Microdoses of Safety: Why Somatic Practice Isn’t About Bypassing Reality

Hello People,

There’s a common misconception about somatic and body-energy work: that it’s here to make us “feel better” or to somehow escape the weight of reality.

That if we just breathe deeply enough, or stretch, or meditate, we’ll transcend the chaos around us.

But here’s the truth: somatic practice doesn’t erase the impact of mental illness, war, racism, climate collapse, or systemic violence. We can’t stretch our way out of grief. We can’t breathe away injustice.

The body knows. The body remembers.

What somatic practice can offer is something quieter, and in my experience, far more powerful: microdoses of safety.

A single breath that actually lands.

A moment of exhale when the jaw softens.

A pause to feel the ground holding you.

A small gesture of turning toward your own presence.

These microdoses don’t fix the world. They don’t bypass the truth of our pain or the structures that cause it. What they do is expand our capacity to be with what is. To not drown in overwhelm. To stay present with life without abandoning ourselves.

This is why I see somatics as activism. Not the kind of activism we’ve been conditioned to expect...loud, relentless, always pushing. But a re-indigenisation. A re-embodiment. A way of returning to our own nature and remembering how to listen.

When we practice in microdoses, we start to reclaim clarity. We create small ripples of nervous system repair. We let the primal, animal wisdom of the body move what’s frozen, so it can settle again. And slowly, we build the muscles of presence, resilience, and care. Not only for ourselves, but for the communities we’re part of.

Because the fractures we see “out there” .... the polarization, the dehumanization, the reduction of people to judgments - are also fractures within.

A body that has forgotten its own connection will always struggle to see the humanity in others.

Somatic practice is not about leaving the world. It’s about learning how to stay.

Stay with the grief, without being swallowed by it.

Stay with the rage, without losing ourselves in it.

Stay with the discomfort, without numbing or fleeing.

How to be you, within it.

This is the kind of activism I believe in.

Not bypassing, but building capacity.

Not avoiding, but allowing.

Not fixing, but remembering.

The body is where the truth lives.

And the body is where we begin again.

I've recorded this blog here:

One love,

Juel

PS. Sign up for my newsletter to stay updated on The Sanctuary and other offerings within Exploring the Veil, including upcoming programs on internalized racism and unconscious bias for space-holders.

I'd love to see you there.

PPS. You can dive into ways to reunite with your essence, pleasure & body with me here.

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Juel helps people return to the intelligence of their bodies—so they can lead with presence, resilience, and truth.

Her work is somatic, trauma-informed, and rooted in nervous system awareness, guiding real change where the body still carries what the mind has tried to move past.

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