Leading From The Body
In this 10 minute talk embodied communication specialist Lucy Nicholson talks you through the principles, theory and practice of embodied facilitation and leadership and delves into the importance of developing communication from our whole selves. Lucy is a senior lecturer at The University of Lancashire, Somatic Movement Educator and Laban - Bartenieff Movement Analyst and she explains:
What embodied communication is.
Why it is an asset to your organisation or professional practice.
Some examples of how it can be used in different contexts .
A simple bodily awareness exercise to get you started.
With Lucy Nicholson
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How can taking a more embodied approach to our leadership and facilitation support us and the people we are working with?
This 10-minute talk explores the idea of embodied communication. It discusses how becoming more aware of our whole selves through the acknowledgement and noticing of our body as well as our mind can develop a more engaging, authentic and effective rapport with those we are trying to connect with.
Over time and through practice we can develop the skills to become more present with ourselves and in turn more present with others. Developing a more agile and responsive approach to leading and facilitating.
Working from the Laban – Bartenieff Movement System, Lucy shares the overriding pillars of her work, using the themes of Inner – Outer and Self – Other to underpin her approach in supporting confident, positive, strength- based communication that ensures we can take care of ourselves and others in challenging communication contexts.
The talk offers examples of how in her work as a Somatic Movement Educator, Lucy can support people, through simple tasks to use the body as a resource in our communication. Lucy refers to those moments as ‘just before’, for example, the big presentation, meeting or difficult conversation where we may need a little extra help to empower us to ‘move’ forwards.
Lucy starts by unpicking the complexity of embodiment and discusses the ultimate objective of whole-body communication, something particularly challenging in a post-industrial, western culture.
She discusses the overarching pillars of how she works and why she considers an embodied approach vital to building positive and genuine professional (and personal) relationships. Lucy offers some experiences from her own delivery to offer examples of how this work can be transformative and finishes the talk with a simple, practical activity to get you started on your own embodiment journey. The end of this talk emphasises the practical nature of this work and that it is indeed a practice.
Photos courtesy of DSP Conference 2023 C-DaRE by Christian Kipp and Amy Williams.
