We were lucky to catch up with Riley Galvin recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Riley, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?
The Unbecoming Journey came to me in a dream, I woke up in the middle of the night and wrote it down. The following day, I created all social media platforms with that name and bought the website address Theunbecomingjourney.org. I had no idea what it was going to be for, but I knew that it would come to me. A month later I enrolled in a trauma-informed somatic body-based certification program after leaving my teaching career.
When you are in the healing profession you are your first client. I had been on my own healing journey for two years prior, and when I thought about the transformation I had made for myself the best way to describe it was The Unbecoming Journey. Learning how to love myself, learning how to change the way I saw myself wasn’t by adding things in. My healing journey was taking everything out, looking at it, unlearning, uncovering, and being unattached to what I thought was the truth. I was unbecoming the person I felt I needed to be, was taught to be and guided to be, and I started tuning into what I desired. The more I let go, the more I learned about myself. The more I uncovered the more I forgave. The more I unattached the more I became safe in my body to create change. That is The Unbecoming Journey.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
My name is Riley I am the owner and creator of The Unbecoming Journey, a Trauma-Informed Somatic Practice. Soma means in the body, and as we have all heard the saying “The body keeps score of what the mind endures” somatic practice is healing from the energetics of the body to the mind.
Our bodies will do whatever it takes to keep us safe. Our bodies hold on to our lived experiences, and the side effects and symptoms manifest their way into our daily lives. This looks like chronic illness, emotional regulation, and our relationship with ourselves and others. It affects how we view the world around us, how we approach situations and the beliefs that we have about our worth. It affects our ability to have healthy boundaries, and safe relationships, how we parent our children, and so much more. Somatics is a practice where people can heal from the body and the mind by tuning into the frequency of that past experience and meeting the need of that part in real-time, allowing it to be released.
My whole life I have only ever wanted to be a teacher, and for 8 years that is exactly what I have done. I went to Iowa State University for my Bachelor’s in elementary education and Special education. I have loved teaching, and working with children has taught me so much about myself. What I am capable of and the type of love this world needs. I was driven, and I wanted to do more in my school district. I went back to Drake University for my Masters’s Degree in Urban Education (Social Justice and Equity). I wanted to create change in our school and I applied to oversee our behavior program, I got it, and I coached sports, and ran our Equity team.
I was 29 with my dream job, in my dream career field, living in a beautiful apartment, and surrounded by all my friends. Then the panic attacks started. As I said, “The body keeps score of what the mind endures”. I was burnt out, overwhelmed, and living with anxiety as my identity. I turned to help, I began seeing a therapist who recommended that I start to meditate. She told me that I was disconnected from my body and that my healing would come from the body. I couldn’t sit still for longer than two min let alone meditate. Each time I tried my mind wandered, it didn’t feel safe or relaxing. I wanted to heal, I wanted to feel better, and I wanted to get to the root of my stress. I found somatics, and it changed my life so much that I went back to school and I have made a career out of it.
The Unbecoming Journey is foundational healing for those who seek it. I am certified to work with clients across the globe in somatic practice. Clients work with me one on one online for an hour weekly and stick with me as long as they feel called. I also hold 8-week group workshops for those who want to dip their toes into somatic work. What is beautiful about this somatic practice is I am there to guide you and create a safe space for you to tap into your body, memories, experiences, and desires and help you to develop the tools to step into your power and live a full life. Clients come to me to heal trauma, PTSD, sexual experiences, childhood events, relationships, etc. Clients come to me to work on finding internal peace, how to be fully present in their body, to create spaciousness in their day-to-day life. At the core of it, clients come to me because they want to live a life full of love and fulfillment. What makes me different then a therapist is that I am not here to diagnose you or give you a treatment plan. I am here to support you, guide you toward healing, and met you where you are each and every day.
The Unbecoming Journey welcomes any human who is ready to step into themselves fully. As a former teacher, it is important to note that I also work with teens 14 and up. If you are a caretaker who feels as though your child is in need of healing, here is where you can find it. My goal is to give you the healing, skills, and tools you need to be successful on your own.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
The Unbecoming Journey is how I describe my healing journey. Anyone who has been on a healing journey will tell you that it is not what you gain but what you let go of that makes the biggest impact. In my personal journey, I had to learn how to just be, how to receive from others, and stop pleasing others before myself. When you start your unbecoming journey and begin somatic healing you identify your core beliefs, which develop as a child in your subconscious mind. “I am not enough, I am going to be left behind”. This was my core belief and I did not realize how much of an impact it had on the way I was living. To change my life, I had to unlearn this belief and not let it control my actions. I began to see my patterns, people pleasing, being the doer, making myself indisposable, and overworking myself to be seen. The more I began to heal these patterns and see my worth not by what I can accomplish for others but by who I am for myself. I began to feel my worth, and see my abilities, and it led me to want to guide others on how to experience the same transformation through somatic practice. This unlearning and letting go gave me the confidence to open my own business.
We’d love to hear about how you keep in touch with clients.
Safety, transparency, support, collaboration, empowerment, and cultural/gender awareness are the 6 key principles that I use in my trauma-informed practice. This is important so I can create and maintain a healthy relationships with my clients. My number one priority is safety during a session with clients, and following my client’s intuition and boundaries. Having full transparency in my practice is important as it creates a healthy power dynamic between the client and me while reminding them I am not here to judge them I am here to hold space for healing to occur. Creating a support system for my client is essential, finding someone in their life that is safe for them to process with outside of our session, in cases where the client does not feel safe with others, I have my clients communicate with me via email in between sessions. for transformation to truly occur the client has to be willing to do the work, which means working with me and being open in and out of session. My job is to empower clients to use their voices, create healthy boundaries, and express themselves in a safe way. understanding and educating myself on the client’s background is crucial as the client’s personal experiences affect the way they view the world. By following these principles in my practice I am able to develop safety, understanding, and growth for my clients which leads me to strengthen my relationships with clients.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.theunbecomingjourney.org
- Instagram: @theunbecomingjourney
- Facebook: @theunbecomingjourney