Do the Workout Witch's workouts... work?
Say that 5 times fast. Here's my experience taking her "trauma release" course for hips
This essay is just for paid subscribers of the Sunday Soother, of which you can become one here for $7 a month. I tend to write more about health, magic, wellness, the esoteric, and more personal things, than on my main Sunday Soother essays here, so if that’s up your alley, give it a shot!
You can also get these essays as part of the Sunday Soother membership, which is $33 a month, and includes two live calls (new moon circle, and a Tarot circle); a pre-recorded lesson, ritual or practice monthly; weekly Tarot forecasts; community; and an archive of many of my past workshops. You can sign up for that here.
Already a paid subscriber and want to change over to the monthly membership at $33 to get these essays, plus all the other goodness mentioned above? Here’s how to cancel a paid Substack subscription, then sign up for the full membership over here.
If you are a Sunday Soother Membership member, stay tuned, this full essay will be coming to you very shortly!
If you’re on Instagram, chances are good you’ve seen the Workout Witch’s account. Her name is Liz Tenuto, and she teaches somatic exercises meant to release trauma from one’s nervous system. She has over a million followers, and regularly posts Reels that talk about high cortisol, why you can’t stop doom scrolling, and more, that are extremely specific and extremely relatable.
She also has several somatic, 30-day courses for sale, that range from $57 to bundled, around $157.
Her concept is, which I 100% agree with, that stored emotions and trauma live in parts of our body and then our nervous system becomes deeply stressed out and dysregulated by trying to hold back these emotions and trying to prevent us from feeling them again, or remembering and experiencing the pain again. This manifests as pain, anxiety, depression, illness, stress, high cortisol and more.
Her belief is that by doing somatic exercises — aka, stretches and movements geared focus on specific parts of your body (she seems to focus on hips, shoulders and jaw) — that your nervous system can open, release the emotions so you can feel and process them, and then you can lower cortisol, feel calmer, less anxious, get out of freeze state, and overall feel more regulated.
She has lots of DMs as testimonials that say incredible things, like “Had the biggest emotional release on day 12 of your course and now I’m sleeping through the night for the first time in 15 years!” or “I had a massive release, I wept and wept, and now all my pain is gone!”
I actually bought one of her courses, the hips release course, like 2 years ago, and then promptly did not do it whatsoever. (Alas, the fate of so many online courses bought by my hopeful and impulsive ADHD brain…)
But the IG algorithm re-directed me to her content a few months ago and I remembered I had access to this course.
I was also doing a 21-day JournalSpeak challenge with some Sunday Soothers, and decided to pair it with the 30 days of her hips release course.
I’m now on Day 26 of the course and have done it pretty faithfully, so here’s what I can tell you.
Below I’ll share my likes, my dislikes, and any other relevant info that might be helpful, because I know many of you are thinking about taking one of these courses!
Let’s go…
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Sunday Soother to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.