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Becoming You Again
Becoming You Again is the podcast for women who are going through divorce wanting help navigating grief, guilt, and the challenge of rediscovering who they are. Divorce Recovery Coach, Karin Nelson offers compassionate guidance, practical tools, and powerful mindset shifts to help you rebuild self-trust, reconnect with your intuition, and create emotional resilience. Each episode is a safe, supportive space that reminds you: divorce isn’t the end of your story; it’s the doorway to becoming the most authentic, confident version of yourself and creating the best of the rest of your life.
Becoming You Again
Windshield Wipers Somatic Practice
When your nervous system won’t switch off, doing more rarely helps. I'm going to slow everything down with a gentle, guided windshield wiper practice that brings safety back online, one breath and one side-to-side motion at a time. This practice blends simple movement with mindful attention so your brain and body can start talking again.
You've got enough bullsh!t to deal with during your divorce. Give yourself 5 minutes to center, calm and feel peace while using bilateral stimulation through slow gentle body movement to engage both sides of your brain and reconnect that with your body. It's ok to choose you. Start here with this somatic practice.
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You are listening to Becoming You Again, episode number 241, and I am your host, Karin Nelson. Welcome to Becoming You Again, the podcast where you learn to step into your power as a woman in this world, where you learn to reconnect to your wholeness, your integrity, and bring into alignment your brain, your body, and your intuition after divorce. This is the podcast where you learn to trust yourself again and move forward toward a life that you truly want. You are listening to Becoming You Again, and I am your host, Karin Nelson. Welcome back to the podcast, my lovely, lovely ladies. As you know, this is the podcast where I help you reconnect to you through your body, through your mind, through your intuition after divorce. And as always, I am so glad that you're here. Today, we're going to slow things down with another somatic practice that brings you back to being able to be present in your body, listening to your body, slowing things down. This practice is called the windshield wiper practice. And my guess is if you've ever done any kind of yoga practice or stretching exercise, you've probably done this before, but maybe when you were doing it, you were doing it just to stretch or just to do the yoga practice and weren't actually paying attention to what was happening in your body. And that's okay. So as you do this somatic practice that I'm going to walk you through today, we want to remember that these somatic practices are helping you create that feeling of safety and re-regulation inside your body. And so as we go through this, I want you to remind your body it's okay to relax. It's okay to feel the safety that you're feeling in this moment. Be at ease inside yourself as you go through this practice. What I really like about this windshield wiper practice is that it creates bilateral stimulation. Now, what's really great about bilateral stimulation is that it activates both sides of your brain in a rhythm. Rhythmic side-to-side motion, like marching, like drumming one hand and then the other hand on your legs, or, you know, moving your arms in a rhythmic up and down motion, one side then the other side. That side-to-side motion bridges communication between the two hemispheres of your brain, which is going to just help continue to support your emotional balance, your memory processing, and the integration of the two. So basically, all it's doing is helping your brain and your body work together again through long periods of stress, through being in stuck in survival mode, through having our nervous system heightened constantly, which is very, very common as you are coming out of a terrible marriage, as you are going through a divorce and beyond into your life. So that's what I really love about this one. It's so simple. But obviously, you can't be driving and practice this one. You've got to be like in your home or in a safe space, a quiet space where you're able to get in a comfortable position on the floor or on your bed. Okay? So let's move into this practice. Lie on your back with your knees bent and your feet flat on the floor about hip width distance apart. I actually like mine a tiny bit more than hip width, but no more than that, okay? What I want you to do is I want you to extend your arms out to your sides, straight out, so that your palms are facing down on the floor for support. We're gonna take a slow deep breath in through your nose. Exhale out through your mouth. And just keep breathing that way. Slow, be present, notice what's happening in your body, notice your surroundings. Make sure to orient where you are in this space. And you don't have to close your eyes, but you can just let your eyes be soft as you notice the surroundings. As you are doing this orienting practice of noticing your surroundings, that is reminding your nervous system, I am safe here. In this moment, I am safe. Now, I want you to gently let both knees fall to the right side, allowing your hips to follow with the movement. Go slow. There's no rush. Now I want you to help with your core, not your lower back, but with your core, and guide your legs up to the center and then down to the other side. And if you need to use your hands to help move your legs, that's totally okay. Remember, we're not shooting for perfection here. We are doing what we can do to be present in our body. So bring them back to center, slowly down to the other side, and then back to center, and then slowly down to the other side, just like windshield wipers on a rainy day. Back and forth, smooth and rhythmic, gentle motions. Now keep doing this slowly. We are not trying to, you know, win the race here. We're just gonna be slowly windshield wipering our legs back and forth. And as you move, I want you to notice what does this feel like in your hips? What does this feel like in your stomach? What does this feel like in your lower back? You might feel a stretch, you might feel some resistance, you might notice you hold your breath at moments and then you release, but just let it be there. Try and relax into the movement and the breathing and the being present. You don't have to fix anything, you don't have to change anything, just be present. Maybe play with the breath as you do this. Make the exhales longer as you lower your legs to one side, inhaling as you bring them to the center, exhaling as they go down to the other side. Try switching that up. Just play around with it and see what feels right for you and your body. Get curious. Maybe let your legs rest on one side for a few breaths and then gently shift as you move back to center and then to the other side. Maybe do try it a little bit faster for a few rounds and then slow it down. Listen, there's no right way to do this. We are just letting our body communicate to us what feels good, what feels open, what feels safe. And we are listening and letting it show us what it needs. As you keep moving, I want you to remember this isn't just stretching, this is reconnection. You are teaching your body that you are here now, you are present, you are not abandoning it. You're listening, you're getting curious, and you are safe to feel. Divorce can leave you feeling like you have to hold everything together, like you have to keep it all together, you have to keep doing it, you have to keep managing it, you have to keep proving your worth to your kids, to everyone around you, to yourself sometimes even. But this somatic practice can help remind you you're allowed to just be. You're allowed to explore, you're allowed to relax, you're allowed to soften. Please let yourself do that. All right, my friends, do this practice as often as you need. Remind yourself, we're not shooting for perfection. We are just trying to feel safe, regulate, listen, and learn. That is what I have for you today. I love you. I will be back next week. Hi, friend. I'm so glad you're here and thanks for listening. I wanted to let you know that if you're wanting more, a way to make deeper, more lasting change, then working one-on-one with me as your coach may be exactly what you need. Together, we'll take everything you're learning in the podcast and implement it in your life with weekly coaching, real life practice, and practical guidance. To learn more about how to work with me one-on-one, go to Karin Nelson Coaching.com. That's www.karin, N-E-L-S-O-N coaching.com. Thanks for listening. If this podcast agreed with you in any way, please take a minute to follow and give me a rating wherever you listen to podcasts. And for more details about how I can help you live an even better life than when you were married, make sure and check out the full show notes by clicking the link in the description.
