As a highly sensitive person who can feel what the other is feeling, and who often cares and is very impacted by the feelings and experiences of others.. you quite likely learnt how to regulate the emotions in the environment (or at least feel vaguely safe) by tuning into others and changing your behavior to soothe Them. This leaves you in the precarious position of needing Them to be regulated (or loving, or kind) in order for you to be ok. The alternative to this is to learn how to regulate your nervous system as a distinct and self-loving survival function, inside your own body. Which is great. Because that’s where your incredibly intelligent survival and intuition impulses originate!

When you’re inside your own body (and trusting it), you can experience regulation, settling and resilience regardless of the psychic/emotional noise around you.

This is Big. And has a BIG impact on whether you feel you have Choice and the ability to step away from situations that don’t serve you. Cause lets be honest.. when you’re living from remote control, it takes way more energy to operate things, and isn’t really that satisfying longterm.

The thing that stops many empaths from moving from remote control to inhabiting their own animal body, is that when we first turn attention to the inner experience, we may initially feel a lot of strong and even “unsafe” feelings, sensations or emotions. Many folk will take this to mean “I just need to try harder to regulate everyone else” or “Shit, it’s not safe in my body, so I’m leaving the whole Body-thing altogether and disassociating to somewhere safer!”

So rather than these 2 (exhausting) options.. We can instead treat it like we’re wooing a wild animal.

Imagine with me that your nervous system is a wild tiger who’s retreated into a cave and is definitely not sure about whether it’s safe here. It’s holding a long history of strong feelings and quite a bit of overwhelm and it would secretly really love someone to come and help it feel safe in the world. All this wild animal knows so far is that it’s told to be quiet when it’s upset, or that it blows its lid when it can’t hold back anymore. … So you wouldn’t start by going right up to the tiger and talking to it, or poking it.. You’d start by being general and open. You might start by just sitting down and being quiet a distance away from it, looking at the sky or the dirt under you, Being.. Allowing the animal to feel that you mean to be kind and to listen without any pressure or demand.

How is it to be here? in this moment, in the room or space you’re in? Is there anything pleasant or okay about your experience? If there is.. Can you ask yourself – how do you know that you know it’s pleasant? What tells you? Maybe there’s a warm feeling in your belly, or your eyes soften a little at the edges. Maybe you notice your breathing is a little deeper than normal and stroking the fabric on your pants feels soothing?

When you spend time noticing and attending to these pleasant or okay things, it’s like placing treats at the entrance to the cave for your nervous system, and giving your felt-sense animal time to come out, check things out and be nourished by the treats…

From here, this incredibly simple practice (of taking time with what’s ok and feeling it in your body) will have helped your nervous system settle enough to get closer and get curious with it.

In my sessions with clients, this part of our work is a lot about experiencing the different branches of the nervous system (flight, fight, freeze, social connection/fawn) as safe.

If, as you hang out with feeling and sensing your body, the settling that came with the pleasant sensations shifts into agitation in the legs .. we’d spend time checking out if (contrary to the automatic response to start thinking, leave or reach out to charm me or get angry) this agitation is ok to feel.

This is groundbreaking for many people. That their uncomfortable sensations Aren’t a signal they need to react by Doing something to get away from them, but a signal the body has something to say, or the body is storing stress.

Together we gently move from something nourishing (a pleasant emotion, thought or sensation in some part of the body) to the thing you’ve previously avoided. The agitation, the fear, the anger or the vagueness. As you experience that you Can handle the sensations inside your own body, they will begin to settle and disperse and change to something more regulated. And like this, you are building your capacity (and love!) for staying with and IN your body.

Slowly you start to trust that feeling of constriction when someone asks you to help them with a task, and you say “I cant do that, sorry” rather than (internally) “what do they need? will they be super upset if I don’t say yes? Am I safe to say no?” .. and then overriding yourself and saying yes when you actually mean no.

You start to build a primary relationship with You, your animal body and your life force. Life in a body then becomes pleasurable, becomes open, becomes free(er).

I take female practitioners through this process in my 3 month 1:1 program and it makes such a huge difference to how they feel in themselves, to their energy levels, their resilience and enjoyment of their good work in the world, and also of their precious love for themselves… from inside their own body.

Shifting to embodied self-connection also means the boundarylessness and confusion of living from remote control is no longer there. You know what you want, what you feel and eventually, clearly, what’s right for you. Of course, this impacts your clarity with stating your rates at work, your boundaries/choices in relationships and your capacity to step away from dynamics that drain you. Being and empath is a gift.. but not when we ignore the messages from the sensitive apparatus that is your body.

This program is a good fit for you if you’re ok with feeling your feelings, have done a decent amount of inner work and are spiritually oriented. It’ll be good for you if you want to serve your populations (clients or family) but don’t want to do the same old over-giving and exhaustion, and if you hold a thread of knowing to the wisdom of the earth (even if it’s dormant… I have a particular love and gift for shining a light on the wisdom in You). We move through 3 phases, embodying your spiritual and animal knowing, healing unconscious patterns held in the nervous system and attachment system and strengthening your relationship with your inner judge and your mind so you can move forward with strength, resilience and self encouragement!

If you’re interested, reach out HERE, I’ll ask you some questions to see if we’re a good fit and we could begin soon

The most common reason for this is there’s a subconscious investment in “being the competent one”.

My clients are often women who had to be independent from an early age, and who have a very strong and capable “doer” part.

A part is like a sub-personality within each of us that hold emotions, perceptions, and belief systems, and that affect our behaviour and emotional wellness. Parts are either with us from birth (a soul aspect of self like being-ness, space or deep abiding calm) or develop in childhood and through life to help us cope and adapt (like the Strategist, the Rebel, the Pusher, the Critic etc).

So for someone who Needed to be competent and adult before their time, they will often develop this strong part that’s very good at getting things done, taking charge when others cant or wont, removing their own emotionality, supporting others at the expense of themselves and just taking care of business.

This strong part will often squash or deny the more vulnerable needy parts in the person in order to create a feeling of safety. When we are competent and strong, we don’t feel the incredible vulnerability of Having needs and being vulnerable to others’ responses (or lack of responses) to them. This dynamic sets up a struggle between the primary (competent) part and the disowned (vulnerable and needy) part. (To be clear, sometimes a person will have a primary part who is needy and in a victim stance – “I cant do this, I need help” etc, and will repress their inner strength and capacity – we’re just talking about the other version for now).

Clients like this often come to me exhausted and feeling like they’ve managed to do all these amazing things, (and survive incredible hardship) but they feel very sad or lonely or even desperate inside.

When we literally speak to each of the parts in turn, we find the root of the sadness in a disowned part so it can be integrated gracefully into your life. This is super healing and transformative for an over-achiever,.. and also can be very tender and a bit scary because its so new/unknown.

When we do this, rather than running with this hard-edge “I’m fine” attitude, you’ll also have access to the softness in you, and be more open to receiving the love and support you might be craving (which your strong, competent part has been keeping out till now).

This process forms one of the first phases of my Reset Program for exhausted successful women. We meet the parts of you that have been criticizing or pushing you to Just Keep Doing, and invite the other, softer and more connected parts to come forward. We help you create healthy boundaries (around your time, energy and communications), you get core tools so you can manage your emotional, physical and mental state, we heal the core stress drivers stuck in your nervous system (the reasons you cant sleep well or get foggy brained when you’re stressed) and we expand your capacity to hold and feel pleasure as you plan out a new way of doing life.

This is a complete package to walk you from hectic pace to calm and grace It includes 1:1 sessions, group processes, an accountability coach (cause yes, sometimes we do need accountability to do these important, lovely things for ourselves) and unlimited email support over 3.5months (we’ll break over xmas).

This’ll be a match for you if you have achieved success in your external world (business, finances and “achieving” in general) and are over-ready to stop pushing yourself so hard.

Reach out through the contact form if this sounds good for you, I’ll ask you some questions to see if you are a fit and we could begin next week.

Usually one of the parts driving this frantic pace is her Rulemaker.. – the one who has all the rules about how she should be. Some common rules are:

“I should be competent and know what I’m doing at all times” (even if I’ve never done something before)

“I should be a can-do person” (even if I can’t)

“I should be able to balance work, family, heath and spiritual wellbeing regardless of how much sleep, exercise or support I have”

“I should be humble and approachable”

“I should ambitious and committed to my goals”

Whatever she values and has had deep experiences with in her life, she will have rules about that thing. If she’s been working in corporate, she’ll have rules about her level of professionalism. If she’s explored healthy eating, she’ll have rules about what and when and how she eats etc. Someone who grew up in poverty or abuse with have a different rule set to someone who didn’t (eg. “I cannot appear clueless about money”, “I have to have the perfect family (or Else)…” etc).

Regardless of the topics of the rules, one thing is common. When you put all your rules together it will be impossible to achieve them all. Your Rulemaker is not interested in achievability.. but in having you meet the “standards” compiled from everyone you have admired and wanted to emulate or everything you didn’t want to follow. Your Rulemaker will be connected to a Pusher part (the one who wakes you up like an incessant coach first thing in the morning “Right! What have we got on today? let’s make a list.. come one!”) and a Critic (the one who compares you and your progress to everybody else and the standards the Rulemaker sets).

When you do this process to meet these parts, you’ll be aware of the Rulemaker when you hear the thoughts “I need to/ I have to/ it’s not ok not to…”. Then you have the opportunity to Choose whether these rules are important and valid to you today. We often find some rules are just unquestioned or outdated, passed on from family or society – and simply do not fit you or your life as you are now. Which often becomes the case when you’re nearing exhaustion/burnout.. because it’s often your rules that have gotten you here.

Doing this process helps to make all of this conscious so you don’t keep running (what may be an unrealistic or outdated) operating system. It takes the automatic “I MUST” out of the dynamic and creates this attuned, aware and listening relationship between you and your life.

After years of doing trauma work with folk to heal and resolve highly stressed states in the nervous system, I’ve found that doing this step early on, creates so much self-understanding, compassion and then space and momentum to make new choices arising from self-connection and authenticity, and something way more life-enhancing for you.

This forms the second step of the Reset Formula that I run, helping exhausted successful women move from frantic pace to calm and grace.

We start by clarifying your definition of unconditional success (what would feel like success for You if you included your heart and body and well-being?), then we create this healthy dialogue and dynamic between your inner parts; so you can relax and allow your heart to lead more. We create healthy boundaries around your time, energy and your word, with a powerful process for communicating boundaries that creates more closeness and trust (rather than hard walls or collapsed giving-in again) and more capacity for you to feel safe being in touch with your feelings and inner longings. Then we support your overall mental and emotional balance with nervous system regulation and healing processes that will help you create a new foundation for the rest of your life. The Reset program finishes with a focus on pleasure and building your capacity to include More of it as you design your life from a new state and place.

This program is ideal for women who have great capacity to succeed and get things done, but who are craving a new way to do what they’re great at that doesn’t cost them their health or joy. It’s a 3.5month 1:1 program with ongoing group support afterwards, some self directed processes and resources to build your resilience and feel enlivened again. As we’re coming into Xmas, you could begin within the next week, and move through the first 2 phases and first 2 1:1 sessions before we take a break over Xmas to integrate for a few weeks.

If this sounds like just what you need, please reach out through the contact form. I’ll ask you some questions to see if you’re a good fit for getting these results and we could begin within the week.

Obviously we can surround it with supportive environments and sounds, things that soothe and feel harmonious to that sensitivity … like the feeling of the finest silk, a day in the forest or a beautifully played piece of music.

But we can’t ALWAYS have soft and lovely things around us.

This is where BOUNDARIES and self knowledge comes in.

When you have a highly attuned nervous system, >> you really Wanna get to know your sensitive apparatus! Because, actually, when it’s respected by you and honoured with your actions, rather than being a burden, YOUR SENSITIVITY BECOMES A GIFT FOR YOU AND ALL THOSE AROUND YOU.

Your sensitivity becomes a wisdom voice.

It is able to feel deeper into the energies in a room and speak Truth when others may be avoiding it. It has the ability to Clear space. To bring integrity, because it can’t-not feel stuff!

I want to empower you to LOVE YOUR SENSITIVITY. Because, honey, the world NEEDS IT.

And it needs you knowing your edges and asserting your boundaries.. Not because the world is bad or wrong, but because you work better when your sensitive apparatus isn’t being crowded by others energy and when you have the resources to shine your unique light.

Sometimes we can be stuck under stories held in the body, past traumas, pains unfelt, fear of growing beyond our edges even when the soul is yearning to fly.

I specialize in helping women befriend their nervous system, train their mind to Back them rather than take the rug out from under their thriving, connect deeply with Spirit and cultivate joy and pleasure as a new normal.

LET ME HELP YOU FALL IN LOVE WITH YOUR SENSITIVITY AND STEP UP TO LEAD.

Reach me out through the contact form for more details on how I can help you xx

There’s a way to maintain your healthy boundaries around requests and agreements even when you feel torn and uncertain. The keys to this are to start with what you Do know and communicate from that place.

To do this, you want to:

1. Be able to know and name your experience and feelings (even if it’s just to yourself)

2. Be willing to sit in the unknown and let your inner experience be your boundary.

I’ll give you an example.

Say you’re arguing with your ex partner about the care of your child. He wants more time with Timmy during the week and you want to have the whole school week with Timmy so his routine isn’t disrupted. You would also Love to go to a new yoga class on Wednesday nights, but your worry about Timmy’s balance is nagging you. If your boundaries are a bit melty, you might struggle but end up saying ok cause you’re worried your ex will withdraw all child care if he doesn’t get his way (you worry what you lose if you say no). The result of melty boundaries will tend to feel like confusion, focus on the other, anxiety and internal collapse.

If your boundaries are more rigid, you might hear the request and say a strong no, and be unbending as your ex tries to discuss or negotiate. The rigidness stops back and forth dialogue, but it also tends to create less connection (to self and other), less trust, more distance and less easiness in the dynamic for future discussions.

But, if you were to try this method below, you’d hear your ex’s request and pause to check what you feel and think. (If you’ve got a history of melty boundaries, you might not actually know what you think or feel other than squirmy discomfort or worry. This is a good starting place).

Boundaries are what define the difference between you and I. I feel hot, you feel cold. You feel angry, I feel peaceful. These are undeniable things happening within the boundaries of your own experience. So your ex (let’s just call him Fred), cannot argue with your statement that you feel squirmy discomfort or worry, because it’s just what you feel. (Or – he can, but then he would be crossing over into your boundaries). Your boundary does not have to be a clear and concise statement. A boundary can actually be a statement of your thoughts, feelings or sensations.

This is how the conversation might go:

Fred: “I want to have Timmy on Wednesday nights”

You: .. pause… …. “I feel squirmy and a bit worried about that”

Fred: “I’d really like to have more time with Timmy than just weekends” You: (…finding a bit more clarity as you sit with the squirm and worry) “Ah, I’m worried that a change in routine would disrupt his sleep and schooling and make him moody again”

Notice, you haven’t said yes or no yet.

Fred: “But he needs his dad in his life, I want to see him on Wednesdays”

You: “Yeah, I’m just feeling worried about the disruption”

Fred might try to convince you you’re not worried or don’t need to be worried. If you just stick to what you know (“I feel… “, ” I am … ” etc.) this can be your healthy and listening boundary.

You are not putting up a rigid wall, and you are not collapsing to try to make it work. It’s a healthy boundary because you’re not overriding your own experience in order to bring harmony or agreement or an end to the discussion, and you’re not making Fred’s desires wrong.

So, where this conversation can go (because you haven’t prematurely acted) is that solutions could start being offered. Or.. if there’s underlying difficult dynamics with your ex, they may come up to be aired or spoken (with the same “I feel…” “I want…” honesty). Either way, you’re staying available to the moment and honest about your inner needs and experience. In an ideal world, the chat would continue like this:

Fred: “well….. I can pick him up from school and make sure he eats early?”

You: “That feels better…. (pause).. Could we cancel his after school classes on Tuesdays as well so he’s not so tired coming to you?”

Fred: “yes, I’m willing to do that. We can also try for a week or 2 and see how it goes?”

You: “Yes. That feels good”

So, you have a clear agreement, you stood firm in your own feelings and thoughts and needs (even when you weren’t quite clear yet what they were) and you didn’t override yourself. This kind of communication of boundaries even before you know what you want allows for back and forth negotiation, and more importantly, Listening. Notice as well that (in our example) nobody made anyone’s desires or feelings wrong (like “you’re selfish for wanting more time with him… ” or “Stop being so emotional, he’ll be fine” etc). We only do that kind of emotional blame or finger pointing when we’re trying to get the other person to stop feeling, wanting or saying what they’re saying. Which is none of our business (or within our own boundaries).

What IS your business (and thing to stand for) is what goes on within the boundaries of your own skin, heart and mind.

This is an example of how you can have connection and healthy boundaries when you’re feeling torn without collapsing or building a wall. And get your extra yoga class (or night off) at the same time. A win-win.

And this is one of the keys to becoming your own hero/champion and including yourself and your own needs in negotiations about childcare, work and project commitments and all the responsibilities of life.

Because, even though you Can do everything (be the loving mum, the successful biz woman, the considerate ex), life works way better when all of You is included and cared for in the process.

Mastering this process is part of how I help successful women stop taking on too much responsibility. Because it teaches them to listen and be patient as they decode their own inner experience, thoughts and needs, and then express them into the negotiations for what they do with their energy and time.

This is huge in shifting patterns of over-giving and exhausting themselves agreeing to things that end up costing them more energy in the future.

There’s a epidemic of over worked, over-stretched successful women in the world and healthy boundaries, a regulated nervous system and a friendly understanding of the ego drives that push us to over-give and become so exhausted is the pathway out that I offer.

If you need to gain your energy and time back from over-commitments, and want to learn how to have and communicate boundaries in a way that is firm and receptive, I run a wonderful 3.5 month 1:1 intensive to help women do just this.

We help you first to disengage from the worship of busy, to make your life an invitation for rejuvination, receptivity and rest. You get simple and profound tools for building healthy, courageous boundaries and the skilled guidance in uprooting the programmed responses and behaviours that have had you returning to the overworked, exhausted place over and over again.

The 3.5 month 1:1 program is online, with 9 long sessions, up to 4 laser coaching calls/month, online learning modules and unlimited email support. It’s ideal for you if you have done more than a beginners inner work and are committed to using your spot on the earth to create wonderful things (without burning out).

Reach out through the contact form if you’re interested, I’ll ask you a few questions to see if you’re a fit and we could begin within a week.

Don’t mind those packing boxes, or the scaffolding, things are still finding their place and being moved around … it takes a while to land in a new home.

But here, I’ve cleared a spot on the couch and found the tea and a couple of mugs. Come and have a seat, it’s been a big 2 months…hooleydooley whacka-doo, it. has. Been. a. CORKA! And I’d love to share some of the gems on internal love I’ve gathered in the move-about-upheaval.

To make it interesting (for me) .. I’m gonna share the gems point style…

1). External things (people, places, objects) can support inner Love, but they don’t substitute for it. Inner Love is an internal job, and that takes grit.

A few months ago, I was living in a heavenly beachside home, in a relationship that felt divinely gifted and I remember walking on the beach with this sweet-sad realisation … that it was easy to feel blissful and connected while I had all this external support, but that at some point it might be up to me to maintain that inner divine state if or when these external things changed (cause, the one constant in life is change, apparently).

What felt like just a few short weeks later, I was no longer in the relationship and had been given notice to move out from my heavenly house. (Gotta stop having these wise but very unhelpful insights into the nature of impermanence when things are yummy! Man! Wish I’d remember impermanence more when things are tricky!)

What a testing ground.

Hooley Dooley Whacka-do (to be polite)

What ensued has been super chaotic and Telling about the underside of my psyche. But under all of that is a quiet, warm sense that the love doesn’t go anywhere. The internal states of connection and love that I found when deep in a love affair and being held in the peaceful trees and beach of a dream home, are actually still here.

The chaos is here and emotional attachment is here. But even deeper is Love. Or even.. warm stability.

So.. a key to building inner love?

Notice it’s there. Go where life is pointing you to go. Go where it’s dancing you, go where it’s dragging you. Look for and be curious about love’s presence even in the darkest, most chaotic places.

Remember love is not determined by external factors.

2) When you work with others’ inner realms.. you gotta know your own -DEEPLY.

Aka: working with others Stuff = Working with your own stuff  (or. The “work” don’t end with the Certification-to-practice-in-hand)

Cause, the way I see it, this work of traveling into others psyches.. plumbing the depths for the gold of their soul.. it doesn’t just happen cause I like hanging out with humans and seeing them glow..

It happens (partly) cause I’ve been willing (ummm, let’s be honest.. DRAGGED kicking and screaming!!) to go to my own edges and, with the help of my own ally’s, have plumbed the depths for my own gold over and over again.

This point would apply to you if you are a mum raising children (if you want to help them with healthy boundaries on the playground.. you’ve gotta know what that’s like and know how to have them in your world first)

If you are an employer or any kind of guide and leader of other human beings.

When we ask others to do something (clean up after themselves, organize their time well, complete projects, face an inner demon.. we’ve usually gotta model it .. “transmission” is Huge)

We’ve gotta know the territory to be able to guide Anybody out and into triumph!

And at the end of the day, it’s 1000 times of an honor to be able to help another human walk their undersides and arise triumphant and more in touch with the Soul in their body.

So as I humbly pick through my literal and figurative boxes of Stuff, I hand to you this gem of kindness…

We’re all divine creatures doing our best to fit into these Little human lives and it’s All fodder for the growing of love.

And I wish you so much love, in any crevice or glorious cavern you can find.

…….

Things’ll be shifting around for a bit here. You might notice the look and feel changing.. a new website is on its way, I’m off to have a professional photo shoot later this week, and.. I’ve joined Instagram: @Wisdombody11.. very much a newbie there!

And, one area of this new home is exquisitely clear, my new session room in Ocean Shores. Please come along and experience the delicious energy here!  (pics coming soon)

Big love to you

Or, to be more specific, loving when you’ve been hurt, when you’ve got no “reason to” trust, is deeply courageous.

I’ve been working a lot with people with developmental trauma lately… in some way Mum or Dad weren’t safe, weren’t there, weren’t able to create a safe ground to expand into. Life started with a preciousness in them unmet.

It’s beautiful (I Love it) to be around people who have a secure sense of themselves in love. Who love easily, who trust love, trust they will Be loved, who innately create stability in relationship. My system widens, warms and expands around them. I feel safe.

But it’s those who’ve been deeply hurt in love who are my Hero’s.

The ones who continue to walk up to the edge of opening and sometimes jump in and open wider, even though their past tells them it will hurt, even if opening their heart in those places feels like fire. Because something calls them in. Connection and longing for more. KNOWING they’re more. Fuck. It breaks me open.

It is So courageous, brave and wildly strong to love in the face of a broken heart. I bow to the power of people to renew, to face themselves and keep moving towards the truth that we are all love and Love wants to love us. In my experience, that’s not some platitude but a tangible experience when we turn and look at it.

I bow… to the beautiful, exquisite heart who believes they are broken because their earliest caregivers couldn’t reflect their glory. I bow to your courage. I bow to the beauty in you, to your still being here.. whether it is deep in the cave, protecting your heart, out on the edges of the cliff, or flying without a parachute. I see you.

And here’s a song I like about love  🙂

And if you’d like to book in a session or have a chat with me about what might be possible for you can book in here: http://www.wisdombody.com.au/book-now/

In the last few weeks I’ve been doing some gentle (but consistent) energy & chi building practices and, as I feel more rested, resourced and happy in my heart, and as my life starts to reflect that inner well-being back to me via friendly, loving people & synchronistic events, a very clear realization has come to me (with some help.. let me explain below).

When energy is flowing well, it moves throughout the body freely and draws energy

… Up from the earth, from the natural environment, and from harmonious people, places, things. When it’s flowing well, it’s obvious when something ISN’T harmonious and enhancing, so we naturally will gravitate away from that thing, keeping our energy flowing and healthy.

The problem with trauma, shock or stored negativity is that they are like a block in your funnel.

A frozen place where energy gets stuck, and you therefore need to revert to “the past” to know how to respond to your environment. This is a good “survival” strategy, but not necessarily a good Thriving strategy. And being stuck in survival can feel very stressful if done over time (believe me, baby, I know)!

Trauma, shock or stored negativity can essentially keep us in a loop within our own energy system, and as Joe Dispenza says, we stay in the lower energy centers (realted to bodily survival) & we start to use our own resources of energy to run our life, rather than the energy of our own connection to source/life-force/chi (the bigger field around and inside us).

What I see in my work with trauma is that when we start touching on a trauma (with slow and present awareness), energy begins to mobilize. We are unlocking the frozen places, and this is good (it doesn’t often feel good at first, but that shifts a lot once the stored energy is mobilised/expressed).

THIS is what I want to share with you on the VALUE of getting your energy moving, and feeding your system with positive life force and self connection.

Because…

>> We can’t create (back up) what we want if we come from a depleted life force <<

We might say we have a dream, a new business idea, a plan for an awesome holiday.. but if we are stuck in survival, many of these “new” things” will turn out like the “old things”… because the system that is creating them is not able to allow new, fresh chi and the unknown IN.

It doesn’t matter what you’re drawn to here (money, love, health, inner peace) if you are depleted, it is harder to feel your natural life-force energy (and the natural joy that it is) and it’s like you dont have “credit” in your bank account.

*Cue big Italian guy at a fruit stall* “eh! Mate, what are you gonna pay for that Expansion with?!! No credit, no Expansion, Eh!!”

…

So, yes, the trouble with trauma is that it limits the amount of life-force that is able to flow through a body. But when energy is Gently mobilised with kind and soft awareness, those blockages in the funnel will soften and dissolve and you will be free from negative loops. I have seen this over and over again.

And then, and even during that, you can Really focus on chi cultivation, on breathing your energy up to your heart (a daily gratiude journal can help this), up into your throat, and brain and more expanded/connected consciousness.

So in the spirit of all of that… Here’s a little ditty of a dit. A boogey of a boog. Energy moving and chi making a giggle on a face and in some hands. (It’s a dance video.. of me.. being silly. Here)

This client explained that he understands that what we focus on expands, and, I definitely experience this to be true, in fact that’s a core of what makes my work Work. We use our focus to develop strength and capacity, to build and create beautiful things.
But what he was expressing was a fear that if he turns and faces the trauma and locked patterns in his body, that he will create more of it (by the law of attraction) in his life.

So I want to address this, because it’s a concern that I see effecting many people’s ability to be deeply present with themselves, and to actually build new brain pathways towards greater health and resiliency.

There’s a school of thought that says “if you are experiencing pain, the best thing to do is to focus on what feels better and keep building your focus on that, and the pain will melt away”.

Now that works to a Certain extent, but it doesn’t take into account the automatic programming in our physiology, nervous system and brain pathways.It doesn’t take into account the high charge that can be in the body of someone who has experienced highly challenging or traumatic events. And we all have some version of something challenging either in our own or our family history.

We can consciously choose to focus on pleasure, but if the body is holding unconscious trauma, fear or hyper vigilance (for eg), focussing on pleasure can be a bandaid that works till that trauma is unconsciously (or consciously) triggered.

And then, the body takes over as it goes into survival responses.

In this experience, I see many people become self-judgemental and feel shame that they couldn’t maintain their focus on pleasure and shift out of pain. And of course the combination of survival-strength sensations, feelings and shame is something we naturally don’t want to get more of.

The way I view this pleasure/pain dynamic is that we want to be able to Look at difficulty, if it is here! 

Difficulty can be such a teacher and strengthener, but not if we ignore it.

So, in answer to the question “doesn’t focussing on fear bring more fear?”.. I want to share how I use FOCUS to help build resilience, presence and inner connection with a sense of Home*. How that focus is not about avoidingfear, but strengthening the foundations that can hold the fear, creating the safety to be able tofeel the fear without fear of it.

This approach doesn’t bring more fear, but allows it to move through in a gentle way so we have More space to feel the whole spectrum.

* I want to be transparent here, that my intention in sessions is to help you to find your way Home into yourself. To me, your inner “home” holds everything you want and need, not in a “happy all the time way”, but in a good and true and grounded way.

………….

When I’m working with someone and they bring something like:

“I feel anxious a lot of the time”

My focus will be on the witness that is able to observe this experience.

On building their capacity as both as a human being and a consciousness, and as a physiology that is able to tolerably manage (sometimes) large amounts of charge/energy moving through it.

On building capacity to be present to whatever life is moving through you. 

Because when we focus on our containment, our largeness… that largeness, that capacity and strength, expands. We become more solid, more present, more anchored.

And what is possible when we do that …  when I don’t shrink back from fear because I’m scared.

When you’re relaxed, even when trauma or constriction is here.. then, the constriction moves through a larger field of relaxation.

Then you begin to identify yourself with relaxation, with love, with the field that holds all these things.

So I want to bring this back to my clients question “If I focus on fear, (in the law of attraction) wont it bring me more fear?”

And my answer is, it might seem like that at first. Because it’s quite possible that if you’ve set up your management patterns, trying to keep fear away, that when  you start to pay attention to what’s happening in your self, you might begin to notice fear is in many places in you, cause you’ve pushed it away and tried to control it.

But as you focus on… “is this ok in this moment to feel this fear?”, the fear may very well start to soften and move and shift into something new.

Once you have a sense of your containment and capacity, then you can turn for a moment towards the fear. And I want to share with you, that if we turn for a moment towards the fear, and give yourself, give in to that fear totally, for just a moment, it will shift into something else, it will become excitement, shivering. It will be Space for your body to shake it off and move into something else.

It’s the resistance to the fear that holds it in place, and keeps “bringing it back”.

So I would re-word the above question in my answer as:

“If you avoid fear (because you’re scared of feeling it) this will tend to strengthen it and make it seem bigger than it is. If you can learn to soften around it, focus on your strength and capacity, there will be more space for it to move through and for you to feel feelings such as peace, joy, contentment and power”

So my advice to you is to do what you can to create foundation and safety in your self in your life in a felt sense way, and then turn towards the monsters you’ve been running from.

And if fear has been your shadow and that sounds like a crazy idea, or way too overwhelming, I’m here. You can reach out to me by email, or see more about this work here.

If you’re like me; a Ms “Fix-it” from way back, you’ve probably tried many ways to change your story; counseling, workshops, bodywork, processing, diet changes, learning more, trying harder, Making An Effort.

But probably, like me, your story just keeps repeating on you. You may have gone to the depths of your despair in that last workshop or counseling session and came out feeling reborn, and then, What?! 2 months later, you’re feeling the same feelings and living that Same Story.

Why is that??

One thing I’ve seen across the years of “fixing” my story is that we don’t Change the story, we Wake Up inside it.

You see our early life experiences, way back to our time in the womb, literally set up a biological map or energetic imprint that is ours to walk and become conscious inside of. The dynamic between our parents, the key experiences of our childhood (belonging/exclusion, love/abandonment, friendships/loneliness etc) all create an energetic imprint and neurological track-work in the brain that then helps to form our personality and psyche and how we respond to the world.

It is possible to change this imprint and the pathways in the brain, in fact that’s a large part of what we are doing in a Somatic Experiencing session. So we may Wake Up to these pathways, and thus have more options, more choice, more flexibility, but generally these make up the terrain of our life. Your life story may not change, but You change in relation to it.

For example:

The first time you experienced being seriously ill as a child it was too overwhelmingly scary for such a little person to handle. So you learnt to disconnect from your body and live from your mind, denying your feelings and unaware of your body processes. Now as an adult, when you become ill, you have the choice to disconnect from your body, or to Feel the terror that illness invokes and become present to the sensations and experiences in your body. As you become present, you can begin to identify less with your “story” (“I’m always sick, I have no control, I cant trust my body”) and wanting the pain to go away, and you identify more with the part of you who watches it all.

Illness may always be something that you have a strong reaction to, but as you build your ability to stay conscious with whatever your story is, there becomes no Need to “fix” it. When you can be conscious with it, the emotions, the sensations and the experience of your story just are*. They may be uncomfortable, but they just are as they are. You notice the fear that arises, the movement towards disconnecting from your body, and you can choose something different, because you are more awake inside your story. And in Being awake, your capacity to experience more pleasure and good-life-force increases as well. As you are probably aware, shutting out pain also shuts out pleasure and reduces your range of feeling both ways.

(*Please note, Im not inferring that this is easy, just that it is the way to go in order to bring light and change to “problems” in your experience.)

When we wake up inside our problems, they are not “problems” anymore, they are opportunities for consciousness here and now. And consciousness is a very yummy thing

I like to imagine that we are all walking our own unique Life Maze. As we “wake up” inside this maze, we start to explore new areas and directions, and the specific qualities of our life story begin to bring particular gifts, like treasures hidden amongst the hedges. These may be humility, compassion, patience, kindness, life force, love. But to glean these treasures from your well trodden maze, you mustn’t be fooled by the story and you must be willing to try something new.

Often, when you are lost down the alley ways of your maze, its not as easy as “choosing” to find a different way. Especially if your Life Maze has some truly scary corners. Like a child lost in a maze, sometimes you need another person to come in there and take your hand, helping you see new options and guide you out. In a therapeutic or an intimate relationship, we can get to know each others’ track-work and become more present and conscious for the other when we know they are navigating tricky areas. We can befriend their maze with them and help to expand the range of feeling that is possible.

Your Life Maze is your burden or your gift for waking up. What ever your story is, it is Your story. The less you fight with that simple truth, the more you will be available to Be Here for your life and for the hidden treasures in it.

I wish you well dear traveller!

Over to you:

I’d love to hear what you think about waking up inside your problems rather than fixing them.. Have you experienced “fixing” your story, or have you had it repeat on you again and again?

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