Somatic planning is a planning practice that starts with a body check instead of a to-do list. It asks what your nervous system can hold today, then plans from that answer.
The word somatic comes from the Greek sōma, meaning body. In psychology and bodywork, somatic approaches treat physical sensation as real information instead of something to push past.
Somatic planning applies that stance to an ordinary planner page. It's Inkleaf's own term for this approach. No licensing body or clinical standard defines it.
Somatic planning is not Somatic Experiencing, the trauma therapy Peter Levine developed, and it makes no claim to that method's clinical grounding. What it borrows is a single idea: the nervous system signals its state before the mind catches up.
Somatic planning applies that idea to something much smaller than therapy. It helps you notice your state before you plan the day ahead.
One borrowed idea, used for one small job: check in before you plan.
Most pages open with a short check-in: a tension scale, a one-word note on how the body feels right now. Only after that does the page turn to the day itself, usually to one priority and one thing that can wait.
A morning page might ask how the body feels on waking and what today can realistically hold. An evening page might ask what the body is still holding onto before sleep, without asking you to account for the whole day.
People with ADHD, a burnout history, chronic pain, or a nervous system that reacts strongly to stress often describe standard planners as assuming a steadiness they don't have day to day. Somatic planning starts from whatever state actually shows up.
Somatic planning doesn't diagnose ADHD, burnout, or any other condition. It isn't a substitute for medical care or psychotherapy.
A body signal that is severe, persistent, or frightening belongs with a doctor or therapist, not a planner page.
Somatic planning draws loosely on polyvagal theory and somatic trauma work. None of the following authors created or endorse the term; they're the background the approach borrows from.