Ejder Atlas Akmaner

Ejder Atlas Akmaner is an interdisciplinary writer, Logotherapist and Existential Analyst, as well as a Somatic Meaning Guide. Akmaner holds two undergraduate degrees, in Archaeology and Philosophy, and completed a thesis-based postgraduate degree in Comparative Literature. Akmaner also holds an associate degree in Marketing and chose to leave an associate degree programme in Laboratory and Veterinary Health on ethical grounds. In addition, Akmaner has completed certified training in psychology and related fields through a range of international institutions and universities, as well as advanced training in Logotherapy and Existential Analysis accredited by the Viktor Frankl Institute. Drawing on diverse fields of science and art, Akmaner developed the Somatic Meaning Guidance approach, which explores meaning across mental, bodily and relational dimensions. While grounded primarily in Logotherapy and Existential Analysis, the approach also draws on somatic practices including fascia-sensitive yoga, mindfulness and breathwork. Somatic Meaning Guidance understands established patterns of thought, behaviour and relating not as fixed structures, but as processes that can be reshaped through awareness, experience and new learning. Scientific findings on neuroplasticity and the nervous system’s capacity for experience- and learning-dependent change provide one of the scientific foundations for this understanding of transformation. Akmaner carries out this work under the independent brand Ejderhane. Akmaner is also a Dynamic Ving Tshun practitioner. Direct embodied experience within this discipline — including contact, distance, centre, orientation, balance, boundaries and response — is incorporated into training and explored through the perspective of Somatic Meaning Guidance. In writing and creative practice, Akmaner uses worldbuilding, myth, narrative, symbolic systems and poetic expression as tools for exploring psychological and existential meaning. Through different narrative and conceptual models, Akmaner examines identity, relationships, values, culture, transformation and the search for meaning. Akmaner also develops public-facing work through the Atlas of Meaning and İletişim Çıkmazları (Communication Impasses) series, as well as the podcast series Bedenin Bildiği Anlam (The Meaning the Body Knows). Across these projects, Akmaner explores how language, historical concepts, social categories, boundaries, interpersonal patterns and embodied experience shape the lives of sentient beings, while also examining the possibilities for change that can emerge within these patterns. Through an academic connection with the University of Iceland, Akmaner remains open to developing this interdisciplinary work within an international academic setting. Alongside independent fieldwork, training, creative practice and applied work, Akmaner also writes for Psychology Times.