“Reclaiming Your Body” by Suzanne Scurlock-Durana

“The body has a language that is older and more primal than most of us realize. Our bodies speak to us with sensations, images, emotions, and an inner knowing that is beyond words.”

Suzanne Scurlock-Durana begins Chapter 1 with this sentence in her newly released book, Reclaiming Your Body: Healing from Trauma and Awakening Your Body’s Wisdom.

• Do you remember that nagging feeling in your gut telling you to do something?
• Can you remember the last time your heart felt light and inspired?
• What does joy feel like in your body?

The body has its own wisdom that can be accessed through our felt sensation.

Suzanne builds on the work of her prior book, Full Body Presence: Learning to Listen to Your Body’s Wisdom by identifying wisdom areas of the body and what they mean. (Read my prior blog post “Feel the Moment”.)

At a workshop a few years ago, another student simplified this concept for me. She said that the brain comes up with options, but it is the gut that decides. I thought about all the agonizing decisions listing the pros and the cons. I was often immobilized with indecision because the brain kept coming up with new options: “What if…” I was trying to get my head to decide by “figuring out” the best option. However, you might hear someone say, “It just felt like the right thing to do. I knew it in my gut.” The gut has its own language and wisdom of inner knowing that can help us make decisions. The key is to integrate the wisdom from all the areas of the body.

Western society trains us out of our body wisdom. We may learn to not trust our gut because it does not always make logical sense, and so we disconnect from its wisdom. We learn to ignore signals like “he gives me the creeps.” We can’t explain it logically. We may get messages like, “Don’t be silly. It’s Santa Clause. You can trust him.” (Even though it is just the random guy at the mall dressed up in a red and white suit.)

“Reclaiming Your Body” explores the wisdom of each part of the body. The gut has instinctual knowing; the heart gives us inspiration; and the brain integrates the system together. Learn about the other wisdom areas of the pelvis, bones, legs and feet. The book is full of anecdotes and stories, valuable insights and information, as well as meditations that help connect with the wisdom of our bodies.

Read Suzanne Scurlock-Durana’s new book and listen to the included meditations. Learn the language of the body and the wisdom that it holds. Use the “Core Embodiment Process” to “Reclaim the Body.”