Episode 121: Creative Vitamins: Somatic Tools for Authentic Alignment in a Chaotic World with MEgan Moseley
Podcast
Episode 121: Creative Vitamins: Somatic Tools for Authentic Alignment in a Chaotic World with MEgan Moseley
“Authentic alignment is the place where your intuition, your heart, and your voice all come together.” —Megan Moseley
This episode is your invitation to explore how creativity is not separate from life, it emerges when we feel calm, present, and aligned. I’m joined by MEgan Mosley founder of BodyWise Consulting and Coaching and creator of The Art and Science of Being Me.
She defines creativity as a natural expression of a nervous system that feels safe, connected, and grounded. MEgan shares how her work integrates physical therapy, somatic psychology, trauma release, and plant medicine to help people embody their truth and live in alignment.
MEgan walks you through a powerful Authentic Alignment micro practice that brings you into your body and opens space for intuition, clarity, and creative flow. I’ve used this practice regularly since we recorded, it’s become a reset button in my day. I am curious, if you try it too!
We also chat about the messy middle of showing up creatively: How saying “fine” can mask people‑pleasing, how everyday acts (like folding towels or making dinner) can become creative expression, and how nervous system health: Sleep, nature, movement, tremoring, can serve as creative vitamins.
Questions to Reflect On:
Sit with these questions: Journal, take them on a walk, create a voice note, chat with a friend, or sit with a cup of tea and reflect on them.
1. What universal imperatives am I most longing for right now? Examples: safety, love, worthiness, belonging, freedom…
2. When do I say “I’m fine” when I’m actually not? Explore how people-pleasing or fawning shows up and how it impacts your creative voice.
3. How do I nourish my creativity on a nervous system level? Examples: Sleep, nature, movement, somatic practices—what works for me and what’s missing?
Leave a comment on Substack or connect with us on Instagram @chefcarlacontreras & @bodywisejourney to share your takeaway from the episode.
xo Carla
PS: Upgrade to Nourished Creator Studio for quick-hit micro workshops, BTS Podcast, and simple tools to help you work on your creative dreams now, not someday.
Disclaimer: Always seek the counsel of a qualified medical practitioner or other healthcare provider for an individual consultation before making any significant changes to your health, lifestyle, or to answer questions about specific medical conditions. If you are driving or doing an activity that needs your attention, save the energy practice for later. This podcast is for entertainment and information purposes only.
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MEgan Moseley
MEgan Moseley PT is the founder of Bodywise Coaching & Consulting and creator of The Art and Science of BEing ME, a framework and roadmap for cultivating nervous system resiliency and healing embodied trauma. Her approach synthesizes over 36 years of experience as a physical therapist with extensive training in somatic psychology, including IFS (internal Family Systems), Hakomi, and RCS (recreation of self). She is certified in Nervous System Resiliency, Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises (TRE®), Embodiment Coaching, and is currently completing her training as a licensed psilocybin facilitator in Oregon.
MEgan’s work is rooted in partnership—meeting each person where they are. She empowers her clients to tap their body’s innate wisdom, cultivating a felt sense of safety in BEing their authentic selves, unlocking their natural capacity for healing, connection, leadership, and authentic expression. She works with individuals, groups, and organizations through coaching, courses, retreats, speaking engagements, and will soon be offering psilocybin facilitation and integration coaching.
Find + Work With MEgan:
Full Transcript:
Carla (00:01):
Welcome to Nourishing Creativity. The cycle of the last few years has left you and me feeling mentally, physically, emotionally and creatively drained. Nourish your very full life through interviews with creatives and entrepreneurs about how they create and move through their creative blocks. If you don't know me, I'm Chef Carla Contreras, a food stylist and content strategist. You can find me Chef Carla Contreras across all social media platforms and more information in today's show notes. Megan, welcome to the podcast. Can you introduce yourself and how you serve your community?
MEgan (00:47):
Yeah. Thank you, Carla, for having me. I'm really excited to be here. My name's Megan Mosley and I am the founder of BodyWise Consulting and Coaching and the creator of the Art and Science of Being Me. In a nutshell, I help people cultivate beingness. It's that elusive state of our nervous system where we feel safe to actually fully be our authentic selves. And this is when we feel calm, when we're in flow, and when we can be creative. And so pull all that together. I've integrated about 36 years of my experience as a physical therapist, specializing in alignment of the body, almost 20 years of study of somatic psychology in internal family systems in Hacomi. And I'm certified as a nervous system resiliency coach and in trauma release exercise and most recently as a psilocybin facilitator. So all of that comes together in a way that I help people use the wisdom of their body to shift their mindset, to literally rewrite their story and rewire their nervous system so they can embody authentic alignment with the core truth of who they are.
(02:00)
That's amazing.
Carla (02:02):
Can you share with us the last thing that sparked creativity for you?
MEgan (02:07):
Creativity is such a constant in my life. I feel kind of constantly inspired. I would say kind of a big thing that's come up for me recently is an opportunity to do an ongoing year and a half mentorship with a woman in Canada who is doing somatic relational work with low and mid-dose psychedelics. And I'm already doing that work as I do this tremor process with people, but it just feels like just so exciting to start to integrate the power of plant medicine with my work.
Carla (02:42):
Megan, could you guide us through a micro practice so that people can get a glimpse of what this work is? And mind you, if someone's driving or doing an activity that they're supposed to pay attention to, we're going to save this for later.
MEgan (03:01):
Absolutely. I'll tell you, we're talking a lot about alignment with ourselves and authenticity. And so what I would offer is my favorite, most powerful, grounded exercise is called authentic alignment. I'll just preface that by saying when we embody authentic alignment, we're coming home to ourselves, to our core truth. And when we are in alignment with our true beingness, we are in alignment with what I call the universal imperatives. So let me just say those first and you can just let them sink in and notice maybe there's some things that feel especially true and some things that might feel longed for, but just notice your resonance with each of these. Safety, love, connection, truth, integrity, wholeness, rightness, as in yes, that's right. Beingness, not doing, belonging, worthiness, freedom, empowerment, and harmony. Just notice, I know people don't see this, but just to watch your smile and your constant nodding, right?
(04:25)
Nobody's like, "No, thank you. I'm really not actually interested in belonging or worthiness." It's like these are the issues. And so we resonate with them. And if there's something that shows up in that list, it's like, "Oh my gosh, I wish I had more safety," or, "I wish I felt more worthiness," then know that that's actually you, the part that's longing, that knows it can have that, that knows that that's the way it's supposed to be, right? We're going to talk about that as we do this authentic alignment. So if you're in a space that you can do it, I'll invite you to come to standing. And if you need to sit, then just kind of join in from the part where we come into the pelvis, okay? So I'm going to stand as I do this just to be able to be in it myself.
(05:09)
So this is not about posture and it's not about doing something. It's really about coming into connection with yourself. So just start off by just maybe marching in place and letting yourself be like a little bit of a rag doll. And then most of us spend too much time literally ahead of ourselves and on our toes. So invite yourself to shift about 60% into your heels. And then with that, it's like you're saying, "I'm coming home to myself. I'm aligning with myself. I'm standing with myself." As you plug in the front of your foot, about 40%, you'll feel the arch of your foot light up in a way. And this is where I'm plugging into my charging station and this is where you're plugging into the charging station of those imperatives. And I'll send you a list of those so you can have those for yourself.
(06:05)
As your attention comes up to your knees, you soften your knees, right? They're just not locked. I'm not locked. I'm not rigid. I'm not stuck. This is where I can be response able, where I can let the moment unfold and let that creativity move through. As you come to the pelvis, you're thinking about just a little bit of a squeeze under of your glutes so that the bones on the front of your hips face forward like flashlights. And that's the embodiment of I'm creating safety and stability and support in my life. With that, you'll begin to feel your core come on. So I'm connecting to my core truth. And as that, from the pelvis to the ribs, like an elevator comes up and the ribs, like the elevator doors close. And this is such an important space. This is the home of your intuition, of your inner wisdom, of your instincts.
(07:04)
And so really staying with that, maybe even putting your hands on that space right where your ribs come together as this commitment to yourself. And then turn your hands palm up from there. This is the gift that I have that I'm offering. And as your arms move out to the side, like you're spreading your wings, so you can feel the shoulder blades wrap back without losing that sense of connection to the ribs, right? So really having that balance and I've got my own back. This is where I'm flying from. This is where I can feel my own strength. The chest and heart becomes open. Maybe it feels vulnerable, but it's this open-hearted way to live and show up. It opens your neck so that you can speak your truth, say what you feel and what you need. And then this place of holding your head high.
(07:53)
And I say this not just in the moment, but as you think about all of your past selves, all of your younger selves, your wounded selves, that you're like, "Here I am. I'm the superhero of my own life standing here in this home of my belonging with my eyes wide open, knowing that I don't have to be ahead of myself or leave myself behind. It's from this place where I feel rooted and connected, that I have perspective, that I have the ability to create the next unfolding." And then with that, just connecting into, if it feels right, hand on your heart, hand on your belly just again is this, again, like another micropractice of just checking in with like, "This is for me and I'm here." And then we actually carry this so we carry ourselves wherever we go. So we put that sense of authentic alignment and beingness into action, and that's how we create our lives.
Carla (08:50):
Wow. That was incredible. Thank you for sharing with us.
MEgan (08:56):
You're welcome. Tell me what you felt in that. If you had a word for, as we say, be me, right? Body, emotion, mental essence, that's our world. So what's a word for how you felt in your body? Connected. Gorgeous. What's an emotional word? It doesn't have to be an emotion. It could be expansive or hopeful or excited or lighter or ... I don't know the word,
Carla (09:20):
But I know the feeling when I'm in Pilates, I'm deeply inside of my body. It's kind of almost like this knit together. You feel at home. Yeah. It's like I feel at home. Thank you for giving me that language.
MEgan (09:35):
Yeah. Beautiful. And then mentally, just planting the experience of what this did for you mentally. If it's like a little slower, a little more calm, a little more
Carla (09:43):
Clear, focused.
MEgan (09:45):
Yeah. And then finally that essence. And you kind of already spoke to it in this place of like, "I feel home." But when we think about our essence, that's like our uniqueness, our spirit, just our true selves and really just kind of noticing in the sense of planting the experience of how that feels to be loving, compassionate, present with yourself. It's such a gift.
Carla (10:11):
It is beyond. I can't wait to hear what people think after doing this, how they feel after doing this and what it does for their creative process. Oh yeah. Yeah. I'm curious about your definition when it comes to creativity in your work.
MEgan (10:31):
Oh gosh. I feel like creativity has like three arms where it's like evolution is a big one. And I think that I've always said, I feel so grateful that I have been able to parallel my work with my own personal evolution. And over the past few years, that's been especially true in that when I closed a thriving physical therapy practice to really come into full alignment with this work, with what I feel like is my calling. So that's one thing that I think about. Another part is intuition. There's a lot of intuition in my work and I co-create my experiences when I'm coaching with clients that it really just unfolds. I call it surfing the edge and trusting in the unfolding. And it's so critical that I'm aligned in myself and have this safe, resonant, nervous system that allows people to unfold and to have an experience that shifts them, right?
Carla (11:37):
What is your current relationship with creativity? And I want to explore the word fine.
MEgan (11:46):
The word fine is it's fawning, right? It's people pleasing. I do not let my clients say fine. I will pause them in that and we will wait until they tune in and be like, actually I do prefer that or this is what I feel. My current relationship is just cultivating creativity in my life and in my own being and how I show up in how I choose to dress. I think just even in conversation, how are we present in that? I love just simple things like folding and rolling up my towel so they're neatly in a drawer. When I make dinner for my little guy, Fabio, I started a few years ago making storybook meals. In fact, I'll show you this. It's called Dinner with Fabio. We made it into a book and I will send you pictures of this. It's so cute, but these are all photos.
(12:44)
This is awesome. We talk about what we're making and then he's so excited. He's just sitting there and then presenting that. So I just think there's just the relationship with creativity is just really being present and unfolding the moment and noticing even in like such a wild and crazy and sad time in our world that there is so much goodness and so much light. And I feel, it just gives me the chills to think about this, the importance and the power of our presence and our creativity and how that allows safe connection with ourselves, allows authentic connection with others. And this really is how we one drop of love. It's like Ray Charles says, it's how we can change the world is by showing up in this way. And it does make a difference.
Carla (13:39):
And we have gone into this, but I want to go a little bit deeper into nourishing our creativity and through the lens of safety and authenticity and belonging. And what does that all do for creativity?
MEgan (13:58):
Oh, wow. Yeah. So nourishing creativity, I think is for me, I call it like creative vitamins, right? Where there's aspects of that. And I wholeheartedly believe that we have to be in that gear one nervous system, that nervous system of being in order to be creative in our lives. And so for me, that's eight hours of sleep. I practice what I preach. I do the three plus be me breaks a day. I do the trauma release tremoring exercise most nights, which is such a homecoming. And I get out in nature every day. Those are things that just kind of fundamentally keep me in that state. And I feel like I lost the second part of that question.
Carla (14:44):
Belonging, authenticity, safety. And I wanted to bring those into this conversation because when we talk about creativity, it's an exposure of who you are.
MEgan (14:57):
Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. David White, gosh, he's my favorite poet. And he talks about the most courageous thing you can do is to risk yourself. It's one thing to be like, oh yeah, I'm an accountant. I'm going to get a different accounting job. And not that there's anything wrong with that, but when we really are putting ourselves out in the world, it's very exposed. So safety is the underpinning. It was the first of the imperatives, right? So it's the underpinning for all of it. And if you've heard of like Peter Levine's work, he'll talk about your system is in this fight, flight, but just know you're not running from a tiger. I don't think it's the tigers that we're afraid of. I think it's not feeling safe being ourselves and then being seen in that.
(15:47)
So when we think about safety and belonging, and the first place of belonging really has to be to ourselves. And that got lost in most of our childhoods, right? Whether by intention or not, right? That does not matter about impact. But as little young beings, if we don't feel completely safe all of the time, we will always, always, always choose belonging, even in a situation that does not feel good over our own authenticity. So sometimes we kind of get later in our lives, we're like, who am I? Back to saying fine. It's like, oh, that's fine. No, that doesn't matter whatever you want. We default out of our authenticity. So cultivating this is what we need to do. Cultivating a sense of safety, being ourselves, belonging to ourselves authentically and fully ourselves. And then that is how we live, how we lead, how we love at the edge of creativity in every moment.
Carla (17:04):
And I feel like this is really my question of creative blocks, safety.
MEgan (17:10):
Yes, 100% because you're out of alignment. If you think about when you're in alignment with yourself, you're tuned, it's connected, your energy is present in an embodied way, your gut, heart, and head are on the same team, you're in flow. And when there's not safety, we're out of alignment because we're looking, we're looking for what's going to keep us safe. So there's this energy moving out in different directions. And so yes, to come back into alignment with ourselves and rooting in and creating that safety, that is absolutely how you move through creative blocks, in my opinion.
Carla (17:59):
Magic. Thank you for sharing with us. I can't wait to, and I'm going to put into the universe part two of this conversation. How can we find you? How can we work with you? How can we support you?
MEgan (18:15):
All of my offerings are on my website. It's be- body-wise.com. And so I work with people in one-on-one coaching containers for a minimum of three months because it really takes that. I do speaking and workshops for companies that really care about the culture that they're creating. I'm an online course. I'm also offering intensives and psilocybin facilitation, and so you'll find all of that in any events that I'm doing on the website. And I recently started a Substack. I really love writing. I do enjoy it. There's so many pieces and I've just been in school around all of this.
Carla (18:57):
Thanks so much for tuning in to Nourishing Creativity. You can find me chef Carla Contreras across all social media platforms and more information in today's show notes. While you have your phone out, please leave a review on iTunes or Spotify. This is how others find this show. I really appreciate your support, sending you and yours so much love.