Body Awakening® — An Intimate Journey
“I have never been a part of anything so transformational in my whole life and it’s something so tied to my self worth and pleasure. I’ve never ever been a part of a program that’s been so well done, has so much integrity and the information you’ve shared there’s been such a powerful amount of education so now I understand.” – D.M, Body Awakening® — An Intimate Journey, Practitioner participant
Body Awakening® began for me as a curious practice of self touch that I devoted time to, in an effort to learn to love myself. I’d spent years thinking something was wrong with me and longed to feel more. I wasn’t skilled at pleasuring myself so instead of trying to make my body respond in a specific way, I focused my attention on moving my fingers softly and slowly — feeling the different textures of my skin as I touched. It surprised me that the parts I was most ashamed of — stretch marks, fat, loose skin — actually offered the most sensations for my fingertips. As I continued to touch, my entire body began to awaken and soon became a playground of pleasure — from elbows, inner thighs, kneecaps to genitals. At times, the intensity of pleasure was so great, I learned to breathe in ways that allowed me to hover in the space between pleasure and orgasm for extended lengths of time. Continuing to play and explore, I discovered that by combining touch, breath and visualization I could spread pleasure anywhere in my body I brought my attention to— feeling sensations I hadn’t known existed.
When I began practicing this “awakening touch” with my new partner, neither of us had ever been touched by another person this way. The touch and the shared pleasure connected us deeply and also brought to the surface, insecurities, deeply held fears and resistances in both of us. This led to greater individual and shared awareness, as well as opportunities for powerful connection and healing within our relationship.
A few years later, I decided to offer this touch therapeutically, naming it Body Awakening — because that’s what happens when we are touched in a soft, slow and present way. Body Awakening touch is helpful for people who struggle with performance anxiety, dulled sensations, sexual functioning, body shame, disconnection from their body and those desiring “something more” — even if they don’t know what “more” could be. After offering this as a service for several years, I created Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey to teach individuals, couples and practitioners this style of touch. While Body Awakening touch as a technique may be simple, what comes up emotionally from it may not be.
With my support, we will begin this 9 month long journey in infancy —when we had our first experiences with touch. From there we journey forward to the present day — learning to attune to and explore our breath so that we can both feel more from touch and down regulate if it becomes too intense. We’ll learn about our nervous system, how it relates to sexual functioning and how to use this information to gently expand our capacity for intimacy. We’ll discover how imagery can support “feeling more” and develop our skills of attunement, consent, presence, communication, reverence and (of course) Body Awakening touch. This intimate journey will include learning to touch ourselves and others in the Body Awakening way, and how to carry forward this learning so we can awaken to life.
What inspired Body Awakening®?
Body Awakening as a modality was inspired by the symbiotic relationship I witnessed between attuned mothers and their infants in Kenya. Our initial experiences with attunement begin when we’re born and we attune to the sensations in our own bodies to feel our needs for safety, hunger, closeness, touch and more. Attuned caregivers seek to understand what their infant needs through skin-to-skin contact; touching, feeling, noticing and listening to their infant’s body so they can respond appropriately. A sense of safety is essential for infants to attune to themselves and this – along with how well their needs are attuned to by their caregivers – will impact their developing self-concept, body awareness, intimate experiences, capacity for feeling pleasure and inform their understanding of how important their needs are in relation to others. Unfortunately, not all infants grow up within the safety of an attuned relationship and the effects of this are evident in many of the adults I work with.
Ultimately what I’m doing in Body Awakening, is recreating in intimate settings, the attuned relationship between mother and child that helps infants feel safe enough to connect to the wisdom of their body and trust that the people caring for them will listen. The lack of self-attunement is at the core of many of our adult intimacy issues and, I believe, stems from the lack of attunement in our earliest relationships. As the person touching, your present attention to their body and their body’s signals provides them with a mirror into their inside world that they might not be aware of. Your outer reflection of their inner world, as expressed through their body, will offer them the safety needed to understand what gets in the way of their pleasure, self-awareness to recognize how this is being expressed through their body and ultimately awaken them to feeling greater sensations and deeper states of pleasure. To feel pleasure is to enjoy feeling, and in order to expand our capacity for feeling, we need to feel safe enough to attune to the sensations in our body that are awakened by this style of touch.
“Body Awakening has been a revelation for me, personally and professionally. As a certified Somatic Sex Educator working with clients for over 10 years, I felt I had turned over every stone offering new insights into embodied erotic awareness, arousal edging, awakening, pleasure, sensate focus, and down-regulating nervous system via touch. Body Awakening provided new lessons and somatic understanding in each of these realms at once.” – Rahi Chun, Somatic Sexual Wholeness
About Me
In my early twenties, I spent several years living amongst the Maasai tribe in East Africa and became fascinated with the way Maasai mothers attuned to their infants bodies to learn and understand their needs. Rather than thinking they knew what was best for their babies, they listened to them – feeling, noticing, and interpreting what their body was asking for – then responded accordingly. It was the most beautiful example of intimacy I had ever seen and I carried this example forward into parenting my own five children.
Learn More About Me
As my children grew up I realized that, having focused so many years on their needs, I’d been avoiding doing the same for myself. I felt completely disconnected from my own body and unsatisfied by the lack of pleasure in my sex life. I had no idea how to change these things within my relationship so I went to the source for answers – ME. Once again, following the example of the Maasai mamas, I applied their model of attunement to myself – devoting time daily to touching my body and listen to what it could tell me. The more I touched, the more I felt, and the more I felt the more I understood what my body needed to experience pleasure. Orgasms became plentiful and, while simply having them had once been revolutionary for me, I was now realizing I wanted something more. I practiced playing with my breath and using imagery to increase and plateau sensations of my touch – allowing me to edge orgasms and remain in extended states of pleasure for longer. My marriage ended and, when I expanded this practice into my new intimate relationship, we both experienced extended states of pleasure. Learning to reconnect to my own needs had allowed me to awaken my body and provided me with the attuned intimacy I had always longed for.
For the past nine years, I have supported hundreds of clients to connect to their bodies, explore pleasure and enhance their sexual intimacy. While I had been practicing Body Awakening informally in my personal life for several years, I was called to offer it as a therapy, when working with a client who required something beyond what my services provided. Since then, I have helped hundreds of clients learn to attune to their bodies, expand their capacity for pleasure and restore sexual functioning. My passion for this approach led me to design Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey so that individuals, couples and practitioners, couples can learn to embody these understandings and become empowered to apply the practices with their own bodies, in intimate relationships and professional settings. The Maasai mamas taught me that the answers to what our bodies need are within us, and have been within us all along, we just need the safety and connection required to listen. Will you join me in learning how?
“Natasha has developed a new sensate-focus modality that offers individuals greater agency and understanding of their own arousal system, practitioners a beautiful new toolbox of skills to add to their business, and couples endless adventures in arousal and pleasure without the distraction of being hijacked by goals or performance. I cannot recommend Body Awakening and Natasha as a facilitator/teacher highly enough.” – Rahi Chun, Somatic Sexual Wholeness
Who can benefit from Body Awakening® — An
Intimate Journey?
- Individuals and couples interested in gaining self-awareness, deepening their understanding of their body, arousal, pleasure, orgasm and expand their intimacy “toolbox.”
- Couples wanting to explore and play with their arousal and pleasure in a non-performance or goal-oriented way
- Couples interested in deepening their emotional and intimate connection, growing and learning together
- People wanting to learn to use their breath to feel more, enhance pleasure, spread sensations throughout their body and edge orgasms
- People interested in gaining understanding into what parts of intimacy feel safe/unsafe for them and how to widen their capacity to safely experience more
- People wanting to awaken their body to feeling more sensations
- People interested in learning how to curiously touch in a present and non-goal-oriented way
- Individuals and couples wanting to experience more pleasure
- People interested in developing a mindful touching practice
- People wanting “something more” in their sexual intimacy
- People wanting a safe space to talk about intimacy within a group
- People interested in learning how to use imagery to enhance and spread pleasure around their body
- Couples and individuals struggling with erectile dysfunction, premature ejaculation, difficulty orgasming, performance anxiety etc.
- Couples and individuals who are bored with their sexual intimacy
- People wanting to learn to attune to their own body and understand what they need to feel safe to experience optimum arousal in intimacy
- People wanting to learn to attune to other’s bodies
- Practitioners wanting to learn more about themselves in order to better support their clients
- Practitioners wanting to offer a new modality to support their clients with mind/body connection, enhancing sensations, building capacity for pleasure and restoring sexual functioning
“The breathing is so, so important. Not just for staying in pleasure but I notice myself doing it at work when I feel stressed or when someone’s around me that has bad energy. It’s crazy what I can handle when I breathe” – Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey, client
What’s Included In Body Awakening® — An Intimate Journey
This journey has online, in-person and certification options. The Online Body Awakening® — An Intimate Journey is foundational for all and stands alone. A 4 day, in-person, experiential journey will be held after the completion of the online journey for individuals interested in guided hands-on experience with attunement, presence, touch and supporting others to sustain high levels of arousal (if applicable). For those seeking certification, the online journey, in-person experiential journey, Deepening your practice weekend and further learning assessments are required.
The 9-month live, online journey includes 3 Explorations: Attuning to Self, Attuning to Another and Awakening to Life. Within these 3 Explorations are 18 modules, 16 live (and recorded) Zoom calls and multiple demo videos designed to support you to embody and apply the Body Awakening principles with yourself, intimate partners, clients and life.
Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey begins March, 3rd 2026!
Attuning to Self
This exploration will begin in infancy, inquiring if and how your earliest environments supported the safety and closeness needed for you to attune to yourself and be attuned to. From here, you will learn how those early experiences with attunement formed your “window of capacity” and how it relates to your adult experiences with pleasure, orgasm and sexual functioning. You will then learn to attune to your breath, discovering your baseline and recognizing it as a tool for self-awareness and understanding. With this discovery you will learn to change your baseline and breathe in ways that support safety, feeling more and expanding your capacity for pleasure. From here you will begin to curiously and mindfully explore the sensations of your body using slow, soft and present touch. As your capacity for feeling more increases, so will your pleasure and you will learn (if you wish) to combine breath, touch and imagery to identify the edge of your orgasm, plateau and prolong sensations of pleasure and develop an understanding of what your body needs for optimal sexual functioning. The self-awareness you develop through attuning to your own body, breath and thoughts that get in the way of your ability to remain present, will be essential to your ability to safely attune to another.
Attuning to Another
In this exploration, you will learn how to apply your understandings from Attuning to Self, to Attuning to Another by embodying the qualities of an attuned caregiver. You will begin the process of attuning to others with an attunement conversation where you will become curious about their body language, experiences in infancy and intimacy as well as what they’re hoping to gain from Body Awakening. This conversation will support your understanding of them as well as promote safety as you prepare to begin touching. You will practice with them attuning to what “yes” and “no” feel like as sensations in your bodies to further support trust and safety for both of you. Just as you learned to attune to your own breath, you will learn to attune to theirs, identifying their baseline way of breathing and supporting them to create a new baseline that allows them to feel more. From this, you will learn to connect to a place of reverence towards them, their body and their stories as you apply the same soft, slow touch that you practiced on yourself. You will curiously discover different ways and parts to touch that increase sensations for both your hands and the body of the person(s) you touch. You will learn how to apply trauma-informed practice including safety considerations, things that can show up in their body or yourself and how Body Awakening can be a corrective experience for people who’ve experienced trauma. Throughout these practices, you will be reminded of the importance of being present and mindful for both you as the giver of touch, and for them, the receivers of the touch. You will learn how to identify shifts in your own baseline as well as theirs that signify a lack of presence and be able to support both of you to come back to that. As their “window of capacity” begins to expand, you will provide the safety and encouragement for them to expand it further through a combination of touch, breath and imagery. If applicable, you can safely guide them to discover their own edge of orgasm, learn to plateau that edge to prolong their pleasure and discover what their body needs for optimal sexual functioning. Interwoven throughout these two explorations are continual opportunities for self-attunement, reflection and learning.
Awakening to Life
In this final exploration, you will integrate your learnings by applying the Body Awakening principles to Awaken To Life. When you Awaken To Life, every moment holds within it an opportunity to experience pleasure. This exploration also provides practitioners with ways to support their clients to continue their awakenings and ways for individuals and couples to carry forward the practices into their intimacy.
The Online Body Awakening® — An Intimate Journey Includes:
- 200-plus page Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey book detailing all that you need to learn and understand in order to practice Body Awakening alone, in intimate relationships and with clients
- 16 live (and recorded) 2hr Zoom sessions over the course of 9 months, designed to guide and support your understanding from the explorations and modules
- The Intimate Journey begins March 3rd, 2026 and zooms dates are as follows: March 17th, March 31st, April 14, April 28th, May 12th, May 26th, June 9th, June 30th, July 21st, Aug. 18th, Sept 1st, Sept. 15th, Sept. 29th, Oct. 13, Oct. 27th, Nov. 10.
- Self-reflection exercises for each module to support integration of learning
- Video demo of attuning to breath
- Video demo of attuning to touch with self and others
- Video demos of widening capacity for feeling pleasure through edging and plateauing pleasure using breath, touch and imagery
- Video demo of working with trauma
- Recorded audio of guided visualization practices
- Homework to practice for integration of learnings
- Group support in Signal
- Couples are welcome to take the journey together (refer to fees for couples)
- Option to attend an in-person, hands on Body Awakening Experiential journey to practice and gain more confidence in your skills of attunement/touch etc.
- To get the full benefits of this journey, anticipate spending 32hrs for zoom learning, plus approximately 51hrs of reading, practice and videos through the duration of the 9 months. This works out to a time commitment of approximately 2.5hrs/week.
The In Person Journey Includes:
- 4 day in-person practice in November, 2026, Saskatoon, SK. Canada (dates TBD)
- Lunch and snacks for the duration of the 4 days
- In-person demonstrations to support your learning
- Practice attuning to another’s baseline breath, supporting them to create a new baseline and teaching expanded breathing practices with partner in the group and volunteer from outside the group
- Hands-on practice attuning to touch, using different parts and in different ways with partner in the group and volunteer from outside the group
- Practice supporting others to use imagery to enhance their pleasure
- Practice supporting others to combine touch, breath and imagery to enhance their pleasure
- Gain hands-on experience with Trauma-informed practice
- Practice with edging and high states of arousal depending on interest and consent
- My guidance, expertise and help with everything pertaining to practicing Body Awakening with clients or in your intimate relationships
- Accommodations not included
- Registration for in-person journey open until August 1st.
- Note: In-person journey open to individuals, couples and practitioners. Individuals and practitioners in training will be partnered with others in the group as well as volunteer participants. Couples will be partnered with each other.
Deepening Your Practice Weekend Includes:
- 3 day in-person practice in Spring 2027, Saskatoon, SK. Canada (dates TBD)
- Lunch and snacks for both days
- Deepening the practices from In-Person Experiential Journey
The Body Awakening® — An Intimate Journey Certification Includes:
- Everything included in the online Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online Journey
- 200-plus page Practitioners manual
- 4 day in-person Body Awakening Training
- 3 day Deepening Your Practice weekend
- 3, 1 on 1 Zoom or in-person sessions with Natasha spread over the course of the training
- 3, Body Awakening personal sessions facilitated by Natasha
- Written record of required practice sessions
- Feedback on submitted self-reflection and “Integration Understanding” questions
- Regular contact, check-ins and mentorship with Natasha through voice messaging
- Take home final exam
- Approximately an additional 1-2hrs/week required for answering “Integration Understanding” questions and practice. Total time commitment of approximately 4-5hrs/week
- 1.5-year time allowance to complete the training requirements (barring exceptional circumstances)
Fees
Returning Participants:
- Individuals — $500 + GST
- Couples — $700 + GST
Individual Online Journey:
- Regular price – $1700 CDN + GST
Couples Online Journey:
- Regular price – $2100 CDN + GST
In Person Experiential Journey (late Nov. date TBA):
- Individuals — $1550 CDN + GST
- Couples — $1950 + GST
- Note: Couples will be partnered with each other
Deepening Your Practice Weekend (Spring 2027 date TBA):
- Individuals — $1100 + GST
- Couples — $1500 + GST
- Note: This weekend is part of the certification training and is also open to Individuals and couples interested in deepening their hands on practice and integrating their learnings.
Certification Training:
- $6500 CDN + GST
- Note: Individuals registered in the Online Journey who wish to transfer to Certification Training may do so as long as they can meet the additional requirements before the In-Person Training
*payment plan available on request
*payment via e-transfer is preferred. An additional 4% fee will be added to payments made through PayPal to cover their transaction fees.
FAQs
- How much time will this journey take? There are 18 modules in this journey and included in them are 16, 2hr live Zoom sessions between March 17th and November 10th 2026. In addition to each Zoom there will be 1-4hrs of reading, practice and videos to watch per module which amounts to 1-2hrs/week. If you’re not pursuing certification, you’re welcome to do as little or as much as you like, while keeping in mind that you will get back what you put in. For individuals pursuing certification, more time in addition to the Zooms will be required, approximately 4hrs/week.
- Cancellation Policy: Transfer of tuition to a following year’s journey can be provided under certain circumstances, however no refunds will be offered.
- Do I need a background in sex and intimacy to do this journey? No, you don’t. Anyone and everyone can benefit from this journey and it is designed to meet the needs of participants of all backgrounds.
- Can I do this journey with my partner? Yes, you and your partner are welcome to enroll in the Online Journey and In-person experiential learning.
- Is the manual downloadable/printable? Yes, it is, and I encourage every participant to download and print it to support their practices and understandings.
- How long will I have access to the content for? You will have access to your manual forever if you download it, and the rest of the journey will be accessible to you for 1 year from the start date.
- How long can I take to complete certification? Under normal circumstances, you have 1 year to complete certification. If there are any extenuating circumstances preventing this, please talk to me.
- What’s the difference between getting certified or not? If you become certified you can legally call yourself a Body Awakening Practitioner and offer this as a service to clients. Without certification, you can’t do that. As well, the certification process is more extensive and in-depth which will support the deepening of your skills and confidence in practicing Body Awakening.
- Do I need other training in Sex and Intimacy to offer this to clients? The certification training is designed for practitioners to develop the skills that they need to offer Body Awakening to clients within that scope of practice. As certified practitioners we can all benefit from additional trainings in Body Work, Sex and Intimacy Counselling etc. as well as life experiences that enhance our understandings and limit our biases. * Note: The Body Awakening Online Journey by itself does not qualify you to offer this to clients.
- If I have a lot of trauma, can I still do this journey? Yes, absolutely. This means you do as much of the self-reflection and practice as feels safe for your body while at the same time, supporting the widening of your window of capacity. This means you need to only go as far as is safe for your body while at the same time, supporting the widening of your edges. This journey however does not take the place of individual therapy that may be necessary to integrate and heal your trauma.
- If I’m already a practitioner, how can this journey complement my work? From my experience, there is nothing even close to Body Awakening offered by anyone. This journey is unique and one of a kind and will complement existing Body work beautifully – especially with clients struggling to connect with their body, want to feel more and who desire optimal sexual arousal and functioning.
- If I don’t have a partner, can I still do this journey? Yes, the foundation of this journey is based on attuning to yourself and requires only you to do that. For the Attuning to Another exploration, it will be helpful to have someone to practice with (not required) and they can be a friend, child, elderly person etc. Body Awakening supports attunement and expanding capacity which can involve sexual touch but isn’t limited to it. As well, this journey will support any future intimate experiences you may have.
Testimonials from Body Awakening Participants
“What I’m taking from this course is the permission to want to expect safety and presence and reverence, and letting go of the role that I put myself in of being able to read minds and body language. To have some words for inviting the other person to speak up for themselves and inviting them to listen to what I have to say. Permission to explore yes’s and no’s and realize that some of them aren’t going to be full yes’s to everything or full no’s to everything, that it’s ok and it’s a good thing to break stuff up sometimes. I’m ok with this, but not ok with that. A better idea of what a healthy intimate relationship could look like and a lot of tools for how to coax that into being.” – T.A, Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online and In Person participant
“You’ve brought so much to my life. Really what’s impacted me the most is learning that instead of trying to make something feel good, I can just follow what does.” – A.A – Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online participant
“My body is a gift and so are the bodies of others…… My breath is always with me and is the most powerful, accessible tool for managing my edges and feeling my feelings…..I don’t have to know everything, have the answers, the perfect knowledge or approach to anything — presence and curiosity are all I need to figure out what to do in a moment or where to go next.” – K.A, Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online and In Person participant
“All parts of this course guided me towards myself; it continues to offer me an expanded spectrum of available insights: sensorily, emotionally, and interpersonally. I am ever grateful for this guided time inwards amongst companions.” – L. Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online participant
“Body Awakening is a program of self discovery. I learned SO much about myself. It’s constant self discovery. The knowledge and learning was so impactful but I loved that there’s so much space in the self-reflections to bring the knowledge back to myself and personalize it so I can understand myself better.” – D.A, Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Practitioner participant
“We both really enjoyed the course. The most valuable thing I’ve taken is just being present and how nice it is to give and receive touch. I probably undervalued it before and now I’m better able to value it and appreciate it. We’ve shared months of happy tears.” – T.S, Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online participant couple
“We’re really learning to be present and communicate. We’re recovering in our arguments much quicker because it’s easier for us to repair and communicate and that’s something we’ve learned through being present and through the breath and through your presence with us. Thank you for showing us the way. We’ve got the tools so thank you for giving us this foundation.” J.F, Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online participant couple
“The key is in the curiosity” – D.M, Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Practitioner participant
“I have appreciated the space you’ve all held for me and allowed me to share. It’s been really difficult for me but I’m going away with very curious thoughts and just wanting to hold that really sacred space for myself to continue to learn. This book is going to be a good reference because it’s been a very pivotal workbook to deep dive into stuff I wouldn’t have thought to ask or do. Going into a relationship and knowing how you want it to look and what you’re going to ask for yourself and not just the other person. I’m really looking forward to it and the journey.” – B.J, Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online participant
“Body Awakening is a path to follow that opens up new growth, understanding and possibility in my relationship to myself and my intimate relationships with others. It’s a gentle path but at the same time it challenges me to learn what I am capable of through attunement, breath and touch. All aspects of my life have become richer because of the learning I have done as I walked the Body Awakening path.”
~K.A. Body Awakening — An Intimate Journey Online and In Person participant
“Do this course. Don’t even think twice, just do it. Your future self will be incredibly grateful.”
– B.T, Body Awakening® — An Intimate Journey participant