Allowing flow….

Self-connection – absolute, non-judgemental and loving connection back with the self; pain is a call to focus within in order to be present and then focus without.

Healing the physical pain by unravelling and freeing emotional pain.
Growing into confidence to deal with what was too much before.

Granting yourself permission (to go within, slow down, take time, raise awareness to your inner world and regain trust in your body and the message that the pain is attempting to convey. Please take all the time that you need).

Now being ready to nurture, love, nourish, and truly feel deserving of good things in your life.

Accountability and responsibility to yourself.

Discovering your strength to “travel backwards to move forwards”.
Reconnecting the child inside with the strong adult that you have become.
Allowing emotions surface and with it the flow of life; to feel all that is good in life requires acknowledging all the feelings that lie within: to feel more, we must ‘feel more’ (of everything)
Committment to our needs; letting go of feeling we owe something to others.

Not only being true to self, but honouring ourselves and our journey (and that of others).
Healthy boundaries; respecting our own, and respecting others.

Seeing past ourselves and connecting with the divine within, the divine surrounding us and the divine within others.

Appreciation of how we are connected to everything and everyone, and the more we can heal ourselves with love, the greater our capacity to heal the pain and wounds surrounding and affecting both us and our world.

Pain, that thing within us that we cannot run from.

It is that restless feeling that no activity can quench,
An anxiety of being around people; a terror of being alone.
We are stuck holding on to something that cannot be given away.
It is feeling alone, no matter who surrounds us.

Pain hides somewhere deep in your being; no one understands.
It is feeling low, no matter what the choice of high.
It is a feeling of never being enough, never having enough, never being distracted enough.
A deep pain that no amount self-inflicted suffering can overwhelm.

Pain is a voice that wants to roar, and is taped into the back of our throats.
It is a heart that aches for love, aches to love; yet is frozen fearful.
It is a child inside that yearns for attention;  and feels deserving of none.
It is the answer that says ‘I’m fine’, while earthquakes shake in our blood.

Pain is always running away.
But there is no running from.

It is tired days and sleepless nights.
It is a hunger never fed.
It is looking in the mirror and hating what we see; wanting to tear ourselves out of our bodies.
Pain consumes despite every tactic of avoidance.

Then finally there comes a day when your body just screams out; no more holding it all in.
The body asks in the only way it knows; your health suffers.
You feel tired, everything slows down.
It’s time to heal.

Emotions never felt before demand attention and a voice.
It feels uncomfortable; but you are strong.
All these emotions flooding the body, are you even allowed to feel them?
Anger, abandonment, disappointment, injustice, being let down….so many emotions.

You want answers; yet sense they are within.
You seek support and forget that you can ask.
You are worthy, you are lovable, and the pain wants out.
Its home is no longer deep in your body; YOU want to live free.

It’s time to let your energy flow again.
To free the body for new experiences.
Time to see yourself with new eyes.
It’s time to allow love.

Can you acknowledge all that you are and always were?
And realise your strength,
….all that you have become?
Can you see with clarity that you always did the best that you knew?

Pain burns deeply in many ways.
It is the pain of loss, grief, shattered trust, feeling unsafe and abandoned.
It is the pain from poor medical solutions and unanswered health questions.
It is the pain of feeling lost and alone in life.

Pain takes many forms:
an accident, an infection, an illness, a physical health problem,
Or a deeper emotional and spiritual pain.
Only you can be honest: what is your pain?

Before you discount all connections to emotions and wager on a physical problem, ask do you live a life that provides your body, mind, and soul with all the pieces needed to permit physical, emotional, and spiritual balance and health?

Can our pain be defined? Can one remedy or diagnosis or solution heal all pain?

Pain is something that is very different to each of us. It is highly personal and individual and something that in truth no therapist, medical expert, or scientist can fully appreciate the depths of. We can break it down into chemical and molecules and pathways but sometimes no drug can provide any relief; the pain is something deeper. We only know our own path, and our own suffering and anyone that has suffered pain would never wish it on another.

A driving force in my work is that I can help people feel free from pain, whether it is physical, emotional, mental or spiritual. Each one of us deserves the freedom to live a life filled with joy.

Out of curiosity I asked people the following questions:

1. what colour is pain?
2. what colour is the opposite of pain?
3. What one word (adjective) describes the opposite of pain

I received many answers, everyone loved to compare answers, many of us had similar answers but even more of us had differing answers.

4. then ask yourself to describe in a few words what does pain look like?

So for me, I would answer 1) black-red 2) bright yellow-white 3) presence (flow) and for the latter I see something empty, incomplete, like there is a void.

My own journey with pain is what will have formed these answers; I don’t want to make this article about my pain. I will however, share a little in order to provoke you into thought about your experience of and hence perceptions of pain. I have experienced the pain of a ruptured appendix and no morphine to treat the pain post-op, I have sprained ankles, suffered migraines, endured an eating disorder, self starvation, exercise punishment and hating myself. I have experienced losing loved ones and pets, I have felt the pain of disappointment and shame, I have felt the pain of being lost and feeling alone. I have felt the absolute terror of anxiety and panic attacks and being empathic and sensitive I can often feel the pain of others and ‘world’ pain, I can sense the physical discomfort or emotional pain that the body of another holds; but I have not felt your pain.

I cannot truly know your pain or the experience of it in your body. I cannot truly know how it feels, where it hides, or how it affects your life. But I want to help. The only way I can truly help you, is for us to meet one another with an element of vulnerability. My opening myself to feel your pain while being cognizant of my own, and your desire to truly go into the pain to describe it to me. Only then can I start to look for a remedy and a solution to assist your journey. It has been said that “Only the wounded healer can truly heal (Irvin D. Yalom). I will promise to do my best to meet you there.

 

In healing circles we often hear that all our symptoms are emotional in source, or that with mind-body work we can relieve our pains. I was reminded today that this is not always so; lest I cast judgement on anyone and the source of their pain, or their inability to focus past the pain, or why could they not make a choice to focus elsewhere on more positive thoughts and experiences. No, it isn’t quite so simple; it is not up to us to judge another’s pain.

Pain is complex, a thread that sees no divide between mind, body and emotions – it tangles them all.

I get migraines, and last week I suffered a bad one. After I lose my vision, I get this window of things being OK only to be followed by the unknown headache. I don’t know if it will be a thumper, or how long it will last and last weeks was a thumper that lasted 5 hours; 3 of these were accompanied by nausea which tells you that my body was struggling with the pain threshold. I had no paracetamol which I would have given in to, I had aromatherapy oils specific for migraine and the smell almost made me puke, and I was left with lying on a bed, not feeling tired enough to sleep attempting to do energy work on myself.

I could not see past the pain; I could not divert my attention from the pain and working on the pain I kept jumping back out because it just hurt too much. I asked questions about what was I not seeing in life if the cause of this was emotional, I was not stressed I was looking forward to a morning swim. The medical answer was the most obvious answer I was a week from my period and the migraine was hormonal; the exact same as the one two months ago. I was left with hoping that it would eventually pass or that I would fall asleep. It is true, all pain eventually leaves the body. 

 

The healing journey and how can plant and tree essences help:

Plant and tree essences can assist us to find strength and courage to allow the healing process; and also facilitates this process and gift us self-love and an ability to honour the path.

There are many remedies that can assist with pain and so I am not even going to attempt to create a one size fits all. I encourage you to come and see me where we can together select a customised supportive remedy for you. Many trees and plants spring to mind as options; of note: sycamore, linden tree and rose; but equally protea, beech, thistle and oak, or wounded heart may be calling to you. Let’s see where this takes us, because your individual path and innate healing wisdom will know….

 

Thistle

Linden tree

Sycamore

Protea caffra, Magaliesberg, SA

Yellow rose

Perhaps the healing journey is not about letting go, forgiving and pushing the past aside. We should go back, see things with pure and adult eyes as best we can; to make peace within ourselves for ourselves.

We should embrace our pain and experience as a part of us; as it is. A story that no one may know yet makes you the person that you are today. Stronger than you realise and compassionate to others suffering.

To expect our past to be forgotten and literally cut out of the person that you are perhaps is not how healing past pain is? Perhaps it is about finding the strength to start to let things flow; because you have travelled far enough now are ready to start to unravel emotions suppressed a long time back.

When we go back and allow it all to be a part of us, and allow the flow of emotions, and pull it apart a little into a place of more truth and see it with adult eyes, and create a safe place to feel the tough emotions like anger, loss of trust, loss of safety, being let down by adults that should have protected us and so on, then perhaps the body is less blocked and we can find ourselves more in the present. Don’t be so hard on yourself to expect that you can just jump into the present and for it to be all roses… but do learn to see past this, the greater gifts and how your experiences translates past only yourself and connects you to humankind on a global level

It may not be about letting go, so much as letting flow once more in the body.

I do believe that when we have an intention to heal, all our physical and emotional being connects to parts of the universe that we cannot understand and sets a path in motion to bring is to where we want to be: free from pain.

 

 

 Love,
Andrea

 

 

PS: Further reading that may interest you:

The Wounded Healer Part I

Here is a snippet from this insightful article:

“What we are suffering from individually within ourselves is the doorway through which we can more deeply relate to and become engaged with the suffering in the outer world in a way that helps alleviate both the suffering in the outer world as well as within ourselves.”

Wounded Healer; give this article a chance as there are some profound statements further down.

And some quotes about pain that may resonate and give you pause for thought:

“I am not a victim. No matter what I have been through, I’m still here. I have a history of victory.”
― Steve Maraboli, Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience.

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“Our own experience with loneliness, depression, and fear can become a gift for others, especially when we have received good care. As long as our wounds are open and bleeding, we scare others away. But after someone has carefully tended to our wounds, they no longer frighten us or others.

When we experience the healing presence of another person, we can discover our own gifts of healing. Then our wounds allow us to enter into a deep solidarity with our wounded brothers and sisters.

To enter into solidarity with a suffering person does not mean that we have to talk with that person about our own suffering. Speaking about our own pain is seldom helpful for someone who is in pain. A wounded healer is someone who can listen to a person in pain without having to speak about his or her own wounds. When we have lived through a painful depression, we can listen with great attentiveness and love to a depressed friend without mentioning our experience. Mostly it is better not to direct a suffering person’s attention to ourselves. We have to trust that our own bandaged wounds will allow us to listen to others with our whole beings. That is healing.” – Henri Nouwen, The Wounded Healer, 1979.

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“The whole purpose of letting pain be pain is this:  to let go of pain.  By entering into it, we see that we are strong enough and capable enough to move through it.  We find out that it ultimately has a gift for us.” –  Matthew Fox.

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“Painful situations, relationships that hurt us, memories of experiences that pinch our nerve endings, need not imprison us.  However, we are seldom very quick to let go of the pain.  Instead, we become obsessed with it, the precipitating circumstances, and the longed-for, but often missed outcome.  We choose to wallow in the pain, rather than learn from it.  And we salt our own wounds every time we indulge the desire to replay the circumstances that triggered the pain.”
“Pain can’t be avoided.  It’s as natural as joy.  In fact, we understand joy in contrast to experiences of pain.  Each offers breadth to our lives.  And both strengthen us.  Our maturity is proportionate to our acceptance of all experiences.  In retrospect we can be grateful for pain, for it offered us many gifts in disguise.”  – unattributed.

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“Pain has a message.  The information it has about our life can be remarkably specific, but it usually falls into one of two categories:  “Our life would be more alive if we did more of this,” and “Our loving would be more lovely if we did less of that.”  Once we get pain’s message and follow its advice, the pain goes away.” – John-Roger and Peter McWilliams.

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“Unexplained pain may sometimes direct our attention to something unacknowledged, something we are afraid to know or feel.  Then it holds us to our integrity, claiming the attention we withhold.  The thing which calls our attention may be a repressed experience or some unexpressed and important part of who we are.  Whatever we have denied may stop us and dam the creative flow of our lives.  Avoiding pain, we may linger in the vicinity of our wounds, sometime for many years, gathering the courage to experience them.” – Rachel Naomi Remen.

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“It is our own pain, and our own desire to be free of it, that alerts us to the suffering of the world.  It is our personal discovery that pain can be acknowledged, even held lovingly, that enables us to look at the pain around us unflinchingly and feel compassion being born in us.  We need to start with ourselves.” – Sylvia Boorstein.

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“There are many different kinds of pain that can keep us from living our lives fully, including physical pain, emotional pain, and mental pain.  Each has its own sets of dynamics concerning how it’s caused, its intensity, how we’re able to respond to it, and how we’re able to deal with it.  What they all have in common is the fact that they can be debilitating sometimes, especially if for some reason we’re not able to deal with them effectively.

In my life, I find that emotional pain is the hardest for me to deal with, mostly because I’ve never been given the tools that allow me to deal with it and then move on–if there even are such tools.  My most intense emotional pain occurs when other people do things that hurt me, especially if they’ve been people I’ve trusted and have cared for deeply.  When I do experience emotional pain from that type of source, I tend to withdraw into myself and try to protect myself from further hurt, a strategy that I know intellectually is ineffective, but that is so deeply ingrained in me that my intellect has little say about my reaction.

I do find that most of my emotional pain has more to do with my expectations of others, especially those whom I’ve known for many years, than with the actions themselves.  When I’ve known someone for a very long time, I start to feel that I “know” the relationship, and there are certain things that I feel I can “expect” from the other person or persons.  When those expectations are violated, this is a cause of emotional pain.  Other causes involve loss, hurtful words or actions, or even my own actions.

It’s important that we look at the procedures that doctors follow when their patients are experiencing physical pain.  The very first step, of course, is to identify the source of the pain.  Only when the source is truly identified can they treat the pain, for if they identify it incorrectly it can lead to the wrong type of treatment for the patient, which can make things even worse.

So it is with our emotional pain.  When someone criticizes me and I feel pain, the person’s criticism isn’t necessarily the cause of the pain–how I react to criticism causes my emotional or mental anguish.  The criticism is merely the catalyst that brings my reaction to the surface.  The knife that cuts my finger isn’t necessarily causing the pain–the way my nerve endings react is actually causing the pain.  The doctor won’t give me any drugs that are made to react to knives–he or she will give me drugs that react to the nerves in my body that are causing me pain.

If a person hurts me, then, that action is exposing something inside of me that reacts to the action and causes me pain.  The pain, then, is a signal that I need to start working on that particularly sensitive area of myself to find out why it’s so sensitive and how I might make it less sensitive.  I may need to seek out the help of an objective person who can help me to see the causes clearly, but unless I actively attempt to deal with the pain, I can expect that the next time something similar happens, it will be just as painful, if not more so.” from livinglifefully.com