Anna Bouma

Why somatic coaching?

Your body has an innate wisdom within it.

Understanding the interoceptive signals your body is sending you has a direct impact on your mental & physical health. I call it Somatic Literacy. Think of it as learning to speak a new language. 

Outcomes of somatic coaching -

Greater Self-Awareness: A deeper understanding of your emotions, sensations, & interoceptive signals, enabling you to more effectively recognize & regulate your emotions, leading to greater emotional intelligence.

Sharpened Communication Skills: Via an expansion of your somatic vocabulary, you’ll increase your capacity to interpret & express your internal experience. This clarity in communication fosters more effective collaboration in every area of your life.

Enhanced Leadership Presence: You’ll cultivate a greater sense of presence & authenticity in your leadership role, inspiring trust in your capacity to lead.

Increased Resilience: You’ll learn practical techniques for recognizing and managing stress in the body and develop resilience building practices, better equipping you to navigate challenge.

Why is your focus on clients in leadership roles?

For a decade I worked for leaders who were overworked, with underdeveloped emotional intelligence, minimal somatic literacy, and were very rarely set up for success when it came to their mental health.

This translated to work environments with high pressure, high stakes, unrealistic expectations, reprimands instead of constructive feedback, and overworked & disrespected employees. The end result of working for company after company & leader after leader where this was the case was burnout, and it doesn’t have to be this way.

I believe in embodied, empathetic, and effective leadership. My interest is in working with clients who are in positions of influence and shaping the way they wield that influence.

Will this type of coaching support both my personal development and my business & leadership goals?

The way we do one thing is the way we do all things. How you lead at work impacts the way you engage at home and vice versa. Your capacity for presence and calm, your strategic decision making and communication skills - all of these impact your business, team, and family - and they are all connected to your somatic state. 

What’s your style of coaching like?

I ask that you commit fully to our coaching engagement, show up, engage with the homework, follow through with the practices. In turn, you can count on me to be honest, inquisitive, and persistent, holding you to the highest expression of yourself and your potential.

I take my work seriously, and have invested countless hours + tens of thousands of dollars in my own training to provide the support and service that I do.

My commitment to my growth and healing over the years is a foundational piece of my approach. I don’t claim to have it all figured out - I’m human and ever evolving just like you. My coaching is an extension of who I am in the world: curious, compassionate, empathetic, driven.

Why did you choose coaching?

For years, I’ll admit I would cringe a little at the word “coach”. Growing up my experience with “coaching” was encountering life coaches of the “live, laugh, love” variety. As the child of a therapist, I was always a big fan of that modality of self-work (and still am).

In my late 20’s I entered into my first coaching relationship and…. over the course of that year I was supported, encouraged, challenged, and expanded in ways that created meaningful change.

Coaching is the lane I chose because I wanted to work outside of a licensed system with the freedom to use a variety of modalities that resonate with me and my clients. This has allowed me to create a unique container informed by multiple modalities, trainings, and lineages of healing.