Healing - An inside Job

What is healing? Most of us have this impression that healing is easy.. Those working to help support others through their own healing journeys, know this is not the case. It is NOT easy and it is most definitely NOT all love and light. Healing is sometimes like ripping the plaster off and expecting to see perfectly healed skin but instead finding a gapping oozing pus filled hole. You then have a choice. You can simply pop the plaster back on and 'try' to forget all about it and struggle endlessly to hide it from the world. But overtime, as plasters do, they become less sticky and start to fry at the edges revealing the wound. You constantly live in fear that the plaster will fall off or worse be ripped off without warning by someone or something. At some point in your life, someone will come along and simply rip it off, exposing your wound that you had done so well, in hiding from the world. You will more than likely react, get mad, lash out and blame that person for causing the pain in the first place. These people / events / things are called triggers and unfortunately until we heal our past traumas we have absolutely no idea what may trigger us. We get triggered by something or someone so we avoid that in the future. Then something else triggers us and we learn to avoid that as well. We start to live in fear about what will trigger us. We start to live in fear about our reaction to the trigger. A natural response is to build walls around us to 'protect' ourselves. These walls may start out paper thin but overtime you realise that they have developed into titanium strength, quadruple layered, 'no-one is getting through' walls. This option causes long term hurt and pain and stops us from experiencing joy. Our other option is to take the plaster off and consciously clean out the wound which allows for the healing to take place. This is the warriors choice - It is NOT the easy option. It will involve pain, tears, snot and probably a few choice words along the way in the short term. In the long term we learn to appreciate all the emotions, we can sit with the grief and the anger this allowing us to experience pure joy and love.

With a pus filled physical wound, it is unlikely that you would start to clean out the wound yourself. You are more than likely going to look for someone to help you. Secondly, you do not grab for the salt bucket and throw it on top of the wound to clean it out. That would be too much and would be excruciating for the person in pain. How you would support another through their physical healing

1) Prepare the person. You let them know that it may hurt. You tell them what you are going to do. You offer a hand or an arm to squeeze for support. 2) You go in gently.

You clean up as much gunk as possible WITHIN the persons limits. 3) You stop when it gets too much and rest. The person must be given the time and space to integrate what has happened. This is pivotal to healing in the long term. We are not looking for short term fixes. 4) You may need to reapply the bandage. You do so with care and love. You do not suggest that the person was weak for not cleaning out the whole thing in one go. You are 100% supportive and meet the person exactly were they are. 5) You check the wound. Each day you gently pull the bandage back and check the healing. You clean out more if required. You tread gently and appreciate the person for going through the pain. You honour them for showing up on the healing path.

6) You offer tools to support the person.

As a person wonders ( often feeling lonely) through their healing journey ensure that tools are offered to help support them. I absolutely love essential oils as they are one of the best and most effective tools for navigating the emotions due to the impact on the limbic system. Remember a tool that works for one person may not work for another so have a wide ranging tool kit and be open and honest with the person. Some will work for them, some will not!

7) Re-bandaging

A person may need the bandage applied over the wound again and again - long after you believe they should have it. Think of it like our shields we often find ourselves in a space where we can take down our shields, only to pop them back on again, when the time comes to leave that space. Many a 'teacher' may believe that there is no place for shields as they are limiting your ability to truly live. True as this may be - Some of us need our shields to survive. They may be serving us right now! Trauma comes in layers and may appear to have been completely cleaned out only to reappear a few months, years later. A new layer will appear when the person is ready for a deeper level of healing.

Our emotional wounds need to be treated the same as our physical wounds. Know that if we get triggered, it is a true blessing, as it gives us the awareness and thus the ability to start cleaning out the 'pus' wound. Know that you heal in your own time. You can reapply your emotional band-aid as many times as you need. You will heal in layers and there is no expectation to do everything in one go. In fact that could end up retraumatising you and could possibly be more damaging to your physical body in the long term.

Remember - If you broke your leg you would NOT, and, would not be expected to, conduct your own surgery or apply your own cast. You do not have to heal your emotional wounds on your own. Know that once you embark on the healing journey it will not be all love and light, as some may have you believe. Yes, once you let go of some heavy gunk, you can feel euphoric ( after the fatigue passes) but it is messy and can be, quite frankly, truly painful. It is more pus and snot filled than most would like to imagine, it is hard, it is exhausting at times but trust me, when you clean out even one pus wound you will understand why people never stop or turn back on the healing journey. I offer teachings in yoga and essential oils which are two of the tools I used to help me through my darkest moments. If you want to experiment and see if these are the tools to help you as well please reach out to me today. Sending love wherever you are on your journey

xx