My tiny humble healing secret: Listening.
Today I’m sharing with you my most intimate secret for how I healed my heart, brain, and body after 17+ years of significant chronic illness, chronic stress, unhealthy relationships, depression, anxiety, and so many more “conditions”.
After working my a$$ off for years (decades, actually), trying to figure out the most complex solution, and prove to myself and the world that I deserved to feel safe and loved…
I finally gave up.
I didn’t give up hope.
I gave up control.
I gave up the old, deep pattern of grinding myself to the bone.
I stopped pushing so hard.
I started telling myself I was already enough.
I stopped researching and analyzing.
I started feeling my body more.
I stopped making complex lists and plans.
I started listening to what I truly needed moment-to-moment.
I stopped trying to find the next answer out there.
I started asking my deeper self what was true for me.
I stopped rushing.
I started moving slowly like a sloth sometimes (which cracked me up, so I kept doing it)
I stopped focusing on what I had missed out on.
I started creating little internal experiences that felt like precious gifts.
I stopped wishing someone would come along and save me.
I started tending to myself with gentle care.
I stopped trying to take big momentous steps.
I started making myself tiny little audio recordings, to remind myself over and over how simple and sweet life could be, right here in this present moment.
As I kept listening to my recordings, I began to feel - for the first time in life - permission to be exactly as I was, in that moment. I felt held. I felt cherished. I felt safe. I began to feel a sense of relaxed hope.
Held, relaxed, safe: these are the subtle, simple internal experiences that started to change my entire nervous system. My entire life, really.
After almost 20 years of scrambling, searching, and striving, traveling thousands of miles in search of the fountain of life…
I realized I could nourish myself in the most profound ways with these tiny subtle internal experiences.
This all started at a time when my health had taken another dip. I was barely functional, and I was so, so exhausted from the years of trying to fix myself.
One day I started asking myself over and over: “What do I really need right now, what is my system yearning for, begging to experience?” Eventually an answer would bubble to the surface (usually it was something super basic, like I just need to feel held). Then when I had a feel for my most prominent unmet need, I would create a little recording, pretending to give myself exactly what I needed.
I would listen to the same recording of myself over and over, for weeks, until the frequencies of that kind of care had actually started to sink in.
Then I’d create a new recording that met my next fundamental need (it might be something like: to know that I am welcomed and loved). I’d listen to that one for days or weeks. When I felt sort of “full” of that kind of nourishment, I’d make another one. After six months or so, I had a beautiful little collection of loving reminders, all stacked neatly in my Dropbox folder. Every morning, every night before bed, and whenever I felt stressed, I’d open up my folder and pick which kind of nourishing experience my system was craving.
After a while, I noticed that I began to spontaneously feel these frequencies in my body, as I was going about my day. I had been guided through these nourishing experiences so many times that my brain and body now had pathways to follow, new thoughts and feelings that started to feel familiar.
More and more, I felt I could stand on my own two feet (literally).
Eventually, I started making new recordings for fun. Not because I couldn’t survive without listening to them, but because I wanted to expand my capacity to receive even further. My little audios became a source of great expansion and delight.
When I started working as a mentor in the Primal Trust community (where people come to heal from chronic stress & chronic illness), I shared a few of my audio experiences with clients. People loved them. I started creating little recordings during group classes, and sometimes customized recordings for clients during our mentoring sessions.
Over the past year, I’ve received so much gratitude for these recordings from students and clients. I’ve heard people say it was the most effective tool they’ve used. This sort of shocked me, but it’s how I felt too!
So I’m beginning to make recordings to share with you. I’ve set up a little shop on my website, and I am looking forward to filling it with nourishing experiences!
The first meditation or “guided experience” is ready now! It’s called “Permission to Thrive”.
It’s 14 minutes long, and it’s meant to lay a deep foundation in your body and mind. It will remind you that you deserve to enjoy your life, and it will guide you toward peace and joy right here, right now, in this moment.
I hope you enjoy this little recording, and I hope you’ll come back for more when you’re ready. I’ll be creating more audio experiences soon, and my goal is to support you in the most easeful accessible ways I know how.
Sending you so much love across space and time.