About
Our passion and work at Integrative Body Solutions is to help those of you who are suffering from fixed patterns of trauma, distress, anxiety and shut down come back into your bodies. Through being personally attuned, skillful guidance and titrated renegotiation, we will assist you through a process where you will come back to your natural rhythms of regulation, build resiliency and realign to your inherent well-being.
Michael Sereda
My name is Michael Sereda and I am a cofounder of Integrated Body Solutions.
I have been on a journey for a very long time, over 40 years in fact which started when I was just a teenager. Unknowingly at the time I began a quest to know myself, to know my spiritual nature, to know my fully embodied nature, to know and experience these together in one unified self. In some real sense this has been the underbelly of my entire life’s work. Integrated Body Solutions is the fruition of my personal work and training towards this end. It is my offering of help to those who are suffering and looking to heal and unify their own dysregulated and divided self.
How I Got to This Life Work
As a precursor to studying traumatology and craniosacral healing, I recognized as a client myself the wisdom within the SE model and Craniosacral work. I experienced first-hand the power these modalities have towards renegotiating trauma, building resiliency and in utilizing the body’s deep intelligence. Healing my own infant trauma has required unwinding and navigating through deeply disruptive territory within myself. In doing my personal healing work, a groundwork has been laid, a capacity has been forged within me. I have become someone who’s strongest asset as a guide is not just what they have been taught through principled studies alone but equally through my first-hand experience of healing my own trauma.
The trainings I have taken in traumatology have helped both expand the territory and hone the array of skillful tools used in guiding others through the process. I can now sit in the foundation I have built, an embodied presence acting as a ballast to hold the space for my clients. With this anchor well established, I am open to respond to whatever is before me as I work with my clients I am available to employ the tools of traumatology with sensitivity, a curiosity, a kindness and an intelligent use of synthesis.
My Athleticism
From a very early age most of the central activities in my life have revolved around me being very engaged with my body. As early as I can remember I have always had a thrust in inside myself to be extremely physical, tactile and connected to the earth.
As a young teenager I developed a great passion for skiing, surfing and running. With years of thrill, practice and advancement in these sports, I eventually developed the ability to anchor deeply into my belly center, as an axis point from which all other movement was informed by. Through this axis point I discovered the “zone”, an opening into ease of proficiency, eloquence and thrill in the here and now. Knowing this kind of experience early on in my life established a deep trust that an intelligent, masterful and eloquent functioning can happen when direct wisdom within the body is the ultimate master. The role the mind plays in these activities is ultimately that of a servant to the body. Since those early days in sports I have integrated this practice into many areas throughout my life including when working with my clients.
Working With My Hands
From my early teens onward, I have always had an affinity and love for working with my hands. Whether it be through the craft of sculpture, working my cameras and equipment through photography, doing a home improvement building project, building a landscape garden or doing body work on my clients, my hands love to lead the way in expressing myself and bringing about more harmony and beauty to this world. When my passionate heart gets stirred, my hands invariably lead the way. The thousands upon thousands of hours in hand-eye-body coordination activity I have done over the years have established an equilibrium between my belly center and the rest of my body that has become one of the greatest hallmarks of who I am today.
Related Education
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Somatic Experiencing ®Training
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Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy Training
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Massage Training
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Student since 1989
Somatic Experiencing Training Institute - 3 years
Star Institute - 2.5 years
International Professional School of Bodywork - 4 months
Ridwhan Spiritual School
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30 years of steadfast meditation practice
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Thousands of hours of structured spiritual inquiry practice
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Development of a body of spiritual knowledge
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Higher mind intelligence opened in curiosity
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Reading and Study of large library of books in related fields.
Heidi Jakobsen
My name is Heidi Jakobsen and I am a cofounder of Integrative Body Solutions. I have been on the yoga journey since I was 29 years old when I experienced a lot of tension in my body and medical issues which to this day could not and still can not be explained by the medical system.
How I Got To This Life Work
My passion for yoga began in the spring of 1997 when I experienced my first classes at The Mindful Body in San Francisco. The profound effects from these classes provided a space for me to slow down, feel and foster personal change. Having experienced these benefits I continued to practice yoga as a beginner until 2000 while discovering a special love for music and nature. Thereafter, I went to my first yoga retreat in Mexico where I practiced yoga for 3 and 1/2 hours a day for one week with the yoga teacher Thomas Fortel. It was on this very retreat that I realized that I wanted to dedicate myself to becoming a yoga teacher.
Related Education
Sarah Powers Yoga Teacher Training
With Tias Little, George Feuerstein, Lisa Walford, Paul Grilley, Kathleen Miller, Nancy Evans, Maritza.
Yoga Studio, Mill Valley
January - June 2002
214 Hours
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The Art & Skill of Teaching (through language)
Yoga Garden, San Anselmo
July 2003
8 Hours
Anusara Training With Maritza
Yoga Studio, Larkspur
September - December 2004
100 - Hours
Heidi & Michael live in the Brentwood Bay B.C.
