Nicole Lemaster with her book “WTF Am I Even Doing: A Nervous System Workbook To Support Mind Body Alignment.” Photo courtesy of Nicole Lemaster (@coleyology)

SACRAMENTO, CA (MPG) – Nicole Lemaster considers herself to be more than just a therapist. She considers herself a healer.

With more than a decade of experience, Lemaster is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) and a Somatic Experiencing Practitioner (SEP).

As a somatic therapist, she takes a body-centered approach in helping clients find relief from trauma stored in the body. Stored trauma might show up as chronic pain, difficulty sleeping or not being able to enjoy the present moment. Her work guides her clients to nervous system regulation and finding a state of homeostasis.

Lemaster’s journey to becoming a somatic therapist stemmed from her own lived trauma. She identifies with the wounded healer archetype, or a person whose personal trauma and pain becomes their source of helping others.

She specializes in patients with PTSD, complex PTSD and shock trauma. Anxiety and depression usually end up in the cluster with those other diagnoses, Lemaster said. However, this type of therapy can benefit clients who aren’t experiencing these disorders.

“The nervous system work is profound, and it can literally support people who haven’t had these types of shock traumas or complex traumas from their developmental years,” Lemaster said.

Working with nervous systems led Lemaster to start her own dream coaching business, Moonbeam Dream, where she offers sessions such as DreamSphere, a five-week program and Auralis, a nine-week program.

“The same nervous system work that helps you get over symptoms also supports you having the capacity to tolerate visibility or have courage,” Lemaster said.

Lemaster said somatic therapy might be considered by patients who are feeling stuck and not benefiting from traditional talk therapy or continue to engage in patterns or habits that they know are harmful.

“There’s like on lay of guilt and shame for being able to see it, but their system still doesn’t have the capacity to do it different.” Lemaster said this same idea applies to fear around pursuing a dream.

According to an article from Harvard Health, “Typical talk therapies such as CBT engage only the mind, not the body, encouraging people to become aware of disturbing thoughts and behavior patterns and work to change them. But in somatic therapy, the body is the starting point to achieve healing.”

Lemaster explained the natural pendulum of the nervous system; it wants to go back to homeostasis.

“What it learns throughout time, it gets conditioned for survival,” she said. She explained it as the system finding a way to manage a stressful situation and continuing to exist in that state because that’s what helped the person survive, even if that is not its true state of homeostasis. This creates tension stored in the body.

Somatic therapy involves showing your nervous system that it can reset, that it is safe.

According to Lemaster, a supported nervous system looks like capacity and resilience. The buzzword concept of being “zenned out” oversimplifies the work that is being done within the nervous system, Lemaster said.

“It is being able to go to that space,” Lemaster said. “But an actual nervous system that is regulated is like ‘Oh, there’s some high charge stress I know how to activate, and after it’s done, I’m able to deactivate.’”

Lemaster explained the process of a somatic therapy session as mirroring back to her clients what she sees in their body language.

“My whole hope is to build safe enough, self-trust, self-love, self-intimacy, self-empowerment and it has nothing to do with me because I’m just mirroring back what your body’s already doing,” Lemaster said. “I’m just helping you know it’s there and trust yourself.”

It’s building a well of resources to pull from and a safe space to pendulate back to. “So often when people are hurting, they can’t locate pleasure as easily or what’s good.”

According to Lemaster, it’s very common for people to experience microdoses of regulation, like taking a deep breath or noticing something beautiful in nature. Somatic therapy can help people become fully conscious of that regulation.

Nervous system regulation plays a significant role in pursuing dreams, something Lemaster realized throughout her work as a therapist.

“To create your dream, you need to be in alignment and authentic and vulnerable,” Lemaster said.

An unregulated nervous system might shut down to keep you safe from experiencing that vulnerability, LeMaster said. Building resilience lends itself to pursuing dreams with courage.

“Because dreams are precious,” Lemaster said.

Lemaster’s book “WTF Am I Even Doing: A Nervous System Workbook To Support Mind Body Alignment” is available on Amazon. She can be found on social media @interconnectedheart and @coleyology.