Emma Toms - The Confident Wellness Coach

14/08/2026

For almost 30 years, I thought healing meant finding the right thing to fix what I was feeling.

Another treatment. Another change. Better food. Yoga. Meditation. Supplements. Trying harder to manage stress.

And many of those things helped. Some enormously.
But something was missing.

Nobody had ever really encouraged me to become curious about what was happening underneath it all.

What had my body adapted to?

What patterns had become so familiar I didn't even recognise them as stress anymore?

What was I carrying emotionally?

What happened neurologically when something in the present touched something deeply familiar?

And what would happen if, instead of constantly overriding my body, I actually learned how to listen to it?

That was where things began to change.

Understanding nervous system regulation, working with emotional patterns, IEMT, somatic practices and developing interoception gave me something I'd been missing for years, relationship with my own body.

Not another set of rules to follow.
Not another wellness routine to get right.
A way of noticing myself.
And slowly, I began to step back into my life again.

More present. More grounded. More able to recognise when I was moving into old patterns and, importantly, more able to choose what happened next.

This is a huge part of why I do the work I do now.

We cannot go backwards and rewrite what happened to us.
But we can begin to understand what the body learned along the way.

And we can teach it something new.
Sometimes healing isn't about becoming someone new at all.

It's about finding your way back to yourself.

If you are looking for support to return to yourself drop me a DM or email me [email protected].

All links in bio

14/08/2026

Sometimes change is very quiet.

You remember something that used to flood your body and notice that it doesn't have quite the same grip.

You have the conversation and don't spend the next three hours replaying it.

Something goes wrong and you recover a little faster.

You walk into the room you've been avoiding.

You say no without writing an essay explaining why.

You sit still and don't feel the need to become productive again.

Your heart doesn't race.

Your shoulders aren't sitting somewhere around your ears.

You suddenly realise:

Ohhhh. This feels different.

One person who experienced IEMT during one of my workshops contacted me afterwards.

She had spoken several times about the experience we'd worked with and noticed that each time there was less emotion attached to it.

Then she told colleagues the story.
And her heart didn't race.

That's the bit I love.
We're not trying to erase the past.
We can't.

But our relationship with what has happened can change.

The memory can remain while the body no longer has to respond with quite the same intensity.

And sometimes you don't realise how far you've come until life quietly presents you with something that once felt impossible and your body answers differently.

Looking for support with past negative memories, difficult emotions or negative identity imprints like "I'm not good enough" drop me a message or email me. Links to book in bio .

I'll be delivering a workshop for Castlemilk Wellbeing Hub CIC
On 22nd August. Follow them to book and out more about IEMT and nervous system regulation

14/08/2026

"August in Scotland always feels different than at home in Lincolnshire. Of course the climate is totally different but also the schools go back earlier and there is always a bit more of a tinge of Autumn that begins about now. I really love it

Summer is of course still here, we have just had the sun come out beautifully again. and it feels lovely. The evenings are still long and the midges are still in place.

But there is subtle shift. The light has changed. The temperature a little cooler in the mornings and the evenings and there isn’t quite the same warmth in the sun that there was a few weeks ago. Not everybody notices it, but I do."

https://emmatoms.substack.com/p/the-living-body-journal-field-notes-cb5?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=18e95h

13/08/2026

We don’t always recognise stress because it doesn’t always feel like stress. Sometimes it just feels like life.

There’s an old analogy about two young fish swimming along when an older fish passes them and says, “Morning. How’s the water?”

The two fish swim on for a while before one turns to the other and asks: "What the hell is water?”

And I think about this often when we talk about chronic stress.

When you’ve lived in something for long enough, you stop noticing it.

The rushing.
The overthinking.
The constant doing.
The inability to sit still.
The tension you barely notice you’re holding.
The need to keep everyone happy.
The feeling that there is always something else to do.

It's the water that you grew in.

And because you can cope, you work, exercise, socialise, raise families, build careers and get on with things — you might genuinely say: “I’m not stressed.”

But stress isn’t only a feeling.
It is also a physiological state.

And sometimes the first sign that we’ve been swimming in stressful waters for too long isn’t a thought saying I’m stressed.

It’s the body beginning to speak.

Poor sleep.
Exhaustion.
Irritability.
Digestive changes.
Tension.
Anxiety.
Feeling wired but tired.
Finding it strangely difficult to simply be still.

Part of the work I do is helping people notice the water. So we become can begin asking the question...

What has become so normal to me that I no longer notice it?

Awareness changes things.

We don't need to keep swimming harder, but by noticing how the water your swimming in is affecting you.

DM me for details of working together

12/08/2026

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12/08/2026

There is space in my diary today that I wasn't expecting to have. Rather than immediately filling it , which I normally would, I'm going to let it stay quiet.

It feels strangely appropriate on the day of a solar eclipse.

I'm fascinated in the spiritual language around days like this, but I'm increasingly interested in a simpler question...

What happens in the body when we actually stop?

Because we can light the candles, journal, pull the cards, set the intentions and talk about transformation but eventually it has to become embodied.

Can I soften my shoulders?
Can I breathe without trying to change my breath?
Can I tolerate a little space without immediately filling it?
Can I become quiet enough to notice what I actually need?

I've been writing about this a lot in The Living Body Journal on Substack this idea that slowing down isn't about doing less for the sake of it.

Sometimes we slow down because we need enough space to see.

To notice where we are.
What has changed.
What no longer fits.
And what the right next step might be.

An eclipse is, physically, a passing shadow. The Sun hasn't disappeared. Its light hasn't gone anywhere.

Something simply moves between us and it for a while.

I love that as a metaphor for humaness

Not everything that darkens our world means the light has gone.

Sometimes we just need to stay still long enough to watch the shadow pass.

And listen to the body while we do. 🌑

The Living Body Journal free and paid on Substack.
The Living Body Course starts in October.

I'd love to see you there. Link in bio

11/08/2026

Another great review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

11/08/2026

Loved this episode with Chris Freer

Would you like to be a guest on a future episode? Drop us an email ...

11/08/2026

When I was diagnosed with autoimmune disease at seventeen, nobody spoke to me about my brain. They spoke about my eyes, my immune system, and medication. They explained that my body was attacking itself...

10/08/2026

You don't have to keep carrying what happened years ago.

Many of the members of Men Matter Scotland I work with tell me the same thing.

"I know I should be over it."
"I don't know why I still react like this."
"I don't really want to talk about it anymore, I just want it to stop affecting my life."

The truth is, trauma, stress and difficult experiences don't only live in our thoughts. They leave an imprint on our nervous system.

That's why you can feel constantly on edge, struggle with anger, anxiety, shame, guilt, nightmares, or always expect the worst, even when life has changed.

Integral Eye Movement Techniques (IEMT) works differently.

Rather than repeatedly reliving the past, it helps reduce the emotional charge attached to memories and the identity patterns that can develop from them. As these emotional imprints change, many people notice that situations which once triggered them no longer have the same hold.

Over the past year at Men Matter Scotland, I've seen men experience profound changes through IEMT. Better sleep. Fewer nightmares. Less anxiety. More confidence. A greater sense of calm. The ability to move forward instead of feeling trapped by what happened years ago.

Healing isn't about forgetting your past.

It's about making sure your past no longer dictates your present.

My new days are Tuesday.

From Tuesday 11th August, my Men Matter Scotland clinic will be changing to Tuesdays, 12:00 pm–2:00 pm.

If you're already working with me, or you've been thinking about coming for an IEMT session through Men Matter Scotland, please keep the new day and time in mind.

Sometimes one conversation can be the first step towards a very different future.

www.emmatoms.com