The Body Image Revolution
The Body Image Revolution
Body Responses Aren't Weakness, They're Wisdom With Lia Ciner
In this episode, I sit down with my dear friend Lia Ciner, a somatic yoga instructor based here in Israel. Together, we explore the shame many women experience around freeze mode—what it feels like, why it happens, and how to navigate it with compassion and self-love. Lia opens up about her own recent traumatic experience, sharing vulnerably how she froze and the steps she’s taking to process and heal. We also offer practical tips and tools to help you connect with your body, deepen self-trust, and feel more grounded in the present moment.
Follow Lia on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yoga.with.lia
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Hello, gorgeous humans. Welcome to The Body Image Revolution. Today on the podcast, we have Lia Ciner, who is a very dear friend of mine. I've known her through many stages and seasons of my life. I met her the first year that I came to Israel. So I guess that was almost two decades ago. It's so crazy. Our journeys have always found a way to collide in the most beautiful ways. And right now, both of our paths have landed us in a place where we feel super passionate about helping women feel safe and at home in their bodies. Lia is a fantastic somatic yoga instructor and just a really amazing and insightful person. I hope you enjoy this conversation and that it allows you to let go of some of your own personal shame and get closer to feeling at home in your body. Here it is. Hi! Hello! Hello! I'm so happy that you're on, finally!
Lia Ciner:I'm happy too yay. It's so funny that we've been in each other's lives for so long and we both have made our way into work that's very mind, body oriented, but just like from completely different paths at no point was it like, Oh, let's do like, we didn't, let's do this
Rebecca Sigala:together. No, but
Lia Ciner:we both landed here and it's really nice because it's a really natural intersection that gives us. So much to talk about and so much that we share. I love
Rebecca Sigala:that. Me too. I love that too. And I'm sure that unknowingly we've impacted each other's lives in that area, because we've been friends for what? 17 years. That's crazy.
Lia Ciner:That's weird because we're just like about 17. So how does that work?
Rebecca Sigala:I have no idea. Wow. What a journey. We've been through so much together and separately and yeah, I really love that it has come to this place for both of us where we're on our healing journeys and it's so parallel in so many ways. How long have you been doing somatic yoga for? How did that start for you?
Lia Ciner:So I started yoga as a teenager, like at the JCC, and that gave me enough of a sense of belonging with yoga that several times throughout life, if things got difficult, or if I just felt like I needed exercise, I did have this kind of place to go back to, which was some foundational experience with yoga when I was a teenager. But I kind of feel like I really started yoga when I was, I was 27 going through a divorce, really looking for a way to feel grounded. I don't think they worded it like that. I guess at the time I felt like I was looking for consistent exercise and something more gentle I think. That's probably how I manifested that I needed yoga was that it was something gentle, but still exercise. Like I think
Rebecca Sigala:that was
Lia Ciner:the best feeling that I had, but once I started it and now definitely looking back, I see that it was very much me looking for a way to connect with my body and feeling particularly in a time of crisis. It's very disconnected from my body and it became like a total lifeline. Like it became that thing that brought me back into my body.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah. And I so relate to that. I'm sure so many of my listeners do as well, because I really feel that so many of the women that come to me or even before they start working with me, tell me that they feel Yeah. Yeah. Disconnected from their bodies and when we say that it can kind of be this elusive concept. What does that really mean to be connected or disconnected from our bodies for you? What was that experience like of being disconnected? And do you think that you felt that in the moment? Like I'm disconnected from my body or are you more saying that looking back on that time?
Lia Ciner:I remember very viscerally feeling dissociated. I didn't have the vocabulary yet, but I think that we all have this Knowing that resonates when people use different words, even people that are out of touch with their bodies and aren't into somatic work or anything like that in our normal, accepted vocabulary, we use words that describe this mind body connection all the time. We say things like I'm reeling, or I can't find my footing or it in my stomach. Even ways that we describe people. She has the biggest heart. Those are not literal things. But they are, they resonate to us as absolutely accurate. And I think that that's because we all inherently have body wisdom and you don't have to be taught it. It's actually always there. And so when someone uses words to describe emotions or an experience, but they're describing like a body sensation, it's spot on. Like it feels exactly right in that. Yes. That's exactly how it feels. It's the gut feeling, the gut feeling,
Rebecca Sigala:follow your gut feeling. Yeah. What
Lia Ciner:is that? Follow your gut, follow the, you know, bacteria in your stomach lining. No, we have an accepted cultural word. That is this knowing that we all share, which is you have this feeling and it actually feels like it lives in your stomach and we've called it like forever. Yeah. So I actually remember being very aware that I was dissociated.
Rebecca Sigala:What did it feel like, like living on autopilot, kind of just going from one thing to the next, kind of brain fog, things like that?
Lia Ciner:Exactly.
Rebecca Sigala:I think
Lia Ciner:that then and multiple times in my life since then, unfortunately, you don't always get out of it and then you're out of it for good. It's kind of a process, I think of ebbing and flowing, but I think that there's an autopilot Kind of mode that I was in and that I've fallen into throughout my life, where I'm very much living in my head. My body is this kind of secondary vehicle. That's like getting me point A to point B. But I'm not, I'm not experiencing what my body is experiencing. Like I'm just eating, sleeping, you know, walking, driving. I'm not listening to what my body's telling me. And
Rebecca Sigala:I think that's the norm, or
Lia Ciner:at least it's very common. I think it's actually so cool, and I'm so grateful that we live in a time when we have a language to describe this. Yeah. I don't think that this was a thing until pretty recently. Well, it's always been a thing because, you know, Eastern culture and wisdom has been here the whole time, but right. Our Western society, this has not been something that's discussed. It probably sounded like you were having some sort of, I don't know, like psychosis if you were like. I think bodies talking to me that probably used to sound really unhinged. Just
Rebecca Sigala:throw you in a mental hospital or something. Yeah,
Lia Ciner:exactly. Like, what do you mean? Use your brain. Your brain is where you think your brain is, where you perceive things. And your body is just this thing that moves you around. And that's just, I think I've learned. And I know you've experienced as well, just so far from the truth. Our body wisdom is so wise. And it's so, it's so supportive of us and it's so much more, I'd say sensitive and gentle in a way than our brain wisdom, which is very intellectual and cognitive and which can be really disconnected sometimes from our heart and our soul,
Rebecca Sigala:like our deeper truth.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, exactly. That inner voice, that truth, that knowing, I think can sometimes get really clouded actually by cognitive thinking.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah, absolutely. Well, cause also with cognitive thinking, you can have five different thoughts about the same circumstance and tell yourself things that are not even true about yourself. And that's where I think self compassion and self love comes in. And that's why it's really a practice of kind of shifting your thoughts, not just taking them. Whatever thoughts come up as the truth. How do they work together for you? Because it's not that we're just saying, okay, don't use your cognitive thinking and just, just listen to your body. But do you think that that's really where things like somatic yoga come in where it combines both or is it really just body?
Lia Ciner:I think that. I think our mind is and our brain, well, it's completely connected, meaning everything starts in our brain and our nervous system, which is the best way I think for us consciously to access this kind of less conscious part of ourselves, which is our body wisdom or our somatic selves. Somatic means body of the body,
Rebecca Sigala:right?
Lia Ciner:I don't know if anyone listening to this review even can relate to this, but when I talk to myself, it's usually not me. It's usually we. There's this relationship that's happening when I'm like parenting myself or calming myself or hyping myself up. It's me now and the me that's always been there. And there's a duality. It's not exactly, I'm not like, I got this. That's not, that doesn't
Rebecca Sigala:We've got this. We
Lia Ciner:got this! I got you, girl. Who are you talking to? We all, I think, have this kind of, I think, unless I'm totally alone here, but like, there's this kind of we that exists in the me, and I
Rebecca Sigala:It's kind of like a combination of all different parts of yourself and your journey. And when you say that, I kind of think about you now, and then you when you were 27, and when you were a child, and really being compassionate and seeing all different parts of yourself.
Lia Ciner:Every version. But I think what's powerful to remember, and when you're having one of those moments where you're really just talking to yourself, I think what's cool about that is that there's this you that's always been there through all of the versions and hard times, good times, mistakes. Parts of yourself that, you know, you really regret or wish you could take back, like you can't say, well, that really wasn't me. I mean, it's very tempting, but it was you and maybe something important about letting that story go and saying that was a part of me. That was really hurting, or that was part of me that felt really lost or confused, or that was a part of me that was in fight or flight. And I feel so off from who I am now.
Rebecca Sigala:Do you think that being disconnected from your body is? survival mode, or is it a little bit different?
Lia Ciner:I think it's one of the sympathetic nervous system responses. So our nervous system, our autonomic nervous system, which starts in our brain and then the vagus nerve actually runs all the way down our spine and ends right in our gut, right in our belly. And the sympathetic nervous system is what controls life or death. So it's fight, flight, or freeze. And when the sympathetic nervous system gets triggered, your breath gets shorter and constricted and you get sweaty. You maybe get that hot face feeling like the blood is rushing to your head. It's all of those emergency sensations and being dissociated is. Part of fight, flight, or freeze. It's
Rebecca Sigala:what did you say? It's like freeze.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, absolutely. And I think also we grew up with fight or flight, but we really need to add or freeze into that language because people, I think like for me, I was always like, Okay. Well, I guess I'm a flight girl. Cause I'm not a fight person. I, I don't fight, but then what happens is there's a shame when you don't flight. So what am I? I don't have fight and I didn't leave.
Rebecca Sigala:I'm just kind of like here.
Lia Ciner:Yeah. I guess I just suck. I guess my sympathetic nervous system is broken and that's not true. There's a very, very powerful freeze. Coping mechanism that can kick into gear. It's just different for different people based on your genetics and your earliest childhood traumas, which one of these tends to be your go to or which type of situation triggers, which of these, but freeze is really powerful and it's really shameful. It can be really shameful because you feel like you're being so not yourself or you're tolerating, you're not
Rebecca Sigala:doing something about whatever's going on.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, I noticed that when I'm watching shows and I see a character clearly in freeze mode, like I get really angry at them and I'm clearly triggered by it because freeze is my first reaction so it's uncomfortable for me to watch someone doing it. Wow,
Rebecca Sigala:that's a lot of self awareness you've got there.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, or a lot of
Rebecca Sigala:Netflix.
Lia Ciner:Both. Like, I, I don't know if we have Breaking Bad fans listening, but a lot of people hate Skylar, the wife. I don't know if you've watched the series. I watched
Rebecca Sigala:it so long ago, but Skylar
Lia Ciner:apparently, apparently Skylar is the most hated television character, like, in history. What's the premise of her character? Skylar is, okay, spoiler alert, Skylar figures out to some extent that her husband is a drug lord and she freezes. She doesn't do anything, watch her. Well, she tries to kind of manipulate certain things, but she doesn't do the big things. She doesn't turn him in at the expense of her own reputation and her children understanding that their dad is, is a monster. She doesn't fight. She doesn't say to him, if you do this, I will do this. Right. But she doesn't leave, but she gives up. Right? And she doesn't leave.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:And you watch her for two, three seasons, basically living like a hostage in their house. Yeah. Miserable. There's even a suicide attempt scene. And I really think people hate her because Freeze is the most shameful, sympathetic response to That's
Rebecca Sigala:so interesting. Yeah. It's so interesting because I kind of do the same thing when I see someone in, I guess people would, I don't even like this term, but like victimhood where there's a circumstance in their life and they're just upset about it, but then they don't. Do anything about it. Yeah. And that is very triggering for me because I think we all have parts of ourselves that can go to that place of victimhood. And it feels like when you're talking about free is that people can kind of perceive it as that. as this person's a victim and they're just not doing anything.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, absolutely. And I think like there's like a
Rebecca Sigala:contempt for that in society.
Lia Ciner:It's repulsive. It's pathetic.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah. Which is not,
Lia Ciner:yeah,
Rebecca Sigala:which is, I don't want. To perpetuate that because I think that first of all, people are actually victims of things. And like you said, our bodies are responding in kind to that. And we have to go through an emotional process. Doesn't mean that all of a sudden, Oh, somebody cheats on us, or we find out our husband's a drug Lord, or we're in the middle of a war. And you know, things are happening. And to just be like, Okay, I'm going to fight, or I'm going to do this thing, or I'm going to be strong. I've been having a lot of conversations with people about this, where, yeah, that's great, but are you doing that as you're in touch with your body and your emotions, or are you doing that disregarding what you're actually feeling? Does that make sense?
Lia Ciner:It does make sense. And I think that people can consciously feel really angry and really sad about a situation they're in, but unconsciously not be able to get out of it.
Rebecca Sigala:Right.
Lia Ciner:And that's, I think when there's something that you can't control happening. And I don't like saying can't control because you always can, but you can't until you realize you can. And someone else telling you that. You can get out, or you could leave, or you could try this, or you could get a different job, or whatever the thing is that you're stuck in. Until you get it, you can't.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah. It's so easy to look in on someone else's life and be like, well, duh, just do this, this, and this. But we all have our own blind spots and our own traumas, and it's not always so simple.
Lia Ciner:No, it's very complicated and it's usually very layered and heavy and when our sympathetic nervous system gets kicked into gear and for men, it's more often fight for women, it's more often flight or freeze. That's also for like evolutionary reasons because we have so many generations of As women of being biologically weaker. So it's not been evolutionarily always very beneficial for us to try to fight. So we also have to have compassion for ourselves that sometimes fighting is the last thing we do. I think also in a very empowered 2024 world, we can get really angry at ourselves that we're not fighters. But we have generations upon generations upon generations of a learned behavior and genetics that have been honed over time to make us better women, which very, very, very long time was not being a fighter. It was being, wait, can
Rebecca Sigala:you, can you clarify that?
Lia Ciner:Yeah. So evolutionarily, biologically. We've needed to survive. That's why we've honed so many women's skills, communication, interpersonal dynamics, right?
Rebecca Sigala:She quoted women,
Lia Ciner:women,
Rebecca Sigala:better women. It's not necessarily exactly. I don't
Lia Ciner:think that that skillset applies anymore. We're very fortunate to live in a different time when. We can be really, I mean, you know, I hate this phrase, but we really can be whatever we want, but for a very long time we couldn't. And so our bodies over time are evolutionarily built to survive by being appeasers, by compliant, submissive, right? I guess
Rebecca Sigala:that's part of generational trauma.
Lia Ciner:It's part of generational trauma, but it's also part of our biology, which I think is important to understand because then we really can try to shed the shame around it. You don't have to have had a sexual trauma in your past as a child to freeze if you get sexually abused as an adult. So people are like, I don't get it. Why did I freeze and let him do that? I don't have any trauma. I didn't have any trauma mode to go back into like, you know, my friend who I know had that experience as a child. So it's obvious that in future situations, she went back.
Rebecca Sigala:We all
Lia Ciner:have the going back. It's in our body. It doesn't have to have happened in our life. We have this submissive, just survive. Just make it out of this situation mode that gets triggered a lot of times by, you know, when we're being invaded, when we're being violated, and that doesn't mean that you're not strong or that your brain doesn't want to move. It's something that's happening in the body.
Rebecca Sigala:I think that's a really important distinction. And I'm sure many women have experienced that to different extents.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, I recently, even in my embodied self mode, I pretty recently had a hairdresser give me a massage and oh, I remember that slip his hand into my like side boob. And I. Didn't move. I didn't say stop. I didn't say that's enough.
Rebecca Sigala:What the fuck?
Lia Ciner:I know. What the fuck
Rebecca Sigala:does that? First
Lia Ciner:of all, it was so gross and invasive and it was purposely when no one else was in the salon and it was the third time I've been to him. So my guard was completely down and I felt completely
Rebecca Sigala:trusted him to a certain level.
Lia Ciner:Absolutely trusted him. We had had two normal experiences and so I had no reason to have my guard up. I might've had it up on the first time with a new male hairdresser who was clearly straight. I might've been a little bit more, but I wasn't by them. And he knew that. And he opened the shop early for me. So I was the only one in there. It was a whole thing, but the rage I felt after was not at him
Rebecca Sigala:at
Lia Ciner:myself. And it took about a week to tell anyone it had happened. And it was very shameful, very ashamed that the situation went the way it did. And so I just, I think it's important to say that, and it's not that we shouldn't be empowered to move past a reality where that's how so many of us react. I, I believe. And move past that to get locked into it. And that's the way it goes. And that's,
Rebecca Sigala:you
Lia Ciner:know, I don't want to say that second, but as we're working on collectively generationally healing past this norm, it does happen. And it's not your fault. Yeah. It's really important anytime we're talking about body wisdom is to really look at shame and the role that that plays. And I think it has a lot to do with also body love and sexuality. And that relates so much. I'm so sorry
Rebecca Sigala:that happened to you, Leah.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, me too. I haven't even really quite. dealt with it. Like it's still a little bit open for me. A lot of times until we hear something from the outside or we say something out loud, our body will twist and turn and move it around and make it okay. There's an internal normalization that happens until it's out. It's out of our body. It has to come out of the body.
Rebecca Sigala:Can you tell us a little bit more about what that journey was? You said you were 27 when you first got divorced, and can you tell us a little bit about what that was like to be in a place of feeling disassociated and being in autopilot, and then through yoga, or perhaps there were other avenues that you started healing? You started to become more connected to your body. Like how did that happen? And then what shifted for you?
Lia Ciner:So I think it really did happen over time, but there were certain things that were pretty immediate or dramatic. One is as I started doing yoga frequently mixed with like really good psychotherapy, I started feeling just aware of my body for the first time in the sense that I felt like, Oh, my body's actually telling me things all the time. Not like you have to go to the bathroom. But like you don't feel safe or you know, you, you don't like this or you love
Rebecca Sigala:this
Lia Ciner:or you want to go to that. The more I did both yoga and psychotherapy. So both delving into myself, my decisions, my childhood, my feelings. And then yoga, this very visceral, sensory, body, consistent experience, those two things together. I think really brought me to a very different place with my relationship with myself. I have always been a very empathetic person and I've always been very attuned to other people's feelings, but I have not always been very self aware at all. I think almost the opposite. I think my emotions were just extremely overly tied to the emotions of everyone else I was interacting with. It was kind of almost easier to feel everyone else than to feel myself. Um, and that caused a lot of identity confusion for me over time. I've always been like a chameleon, and
Rebecca Sigala:Right, like, you kind of can't differentiate between, well, is this my feeling, or is this my opinion, or Am I trying to make this person happy or yeah, I
Lia Ciner:think that like classic people pleaser mode has been something I've related to forever. And then a lot of navigating the inner circle of my life, navigating those people's feelings. Um, managing other people's feelings has kind of like my emotional MO and not being very in touch at all with how I'm doing until I reach some sort of crash and burn stage. So I think those two modalities of, of
Rebecca Sigala:psychotherapy and yeah.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, together, but then also definitely doing some somatic work in the therapy, having a great therapist that was like, I think we got to figure out how you're feeling in your body. I mean, she just said this, so I still have this problem, but like. Yeah, that it's very easy for me to cognitively describe how I'm feeling and how things are going. And there's a block around just the body, the body experience, and I've worked on it so much until this point. But it's still complicated for me. I mean, like, you know, there's that saying you do what you need. Yeah, I totally feel that I'm able to. Create the safe space and really help my yoga clients feel their body and really open that door. And I'm doing that because it's something that I need. So it's like resonates for me to help other people do it. It's not because I'm amazing at this.
Rebecca Sigala:I think that's. It's really the case for so many people in the healing profession. I just think that we are drawn to the things that we need and it's almost like part of our mission or our purpose. You
Lia Ciner:know what I mean? Like, it's like, I feel like that 100%. Yeah. I feel like, like my marketing job is like my money job. The yoga somatic work is part of me.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:And I
Rebecca Sigala:think, you know, maybe at the beginning of my career, I would be like, how am I helping people with this? When This is something that I'm still working on or I'm still struggling with, but what I've realized over the years is that it's actually such a strength to have gone through it and to still be on that journey, you can deeply empathize with your clients and really help them in a way that someone who just knows it in theory or sat in a class and learned about it can't do.
Lia Ciner:Absolutely. 100%. And I also just want to say that I think anything that requires being very present and physical can be really traumatizing, or it can be really therapeutic. So, if someone tried to do a boudoir shoot with someone that didn't make them feel safe, I was literally just
Rebecca Sigala:thinking about boudoir when you said that. I think about it
Lia Ciner:all the time, because anytime anyone asks me about it, I'm like, It was very therapeutic for me. It was nothing of therapeutic. Like that word is not strong to describe it. And it's because it's so up to the facilitator of an experience like that to either traumatize someone, make them feel small in their body or not right in their body or dissociate or to feel present and themselves and there. And. You know, right. And that's everything. And I know that's such a big part of what you do. Like you have the gorgeous. Photography and the final product, which is incredible. But I think a lot of what you do and why it's transitioned so much into healing work and not just art is that it's very therapeutic people feel safe. And back to the somatic work, that experience of feeling safe. And doing something different with your body can be that transformative shift that allows you to come out of your sympathetic nervous system to come out of fight flight or freeze and to be
Rebecca Sigala:real safe in your body. Exactly. Like so many women. that have that experience are so proud of themselves and so surprised that they were able to get to something differently, something that they've never experienced before in that way and being like, wow, I felt safe enough to be so emotionally and physically vulnerable and I still felt. connected to the present moment and I felt beautiful and I was laughing and I wasn't just thinking about what the pictures are going to look like. And for sure, I think that's incredibly healing to know that you're capable of moving into a different world. state of being. And then once you kind of access that place, I don't know if it's the same thing with yoga. You can let me know. But when you access that new place inside of yourself, then it's kind of like always there. It's something that you can. Tap back into,
Lia Ciner:yeah, absolutely. You've reconnected with that part of you that lives very much in the body. That's always there for you and always waiting for you and whatever that physical experience is, whether it's boudoir or yoga or something completely, I don't know, climbing a mountain, it's usually something physical and different. I'm not saying having like an amazing conversation can also be really mind shifting that sometimes someone comes out of a conversation and they change their life. So I don't want to minimize like psychotherapy or an amazing important workshop or something like that. But there is something to be said about a somatic. Experience that can shift us in ways that sometimes the brain can't do alone. It just can't make the jump. I have this experience and I think other people can probably relate. You can sometimes go through something in your head a million times and then something external happens and it allows you to move. That body thing happens. It's just not moving.
Rebecca Sigala:Right. Yeah. I think that's kind of what we were talking about before too, of maybe being in a place of freeze or autopilot or being unhappy with a certain circumstance in your life, but then not feeling like you can change it, maybe it's not even anything to do with the mind. Because so many people, especially people like you and I and my listeners as well, like, you know, What you quote unquote need to do, or, you know, what would be good for you and your mental health and your body. And then you can't always get to the place where like, okay, well now I'm just going to do it. There's a block and that block is beyond something that's logical.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, I agree. And that's again, where we need to look for a different way. Because we all deserve to move in life. We all deserve to not feel stuck. And so I think that's the biggest kind of takeaway. And one thing I would want to share is you can always look for a different way. Your body's waiting for you to find a different path to getting past whatever it is. It might not be yoga for everyone. It's different for different people, but I would really just encourage people to lean into their inner knowing. And if you have no idea what that means, then that's fine. Start the journey, start talking to people who love to talk about it and share it. Cause you'll find it. Right. Start
Rebecca Sigala:asking the question. Instead of being like, that sounds like bullshit. I don't know what that means. So get curious about it and be like, okay, well, what does it mean to listen to my body? What does it mean to have a relationship with my body? I think to the average person, it just sounds like something that is unattainable.
Lia Ciner:Yeah. It's so funny. I have a yoga client who's been working with me both one on one and then sometimes in groups. Yeah. And we always start anytime I do a yoga practice, I start with like an embodiment exercise to just try to get there on the mat. These are your hands. This is your face. Like literally, cause we don't live like that.
Rebecca Sigala:And before
Lia Ciner:you start an hour of yoga practice, like if you're already picking up your kids from school in your head, then like, it's just not going to be what it can be. So I always try to do an embodiment practice. One of the ones that I start with is putting your hand. On your chest or on your belly or on your neck like up to you somewhere on your body and just breathing deeply and the words I use and it's purposely a pretty vague statement is allow your hand to meet your breath.
Rebecca Sigala:I'm doing it right now.
Lia Ciner:Allow your hand to meet your breath. And I purposely don't try to describe that more because the point is. You'll figure it out. And so I had this yoga client who one of the first couple of sessions that I did that, she said afterwards, like, I just don't know what you mean. And then I'm in my head because I'm trying to
Rebecca Sigala:figure out
Lia Ciner:what I mean. And I said, and I really resisted the urge to try to tell her what it means to me, because it's not the point. And so they said, I really understand that. What I would suggest you do is try not to overthink it. Just breathe with your hand on your whatever and see if over time it starts to feel like it makes sense. Like I know that's uncomfortable, but just maybe right now, it doesn't mean anything to you. And that's okay. But I don't want to try to tell you what it means. There is no right answer. It means something to you when it does, like that's kind of where we left it. I like that. And over time, you know, I didn't bring it up. We did keep doing it mixed in with other embodiment practices, but I didn't take that one out of the routine. I wanted her to. Get through that.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:I used it recently and I asked her after class. I said, do you remember like over a year ago, you told me that you didn't know what that meant? Like, do you still get her? And she was like, no, of course I know what it means.
Rebecca Sigala:Oh, that's so amazing. I love that. And
Lia Ciner:like, there's no what it means. There's no like, I know what it means. It means da da da da da. It just means exactly what it is. Your hand meeting your breath. That's a different experience for every person. You know, that's the point.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah, but I do like the concept of meeting. Like meeting yourself where you're at. And for my clients, I have a whole process that I lead them through for the healing food war experiences and for my group coaching program. And for both of them, the first step is meet yourself where you're at. And I think that if you're listening to this conversation right now and you're okay, all that sounds amazing. Well, where do I start? That would be my suggestion. It's taking yourself where you're at, meaning that, I mean, it could mean a lot of different things when you just said, but wherever you are right now, that is okay. And to bring compassion to your struggles. It's interesting because I think a lot of people who are on healing journeys, it's not only that you're struggling. I think the hardest part of the struggle is being judgmental of yourself in that struggle. Because you're like, I should be further along. I should know better. I should be doing this thing. I should be moving every day and journaling and doing cold plunges and whatever it is. And that's actually so I think one of the biggest things that keeps us stuck.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, absolutely. That feeling that like, do I even deserve to be better if I'm not even doing what I know I should be doing? Yeah. Right. I think a really important key to that self compassion, which can unlock the movement. Cause I don't think we move very well if we're mad at ourselves. Being mad at ourselves just triggers more of those, you know, fight, flight, or freeze responses. So the kind of you eat yourself up about not being more healed, the more those coping mechanisms and negative behaviors are going to come out. Because that's yeah, it works. It's just,
Rebecca Sigala:well, that's what people kind of think is that they have to be mean to themselves. And I thought this for a long time as well. Yeah. It's tough love. They have to be mean to themselves in order to motivate them to do something. But actually it's the opposite. It's
Lia Ciner:the opposite. The more you can have those wee conversations, I think the more likely you are going to be able to come out of the stuck patterns.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah. You and I, we hung out last week after Shabbat. We had such a beautiful conversation about self compassion among many other things, but something about it. Kind of shifted something in me. So conversations are helpful. And the next morning I haven't been in my movement routine. And, you know, I always want to normalize that for people that it always ebbs and flows. But I woke up and I went on an amazing jog and I was literally smiling as I was running and in the past, you're like, Oh my God. Would it look like a crazy person? But in the past, if I had left my routine and the first time I'm doing it, like, okay, I got to get into it. And then I'm. I'm in my movement and beating myself up that I haven't been doing it for however long. Look at how hard this is. And this is so hard. I can't breathe. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then I'm just like, shit. Good for you. Literally, that's how I felt about it. I was like, good for you, girl. You always have your own back. You will always come back to yourself. You will always. Take care of yourself, you know, and it was such a different experience. I was just reflecting on it because, you know, that's what I do. I help people be compassionate and loving to themselves, but I was reflecting on what it felt like before to move With hatred and punishment and guilt and trying to control my body and trying to control my life and be a certain way versus moving with self compassion. And I think it's such a good example, but it goes so much further on all different aspects of our lives. When we move through our lives with self compassion, it's a completely different experience. Things flow. We can move past our blocks easier. Not that we won't have blocks, not that things won't come up. Of course they will, but. You don't say it stuck as long.
Lia Ciner:No. And it's really important to say that that's not just a psychological phenomenon, that there's actually a reason why that happens. And that's because we're triggering our parasympathetic nervous system. And we're inviting our sympathetic nervous system. To settle down. That's what compassion does.
Rebecca Sigala:Hey, actually, I was just, I was reading about this, that like when you're mean to yourself, your body actually responds to that. Like you're fighting. Can you speak to that?
Lia Ciner:Your body, yes. So when we're angry at ourselves and we're ashamed and we're disgusted. And we're not just in our head. Just to ourselves, but your body will still respond like there's an external person that's ashamed. Of you and disgusted and angry at you, right? Even some sort of response to abuse can kick in. And so you're actually triggering your sympathetic nervous system to stay in a fight, flight or freeze phase. And then we're more disgusted with ourselves that we haven't gone to the gym and we haven't. You know, whatever, stop smoking. And we haven't whatever, but by beating ourselves up, we are actually re triggering those negative behaviors. So it's a completely like nervous system level experience. So I want to suggest that when we start doing that, immediately come in with something that regulates your nervous system,
Rebecca Sigala:something
Lia Ciner:body level that regulates your nervous system, a hot bubble bath, a jog, a great yoga class, the expensive one with stepping outside, even yes, exactly, or an amazing spin class. It's a hike outside in the sun on the porch.
Rebecca Sigala:Something more physical. Actually, I have this essential oils that I've been putting on and it's just to take a moment to actually like deeply breathe it in and put it in places where maybe I'm feeling stressed like the back of my neck or my arm, wherever I feel like I just intuitively need it. And I just like take a moment. And literally that takes three seconds. It doesn't need to be something that feels like a big deal, you know? Doesn't.
Lia Ciner:And on the other hand, it can be something that you create some sort of ceremony or routine with. Like, I almost can't go to bed without a bath. Like I'm almost, but it ebbs and flows. So there's when I'm not wanting a bath at all. I'm like, ew, I don't want to sit in my filth. And then there are times where I'm like, I just need a bath. I need to get in the bath. So whether it's big or small, I do think that for each of us to find those little somatic moments that bring us into a peaceful place in our body, um, Sometimes, you know, we make up with a loved one, so we feel better, and then we feel calm. But sometimes, you can make your body feel calm, and then it'll make your mind feel better. Like, you know what I mean? Like, sometimes you're freaking out, and taking a bath isn't going to solve the problem,
Rebecca Sigala:but
Lia Ciner:it can allow you to get to ground level.
Rebecca Sigala:It's hard though, because it's like sometimes the last thing you want to do when you're in that place. You know what I mean? Like
Lia Ciner:something nice to yourself?
Rebecca Sigala:Like when you're in a place of not being compassionate to yourself and your mind is reeling, I feel like it's hard to just be like, okay, I'm gonna go on a run. I'm gonna go to that. It can be really difficult to get to that place. So I would also think maybe starting that practice even before, even before you get to that place. Yeah. That it's something that just. comes a little bit more naturally to you so that when you are reeling it's like, oh yeah, okay, well, I take a bath every day anyway, so I'm going to do that.
Lia Ciner:Well, I would be remiss to not say like, breathing, because you can always do it. You need nothing other than yourself. Is such an amazing nervous system regulator and it sounds so stupid like, well, I'm always breathing. No, but you're not conscious breathing and it's an immediate vagus nerve switch when you start paying attention to the breath as simple as just taking 5 to 10 slow, deep breaths. Consciously can completely reset where we are. And that's something that's great to do when you're in a good place, like you said, so that habit to go back to when you're in a bad place, like a day that you're just feeling strong and it's ovulation time and you're just like, it's like a really good time to just YouTube any type of like five minute breath work and tap into it and know that, okay, I feel great right now. Why am I doing this? You're doing it because. In a few weeks, you won't feel great and then it'll be really nice to already know this video and it'll be bookmarked and like Breathing is just the best. And once you've done it a few times with a guide, whether it's a person or a video, you always have it. You always have it. I do like the three part yoga breath where you inhale in three parts and then you exhale really slow. I do that breathing. I don't know, at least three, four times a week, just when I'm in a tough spot.
Rebecca Sigala:How do you think it's affected your experience of being in this war for the last 13 months, having these tools?
Lia Ciner:Whoa, I feel like I haven't quite processed it yet. To be honest, I still feel so in it.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:I think I've been really gentle with my body during this war in a way that maybe I wouldn't have had the tools to do in the past. I've just been like very kind to my body and to myself, like I've been really okay with under planning things and being less available and you know, not being busy. And I think that that's a body lesson that I learned from pre war that I was able to take into the war with me, like in the past. I think maybe this level of crisis and tragedy might have driven me into like being overly busy.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah, I think I see that a lot.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, I think a lot of people are doing that. There's no shame in that. It makes a lot of sense. Like, the problem is that it can make it worse. Because then you're giving yourself an extra load to bear.
Rebecca Sigala:It can sometimes lead to that disconnection from yourself.
Lia Ciner:Yeah.
Rebecca Sigala:And your body.
Lia Ciner:For balance. Because like, on the one hand, you don't want to be like, well, my body wisdom wants me to crawl into bed for four days. Like, but on the other hand, okay, well, maybe one day.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:Maybe give yourself a day, maybe take a day off of work. And don't have that day
Rebecca Sigala:just be full of like self loathing and you're sitting there and like marathoning Netflix and just being like, I can't believe I'm here. Like, yeah, exactly. Like, actually give yourself that.
Lia Ciner:Exactly. What if instead you said, I know it's not healthy for me to do this for the whole week, but I'm going to do it today and I'm going to fucking love it. Yeah. And I'm going to see it as like therapy today. Eat whatever I want and watch as long as I want and like tomorrow's a new day, but we're not going to be mean to ourselves about this today.
Rebecca Sigala:You know, I think once you also do, you know, tap into that body wisdom through a combination of different things, I really like what you said about having kind of like the embodiment and then also psychotherapy and maybe someone has something else as well. I really feel like healing is really so many different paths combined together. Once you really Meet yourself and face yourself and start to go through this process. Hopefully with someone on the path with you, you know, when it really is your intuition or your body wisdom or not, or something that is outside of you, like your inner critic, it helps you find that inner voice. Yeah. Self compassion is not always. Like, Oh, honey, you don't have to do something or just forget about taking care of yourself and forget about life and stay in bed all day. Self compassion can sometimes be like pushing yourself to actually do something
Lia Ciner:100%. By the way, like our bodies are not always telling us to take it easy.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:Sometimes your body is saying, move.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah. Like, I have sciatica pain and the more you sit and the more you don't move. It actually makes it worse. So you would think like, oh, okay, well just rest and take a bath and whatever. But no, my body's saying, get off your butt and move. I need that. That is love for my body.
Lia Ciner:Absolutely. It's just still being able to do it like gently.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:Instead of seeing it as like, you're a drill sergeant and you need to be tough on yourself. It's like, I love myself enough to exercise today.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:I love my body and I want my body to feel that good, sore burn and for my muscles to be like, thank you. Because I deserve that amazing euphoric. I kicked ass, you know, feeling with the endorphins and the adrenaline of a workout.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah. What I've been thinking about the mantra for me is like, I'm choosing to feel good. Yeah. Because we all know that when we don't, not even just exercise, it's interesting how we always go to that. Sometimes me as well. And I feel like there's so many other ways that we can also take care of ourselves. It's not just exercise. It's. So many different things that we even mentioned in this episode. Also like people,
Lia Ciner:letting your body also speak to you about how you feel around people and then being curious about it. Maybe your body feels uncomfortable around someone, not because they're not a good person for you, but because they trigger you. Right. And it's something you need to explore in yourself. So the other thing about the body wisdom and that inner voices, I would also say, don't act rashly. That's where your brain is important. You get a message, listen, and invite your brain to help you decode it. Because sometimes your body is upset around someone, not because they're not anything. But because it's telling you something about yourself, but the important thing is that the body communication, it's a map. Look at it. It's a map. It's showing you this array of places and things and events and experiences. And it's, it's trying to guide you.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:It's not always going to be a one sentence. Yeah. You know, it's maybe a few points that you have to travel to.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah, I feel like as you're talking about that, there's just so much that has to do with boundaries and really understanding and getting to know who you are. And to really tap into that inner voice that is yours and it's not somebody else's. With somatic work and with connecting to your body, there's such a feeling of groundedness and coming into yourself and understanding who you are and how you relate to the world and not being like, this is what I should do because. X, Y, and Z, or because this person told me this is good for me. It's really about getting to know yourself.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, exactly. I think you're saying it really well. I think it's also like trusting yourself.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:What if you could trust yourself? What if you didn't need to ask your friend and your mom and your therapist? What if you really believed that you knew?
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:And that's not to say that you shouldn't ask your mom and your therapist and your friend what they think. Cause like, that's amazing and beautiful, but like there's something to our end goal being, I trust myself so much that if I couldn't reach this person or that person, or if I didn't have time, I'm sure I would know what to do.
Rebecca Sigala:No. Yeah, absolutely. And that really, for me and for my clients, I feel like the self trust really comes. Through that combination of what we were talking about, the healing process and coming into your body and not feeling like your body is your enemy or moving you astray or that, you know what I mean? Like, Oh, I'm hungry, but no, I'm not hungry. Or like your body telling you I need connection, but then you just don't. decide to keep working or even something as simple as like, I need to go to the bathroom. Am I going to override that? Or am I going to actually just listen to my body right now? And I think that society has kind of taught us to not trust ourselves. And this is an opportunity to through somatic work or whatever work that you feel called to do. Can really be an avenue to start to trust your body and therefore trust yourself again, so that when you enter in situations with people or just any other aspects of your life, you can actually listen to your gut and you can actually listen to your intuition and be like, yeah, that's right. And not question yourself.
Lia Ciner:Totally. Totally. I really, I agree. I think it's a journey also. Times where we're going to feel more in touch and there are times we're going to feel less, but. If you open the door to it, it starts to unfold on its own.
Rebecca Sigala:Yeah.
Lia Ciner:Like once you start this ride,
Rebecca Sigala:like you don't need to figure it out. Logically, no, it's like once you start,
Lia Ciner:like this is life now and you'll start just seeing more in life, I think through your body and that's very healing. And I mean, this is life. Life is healing. I kind of feel like that's kind of how I've been perceiving the journey of life. It's like one big. Journey of healing, not to say that we're not okay as we are, we are, but we're always just getting a little bit better or we can't, we're getting a little bit better and a little bit better and a little bit better. And that's the journey. Yeah. So
Rebecca Sigala:yeah, I think that's really beautiful. Where can people reach you if they're interested in the work that you do? And can you tell us a little bit about it?
Lia Ciner:Yeah. So I do somatic yoga. What that means is I'm doing, you know, the same foundational vinyasa yoga poses and flows that you might've done somewhere else. Why I like to put somatic in front of it is because A, I'm always very conscious of being trauma informed in how I see. Speak the setup of the room, the flow itself, the suggestions. It's just a really different experience to do yoga with someone who's trauma informed. I did a somatic trauma therapy certification through the embody lab, which was fantastic and I recommend it even if they're not practitioners just for themselves, I actually think it's an amazing course, but I've taken so much of it and incorporated it into my yoga practice. So I do women's classes. At my small little studio in the dug on and a front, and then I do one on ones in general, though, I do like to have it in my space so that I can set it up. Exactly. You know, cause a lot of it is that sensory experience, what you see, what you smell.
Rebecca Sigala:You make the environment.
Lia Ciner:Yeah. Reach me on Facebook and I have three classes a week.
Rebecca Sigala:Thank you so much for coming on, Leah. Hi. This was amazing and I know that whoever listens to this is gonna get so many beautiful gems and I love how you gave people really concrete things to think about and things to start to incorporate in their lives. Thank you.
Lia Ciner:Yeah, thank you. And we're matching nails, by the way.
Rebecca Sigala:Ooh, love it. Of course.
Lia Ciner:I love you. Have a great, I love you so much. Bye dear.
Rebecca Sigala:Bye bye.