External Resourcing is a somatic practice that invites you to connect with something carrying a positive, pleasant, loving or supportive quality. Your resource may be an object in your environment, a person, an animal, a place, a memory, a spiritual figure or something from your imagination.
You will explore its sensory and emotional qualities before noticing how your body responds while remaining connected with it. Through attention, sensation and breath, the practice invites you to receive the quality of the resource and allow it to settle within your body.
External Resourcing can help you become more familiar with recognising and accessing experiences of support, connection and safety. Like Internal Resourcing, it offers a gentle foundation for grounding, regulation and approaching more activating experiences with greater support.
When this practice may be supportive
- When you feel activated, overwhelmed or disconnected from your body.
- When numbness or intense activation makes an internal resource difficult to recognise.
- When connection with an object, person, place or memory feels more accessible than beginning within the body.
- When you want gentle support for grounding and regulation between somatic sessions or before approaching more activating experiences.
Before You Begin
Choose a quiet place where you can remain undisturbed. You may practise seated or lying down with your body comfortably supported.
Your resource may be an object or photograph in your environment, or a person, animal, place or experience held in memory or imagination.
This is a gentle exploration. You can pause, change position, reduce the intensity or stop at any moment.
Listen to the Practice
This practice is offered for personal use through the Healing Art website. Please do not download, reproduce or redistribute the recording without permission.
Read the transcript
Welcome. Let us practise External Resourcing.
Take a moment to find a comfortable position. You may sit or lie down, allowing your hands to rest somewhere comfortable.
Notice the support beneath your body: the touch of the floor, chair or mattress. Allow yourself a moment to simply arrive. There is nothing you need to change.
External Resourcing begins by connecting with something that carries a positive, pleasant, loving or supportive quality for you. Your resource might be something in your present environment like a beautiful object or colour, a plant or a photograph. It could also be a memory of a beloved person, an animal, a favourite place, a spiritual figure or something from your own imagination. Take a moment to notice what comes to you.
There is no need to search for the perfect resource. Choose something that feels available to you in this very moment. Something that carries even a subtle sense of comfort, connection, steadiness, love or pleasure.
If your resource is present in the room, allow yourself to gently look at it. If you are connecting with a memory or an imagined resource, you may close your eyes if that feels comfortable or you can keep them open with a soft gaze.
Begin to give your attention to the resource. Notice the colours. The shape. The texture. The way light meets it.
If you are remembering a person, place or experience, allow some of its sensory qualities to become available to your awareness. What do you see? What do you hear? What is the temperature? Is there a particular scent, texture or movement? You don’t need to reconstruct every detail. Allow the qualities that feel most supportive or alive to become clear. Notice if there’s an emotional quality connected with this resource. Perhaps it carries warmth, tenderness, beauty, strength, protection, belonging, freedom, joy… Or it may be something different for you. As you remain connected with the resource, begin to notice how your body responds. What happens in your breathing? What do you notice in your face, throat, chest or belly? Perhaps something softens. Maybe your breath opens a little. You might notice warmth, spaciousness, steadiness or a subtle sense of being more present. You may also notice only a very small response. There is no particular sensation that you need to create. Remain curious about what is actually here. Allow your attention to rest with the sensations that feel supportive or pleasant. Give your body time to receive and experience them. Now begin to notice your breathing while remaining connected with the resource. There is no need to make the breath especially deep. Simply allow it to move inside you. With your next inhalation, imagine receiving the quality of the resource through your breath. Perhaps you are breathing in its warmth, colour, strength, love or another quality that feels meaningful to you. As you exhale, allow that quality to settle into your body. Breathing in, receive the resource. Breathing out, allow it to settle. You might imagine the resource gradually spreading through your chest, belly, back, arms and legs. There is no correct way to visualise or experience this. Follow what feels natural for you. Continue breathing with the resource in your own rhythm. Allow your system time to receive the experience. Notice whether the quality of the resource has become available anywhere within your body. Perhaps you can now experience it as a sensation, a colour, an image, a movement or an atmosphere. Remain here for a few more breaths. Receiving the resource as you inhale. Allowing it to settle as you exhale. Now begin to prepare for the end of the practice. Let go of the visualisation or image gradually while noticing what remains present within you. Feel the support beneath your body once again. Become aware of the room and the sounds around you. If your eyes are closed, allow them to open slowly. Let your gaze move through the environment. Notice colours, shapes and light. Gently move your fingers and toes. Allow any other movement your body needs. Before continuing with your day, notice your experience as it is now. Has anything shifted in your breathing, muscular tone or quality of attention? What quality of the resource remains available to you? There is no right answer. Simply notice what is present. Thank you for practising External Resourcing with me. Have a great continuation of your day.
After the Practice
Notice whether anything has shifted in your breathing, muscular tone or quality of attention. Notice whether some quality of the resource remains available within you.
External Resourcing may be repeated whenever it feels supportive. Regular practice can make it easier to recognise which people, places, memories, objects or imagined presences offer meaningful support.
Origin and Credits
Created by Giulio D’Anna. Draws on the principle of resourcing taught within Somatic Experiencing, developed by Peter A. Levine.