Defining Embodiment
- Joanna Pustilnik
- Sep 25, 2025
- 9 min read
Updated: Oct 2, 2025
A powerful tool for healing and pleasure.
Table of Contents
If you don’t understand embodiment, I’m glad you're here investigating- it’s worth diving into. I'm a Certified Feminine Embodiment Coach, and I love this stuff.
Through embodiment practices, I healed old wounds, liberated a part of me that wanted to be more fully seen, and it helped me to feel worthy by radically accepting all parts of me.
No, it isn’t a magic drinkable elixir- although that would have been awesome.
But before we get to work defining it, let me tell you a story about how embodiment can impact our pleasure.
The Story of the Two Hozier Concerts
About 6 months ago, my husband, Dr. P, approached me with an idea. “Should we go to two Hozier concerts in one week?”
His eyes told me what I needed to know- he was pumped about this idea. It was the week after our 10-year wedding anniversary. How could I protest?
Fast forward to last Tuesday, when Dr. P and I finally made it to Jiffy Lube Live for the 7 pm show, I was frazzled after a day of clients and rushing around with the kids.
It was also raining, and I was wearing the world’s worst outfit for the cold and rain- a long summer dress and light sweater with no raincoat. I was drenched and preoccupied.
The show started, and my eyes were drawn to Hozier's politically-driven videos and imagery in the backdrop which made me empathetically contemplative. I also checked my phone compulsively, it felt, to make sure the new-ish-to-us babysitter was handling the 3 minions.
In other words, I was in my head, not in my body.
We were stuck in traffic on the way out of that G-d-forsaken parking lot, and I told Dr. P, “That concert was a solid 6 out of 10. Maybe we shouldn't go again Friday”.
I echoed this same concern 5 times over the next two days. Luckily, he ignored me.
Fast forward to Friday, we drove the 4 hours north to Hersey, PA, the kids neatly tucked into the grandparent’s confident hands, and I was in the mindset to be in my body.
We found a spot front and center in the pit, about 8 to 10 people back. I had enough space to dance and thrash around, and I kept my phone away in my small purse. The political messaging, the concerns of the past, future, or elsewhere also stayed tucked where they should be- in the past, the future, and elsewhere.
Friends, I was fully present, embodied, and awake in my moment, in this given body, moving with the aliveness, and feeling this incredible vibe that elevated my experience to a clear 10 out of 10. It was so damn pleasurable.
Every time I listen to De Selby (Part 2) or Francesca, I can feel the freeing nature of the music in my bones.
The difference between the 2 concerts wasn't Hozier's performance- it was the level of somatic presence and awareness I was embodying.
But this awareness to open ourselves to pleasure is just one part of embodiment, so let's keep defining it.
My Definition: Defining embodiment more deeply
Embodiment is about this awareness and pleasure, but it is also about a greater emotional regulation and connection to healing.
Embodiment encourages us to open to a greater space to pause and feel and be with yourself- a white space for feeling. So often we are rushing or “keeping busy” to avoid the depth of actually being with our own thoughts, feelings, memories, and fear of unworthiness.
Just like me at the first concert, a mental orientation where we are stuck in our thoughts disconnects us from what is happening to us as a whole, somatic being.
We forget to feel the music.
This mental orientation also makes us more likely to judge and label. We tend to label parts of ourselves as off limits, do not open, “walkers inside”. So we judge and then we categorize, and this creates places and elements within us that we lock away which shuts down huge swaths of ourselves- and our personal power.
When we close ourselves off, these parts become unknown, scarier, like a stranger lurking in the dark.
We feel we need to hide our shameful parts or shadow deities or others will find us out for the imperfect beings we truly envision ourselves to be.
And it is hard to access these scary parts of ourselves after we have shut ourselves off to them. We can experience internal resistance- a feeling of not wanting to.
Just as pleasure is a leaning into the moment, healing through embodiment is a practice and a skill of moving toward that which we don't want to feel and be with or feel and encounter.
Once we open ourselves up to our internal landscape, we begin to see we are made of love and light- the same stuff everyone else is made of. We see ourselves and the world with a fresh, joy-fueled perspective.
Even the scary parts become safe if they are known and welcomed.
Blinking Lights: Our Needs
Embodiment also acquaints us with what needs attention in our inner landscape and world.
It tells us where the flashing engine lights are in our self-care realm.
We might have no clue about our hunger cues or feel we can't respect our fullness cues. We may have unmet desires, be out of touch with what is meaningful, or feel like having needs- being needy- is socially unacceptable in our world.
We can start being curious about these needs and our orientation to them. We can begin to answer the call, address the blinking lights. Embodiment brings us back to home base, square one, the foundation of it all- ourselves- and the fact that we are a living, breathing, needy + worthy collection of molecules that need love, nourishment, and focused care.
The Official Definition: Defining Embodiment
Merriam-Webster defines embodiment as: “1. One that embodies something; the embodiment of all our hopes. 2. The act of embodying : the state of being embodied.” But, as I've been expressing, it is SO much more than this. It’s not just a concept, precept, theory, or act of embodying a mental state.
It's actually the state of aliveness within us. Let's learn about the felt senses.
The Felt Senses
Embodiment asks us to tune into what’s called the “felt sense”- those small shifts, sensations, and cues happening inside your body. A tightness in the chest when you feel anxious. A warmth in your belly when you’re safe. The deep exhale that comes when you finally let go.
This felt sense is data. It tells us more than our thinking minds alone can access. It’s how we connect to intuition, presence, and even joy.
And here’s the key: embodiment isn’t about controlling or fixing your body. It’s about reconnecting to it. It’s about coming home to yourself, especially if you’ve been living in disconnection, perfectionism, stress, or emotional numbness.
Our body is intricately connected to our thoughts, our mental world, and our nervous system, which houses our lived experiences and is connected to our intuition, or sense of inner knowing.
This means that our thoughts have a physical felt sense- a somatic sense- and when we begin to notice this felt sense, we get TONS more information about our needs, self, and desires.
Our feelings can be also perceived as a felt sense, and even our intuition and life force (chakra energy) vibrates within us if we pay attention.
And that is the key to embodiment- paying attention to these felt senses.
When we bring attention to our inner landscape somatically (to our thoughts, feelings, somatic emotions, interoception, proprioception) then we are able to increase our sensitivity to this world, and when we are focused on our external senses, we bring greater attunement to our environment, like at my 2nd concert where it BLEW MY MIND. (Seriously- listen to Unreal, Unearth if you haven't!)
This sensitivity is important for health and happiness, because this grounded awareness of the subtle sensations and signals tell you something real about who you are and what you need.
In this way, the body isn’t just an object you carry around. It’s a source of knowledge, a wise guide that reflects what’s true for you, moment to moment.
And this attention which increases sensitivity is a skill- it starts with listening.
Why It Matters
When we’re cut off from our bodies- when when we aren't creating that white space to listen- we lose access to joy, creativity, and self-trust. We might go through the motions of life, but feel drained, restless, or stuck.
Embodiment offers a path back to ourselves. It allows us to integrate what we think, feel, and sense into a whole, authentic self. It restores vitality, emotional regulation, and connection- not just to ourselves, but to others and the world around us.
This is why embodiment practices are so powerful in healing work, especially for those who have experienced trauma. Trauma often creates disconnection from the body, and relearning to listen- to feel, notice, and honor sensations—can be deeply regulating and restorative.
When we reinhabit ourselves, being able to be in our bodies more fully, we also start to acknowledge our needs from a place of deep understanding. We are more likely to pursue fulfillment of them.
We also experience joy, pleasure, and all the positive emotions more often, more deeply.
We are also more likely to be able to sit with difficult emotions, memories, thoughts, and feelings when we spend more time and attention attuned internally, being fully embodied.
A Practice, Not a Destination
As I mentioned previously, embodiment is not a fixed state you either “have” or don’t. It’s a practice, like learning an instrument or training a muscle, it takes attention, patience, and repetition.
Embodiment begins with the simplest of acts: noticing your breath. Feeling the ground under your feet. Sensing the wind against your skin. Leaning into a moment of discomfort instead of rushing past it.
Each time you pause to notice what’s happening inside your body, you strengthen the skill of awareness.
Over time, you begin to hear yourself more clearly. You start to trust your signals. You begin to live more authentically.
And perhaps most beautifully, you begin to radiate joy-not the fleeting kind that depends on circumstances, but the deep joy that comes from being fully alive and present in your own skin.
You begin to collect more moments- moments like my 2nd Hozier concert where I felt young and magnetic and activated. I felt JOY. Collect these moments, and over time, you start to be able to access this joy more readily and anywhere you want.
Embodiment Coaching and Joy
In addition to my Nourish nutrition therapy, which is grounded in attunement to body cues and our basic needs, I provide feminine embodiment coaching which has the goal of connecting you to yourself more fully for all the reasons above- so you can move past emotional avoidance to a place of emotional understanding, so you can somatically sense your needs and wants, so you can more fully get to know your one beautiful, authentic self.
Sitting with powerful questions, like, “How do I actually feel about my relationship?” or “What do I truly need to accept about myself?” is a process of unwrapping your own protective layers and laying barer your real, raw sense of what is best for you.
This unwrapping and untethering deepens your ability to be vulnerable with loved ones and your own tender needs, and it also helps you view your adversity from a new light and framework. You start seeing your adversity as a gift, opening you up to become more resilient and leaning into a happiness mindset.
In Tibetan Buddhist mind-training practices, called Lojong, there’s a slogan: “When the world is filled with evil, transform all mishaps into the path of awakening.”
Seeing our hardships as opportunities for awakening increases the neural pathways linked to joy and gratitude, increasing our sense of being positively embodied.
When we are positively embodied- seeing our body as a source for joy and power and connection- we can take a moment, a pause, a breath. We can sense we are having a thought that is like a tumultuous ocean wave, and before it knocks us over or spirals us into an emotional tidal pool, we can stop and sense into- “What is happening here?”
From this place of awareness, we can become more of how we want to be, but also, just like my second Hozier rodeo, we become more alive and experience more pleasure and joy when we stay awake in awareness, affectionately connecting to the felt senses, external senses, and music within us.
I'd love to hear- what is it like to be in your body?
Comments