What is Somatics?

What it means

At its core, somatics is the art of reconnecting with your body with the principle of healing from the inside out. Somatic practices help you to move beyond talking about what’s wrong and helps you to feel and release what’s holding you back from long term healing.  With this deeper awareness you’re able to notice, regulate, and respond to stress through the breath, movement, and simple awareness in a way that feels safe, manageable and with instant results. This is how we begin to unwind survival patterns and start feeling ourselves again. 

Why it matters

• Helps to move past “just” talking about your challenges and allows the body to heal from the inside out
• Builds emotional resilience and body trust
• Supports sustainable wellbeing—not just temporary calm
• Creates a sense of safety, connection, and presence

About the Book

Who it’s for
Whether you’re someone just starting your healing journey, or already a yoga teacher, coach, bodyworker—this book helps you better understand your nervous system and its role in storing and healing from trauma. This book introduces tangible and accessible trauma-aware somatic practices that can be used in moments of stress, or explored at home.

What you’ll learn

• How trauma lives in the body—and how to shift it safely
  
• Key nervous system states and how to support each one
  
• Practical somatic tools to feel more regulated and resilient
  
• How to build a consistent practice without burning out
• How to create a safe and compassionate body-awareness to help you experience the fullness of life without overwhelm or shutdown
• How reclaiming a relationship with your body is an act of rebellion to the people and systems who disconnected you in the first place!
  
  

Pull quote:
“This book helped me make sense of reactions I thought were ‘just me.’ It gave me the tools to come back to myself.”

Real feedback from early readers and students

Rachel Fearnley

Rachel didn’t find somatics in a studio. She found it in the middle of anxiety, burnout, solo motherhood, and a quiet but constant sense of disconnection, even after doing all the right things.

She was a certified yoga teacher and breathwork facilitator, running teacher trainings and hosting retreats in Bali. The practices were powerful, and she still uses them today. But over time, she realised something wasn’t landing.

She was becoming more and more aware of her patterns. But awareness alone wasn’t helping her move through them. No amount of talking, mindset work, or breathwork highs was helping her integrate her experiences. Or actually build the kind of inner stability she needed to meet the chaos, the beauty, and the pressure of life, especially as a single mum.

That’s where somatics came in. Not as a concept, but as a lived experience. A way of working with her body that created space - real, usable capacity - for change.

Now she blends somatics, psychosomatics, trauma-aware breathwork, tapping, and nervous system repair to help others feel safe in their bodies and lives, without overthinking, overdoing, or overriding their own needs.

Rachel co-founded The Whole Health Project with Lucy Foster Perkins to help train facilitators in somatic work that’s safe, grounded, and actually useful in real life. She lives in Bali with her daughter and is fiercely committed to making this work deeply human, deeply doable, and something you can come back to again and again.

Lucy Foster-Perkins

Lucy began her career as a professional dancer, spending years deeply attuned to the language of movement, rhythm, and physical expression. Dance gave her a profound understanding of the body’s capacity for both power and vulnerability, but it also exposed her to the challenges of pushing too hard, ignoring signals of fatigue, and prioritising performance over balance.

In 2014, after experiencing adrenal fatigue, Lucy was forced to confront this imbalance. It was a pivotal moment that reshaped her relationship with her body. No longer able to rely on sheer willpower and physical intensity, she turned to gentler, more introspective practices like Yin Yoga, breathwork, and meditation. This journey not only restored her health but also deepened her understanding of the nervous system, somatic awareness, and the body’s capacity to heal.

This shift in perspective led Lucy to deepen her study in trauma-aware breathwork and meditation, including studies with her primary meditation teacher, Rupert Spira. Her approach now blends the precision of a dancer, the curiosity of a lifelong learner, and the compassion of someone who has walked the path of recovery herself.

Today, Lucy lives in London with her family, where she continues to explore the natural world through her toddler’s eyes, appreciating the simple, present moments that once felt out of reach. She co-founded The Whole Health Project alongside Rachel to help others reconnect with their bodies in a way that feels grounded, safe, and deeply authentic.

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