Mind Body Connection.....

Emotional blocks result in PHYSICAL blocks.

Worry is a negative emotion and faith is a positive emotion. Light and dark can NOT exist in the same space, neither can faith and worry. One will always win out.

We are ‘trained’ from birth to suppress our feelings. “Hush that crying up or I will give you something to cry about.” This is the ‘norm’ for many people. We spend our childhood being trained and guided in what was and was not acceptable to express. Then we enter school and the training continues. Now we add teachers and peers into the mix. Then comes middle school, high school, sports, extra-curriculars, dating, social settings. Now we have arrived at early adulthood. Many enter the workforce and the NEXT LEVEL of training begins….what is acceptable in society.

By this point we have perfected our ability to suppress and hold in our emotions. We even have the confidence that we have ignored and swallowed them down so well that they are GONE! Never to be heard from again. However what we don't realize is that our emotions have not gone ANYWHERE except deep in our bodies and taken up residence. All of suppressing, ignoring, and swallowing emotions has set us up for a MIND-Body disconnect.

Mind-Body Connection…

Often when we are treated by conventional medicine, these areas are treated individually. However, the conscious and subconscious relationship between the mind and body is an intertwining of physical health and mental health. When we suppress our emotions we are creating a disconnect of the mind and body. Our ability to FEEL and NAME our emotions is compromised. We may feel disconnected, detached, outside of our body or even numb just to name a few ways a mind-body disconnect may manifest. Depending on how long the emotion has been suppressed (or how deeply) you are likely not be AWARE of what all is buried in the body. The mind-body disconnect is a result of being “unrooted” and detached from our emotions. It can cause symptoms such as fatigue, anger, anxiety or stress without awareness as to WHY.

Such was the case for me…. .After a traumatic loss as a child, I began pushing my feelings down thinking that “if I didn’t love people, it wouldn’t hurt me if this happened to anyone else when someone died.” I made the CONSCIOUS DECISION to ‘not feel things'. I stuffed everything down deep inside and ignored it. I refused to cry anymore about it. I REFUSED to grieve. I refused to “let it go”. I took the anger and held on to it…..

When they diagnosed me with Lupus, I was dumbfounded. I was unaware of any autoimmune issues in my immediate family. I am the type of person that needs to know WHY, HOW, WHEN, WHERE. I want to know the origin so I can understand what I am fighting. My lifestyle changes had gotten me 80% better but I KNEW there was more. I didn't know what, but I knew there was more.

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It was after my diagnosis that I crossed paths with a dear friend who introduced me to essential oils. Because I was still holding onto my anger, anytime I was triggered such as being upset, hurt, scared, sad, etc the initial emotion that surfaced was always anger. She would rear her ugly head and wreak havoc on whatever situation prompted her to emerge. Over the years she had grown from an angry little monster to a large fire-breathing dragon that burned up everything in her path. My friend had the inner strength and intuition to see my mind-body disconnect and lovingly but FIRMLY suggested I try a couple of essential oils. Being the (angry) skeptic I was, I was immediately resistant. She refused to allow me to detour from her efforts. She gave me Cedarwood and grapefruit oils. I was instructed to put 3 drops of both oils on the bottom of each foot and back of my neck 2-3 times a day. I was also advised to deeply inhale the oils several times throughout the day. This was NOT APPEALING to me. I hated the smell of Cedarwood. It smelled like a litter box to me! And the grapefruit was just as unappealing.

After her absolute insistence, I decided I would use the oils for a month only to prove her wrong and that they wouldn't make a difference. And so every day I applied what I felt smelled like CAT PEE to my feet and the back of my neck. However, what I found after 4 weeks of consistent use (yes, I was committed and consistent to the applications) I began to feel a shift. I couldn't ‘explain’ the change I felt. The closest I can get is to say my mood was lighter. I was smiling more. I was having more emotionally ‘good days’ than bad. I decided to continue using the oils for another month, then another, then another…..and then I was hooked. I began diving into learning about oils, emotions, and how our trauma can impact us.

It was during this time that I came across the book ‘FEELINGS BURIED ALIVE NEVER DIE’. (This book changed my life! I strongly encourage anyone who wants to come to a deeper understanding of themself to read it.) At the end of reading the book I decided to list every health issue I could ever recall having. (Allergies, Hay Fever, Asthma, Colon issues and GI pain, Chronic Inflammation, lupus, etc) Using the illness reference in the book I began to see that ‘grief’ or suppressed crying was a recurring theme that was related to all the conditions I had listed. This made absolutely NO SENSE to me at the time. I kept thinking “this is nonsense, I’m not grieving anything.” I tossed the book aside and tried to forget about it. However it kept rolling around in the back of my mind.

It finally dawned on me one day when something triggered a thought of my grandpa and I realized how badly it still hurt emotionally. I pulled the book out and revisited the issue of grief.

I began working through the process of releasing the grief I had pent-up all those years. These emotions had been so suppressed I no longer felt them. I couldn't feel much of anything except anger. Anger was ALWAYS there.

In focusing on grief, I came to realize I was still stuck in the grieving process. Remember, I said I consciously decided to nor grieve, to not cry about it? Well here I was, 34 years later, realizing how my grief, my sadness, my anger, my refusal to cry had taken a toll on my body and now I was seeing it physically manifesting as systemic inflammation, Lupus, sinus and lung issues.

This awareness set in motion my ability to FINALLY begin working through the stages of grief and release of emotions. This began my mind/body “reconnection”. I utilized the essential oils that I had researched for grief, sadness, and anger. Oils affect not only our emotions but physical conditions as well. I was also working with “the script” from Feelings Buried Alive.

Funny turn of events. As I continued to use Cedarwood and Grapefruit, I found a deep affection for those oils…. Cedarwood is probably my most favorite oil now. I love the smell, which for me, is strongly associated with liberation/freedom. It was the oil that started my emotional journey and was a foundational block in my emotional health.

We can't be present in our body without our mind-body connection. What I have learned over the past 5 years of this process is that healing is never ending. We are more than just our diagnosis. And with the right guidance and information we can change the path we are on. I am a spirit, I have a physical body......