There are two Realms that I consider to be the Realms of connection: The Muscle Realm and the Nervous System Realm.

The Realm of Muscle, Connection, and Relationship is an elastic energy that shows us how we are in connection to people and resources; The Nervous System and Soul Realm is one of electrical conductivity and shows us how we are communicating within ourselves, with our external world, and in our soul/human relationship.

I often consider the relationship between the two Realms of Connection, and reflect on the shifts I’ve noticed in my own body when I work in one or the other. 

I’ve worked deeply through the Muscle Realm twice – the first when it came into being in my body of work, the second when it called me back during a deep time of personal change. Each time, I’ve noticed how my tone of voice changed, facial expressions shifted, and the ways in which I’m freer with my words and emotions than before. 

The first time I worked with the Muscle Realm, I shifted my functional freeze response — the second time, my fawn response.

Work in the Muscle Realm intricately connects with your Nervous System and facilitates deep and lasting change in both. 

How Do Two Separate Realms Connect 

The Realms of Embodiment can function both like a ladder or like a fractal. But in neither of these views is it obvious how two Realms would interact so specifically and directly. So let’s start with how the Realms have always presented themselves to me and numbered themselves (even though there is no hierarchy).

1. Realm 1: Bone + Foundation
2. Realm 2: Muscle, + Connection, and Relationship
3. Realm 3:  Fluid and Spirit Movement+ Flow
4. Realm 4: Organ, Emotion, and Ecosystem + Rhythm
5. Realm 5: The Nervous System and Soul + Frequency
6. Realm 6: DNA + Quantum

Now, imagine drawing a horizontal dividing line between Realms 3 and 4. They’d split into two sets of three, not unlike the trigrams of the I’Ching, Human Design, and the Gene Keys.

Similar to those frameworks, the “first three” Realms are personal, and the second three are transpersonal.

An interesting pattern emerges when we look at them that way.

Realms 1 and 4 are independent (string lines and grids) and interdependent (networks).

Realms 2 and 5 are connection (elasticity) and communication (electricity).

Realms 3 and 6 are omnipresent (wave) and omniscient (particle).

This is why working in the Muscle Realm has a reciprocal connection to working with your nervous system. They’re essentially paired Realms with a personal or transpersonal expression.

The Muscle Realm and Your Nervous System

But even knowing what I know and seeing these Realms how I do, I didn’t fully recognize the power of this until I saw my own ingrained nervous system patterns shift so drastically.

It’s like the difference between having a hypothesis and then seeing the results come back from an experiment, and they’re even better than you hoped.

Nervous system shifts aren’t all just happenstance because the Realms are interrelated, though. Energy work in Embodied Realms often begins by holding and supporting the nervous system as a way to drop into the Muscle Realm.

Because these two are so closely paired, if the nervous system isn’t settled, the Muscle Realm isn’t receptive to shifting. The same can be said of the inverse.

Suppose you’ve been doing a ton of nervous system work and don’t seem to be making progress with your outer world and ability to connect to your everyday life. In that case, it’s likely because you need to access and address your Muscle Realm in order for the nervous system to integrate.

Likewise, if you’ve been working on relationships, connections, and resources but can’t seem to hold it or make a tangible shift, it’s likely because your Nervous System doesn’t have the capacity for what you’re envisioning or working towards.

Recognizing where you’ve been focused and what you may have overlooked is an important step to creating congruence between these two Realms and shifting the larger ingrained patterns in your Nervous System (as well as the one in your connection to people and resources!)

These two Realms have a massive impact on how you understand self-regulation, co-regulation, safety in solitude, and safety in community. It’s a beautiful interplay, and when you can access both and grow in the personal and transpersonal ways they ask of you, it unlocks a lot of ways we get stuck when we focus on only one or the other.

Let’s explore these two Realms together in an Energy Archaeology Session – a one-on-one somatic energy work session in the Realms of Embodiment. Click here to get started.