What I'd like to share with you today is an essay I wrote on healing. You can use this information to apply to anything in your life that feels like it's not working the way you want it to.  You don't ever need any fixing, but sometimes we could all use some healing.

For myself, I found it enormously helpful to realize that sometimes - all the behaviors we beat ourselves up for (the ones we wish we did and the ones we wish we didn't do) might be part of our conditioning and programming and are not moral failings. Phew! Good to know! 

My interest in healing encompasses the latest in science and the latest in spirituality. And it turns out that both are pointing us toward the same things.

Both are pointing us toward going deep within ourselves for healing and transmuting stuck energies, connecting with our wholeness, and connecting to the essence of love.

In science, this work is being expressed through the process of healing the nervous system.

The nervous system explains how we hold onto so much trauma and unrest - be it from this lifetime or generations past.

When trauma happens, the nervous system adapts and may get stuck in fight, flight, or freeze. It's a brilliant survival strategy to keep us alive.

And then, epigenetics tells us that our DNA actually gets modified by our adaptations in order to ensure survival. It's unconscious and actually means our system is doing exactly what it's supposed to.

Unfortunately, these modifications can also have unintended consequences. They can sometimes lead to a variety of illnesses.

Chronic pain, inflammation, autoimmune conditions, high blood pressure, diabetes, and cardiovascular conditions are just a few of the illnesses that we know can come from chronic stress and tension or the remnants of trauma that have impacted our nervous systems and modified our DNA.

This gene or nervous system adaptation can also be passed down through generations which explains why we may have tendencies for certain illnesses or ways of being that can't only be explained by our lived experience. This is what they call "ancestral trauma."

Epigenetics also explains that we have in our very DNA a propensity to express specific illnesses. They lie dormant waiting for the right conditions to manifest. Sprinkle in some stress and trauma and whammo - illness occurs. 

Once these illnesses manifest, the irony is that we end up trying really hard to heal by tackling the specific symptoms of the illness.  But it's the root we need to go after. The illness is actually the symptom of something greater happening in the system - either on the cellular level, energetically, emotionally, mentally, or spiritually.

Our physical health is a conglomeration of energy, emotions, and spirit working together and Western medicine often misses the boat when it chops up our bodies and looks at one piece at a time in order to help us be well.

In addition to physical manifestations of trauma, we might also have emotional manifestations where maybe we just don't feel like we are being as effective in our lives as we wish we could be.

Or maybe we don't feel quite as strong and capable as we'd like, and we have this knowing that it could be better. It may feel like something is missing, or we just aren't satisfied with what we have. It may feel like a lack of resilience or an inability to cope.

We often turn to diets and exercise at this time in order to "fix" what might be wrong.  To give us energy, to be healthy, to change our bodies, to fight disease.

But as I have said before, trying to heal by starting with the body is often like fixing the shingles on a house when the roof is leaking. It's not that food and movement aren't important, but they aren't the only things that are at play and may not be the key factor in our healing. 

I will come back to the food and movement piece in another post - but in this one, I want to talk about what happens when the adaptations that once allowed for our survival are no longer necessary and in fact, they seem to be holding us back.

If our nervous system is unwell - due to biological changes that happened in order to survive - and is unable to regulate itself - we are more prone to chronic illnesses.

If on top of that, we are living in stressful environments and constantly suppressing the full expression of ourselves, and burying it under a mountain of expectations and "shoulds",  this tension toggles the switch between health and disease.

I'm sure you've heard people say disease as "dis" - "ease" and that is exactly what it is. It's a lack of ease in our bodies. The nervous system healing is all about bringing that ease back into the body. Bringing in a sense of safety.

The re-training is full of small consistent acts of choosing ease over and over again and being sure to notice and be aware that we are indeed safe as we sit in our homes, our cars, and our offices.

We may not always feel safe - and that is where the retraining is needed. (And sometimes we really aren't safe and it that case, physical safety needs to be our main priority of course.)

Spirituality teaches us the same lessons. It tells us we are loved and we are safe at all times, no matter what else is happening. It tells us to trust and to know that we are whole.

It's not that something is missing in our lives, it's that something is in the way.  There are layers and layers of conditioning, historic adaptations, and false beliefs that are clouding our vision, in addition to these cellular changes that are no longer useful.

Just like the build-up of stress hormones in the body - there is a build-up of debris in the soul. 

So no matter what has occurred in your life to gunk up your system, getting from where you are to where you want to be is about clearing, releasing, and healing.  It's not about dieting, restricting, and controlling. 

The diet industry and any consumer-driven product that profits off your fears - doesn't want you to know that you are whole. They purposefully try to make you feel unworthy so they can sell you what you "need" to be well over and over again because many products aren't actually offering true healing.

Healing is about allowing, accepting, loving, and knowing you are loved. It's about ease, joy, glory, and freedom. That kind of medicine doesn't come from a bottle, it comes from you.

We are whole beings, no one is broken, and this deep knowing is always available to us if we learn and practice how to cultivate it. 

Our trauma, whether it's "big T" (racial injustice, abuse, and neglect) or "little t" trauma (being born sensitive, or not feeling like you fit in), our sense of "something is wrong" or we are "not enough" may be running the show, but we are not intrinsically flawed.  

Once we understand how this works - it's great news! It means that if we so choose, there are steps towards healing we can take that are simple and soothing and effective.  No dieting necessary!

Maybe you don't identify with having been through trauma, but if you are in a cycle where you are constantly wanting to change your body - then there is definitely something that is blocking you from experiencing your wholeness.

Once we truly know ourselves and our grace, divinity, and worthiness, and once we heal emotionally and spiritually, the need to change the body diminishes and we are able to care for ourselves with warmth, compassion, understanding, and a true sense of nurturing and self-care.

Old patterns can be hard to break, it takes practice and patience, but it can be done.

What put you on the diet hamster wheel or lead you to dislike your body in the first place? What is it you'd like to heal? How interested are you in exploring a new paradigm that is not based on rigidity and control?

I believe in your wholeness and am available to assist you if you'd like to discover what might be holding you back, in your relationship with food and body and in your life.

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash