SOMA® STRUCTURAL INTEGRATION AND MASSAGE THERAPY FOR EFFECTIVE PAIN MANAGEMENT
STRUCTURAL INTEGRATION: THE EDUCATION EVERY BODY NEEDS
Structural Integration is a time-tested bodywork modality effecting lasting, transformative change in the body over a series of sessions which focus on smoothing and strengthening the fascia (connective tissues).
Soma® takes a uniquely profound, whole-body, whole-person approach, creating transformative, beneficial and super long-lasting change.
Over the course of the series, Soma® restores the health of the connective tissues and aligns the body in gravity while also balancing nervous system response, re-educating natural movement patterns, and activating core energy flow.
It gifts clients with the awareness and practical tools they need to clear pain, tension and restriction and move forward with power and sureness of body and mind
Soma® fills the body with vitality, a living sense of ease, grace, and joy.
It helps heal persistent pain + old injuries • restore vital movement patterns • create self-awareness, body and mind • increase resilience • activate natural creative energy
“Soma was a big piece of the solution to my anxiety. I learned how to feel good being in my body, and my mind followed.”
—Treavor
“working with OLIVIA HAS ADDED SO MUCH to my life. i have the tools i need to continue to feel great.”
—Brian
GREAT BODYWORK MUST ADDRESS THE FASCIA
Afloat within the saltwater seas of the inner body, a delicate, pliable, yet robust web of connective tissue (fascia) enwraps every single cell.
Fascia gives our bodies shape, makes movement possible, and serves as communication pathway for the nervous system.
STRENGTH, FLEXIBILITY, AND RESILIENCE OF BODY, MIND & SPIRIT DIRECTLY DEPENDS ON THE INTEGRITY OF THIS MIRACULOUS FABRIC OF LIFE.
Soma fully honors the depth of its significance.
As we age, fascia snags + sags, becoming gluey, bound up, strained, dense with scar tissue, adhesions, and armoring.
We don’t feel right when we’re tied in knots!
Pain affects our whole being, limits our movement. And, after a time, we come to embody limitation—physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally—and experience pain, anxiety, and stress.
Soma® unwinds all that so you feel better in body and mind.
When fascia is healthy, pain resolves
Soma® restores balance, vitality, and ease to the body … and to the human being within.
A mindful whole-person approach, plus focus on education and conscious movement means Soma® achieves incredible, lasting results way beyond any other Structural Integration modality. Read my interview with Jim Asher about the power of integration.
Perfect for those pursuing pain management, pain relief and healing, better performance in athletics and exercise, lifestyle change, and better self-care and habits.
Effective for chronic conditions, like pain and stiffness, anxiety, headaches, and sleep issues, as well as healing, post-op or post-injury.
Flowing with natural energy, we relax. In that moment, joy takes us by the hand.
Breathe more fully. Move from a grounded place, and with grace. Learn to express yourself (and why that’s important for your health). Embody mindful living. When you have that, it’s easy to move in harmony with your inner callings.
Come to trust, love, & honor your body exactly as it is, and feel fuller agency and individuality.
How often in our modern lives we are told to disregard our inner voices for the good of society, family, or any cause, compulsion or person who would co-opt our vital energy.
Fie, I say. Read my manifesto.
“Olivia is a rare gem. She lives and breathes creativity, intelligence, integrity and kind, empowered living...”
—Milah
“OLIVIA never fails to help stabilize and ground me to the good Earth”
—Laurel
TRANSFORMING AT MIDLIFE
The good, the bad, the ugly—midlife arrives like lightning from the blue.
A laughable trope only until it finds you, the classic midlife crisis creates twists and surprises worthy of an episode of Dynasty.
Soma®—symbolically and actually—gets to the core of what makes you YOU, the ever-elusive mystery of the self as it emerges past your programming + limited beliefs.
You can emerge more beautiful than ever before—the kind of beauty which begets more beauty: the beauty of truth to inspire the next generation.
ON A JOURNEY TO GROWTH
On a healing journey? Pursuing therapy, coaching? Seeking help?
The reality is that there are many layers to that process. Timeworn thoughts and emotional patterns must shift if we’re going to grow.
If you’re willing to change, you have all it that it takes to change.
Soma® helps establish new physiological and neural pathways, reconditioning your nervous system so that it can help, instead of hinder, your progress. It brings into balance the left (critical and limiting) and right (creative and enlivening) hemispheres of the brain.
WHEN YOU’RE EMBODIED, Your work on yourself works even better!
NAVIGATING NEW PHASES & STAGES
Foundations, shaken.
Plans, imploded … Kingdome-style.
It happens to everyone, yet the struggles to understand, to heal, to land solidly on our feet again feels lonely.
Family, work, community, business pull at us while we try to heal.
Time to ourselves, for ourselves, gains significance when we need healing.
Soma® is sanctuary for the soul, where balance of body and mind becomes a lived reality.
KINDLING THE INNER LIFE
Because it’s intelligent, integrative bodywork that focuses on developing embodied and interoceptive awareness, Soma® awakens innate wisdom, intuition, self-knowledge and unconditional self-acceptance.
There are those of us who care to express our highest potential.
Soma® gently reminds us that, even when we must face what we don’t want to see, in every moment, we do retain the choice of how to act.
Soma® reconnects us with our unique individual imperatives and callings.
Give yourself permission to receive the peace + beauty that resides within you.
“Thank you. YOU FIXED my knee. I never thought I would ever feel better BUT Every session gave me new hope.”
—Jill
“my whole body FINALLY felt like ONE nice deep breath.”
—Kai
SIX GOOD REASONS
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You deserve to feel good
Through Soma®, remember the simple joy of being present to yourself. Reactivate the natural vitality locked within the body: a great challenge for modern westerners.
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You deserve to live free
We naturally want to move in personally meaningful directions. It’s not easy to stop and check in with ourselves while riding the hamster wheel of life, but it is a precious skill Soma® helps us remember.
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You deserve relief
Soma® heals the modern … well, everything. Bodies crying out for attention in pain and stress. So: listen, and respond. Then listen again. You’ll make better choices.
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You deserve joy
Joy doesn’t require that we look, act, feel, or do everything perfect all the time (thank god!). Soma® is about the natural joy that comes when when we are present to our whole bodies, whole selves.
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You deserve space to be youself
Soma® awakens, grounds and clarifies our innate guiding companion, the body. Our body can help us understand why we are here, what makes us tick, what we want and what isn’t serving us.
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You deserve real value for your time & money
If you’re spending money on massage anyway, why not make an investment that pays long-term dividends? You take so much more away from Soma® than any other kind of massage.
SOMA® FAQS
WHY CHOOSE THE SOMA® STRUCTURAL INTEGRATION SERIES?
In the wide field of structural integration, Soma® is deeply integrative bodywork practice.
Soma® shows people how to feel better by developing simple mindfulness and movement education skills.
Soma® clients come fully into their bodies, and into themselves. They develop agency, ownership and personal power, and learn how to participate in their own healing process now and in the future.
Soma results last and last!
WHAT’S A SOMA® SESSION LIKE?
Sessions run an hour and a half to two hours. (The first session includes plenty of time to check in, look over your intake, answer your questions, and orient you to the journey ahead.)
You will spend roughly 60-90 minutes on the table, receiving the session’s bodywork.
The remainder of the session is spent learning and practicing new awareness and movement, reviewing work from past sessions, sharing insights and “aha”s, discussing progress, and so on.
Between sessions, Soma® asks you to participate in your own healing. You can expect "homework" outside the session, designed to encourage new mindfulness so you can really own the results of this exceptional, healing bodywork.
Don’t worry! It’s “work” that feels good!
WHY ELEVEN SESSIONS, AND NOT TEN?
Eleven = the famous structural integration "ten-series" (ten progressive sessions) *plus* a stand-alone arms session, for extra support in our modern screen- and desk-centric lives.
This series has been developed over fifty+ years as a full healing process.
Of course, you may choose to experience as few, or as many, sessions as you choose.
Every session is profound.
TELL ME ABOUT EACH SESSION.
SESSION ONE: We free the breath so that source energy begins again to flow from within.
SESSION TWO: We build a stable connection to Mother Earth with more ease and flexibility in the feet + lower legs.
SESSION THREE: Restructuring the side body, we restore a full range of motion while providing a refreshing sense of the “lightness of being.”
SESSION FOUR: The beginnings of grace: creating dynamic connections between the deep core and the feet and legs.
SESSION FIVE: We make space for coherence between the deepest core and the extremities, dissolving resistance and fear.
SESSION SIX: Vitalizing the core, we come into healthy relationship with our physical resources and strength.
SESSION SEVEN: Balancing neck, shoulders, and head atop, our being comes online.
SESSIONS EIGHT, NINE & TEN: Custom somatic awareness and bodywork, personalized according to client needs.
ARMS SESSION: From the front, sides, and back, the arms, hands, wrists and shoulders receive work to renew fullness of range and smooth function.
WHAT DO I WEAR?
Because sessions include bodywork, active & passive stretching, and movement education, clients wear loose, comfortable running shorts, and a non-binding tube top or camisole, as personal modesty & current draping practices indicate.
I do have extras to share if you forget yours!
WHERE IS YOUR OFFICE?
On the westside of Olympia, just off Route 101 near the intersection of Black Lake Blvd and Cooper Point Rd SW.
Exact directions when you book.
WHAT DOES SOMA COST?
Soma sessions cost 200- (tax + applicable transaction fees included) for one and a half to two focused, effective hours of bodywork and movement education.
WHEN CAN I START?
If you’re reading this, you can trust that it’s the right time.
Your first Soma session will mark the beginning of the journey home to an awakened body—and the joy, ease, grace, vitality, natural richness of being which it provides.
WHAT IF I HAVE MORE QUESTIONS?
Let’s chat on the phone or in my office and if it seems right for both of us, schedule your first session. Request your free 20-minute consultation here.