Suffering is inevitable in this life. It’s one of the things that we all must go through. Some more often than others, some more intensely than others. No avoiding, no deflecting, no controlling. Suffering vastly ranges and there is no shortcut through it. Suffering craves suffering. It’s easy to fall into the vicious cycle of pain and numbing. The energy you put out is the energy you will receive. Hardship breeds shame. It makes us want to camouflage with the crowd while our subconscious mind feels anything but normal. We must challenge what we think we know to arrive at our truest, most innate self. The same goes for healing. We cannot simply hide our hardship and expect growth.

To step into a mindset of healing, we must honor our innate needs. This can be a challenging thing to do as we have been conditioned to hide our pain. We assume that it makes others uncomfortable, leading to a downward spiral of doubt and mistrust in the mind and body. The good news about that is you get to control the way you show up. The bad news, only you can choose the path to healing and nothing else can or will kickstart that process for you. Healing means vulnerability, honesty, reflection, and true inner work that only you can do.

There is No Beauty Without Pain

Growing up, we didn’t talk about emotions much. Our family was pretty open to conversation and communication but emotions weren’t a topic of conversation all that often. Vulnerability was uncomfortable and foreboding. Crying made you feel like the plague that everyone was trying to stay away from. You can imagine how that went for me; empathy is my first language and crying is my favorite pastime. I used to think maybe I was born into the wrong family but watching them become more vulnerable and open has made me believe I was very intentionally placed here simply to help foster loving kindness and inward connection among us all. It’s truly been an honor having hard conversations, initiating change, and cultivating emotional connections that interlink us all. We’ve gone from being glued as a family to being woven together thread by thread. A bond that would take great force to break.

I believe anxiety has always been a part of me. Looking back, I can recognize anxiety impacting me from a young age but it wasn’t until my teenage years that I truly discovered the hold it would have on me. Read more about that here. I think it’s important to note here that though “healing” seems magical and beautiful, it’s also messy and hard. And, it couldn’t be transformative without the grueling pain that anxiety has inflected. Have you ever heard the term “it hurts to be beautiful”? Well, that goes deeper than surface-level beauty. A beautiful life isn’t just filled with healing and growth. You can’t heal what wasn’t once hurt.

Healing Isn’t Linear

I had a really hard breakdown just the other day. I am years into my healing journey and this one hit really hard. I was reactive. I was in pain. I felt like an addict that had relapsed. I think for so long I felt so much pride in my healing journey. I’m now realizing I must heal from my pride that was inhibiting natural beauty in the growth process. I looked at my anxiety as something that had to be fixed forever rather than an emotion that will continue to ebb and flow. Shame washed over me like a tidal wave. I saw it coming. I had plenty of time to run to shore but before I knew it, the water hit, and the safe shoreline merged with the open water. I was lost at sea. Anxiety became me. Quickly, the anxiety turned to shame and the shame turned to sadness. It was a plethora of hard-hitting emotions. I knew I had the skills and resources to overcome this meltdown but my entire body was paralyzed. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move. I had no choice but to just be.

That’s the thing about being present. We often assume it enhances the joy in our lives and it does. But, it also enhances the hard-hitting suffering that we will inevitably feel. We cannot feel joy without suffering and we cannot feel good without the hard. They must coexist. Being rather than doing is a hard task and we are so quick to assume that it means being in the joy that this life brings. It equally means sitting in discomfort as grace moves through the vessel in which we are. If the goal in life is growth, then why would we try to stay so constant? We often force ourselves to keep our bodies a certain way while pleasing and perfecting for the outside world. Just as your physical being will fluctuate through life, so will your emotional and mental being. Emotions aren’t constant and no matter how much growth occurs, there can’t be a finish line because our emotional state will always be evolving. It simply can’t be a linear path to healing.

The Path of Healing

There really isn’t one specific way to heal. We can nurture our beings and we require different needs during varying times in our lives. While I may not have the answer to what healing must look like for you, I can guide you in the direction of optimal love and intuition which will lead you to the place you need for healing and growth.

• Release attachment
  External attachments are preventing you from growth. Attaching to something that is everchanging will bring more doubt and fear. Practicing non-attachment is a powerful practice that creates room for new and beautiful ideas to bloom in your life.
• Release expectations
  Holding expectations will only initiate more doubt. Expectations are future-based taking you out of where you are right now. Release expectations of yourself and others to enhance what’s going on in your life right now.
• Invite in the calm
  Someone once told me that you can know your yoga is working when you feel calm. And, I believe that to be true with healing. When being calm is a part of your aura, growth is occurring. This is especially true in situations that typically would yield reactiveness and overwhelm.
• Keep an open mind
  You can’t heal anything with a closed mind. Healing is necessary when you are deeply suffering from hard-hitting emotions and self-doubt. If you had all of the answers, you wouldn’t be experiencing hardship. Keep an open mind to experience the beauty in this life. You never know what might transform your inner being.
• Shift the idea that setbacks are inhibiting growth
  They actually allow for greater growth and recognition. When I had my breakdown the other day, I was in sheer panic. I kept repeating “I’m so disappointed. I’m so sad. I’ve come so far”. That moment was hard but if I would have reacted that way years ago, I wouldn’t have even noticed what was going on. The shame and anxiety would have become me entirely. I noticed what was happening. Though I was reactive, I knew what was happening and I knew what I needed to work on. I knew who I needed to talk to. I knew what work needed to be done. I may have been reactive and struggling, but it wasn’t a setback. It was an opportunity to explore something new.
• Explore your past
  I know, it’s hard. I do really deep shadow work with my clients and it’s tough work. I continuously do it myself as well. We have to explore earlier versions of ourselves in order to understand what we’ve neglected for so long. Your subconscious mind remembers everything and is taking count. It needs to be seen and recognized to understand where and who you are today.
• Trust others and trust yourself even more
  Intuitive living is about trusting yourself during your healing process. We can’t rely on others to do the hard work for us. But, it is important to have other people that you trust along for the ride. We must confide in others to grow and learn. Find the people that have earned the right to hear your story and be a part of your progress. Lean into them for support while maintaining the integrity of your judgment and intuition.

There is No Finish Line

I didn’t and haven’t just healed. I’m not some enlightened being that has all of the answers. But, I do see clients every single day improving their relationships with themselves with my help. We work day by day to uncover the traumas that have been building for years. We develop lasting strategies that make healing possible. Healing hard emotions, healing the relationship they hold with themselves, and healing their relationship with the world around them. Emotional and personal growth isn’t something that happens overnight. It can be excruciating work at times. It can be beautiful work at times. And, it’s never done.

I don’t believe that there is a finish line to the healing work that we do. There are so many moving pieces and when people enter their personal growth journey, they often quit rather quickly. This happens because of the expectations set on ourselves. We assume that we can go work out, go to therapy a few times, and journal every now and then to reach enlightenment. That’s not how it works. It’s a lifetime of work without an end goal. The hope is optimal living and joy. Every time you reach a point of “being done”, there is a new idea to explore. We must release control while taking control. We must stop trying to perfect every aspect of who we are when in fact. When we control and perfect, we lose control over our well-being. Discipline in our practices yields freedom within. The path to healing doesn’t grant you a finish line and that’s okay. Hard breakdowns will happen, and they don’t define me. Or you. Or us. There is beauty in the breakdown and we must break down to break through. We must break down to experience the power of true healing.