From Default Mode → Deep Listening
Concept to sensation: where values take shape
I hope you’re finding your own soft landing in this transition of seasons and rhythms. I don’t know about you, but I crave this time of year (late summer to early fall if you’re on the Northern and Western Hemispheres of the globe). Summer’s pulse is vivacious and exciting, but then comes the time to reel it in—to slow down and reflect.
I’ve been doing a lot of work behind the scenes on what I could say is my business, but it’s more personal than that. Sure, it’s a business mastermind with systems and formulas to work smarter, but it goes deeper. In the professional and entrepreneurial world, I’ve been asked about my values countless times. Values are not fixed—they’re shaped by our belief systems, which emerge from the ongoing interplay of lived experiences, cultural conditioning, emotional interpretations, and social connections.
I meet myself at the intersection of values shaped by lived experience and the ways my body has interpreted and carried them—constantly shaping how I move through both my work and my life.
This is exactly what I love about travel so much. It places us outside of our habitual patterns and habits, and challenges us to see the world differently, to think differently—that is exactly what creates change.
Let’s dig into change a bit deeper, pulling from neuroscience and the work of Dr. Joe Dispenza. If the reality we live in is shaped by our thoughts and emotions—and 90% of our 60–70k daily thoughts are repeated—we’re subconsciously recycling our lived experience according to how we’ve been programmed: our default mode. When we have the same thoughts, we make the same choices, feel the same emotions, and we repeat the same experiences.
But we can shift that.
It starts with the frontal lobe, and a process called metacognition. This is our ability to think about our own thinking, behaviors, and feelings. This is where we notice.
When we become aware of our thoughts, we’re breaking our default mode in real time. We’re expanding our consciousness beyond the programming that has kept us stuck in the repetition of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
Circling back to my business: for years I was asked about my values, and while I could name them on a cognitive level, it wasn’t until I began exploring somatic work that my deeper truth came into view. Somatics is a field of study that focuses on the body and its relationship to the mind, emotions, and behavior. It can be explored through movement, breathwork, or even psychotherapeutic applications.
What I once treated as a purely cognitive exercise (thinking my way to what my values are), I began exploring through the lens of somatics. That transformed it from simply thinking I knew my values to actually feeling their depth so clearly, that it shapes how I show up in work and life in real time.
I’ll close by sharing a practice to help you truly embody your values—shifting them from mind into body. Of course, reading about it isn’t the same as experiencing it, so maybe this is the nudge I needed to finally record my first audio practice. Stay tuned.
SOMATIC VALUES EXPLORATION
First, arrive in your body
Find a comfortable seat or lie down.
Take a few slow breaths. Notice where your body makes contact with the ground or chair.
Allow your breath to soften into your belly and ribs.
Next, recall a resonant moment
Bring to mind a moment in your life when you felt deeply aligned, proud, or “at home” in yourself.
Rather than analyzing, notice: where do you feel this memory in your body? Warmth? Expansion? Strength?
Now, track your sensations
Stay with the physical sensations for a few breaths.
Ask yourself: if this feeling had a texture, color, or shape, what would it be?
Notice if your posture shifts naturally—do you sit taller, soften, ground more?
Then, name the value
From the embodied sensation, gently ask: What quality of life does this feeling represent? (Examples: freedom, connection, integrity, creativity, love, courage.)
Let the word arise rather than forcing it.
After, test the value in your body
Once you have a word, speak it aloud or silently.
Notice: how does your body respond when you say this value? Do you feel expansion, calm, energy, or contraction?
This embodied response is your confirmation.
Now, Integrate
Place a hand over the part of your body where you feel the value most strongly.
Take a few breaths anchoring it in.
Carry an image, gesture, or simple movement that represents this value into your daily life as a reminder.
UPDATE: SOMATIC VALUES Audio Recording can be found HERE.
As I been exploring this work myself, I also create spaces where we can explore it together more deeply. My next retreat is designed exactly for this—slowing down, tuning into the body, and uncovering the inner truths that guide how we live and create.
If you’ve been craving a reset, community, or simply space to feel into yourself more fully, I’d love to have you join me in British Columbia this fall.
You can learn more [here →].
I love the SOMATIC VALUES EXPLORATION, I love that there is NO "take 3 Breath in and out" , no numbers, no seconds, minutes......everything is soo free and peaceful... every sentence. Feeling way more calmer even before coming to the practice. Im waiting for the audio 🥳🫶🏼🦢