help regulate muscle tension and prevent injury.

In doing so, PNF increases proprioceptive awareness—your ability to sense where

your body is in space, how it’s moving, and what it's doing without needing to look. Think of it as your body's GPS. When proprioception is strong, your body feels more oriented, grounded, and stable. You literally feel “more here.”

But PNF does something more subtle, too. It builds interoceptive awareness—the capacity to feel your internal states. This is the awareness that tells you:

• My heart is racing.

• My stomach is tight.

• I’m holding my breath.

• I’m safe. I can soften.

  
  

Interoception is the body’s sixth sense. It’s how we feel, not just our physical body, but our emotional landscape.

By gently cycling between tension and release, PNF enhances both of these sensory systems, giving the nervous system clearer, more trustworthy information. It tells your body:

“You are safe. You know where you are. You can feel what’s true.”

This is why PNF is especially effective for people who are used to pushing through, who are excellent at engagement but unfamiliar with letting go.

It teaches your body that surrender is not collapse—it’s cooperation. It’s trust. It’s learning, through movement, how to feel safe again.

Feldenkrais – Repatterning Through Subtlety

Another practice I often weave into sessions is the Feldenkrais Method.

Unlike traditional exercises that emphasize repetition or effort, Feldenkrais invites you to move slowly, gently, and with deep curiosity. These micro-movements—sometimes as small as a breath or a shift of the pelvis—help you sense your own habits and discover new, more efficient ways of moving.

What makes Feldenkrais so profound isn’t how much you move, but how you pay attention while moving. It taps into neuroplasticity, the brain’s ability to rewire itself, by creating new sensory-motor pathways. This makes it especially effective for people dealing with chronic pain, trauma, or neurological challenges.

It’s not about stretching or strengthening—it’s about reclaiming ease. As you move with awareness, your nervous system begins to reorganize itself. You move better, feel better, and begin to trust your body again.

A Gentle Practice: Breathe, Move, Listen

This 5-minute practice invites you into a conversation with your body—using pandiculation, PNF, and awareness to gently unwind the armor and rebuild trust.

1. Settle (1–2 mins) Sit or lie down somewhere quiet. Let your body be supported. Bring a hand to your heart or belly and notice your breath without changing it .Ask: How does my body feel today? Where is effort living?

2. Stretch Like a Cat (Pandiculation-Inspired) (1–2 mins)Slowly stretch your arms overhead like you’re just waking up from sleep. Yawn if it comes. Then release completely. Repeat 2–3 times, moving slowly, letting the sensation lead.

3. Gently Contract and Release (PNF-Inspired) (2–3 mins) Pick a muscle group—your fists, your thighs, your shoulders. On an inhale, gently contract (about 60% effort). Hold for 3 seconds. On the exhale, slowly release. Repeat a few rounds. Notice the quality of the release. Can you let it melt?

Then pause. Feel the afterglow. Let your nervous system register this shift.

4. Close with Stillness (1 min) Return your hand to your body. Soften the muscles of your face. Feel the support beneath you. Whisper inwardly: “I am allowed to soften. My body knows the way.”

Letting Go as a Way of Becoming

The body doesn’t need to be forced. It needs to be listened to, invited, and

reintroduced to its own rhythm.

This is what it means to let the body lead.

Each stretch, each release, each pause in movement rewires your relationship to the self you’re becoming.

In a world that asks us to perform, to strive, to override our instincts, choosing to move with awareness is a radical act of remembering.

Let this be your new practice: Not fixing. Not forcing. Just feeling—and allowing what’s real to rise.

Next time, we’ll explore how the breath becomes your bridge—a quiet guide from survival to soul, from doing… to being.

Until then, let your body lead. It knows the way back home.

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Samantha is a member of the International Association of Yoga Therapists, a Noom Certified Health Coach, and founder of Davidson Yoga Therapy and Health Coaching.

She has held complimentary healthcare positions at The Blanchard Institute, Atrium

Hospital, Levine Cancer Institute, Sanger Heart Clinic, and Davidson College. She has presented for Fortune 500 companies and major Universities, both public and professional audiences, on this thing called yoga therapy and what it can do when it is unpeeled, revealed, and adapted to meet the needs and the abilities of the person doing it. 

She leverages her three decades of yoga therapy, and health coaching experience with the following therapeutic models:

• Breathing Technology

• Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction

• Jungian Psychology

• Jungian Dream Interpretation

• Somatic Cognition

• Internal Family Systems

• Interfaith Perspectives

• Spiritual Technologies

• Trauma Healing

• Polyvagal Somatics

• Ayurvedic Lifestyle Coaching

• Compassionate Inquiry

• Pain Reprocessing Therapy

• The Neurosequential Model

All this is to say, there are many doorways to use on the path to healing and self-discovery, and Samantha’s breadth of experience allows for vast creativity on which approach is right for you!