Month: January 2016

How to forgive those who hurt you

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Healing from child abuse

Forgiveness is a term used falsely by many. It is not important for you to forgive another. What you need to do is stop torturing yourself about what occurred. Whether you forgive or not is irrelevant. The healing comes from letting go of the judgement, the hatred, the grief, the sense of betrayal or wishing it could be different, letting go of the need for revenge or expecting the person to say sorry or make amends. Peace comes from letting go of all that and accepting the person as they are, accepting what occurred and no longer fighting the emotions around it. Feel and release the emotions then move on.

It is only when you repeatedly tell the story of how you were wronged that you stay in pain. Choose to tell a different story, choose to focus on the growth that resulted, the personal insights and awareness that you wouldn’t have gotten without that painful experience. Choose to see the good that has come from it or if you can’t see the good yet, know the opportunity that is before you to heal will lead you to goodness, to purity, to innocence and love. It will lead you back to your heart and God and that is a gift.

Without the suffering, many of us wouldn’t go on our personal development journeys. So the pain is a catalyst pushing us to find the light. So those who inflict the pain are really helping us evolve. So there is no wrong to forgive. In the bigger scheme of things, we could thank the person who hurt us, because their actions led to our growth.

So let go of the idea of forgiveness. You do not have the power to condemn or influence another’s actions in the sense of forgiving them lets them off the hook. There was no hook in the first place.

Each person walks a challenging journey while on Earth to learn and grow from. For some, the challenges start when they are young, for others in their mid or later life. We all struggle. We all grow. We each have the choice about how we respond to the experiences in our life and what we think about them, the stories we invent around them, the conclusions and assumptions we jump to, all determine how much we suffer and how long we stay stuck.

Let go of the story, the drama, feel the emotions about it all and return to peace. It doesn’t matter whether or not the person/perpetrator has changed or not. You and you alone determine how long you are kept in the jail of misery by your thinking and the actions you take.

Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises (TRE) can help to shift out the dense energies, the energetic blocks stored inside you from all the painful, shocking and traumatic events in your life. It can help you to come out of freeze, shut down, depression and make it a little easier for you to then take action to move forward. It is just the old energy that weighs you down, clogs your system and leads you to feel hopeless, helpless and pessimistic like it won’t get any better. Life is changing every day as you release the old energies and open to the new. TRE is one of many useful tools you can use to help heal your past and move into enjoying life more.

Choose to see the flowers and beauty all around you. Choose to see the blessings in your life and how far you have come. See the love that is there at your core and in the core of all beings. See the love, joy and innocence of children and know that is who you truly are – a peaceful, loving, contented child who is in wonder with life, learning and growing with all you experience.

There is no such thing as good or bad. These are just judgements, labels we use. But in the bigger scheme of things all events help you evolve and grow. So let yourself and others off the hook. Just love them. Just honour them and accept them as they are – as beings of light on an evolutionary journey, waking up to love and kindness for all. Do not see yourself as more advanced than them or more aware. Try not to go into ego judgements. Just be love and kindness. As you give love and kindness to yourself and those around you, you will attract love and kindness back to you. While you are filled with hate and bitterness, you will attract more of that, people who feel that way or events that reinforce those feelings inside you.

Do the healing work so you feel peaceful and happy within, then your outer world will become that also. It is all up to you. So choose peace and happiness. Choose to focus on the light-hearted things and let the old stories go. They don’t serve you. Each time you relive a past event, you reignite those feelings, that vibration within you. That is why you feel stuck and like it never changes. Because you have hit pause and replay on that video in your life, that memory, that story. You are just stuck in an endless loop of replay, so you never see the later scenes in the movie, where it all turns out okay. You don’t see what is still to come, because you’re focused on that scene only. Let it go, let the scene disappear as you progress forward in your life open to the new possibilities, trusting in life to lead you forward and help you heal. Feel what needs to be felt and move on.

You can reprogram the subconscious beliefs that keep you stuck, thereby making it easier to move forward. Change ‘It never works out for me‘ to ‘Life is always working out for me.’ Change ‘I can’t trust others, they always hurt me‘ to ‘I attract in loving and kind people I can rely on’. Change ‘I hate my parents and my life‘ to ‘I am grateful for my life which is filled with loving and supportive people’. Change your mindset and your life will change. Feel the peace and ease which comes with these belief changes.

Make such changes through a conscious focus on stopping and replacing negative thoughts, through affirmations and repetitive thinking of the positive thought/belief OR make the change more deeply in your subconscious mind using Psych-K, Lifeline Technique, Hypnosis or other methods of reprogramming subconscious beliefs.

There is much you can do to help move towards peace and happiness. It does not have to be hard or a struggle and you don’t have to force yourself to forgive those who you see as having hurt you. False forgiveness is condescending. It is almost like spitting on the other person as you say I forgive you. In essence, you are saying “I judge you, I despise you, I hate what you did, but I forgive you because I am a better person than you. I forgive you and walk away because you are not worth my time or energy“. That isn’t forgiveness. It isn’t loving or kind. It is just emotional pain that hasn’t been healed. It is like having a nail in your foot, you are stuck, you can’t move, it hurts, yet you are saying to the nail ‘I’m going to ignore you and move forward’. You can’t, you’re nailed to the ground! You have to feel the pain, acknowledge it, release it, so the nail dissolves, then you are free to move forward. But you can’t skip the emotional healing and pain. You have to feel it, move through it, to get to the other side.

Life will guide you there. The right people and events will come to help you through it all. You just have to relax and allow. The less you fight against what is, the less you will struggle. Accept and flow with life. Be honest and kind with yourself. At least if you admit you still feel cross with the other person, you are knowing the truth of the situation for you at this time. It may change in future as you heal and it may take a long time, that’s okay. Be as honest with yourself as you can be, then you can stay connected with your heart and its power to heal you, as opposed to being stuck in your head, which can drown you in negative thinking.

Life will lead you forth in perfect timing for your growth and evolution. That is all you need to know and trust in. It will happen regardless of what you do or how much you resist. Life leads you to where you need to go and what you need to feel, to return back to a state of wholeness and love. That is the goal of life and the journey we are all on. We all make choices we later regret and wouldn’t choose to do again. No need to hold ourselves or others accountable for it. No need to shame or blame or degrade someone for their choices. Choose kindness instead, for we have all made poor choices at times and no one likes to feel ashamed or embarrassed about their past. No one wants to beg for forgiveness. They shouldn’t have to. They are learning and growing, evolving just like the rest of us. We can choose to do so peacefully or painfully. The choice is yours to make. Choose wisely. Blessed BE. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (24 November 2015).

Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.

How to free yourself from fear?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Healing from child abuse, Parenting, Personal Development

Fear takes hold of us when we are put into a state of phsyical danger. It is a natural mechanism designed to help us. It is the fight or flight or freeze response associated with the amygdala in the brain.

When a wild animal or cave man is attacking you, it is a good response. Blood flows away from your organs, digestion, immune system and brain and goes to your muscles, so that you have the best chance of winning the fight or out running your attacker. In this response you are helped to survive.

However, for many people their body’s are locked in fight or flight mode all the time. This is not helpful or healthy. It makes the body stressed and unable to do all that it needs to do with ease and grace.

We need to help calm and soothe our bodies back to a state of peace and relaxation. We need to let go of the tension that accumulates so readily in modern life. Rushing around all the time, trying to meet deadlines, putting ourselves under unnecessary pressure to achieve, to succeed in our jobs, our homes, our families, to have the best of everything.

Modern society measures success based on wealth and posessions. This is not an accurate description of success, for it ignores the lack of joy, close relationships, poor health, fatigue and exhaustion that comes from always being on the go.

Health-Happiness-Peace

A truer measure of success is peace and happiness. Is a person happy with their life, are they operating from their passion, fulfiling their creativity and purpose in life, are they loved, loving and kind with many close friends and healthy relationships with family, work colleagues and those they meet on the street. Do they have time to spend with their kids, who know that they are loved, important, valued and heard. Or are they waving goodbye to the kids in front of the TV as they go off to work.

Which version of life do you relate to most? If the first then it is not surprising that your body may be locked in a fearful state. There is no deep relaxation when someone is constantly on the go, rushing around. The body doesn’t get a chance to relax and recharge. Sleep may be broken and less of it than is needed for good health.

During sleep the body realigns with its natural state. With the mind switched off it can finally connect with Source and let all the residue of the day be cleared out. Some of it appears as dreams. Some of it just releases. But deep sleep is needed for this restorative process to occur.

If a person is locked in to chronic fear, they may struggle to sleep soundly, which then exacerbates the situation, as the body does not get the time to heal itself that it needs. Sleep really is very important. It is worth going to bed an hour earlier so you can sleep more. It is certainly more important than watching TV.

Most of people’s fears today are not about life and death situations. It is usually about stressful situations faced due to pushing themselves too hard in modern living – traffic, job pressures, rushing around, not having time to do everything that is needed. These are the superficial fears, the feeling like the ‘wheels will fall off’ if you actually stopped to rest. These are easily rectified by actually choosing to do less. By realising that you are living at a pace that the human body has not been designed for. So, choose to do less. Cut out unnecessary tasks and do only that which bring you joy and are truly required for you to live a happy and healthy life.

The deeper seated fears are those that come from childhood conditioning – ‘Am I good enough?’, ‘Am I lovable?’, ‘Am I acceptable as a human being?’. These are core fears, doubts about your being, your essence, that have resulted from not receiving enough of your parent’s attention, love and kindness when you were little.

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With modern lifestyles this is only getting worse, as more and more families have 2 working parents and the children spend more time in front of the TV and in childcare than they do talking or having fun with Mum and Dad.

Children’s developing brains do not have the capacity to understand that Mum and Dad are working so hard because they think they need to have the big, fancy house and cars and holiday homes, etc. The children simply see that Mum and Dad do not want to spend time with them and they assume it is because of a lack inside themselves.‘If I was more lovable, a better person, if I was more ….. then Mum and Dad would spend more time with me. They don’t value doing so, don’t make time for it, so I must not be valuable or lovable’.

This sets the scene for a fearful life with low self esteem. The child grows looking outside themselves for validation, constantly looking for evidence that their fears are real. ‘See the way that person looked at me, it confirms my fear that the world is a cruel place or danagerous place. See how that person pushed past me, etc’. These people may not have even noticed the first person and their actions aren’t deliberate or targeted, but because of the fearful thinking the person takes it to heart and draws false conclusions about the world and their safety in it.

In time with enough fearful thinking, it becomes habituated and the body goes about reacting as if it is always in danger. The day is lived on high alert, which is not healthy for the person concerned. As it takes hold the body gets overloaded and the result can be panic attacks and high anxiety levels. The body is so full of adrenalin and other fear related chemicals, that it becomes toxic and normal thinking abilities cease. The blood is flowing away from the conscious mind, locked into the primitive or hind brain in fight or flight mode. This is traumatising and exhausting.

Underneath all of this fear is faulty thinking, false assumptions about self and your ability to cope with life. Negative self messages may have been programmed into your subconscious mind when you were little, leaving you feeling weak and helpless.

From 0-7 the developing brain of a child simply absorbs what it hears, like a tape recording. What a child hears is what they believe about themselves and their abilities. It becomes the self-talk they say to themselves later on. It becomes the programming in their subconsicous mind. If a child is told it is weak, clumsy, useless, unwanted, a burden, not good enough, etc, then these become the core beliefs that the person will live with throughout their life, unless they learn how to change them.

If a child is told it is hopeless or can’t achieve, then they will struggle to be successful throughout their life. There will be this internal self sabotage due to their programming, which won’t let them be successful. Those negative self beliefs will kick in and stop them achieving their goals. Worse, it will create high levels of stress and anxiety whenever they try to achieve anything, as the tape recording in their subconscious mind will be constantly playing – telling them they are going to fail or are in danger of making a fool of themself if they try, etc.

Some people are aware of this negative self talk, for others it occurs quietly below the surface and they don’t even hear it. But it is occurring regularly throughout the day, adding to the fear and anxiety.

Over coming the fear and anxiety requires turning up the volume of the self talk so you are aware of it, then choosing to change it. Every time you hear a negative self belief, stop it, and say a more positive statement to yourself. Instead of ‘You always do that, you always stuff up’, say ‘In the past i’ve struggled, that’s true, but now i’m choosing to be kinder to myself. I can do this. I just have to practice and build my skills’. Become your own best friend and encourager of yourself.

The subconscious beliefs can be reprogrammed, changed to be positive, supportive beliefs that help you achieve your goals. There are many ways to do this including Psych-K, Lifeline Technique, Hypnosis [and] use of affirmations for long enough and often enough that the statement becomes habitual thought.

While affirmations take a long time to become habituated, the other techniques are much quicker. With Psych-K it only takes a few minutes to replace negative beliefs with more positive ones. However, lots of belief balances are needed as most people have a lifetime of negative self beliefs to reprogram. As you do, the tension in your body can release as the fearful programming is let go of. If you know you are safe, loved, wanted and cared for there is less reason for being on high alert. The body can start to relax as the danger has passed.

This deep level of core belief change is needed for this deep relaxation to occur. That is why just thinking more positively is not enough. Our conscious mind represents only 5% of our brain’s processing capacity. 90-95% of it occurs in the subconscious mind, which makes your body function without you having to think about it. The subconscious mind makes our hearts beat, our lungs breathe, our digestion work, etc. It does all of this without our having to think about it and it is so powerful it over rides our conscious thoughts. We cannot make ourselves stop breathing or not be hungry, our body forces us to breathe and to know that we need to eat. So, just using positive thinking is not enough to over come these deeper bodily reactions and programming. Changing core self beliefs is needed to help the body relax and let go of fear.

Diet and exercise also assist the body to be healthier, as does extra sleep, vitamins and minerals. There are many things that can be done to help the body let go of fear – massage can help a body in heightened fight or flight mode to relax a little and slow down.

For those that have been abused or suffered trauma, body work is very important as the person needs to learn that it can be safe to be touched. This is crucial for their body to relax and soften and allow them to feel safe again. It will take time for this relaxation to occur. Someone who has been traumatised and hasn’t released the underlying emotion may automatically flinch when touched. They automatically pull away for fear of further abuse or trauma. This is very sad, and this patterning will continue unless action is taken to heal it.

The nervous system of someone locked in fight or flight mode is constantly activated. Processes like Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) can help the body to calm by activating the body’s natural release mechanism. The body will shake out the tension and stress, if allowed to, so that it can return to a state of ease and grace.

When a person’s nervous system calms it is easier for them to relate to and connect with others, as their body is open and more receptive. It no longer fears or assumes danger from interacting with others.

TRE and other trauma release processes that focus on healing the autonomic nervous system are an important aspect of healing from fear, so you can have greater peace and relaxation.

Underneath the fear and anxiety is buried emotions from the initial events that led to the conditioning. It may be sadness or anger or shame and embarassment. Whatever it is, these emotions need to be felt and released so the body can go back to its natural state of peace and relaxation.

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Know it is possible to overcome exagerated fear responses. It is possible to heal these automatic reactions. It just takes time and effort to calm and soothe your body, to reprogram your subconscious beliefs and use more self supportive thinking and self talk patterns. Time in nature can also soothe us as can body work, diet and exercise. There is much that can be done. Enjoy. Blessed BE. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (18 November 2015).

Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.

How to overcome the tendency to isolate?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Healing from child abuse, Relationships, Uncategorized

People isolate themselves when they are feeling overwhelmed by life. They may have been hurt badly and not trust anyone or they may be fearful and depressed. Either way hiding out alone feels safer than risking contact with a world that to them seems harsh, unforgiving, cruel and threatening.

Life is not like that at all. You are always surrounded in the love of God/Source Energy, however, most people are so busy in their heads that they don’t notice it. You rush from one place, one task, one test to the next. You don’t rest fully in the peace of God/Source Energy, in your heart or spend time in nature deeply connecting to the Earth and your true nature.

People rush, rush, rush and then feel exhausted, then they wonder why they have no energy to enjoy life, to go and have fun. They get caught up in negative thoughts and conditioning, which just play out on an endless loop, until they wake up from this state of exhaustion and seek the light.

Sadly all this busy-ness has led to diminished connections with other people. It is rare for you to stop and meet another fully, to look into their eyes and feel their essence, to hear what is going on in their hearts and to talk honestly, truthfully about their experience of life.

empty-cup

You are all walking around like empty cups. Your cups should be filled with love and be over flowing from you to others. Connecting to God, to nature, to each other deeply fills your cup. But most people, nearly everyone, thinks they are too busy to slow down and have their cup filled.

If conflict occurs and you feel fearful, your cup is drained of the little amount of love you have in it. Then you feel empty, drained, exhausted. You know that it was the conflict with that person who led to you feeling drained, so you vow to isolate yourself from people like that, so you don’t get drained further. But in isolating yourself out of fear your cup stays empty. You get stuck in fear and that is the opposite vibration of love.

To love fully you need to be filling your own cup from God/Source/Nature, then you have so much love it doesn’t matter if a little conflict occurs. You will be able to respond to it more lovingly and be less affected by it as your cup is full and over flowing. Instead of getting upset, angry or blaming the person for negatively affecting you, you would simply send them love, feel compassion for them, as they are obviously having a hard time and have an empty cup.

So the key to feeling good is not to isolate out of fear, but to connect with love to God/Source/Nature, to listen to your heart and do things that bring you joy. Do this and your cup is filled, then it is easier to face the other aspects of life.

With people that you do feel safe and good around, make sure you take the time to connect, to talk heart to heart, to fel seen, heard, validated. You will never have that kind of connection with everyone, but when your cup is full the interactions that are less pleasant don’t bother you so much.

Yes you should have boundaries between yourself and those who disrespect you, abuse you or take advantage of you. That is self love, to say no to their demands. But make sure you spend time with those who do love you, respect you and treat you well. Don’t isolate and hide – at home, in social media, in work, etc. Come out into the open and breathe in fresh air, absorb the love, take the risk to open your heart and be present to what life is bringing you. It is all helping you grow and all leading you forward to a higher vibration, to the vibration of love. It is a process, a long one for many who resist out of fear, but know you will get there in the end, everyone will.

When you are isolating out of fear it is like you are stuck, frozen, unable to move and life life fully. Symbolically, that is what is also occurring within you. Any buried emotions, trauma, stress and tension gets held in your body, in your muscles and it is this stuck energy that leads to physical pain such as aching backs, shoulders, hips knees, necks. It is this tension, this rigidity, locked-in that stops our bodies from moving fluidly, from gliding with ease through life.

When our body gets locked up tight so does our thinking. It becomes less flexible. We see more in black and white terms. We see less love and goodness in the world because we are seeing through the lens of pain, of tightness, of soreness, of defeat, anger, disappointment and fear. The way we feel inside our body affects our thoughts and way of seeing in the world. We see less opportunity for change, for improvement. We slump down into resignation, shut down, overwhelm. We curl into a ball to protect ourself.

All of this inner tension, stress and pain can be eased if we use Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) to activate the body’s natural process for releasing that tension, stress and trauma.

The body has a way to ‘shake it off’, to cleanse that energy adn use up all of the fight/flight molecules stored in the body from all the times when we were triggered, but didn’t fight back, run away or speak our truth. All the cortisol and adrenaline was released into our blood stream to prime us to act, but we didn’t so it never got used up and these chemicals stay in the body as incomplete trauma activations. They build up and it is part of what causes our muscles to then tighen up and ache.

TRE can help you to shake out those energies, to complete the trauma activations, so that your body can finally open back up, relax, see and feel more clearly from the now, rather than feeling from the past. Clearing out that stress and tension enables you to see differently, to have easier social interactions, to feel more playful and safe.

When our body is tight, wound up, on hyper-alert, of course it is hard to play or joyfully interact with others, but that all changes when you complete the trauma activations and enable your body to come out of high alert back into peace. It is well worth doing so you can come out of isolation and enjoy life.

When you have healed the hurts in your body, it is much easier to open your heart, to love yourself, others and just BE. You can be present to all that occurs, choosing faith and peace, knowing it is all perfect and all of life is made of God and is doing God’s will. There are no bad people or places or choices, just learning opportunities. Just people who have closed their hearts to love and the light and who will open back up in time. Nothing to do or force, just trust God’s plan and love all that arises.

Send love to your fear, to your pain and to your sadness. Send love to those who you perceive have harmed you. That is what they need most, love. Noone who is feeling good about themself and is at peace within would willingly hurt another. They know that to do so hurts themself. So know that anyone who does hurt you is suffering, they are struggling within themself and with life.

You don’t need to accept the poor treatment, but try to send them love instead of hate or anger or judgement. They are judging themselves harshly and that is what leads to their angst. It can be torture when you are stuck in self defeating patterns of self judgement, self hate and self loathing.

Sadly many people speak to themselves more harshly than they would speak to others. They beat themselves up internally calling themselves names and feeling not good enough. It can be a very dark place. Know that noone will treat you as badly as you treat yourself!

When you are in that dark place the whole world seems dark, but the light is there, just waiting for you to see it and let it in. This is the process of awakening to love, light, God, peace and joy. This is the path back to wholeness. Become your own best friend, be loving and kind to yourself, say nice things about yourself to yourself. Be the loving parent you wished you had.

As you become more loving to you internally, the outside world will mirror it, bringing you people who treat you with more kindness and love. Life is just a mirror showing us what we still have to heal.

Heal it and see the truth, there is nothing but love around us. Anything else is an illusion created by our minds out of fear, judgement and hate. Heal it and you wil see peace, joy and beauty wherever you go. for it is there, we just have to clear out the blocks, the filters to seeing it. Blessed BE. Amen.

Remember everyone is on this journey, you are all isolating out of fear to some degree, not showing your true self for fear of rejection or ridicule. Yet you all are longing for love and acceptance, so why not give it. Just love everyone as they are. If you could do this the pain and fear will drop away and you will all feel safer, happier and more able to enjoy life fully. Choose to love and be loving, that is the key. Blessed BE, Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (5 November 2015).

Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.

Why is it useful to spend time in nature?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Conscious Evolution, Self help techniques, Sustainability, Uncategorized

nature-scenes-04Nature vibrates at the rate of Source energy. It helps us slow down and our vibration rise. It is calming and soothing to our nervous systems that are over stimulated from modern living and rushing around.

Nature shows us life’s pace – things grow, bloom, wither and die. There is no fanfare or drama linked to these events, it is simply part of life. There are times when life seems bountiful – good weather, nutrients, enough water and plants thrive. There are times when life seems poor, harsh and cruel – no water, drought, blistering heat. Yet the plants and animals simply adjust, changing their behaviour to suit the circumstances. Some may perish. This is not a personal vendetta or attack. It is simply life in the bigger picture.

All species need some form of control to limit numbers and destruction of the ecosystem from over population. Different species eat each other. Pests and disease come to wipe out some populations. It is all part of the cycle of life.

Trees don’t take it personally when the wind blows, pushing them around. They just bend as much as they can and let the wind blow. They don’t go into ‘Why me, it’s so unfair, i’m a good tree, I haven’t hurt anyone, etc’. They just bend and adjust. They just keep growing. And life can be much simpler and more enjoyable for us if we learn to do the same.

It is our emotional reactions to events in our life that create the suffering. If we just flow with life, accepting what occurs and adjusting to it as need be, we wouldn’t suffer as much.

The loss of that job or partner is not a tragedy, it is a step in your evolutionary process, it is leading you forward to something far greater.

When we are comfortable in our lives, we just sit and be still through much of it. This is beneficial, a time of rest, restrengthening. The bud is beginning to reach out, absorb the sun and is readying itself to burst forth in bloom when the time is right.

Most of us will not step out of our nice, comfy place without a push, a life event catapaulting us forward to face whatever needs to be faced for our growth and evolution. We need the storms in order to grow. The floods and fires shake things up so that new life can spring forth once the tidal wave of change recedes.

Big events in our lives, unexpected massive changes to our lives are like these storms. They unhook us from our stable foundations and force us to adapt, to find a way to evolve and grow.

Human beings are part of nature and are also exposed to similar cycles and patterns of growth. Nature itself shows us the most useful way to respond. Nature adapts and moves on. The deer run when the lion is around and rest when it is not. The bear hibernates in winter. He doesn’t push through, trying to force things to be different than they are. He just does the wisest thing he can to conserve his energy and stay strong. He rests, sleeps deeply and awakens when the time is right and the harvest is present. We do the same.

Spending time in nature helps us in so many ways. The green colour which is so prevalent in natural scenes soothes our heart and helps the heart chakra open. The blue of water soothes our throat making it easier for us to calmly speak our truth. The beauty of nature leaves us in awe of life and to creation, helping us consider that there may be a creator who produced all of this magnificence.

Nature soothes us, replenishes us and helps us ground within our bodies, to come out of the head or mind chatter and be present in the moment. Walking bare foot on grass helps us heal. It allows the energy of the Earth to travel up our legs and calm the body. It is a good cure for jet lag too, helping us adjust to the new location / new energy that you are in.

Nature truly is our friend, of great benefit to us and when we destroy it, we are harming ourselves literally. Without nature in abundance the air we breathe would not get cleansed or purified, the water cycle would not work as well and pollution would stagnate in our water instead of being filtered out. The soil would erode without tree roots holding it in place and the land would become barren, making it more difficult to grow our food.

When we disturb the balance of nature we suffer as well. So plant some trees, support your local environmental groups and give thanks to this wonderful planet who supports us, nourishes us and heals us, all without asking for recognition, compensation or reward. Thank you Mother Nature. Thank you. Blessed BE, Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (04 November 2015).

Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.

How do you stop being over controlling?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Healing from child abuse, Relationships, Uncategorized

People are over controlling when they feel scared and vulnerable underneath. They micro-manage everything in an attempt to stay safe and have everything work out as they want it to. If another person does not behave the way they want, the first person is likely to get very angry as they fear the consequences of that person’s actions will be devastating.

Underneath it all is FEAR, lots of fear, hurt and sadness which has built up over the person’s lifetime. The controlling personality is just a defense mechanism to cover up the fear and protect their vulnerability.

In reality the process of over controlling is exhausting, it is done frantically, manically. It is not a peaceful process and it certainly isn’t kind. A controlling person can be very bossy and judgmental as they push through trying to force the outcome they need to feel safe.

They are not thinking about the other person’s feelings or needs, only their own. While this sounds selfish, it is not really. It is not coming from a place of my needs are more important than yours. It is coming from a space of ‘I need you to do this in order for me to feel safe, I am in danger unless you do this, you must do this, please do this’. It is a painful way to live, so desperate and afraid.

Many controlling people appear tough, cold, judgmental, unemotional, but that is just the mask they wear to cover up their vulnerability and fear. What the person really needs is to drop the mask, feel the feelings, release the hurt and sadness, learn to speak their truth in kind and loving ways. For instance:

‘I know I have been pushy and controlling wanting you to do certain things. I’m sorry that I have been so forceful. I was afraid that if you didn’t do those things, X would happen and that worries me. I’m scared Y will occur and I wanted to avoid that. I understand you don’t feel the same ways as me and you may have felt I was saying “You are not good enough as your are”. Please know that I never meant for you to feel that. You are a beautiful child of God on your own path of healing and wholeness. I was just scared and wanted to avoid what I feared would occur. What I really need is to say all of this to you and stop pretending to be strong. Can we work out a plan together to tackle this situation, then I can relax knowing that it will be okay.

When I start to get scared or frustrated can you please just give me a hug, help me to feel okay, safe, reassured that all is okay. I would love it if we could do that. I know it is not your job to look after me, I will look after me, I am just sharing how I feel. I will do my best to let go and trust you to do what is agreed to. I may slip up and be pushy occasionally – this has been a lifetime habit. If I do slip up just let me know and give me a hug. Please don’t get mad at me. I mean no harm, I’m just scared and need to be comforted and reassured. Thank you for loving me, listening to me, and caring for me. I love you and value you and want to treat you better and I will do so. Thank you’

If a person who has been over controlling like this can speak their truth, the armour can start to melt, they can let go of the rigidity, soften the emotions and feel their heart beat. They will need to learn self supportive talking techniques to reassure themselves whenever they start feeling vulnerable. They will need to learn positive thinking / thought stopping skills, so they can stop a negative thought in its tracks and change it to a more positive one. ‘Yes, I used to believe it would be a disaster if …. occurred. I know now that I would cope, even if it did occur. In all the years of worrying about …… it has never or rarely happened and even when it has, it hasn’t been that bad. I’ve coped. I’ve survived. I’ve learned and I’m okay!’

Free-Bird

Worry is pointless, it really is, let it go. Let go of wasting your days in fear. Let it go. Focus on your breathing and calm your body this way. Deepen your breathing as much as you can. Long breaths into the belly help your body to calm and to regulate itself. Fear chemicals will get dissolved and you can return to a state of balance and peace.

Know that those people who appear most rigid, have the most emotion locked inside them. They have not processed and released it. They have bottled it up inside and they are like a pressure cooker waiting to explode. They are under great internal pressure that they need to learn to regulate, to let the steam out little by little, in manageable ways until the pressure has dissipated.

The body actually has a natural mechanism to do this. It will ‘tremor’ to release the tension, stress and trauma that has accumulated in the body. You can activate the tremoring mechanism to safely discharge the blocked energy and calm your nervous system out of fight and flight back to peace. If you would like to learn more about the tremoring process see the Trauma and Tension Release Exercises (TRE) page of my website.

Processing the emotions underneath controlling behaviour will take time and courage to face the truth of your feelings and drop your personality mask. It requires a willingness to be vulnerable, to meet and reveal your true self, your inner child and all the hurts that have been hidden. Doing so leads to freedom, to inner peace, better relationships and more enjoyment of life. It is worth doing. Blessed BE. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (29 October 2015).

Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.