Tag: Personal Development

What is the family soul?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Family Constellations, Healing from child abuse, Parenting, Self help techniques

reflective-treeThe family soul is the collective energy that surrounds a lineage of people from the same family. It contains all the memories and experiences of everyone in the family.

When there is trauma or exclusion a wound occurs to the family soul, a distortion of the energy, so instead of love flowing through the family line, pain now flows from the ancestors to the current and future generations. This also occurs when the orders of love are reversed, for instance if a parent is absent and a child does not receive the nurturing and connection it needs. The absence may be due to war, abandonment, physically if a child is given up for adoption or if a parent themselves is sick, unavailable emotionally or physically. When a parent is ill or emotionally unavailable, often the child will try to ‘give’ to the parent to help them cope or feel better. The child takes on responsibilities that are not theirs to carry – it may be helping out a lot around the house or caring for the other children or even caring for the parent. The orders of love are reversed in this instance as the flow of energy is child to parent, instead of it being the parent giving and the child receiving.

It also occurs when someone is excluded from the family, because everyone does belong to the family system, no matter what they have done. Excluding someone is like throwing a block, a big boulder into the flow of the family soul, the river of lifeforce energy flowing to all people. The block diminishes the amount of energy available to all people. Worse it creates a tear in the fabric of the family soul that will only be healed when that excluded person is bought back into your heart. If this does not occur, someone in future generations will subconsciously choose to relate to the excluded person and will end up feeling like they are not accepted or don’t belong, they will repeat the fate of the excluded individual as the family system attempts to heal the wound.

It is just like our personal journeys where life presents us with a repeating situation until we learn the lesson. This is the same thing, but at the family level. Discovering this enables those who are suffering to resolve it by welcoming the excluded person back into their heart, energetically welcoming them back to the family system and restoring them to their rightful place. This allows the lifeforce energy to then flow freely again to all members. This occurs at the soul level, energetic level, it does not have to be physically and often it is an ancestor long dead who was excluded and in need of reconnection to their rightful place in the family.

If there has been trauma in the family system, be it war, violence in the home, tragedy from loss of children, divorce, early death of parents, etc then this trauma can also pass through the family system to the current and future generations. It is as if the unresolved pain seeps through the blood of all involved instead of love, strength and support. This too can be healed so that those affected are freed from their over reactions to situations, the inappropriate feelings or thoughts they may have that don’t seem to be appropriate or consistent with their life experiences. For instance persistent suicidal thoughts or depression or anxiety could actually be resulting from entanglements with past family members, you are feeling their feelings, they are not actually your thoughts. These cease once the wound in the family soul is healed by acknowledging the tragedy, the loss and giving it it’s rightful place, allowing all to feel and move through the situation, instead of being stuck and controlled by it.

The family soul is a container of energy around all members of the same lineage, when all is well in a family you can feel the flow of love, flowing from the ancestors to yourself and the other current family members. This energy strengthens you, supports you and encourages you to live your life as you wish to do so, for you are the leading edge of consciousness, the person now evolving while here on Earth and expanding the consciousness within the family. The ancestors want you to succeed and do well, they want you to thrive and advance the family line. This is life as it was meant to be. This support is available once you heal any blockages to its flow. It is worth doing and quite easy when you know how.

There are many methods that can help. Family constellations is one of these, where the field supplies the information about what is missing and blocked and needs to be resolved within the family system. The challenge then is to feel what needs to be felt, forgive all involved and welcome them back into your heart. It is a similar task to our personal issues, just with some larger influences. It is a part of our evolution, our connectedness and oneness with the fabric of life. So be it. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (15 September 2016).
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 do we inherit family trauma?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Family Constellations, Parenting, Relationships, Self help techniques

Trauma that cannot be processed by one family member, because it is overwhelming, they do not have the skills or knowledge of how to process it, or do not have the will to feel it and release it, will be passed on genetically to the next generation. It also of course affects the rest of the current generation due to the unavailability of the traumatised person who will be isolated within themselves, possibly numb emotionally and distant in their ineracting with others, be they their children or siblings.

Trauma stays within the body and freezes part of the person’s energy, it is literally stuck, frozen in time within them, locked into when the trauma occurred. It stays in the body until it is processed and if it is not processed then it remains locked in place, creating internal tension and dis-ease.

No individual wants this to occur or be passed on to their existing children or grand children. It is not an intentional thing, it is an automatic thing. If Dad has died in the war then Mum is going to be mourning, she is not going to be able to be present fully for the children or meet their emotional needs. The children will sense Mum’s pain and feel their own loss and mourning, so they will try to get Mum to feel better, so they can get the attention they need. If it doesn’t work they eventually give up trying and switch off, shut down emotionally, feeling empty, unloved, unsatisfied with life.

The pattern then repeats when they marry and try to get the attention they missed out on from their husband or wife. No matter how loving the partner is, they cannot make up for the emotional pain or love deficit from their partner’s childhood, so it will feel unloving or not enough. They may try hard to give enough, to do extra, be extra affectionate and giving, they may try to fill that hole in their partner. Eventually they realise no matter what they do it is not enough, it doesn’t work and they are exhausted from trying, so they switch off, shut down, isolate and become emotionally numb as well, so the pattern continues. No malice, no cruelty, just life when there is trauma within one or both partners in a relationship.

So how do you resolve it? By becoming aware of the trauma within, by creating a safe enough space that you can feel it, acknowledge it and let it dissolve. By seeing your defense mechanism and games you have used to protect yourself from it.

  • Have you kept yourself so busy that you can’t feel?
  • Have you been saving the world, feeling righteous putting all your energy into others or a cause, but neglecting yourself, avoiding yourself and your inner world?
  • Have you been pleasing others, doing for others, hoping that they will love and accept you and you will feel that you are okay, lovable and worthwhile?
  • Have you been isolating yourself from others, keeping a low profile, so as not to be seen or to avoid any possible further trauma? By being preoccupied with avoiding it, you stay stuck in it and will have difficulty exeriencing any joy in life.

There are many defensive mechanisms that people use to try and keep safe or to avoid their feelings. Looking good so to avoid rejection, fearing you won’t be accepted as you are, so you try to be, look, do everything perfectly. This is exhausting. It is no wonder people end up depressed or ill, their life force is being frittered away with fear and their over reactions to it.

To clear the trauma and stop passing it onto our kids we need to become emotionally aware and savvy in processing how we feel. Learn to go within and sit inside yourself, breathe, let the emotion surface and breathe through it, let it be released, felt into completion. It can’t be avoided. It has to be acknowledged and felt. Thank the defense mechanism for keeping you safe, but choose to be present for yourself and your inner child now.

happiness inside jobIt is this inner child part of you that needs your reassurance, your love, your acceptance. It needs you to become the good parent to yourself, to know that you will look after him/her and protect her, you wil be the Adult guardian she felt was absent in earlier years. As she feels safer and you feel and release the pain, you will find you are not triggered by life any more, you can live more in the now and be there for those you love. Your children, if you have any, will notice this shift, they will feel your presence and they will absorb your love, your attention, and you can meet their emotional needs, fill up their inner cup with love so it is overflowing, then they can acept themselves and enjoy their lives.

If their cup does  not get filled and they feel empty, forlorn, they will at a soul level choose to take some of your pain, some of your trauma so you feel better and then you might be able to love them more. They abandon themselves to care for you. This is a reversal of the orders of love and is damaging for all involved. Parents are meant to give and children receive. However, it is often reversed in many families when the parents are hurt, injured or unavailable, whether that be due to illness, addiction or absence.

Children try to make the parent happier, they may try to be neater or tidier, they may help out with the housework or try to cheer the parent up with jokes, they may try to steal the attention through getting into trouble to distract you from your pain or they may even sacrifice their own health, choosing to get ill so you will focus on them and not feel your own pain. Children are so loving, but this is not healthy behaviour.

In doing this chldren miss out on being kids, they grow up way too fast and this stunts their natural growth and emotional development. It locks trauma, pain and loss within them and so the cycle repeats. When they have their own children they will sense the parent’s pain and do the same thing, hence it passes through the generations. No malice, not deliberate, done out of love, of wanting to help and of not knowing how to heal the underlying issue of emotional pain and trauma.

Thankfully in today’s world we do have the knowledge of how to heal trauma, how to bring love back into the family system and to correct any reversals of flow, so that the younger generations can receive the love and support they need and deserve from the ancestors behind them.

Family Constellations and other methods can help individuals to heal their family systems, enabling hope and love to exist for all family members. There is much more that can be said about this in future blogs, for now this is enough, to understand that trauma passes through families until love is restored.

Each family member can find peace and happiness when the blocks to love are removed. It can be done, support is available and you can learn the skills to feel your emotions and release that which is locked away inside you. It is possible, it is worth doing and your children thank you, because then they don’t need to do it for you, the burden they carry for you is transformed, freeing them to enjoy their lives more. Such love, such loyalty, such strength and commitment to each other, that is what families are about and it is beautiful. Blessed BE, Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (10 September 2016).
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 are families so disconnected?

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

Some are and some are close, still maintaining a heart to heart connection between family members. In today’s world people are very busy, achieving, being better than others, obtaining things / material objects. These advances in gadgets, in stuff, are valued more highly than taking the time to BE, to connect with friends and family in real life. It is quicker, easier, more hassle free to just connect on social media and keep your physical distance, to have space for self, to rest and recover after working hard all day or facing your own emotional turmoil.

We are here on the planet to go through our awakening and this requires events to hapen to get us to stop and rethink our choices. It requires events that totally alter what we see as important and valuable in life, that is why the tragedies occur, the near death accidents or illnesses, the loss of relationships, family members or careers, the bankruptcy and crime. It all occurs to get us to stop and feel.

While we are busy living normal life we are often on autopilot, we go about our days the same way, over and over. It is comfortable, relatively easy, we don’t have to expend too much energy. Our comfort zone is stretched if we are asked to do much more and we may resist by shutting out that person and their demands or whatever it is that is asking us to stretch. It is easy to get lazy, to just rest and watch TV, to cuddle your pets or children or partner and to switch off from what is occurring to everyone else and the larger world. This is not callous, not personal, it is just human nature, to care for those you hold dearest and to draw a boundary around them and your way of being and to keep that safe, happy and easy.

Anyone wanting to come into your space may find it hard, if your boundaries are very strong. You simply don’t let them in, there is no time available for catching up or getting to know each other. No time for interaction. This is not necessarily a personal rejection, it is just that the person or people inside the circle are contented with their lives as they are and do not see the need to let anyone else in.

This may change in time, they may become more open and available, a career change, a new child, a special event, starting a hobby, or a loss of some kind may lead them to open the door a little wider. Their circumstances may change and they may need more people to help them, if someone was ill, if there was a new child or if their was unexpected loss in some way, whether that be a death of a loved one, loss of a job, crime and loss of posessions or finances. These losses occur to get people to open up, to step out of their comfort zone and to expand their consciousness. These life changing events kick-start the next phase of your evolutionary growth. They are meant to occur and they serve us. They shake us up and get us moving again.

hurting againIf you are upset that people will not let you in, that the door is closed, their boundaries too high, then look within yourself, look within and see why you are upset. You as an adult don’t need these people, you just want them. You can survive on your own. Any pain you are feeling is a trigger to heal that pain inside.

Many of us in childhood did not get our own needs met. We were left with an emotional deficit and we are hungry, starving for love and acceptance. We try to get it from many places and one of those is our families. We assume that they are our blood and we should be close, together, supporting each other. We should be happy, friendly and caring of each other. But this is just your thinking, your judgement.

You chose to incarnate into your specific family for a reason. If you chose a family that is disconnected, you did so for a reason. Perhaps you wanted to learn independence, self reliance and contentment outside of the family realm. If your family was all loving and kind and life was easy, you would not evolve at the rate you do when life is challenging. The challenges occur to help you go within and heal, to reconnect with your own divine nature and that of Source.

heart wateringAs you heal yourself you find that you don’t need love from others, you realise you are love, that is your true nature, and the nature of the Universe. We are surrounded by love and support all the time, but we don’t see it until we heal all the pain and trauma through which we view the world and those in it. We judge based on what is inside us. Each person, each family is doing exactly what they need for the evolution of its members. In time as they all heal and become one within themselves, love will flow freely throughout that family system. Until then there will be blockages, their will be conflict or separation.

You can’t force people to change, to heal, to let you in. What you can do is choose to love them anyway and to focus on healing your wounds and reconnecting to peace and love in your heart, so energetically love flows from you to everyone, instead of pain and judgement, shaming or blaming of those involved.

Try to be compassionate, try to accept that each is doing what they need to for their evolution and each is awakening at their own speed, evolution cannot occur over night, it takes time, lots of time and different people have different abilities to do so. We need to learn the skills to change our thinking patterns, our subconscious beliefs, our conditioning and emotional density. We need to learn how to take responsibility for our own lives and make the best out of what we have. We need to learn the power of gratitude and positive regard, seeing the best in things, as opposed to the worst.

Life truly can be Heaven on Earth if we do the work to heal ourselves. When we do so we make it easier for others to do the same. Energetically our freedom radiates out into the family system affecting others, making it easier for them to do the same. This is how we can help and make a difference  – by loving everyone as they are and accepting their choices and journey. We can focus on our own healing and evolution and know that when everyone’s hearts open back up love will flow freely between us all and families will be more harmonious. This will all take time and we can’t force it.

Don’t torture yourself by judging your family. Heal yourself instead, enjoy your life as much as you can and the doors will open in time, allowing greater connection to those you love. First you do the work internally, energetically and then it manifests in the outer world. Choose peace and love – that is what the world needs and what you are craving. You have to give it to you. You have to heal your blocks to receiving and to letting people close.

When you are healed and energetically open people will come, some of your blood family and some your Soul family, those who resonate with you, love you and want to be with you. These are your true tribe or family. The ones you birthed into were just the catalysts for your evolution and growth. Know in your heart you are okay, you are loved and you are held dear by all who know you, it may not seem like it, but the love is there, just waiting for you to heal enough so you can feel it. May that day come soon. Blessed BE. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (27 July 2016).
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 enjoy life?

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

You can enjoy life more fully once you stop fighting against it. Many of you are so caught up in judgement and drama. You don’t see the bigger picture or trust the evolution occurring. You try to control it, predict it, struggle against it. Yet it will take you exactly where you need to go.

Surrender and allow, don’t fight against it. Feeling the pain that you are avoiding at all costs is what liberates you. Feeling and releasing the pain sets you free to enjoy life more, to be unrestricted, to flow gently and joyously along your path.

feel inner emotionsYou humans judge pain so much, you avoid it, you fear it, you think it is wrong. And in all that focus you keep it active and alive. Even when you are trying to ignore it, pretend it isn’t there or magic it away, all of this is putting energy into its existence. Whereas if you just surrender and feel it, it can dissolve, it can leave.

Yes, you will feel vulnerable and raw going to the core wound, the core pain in your heart. It will feel challenging to allow that, but if you drop into it, through it, you will find peace on the other side. Your body can then relax, no longer needing to be locked in armour, in fight or flight or senseless defense mechanisms.

Your body does what it needs to in order to protect you and keep you safe. If you couldn’t fight back or flee from danger then your body will move into freeze, into numbing you from the pain so it doesn’t feel so bad.

Inside you are all these frozen parcels of energy from all the times that you didn’t speak up, stand up for what you wanted or defended your honour when people were being unkind or inappropriate. Whether it was a bully at school, a sibling, a teacher or parent who treated you poorly, all these hurts, resentments and disappointments get locked inside you and weigh you down.

Thankfully you can use Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) to help yourself. You can shake out all these old frozen dense energies. You can release the buried stresss, tension and trauma, so that you can feel more fully the goodness inside you. You can regain access to your innocent self, your childlike playful nature who trusts in life and enjoys connecting with others. That purity is still there inside you. It’s just buried under layers of density that have accumulated throughout your life, weighing you down and making it harder for you to enjoy life.

By releasing the stress, tension and trauma your body can finally relax and BE. You can be more present as more of your energy is available now, instead of locked into all those protective mechanisms. And when you can be in the now without all those distractions, you will feel joy, simply because you feel more whole, you feel the war is over inside and you can do what ever you want.

The controller and guard are gone, or at least sidelined, they no longer control the show. You are free to breathe more deeply, to rest, to just BE, to enjoy nature and life more fully. You feel joyous because you are finally being you and not pretending to be okay, you actually are okay and you know it.

You know that life is on your side and the Universe is helping you evolve and live more fully, more freely, so you can be your true self, your destined self and make a positive contribution to this world. You are finally being who you truly are. You let love in and you surrender to the majesty of life on Earth, knowing whatever comes it will be glorious. Your greater freedom within enables greater freedom outside, in life, in what you do.

Your life circumstances will improve as your inner life comes to life, is empowered, freed and born anew. You are literally being reborn with a clean slate, without your childhood conditioning or your past life influences. Instead of the old baggage which you have felt and transformed, now your gifts can awaken. Your joyous abilities, your light filled gifts can awaken and arise enabling you to serve more fully and be yourself in all you do.

You obtain freedom from 9am-5pm standard life, you see a much richer picture of life and live it. You will attract what you need to step up and be you more fully serving the whole in your own unique way and this will feel so good, so joyous because you will know inside that it is who you truly are and what you came here to do. Blessed BE, Amen.

You really can enjoy life fully and you will. So be it. Amen. Blessings to your hearts and the awakened being within you, who waits patiently until you are ready to embrace it. You have all you need. It is already within you. It is growing and blooming at the perfect rate for your journey, just as nature’s plants grow and flower, so do you, your soul, you are part of nature and it all happens perfectly.

jacaIt is all programmed into the seed. You will grow into who you truly are, it is inevitable. You can’t become anything else, just as an acorn seed can not grow into a Jacaranda tree. It must grow into an acorn tree. It will become that, it is nature’s will and it wins out over everything else. So relax, trust, breathe through the feelings that arise and settle into your true nature, that which lies beneath the surface, at your core, deep within your heart. So be it. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (4 July 2016).
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 release rage safely?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Self help techniques

When your life has been filled with disappointment and loss, a significant amount of rage can be built up inside. Rage at missing out, rage at being hurt so deeply. Rage at feeling unable to enjoy life. Rage at those people and events that hurt you, held you back or stopped you in some way from living life how you thought it should be.

AngerThe truth is everyone will experience loss and challenge. Life does contain ups and downs, good times and sad times, joyful and painful times. The rage is just blocked emotion. You have deep grief and sadness inside and you are stopping yourself from feeling it, it builds, it becomes a pressure, a weight, a burden on your shoulders pushing for your attention, asking you to feel it, to give in to it, to grieve what you lost and let go of the pain.

The more you resist it, the stronger the rage gets and the more easily you are triggered by day to day events. If your reaction is over the top, you know it is the pain underneath toppling out. The day to day events provides you with an opportunity to diffuse your bomb, to let out a little bit of steam so you don’t self destruct and explode.

When rage is felt at these extremes, it is dangerous and has the potential for harm to occur to others. It could be random strangers or people you love. When the top comes off the bottle it can be volatile and venomous. The challenge then becomes how to release this rage with as little damage to self or others as possible.

There are many ways to release the rage. Some people like to yell or punch a punching bag. You can run and stomp it out as you go. You can draw how you feel and let the energy move from within you out onto the paper.

You need to titrate it, to let it out bit by bit. Another powerful way to do it is to use Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) to help release the stress, tension and trauma out of your body. You may have noticed that when you are enraged you start to shake. Your hands might shake with rage wanting to let it out, express it.

This is a sign that your autonomic nervous system is overloaded. It is highly activated and locked in fight/flight mode. You need to help it calm back down into a relaxed state. That’s what TRE does. It helps the nervous system to release that built-up tension. It unwinds the wound up tight muscles so that you can breathe more deeply and relax back down.

Whatever has triggered you on the outside may have been quite small. It’s the built-up energy and unexpressed emotion within you that leads to the overreaction, to blowing your top.

TRE is just a set of simple exercises to activate your body’s natural stress release mechanism. Just as your body automatically tenses up when a threat is sensed, it also has a process for it to relax back down. It’s just that most of us don’t know about it, so we don’t allow our body to naturally balance back up.

It does so through tremoring. Your muscles will tremor and move to use up the cortisol and adrenaline released in your body to prepare you to fight or run away. So your legs and arms may move, shake to use up this energy as if you were running or fighting. Your torso will twist and contort as well as shake mirroring defensive movements to avoid being hit.

When threat occurs we automatically contract. We hunch over to protect our self. We might stiffen and stand tall to show our strength resisting the urge to run away. All of this contraction, stiffness and hypervigilant energy stays in the body if we don’t actually fight or run. It’s this that leads to our stiff muscles, aching shoulders and backs. TRE is a natural process that you can use to help your body release this tension and calm back down.

If you’d like to learn more about TRE visit the TRE page of my website. There you will see what it looks like to allow your body to tremor and discharge the energy. You can learn TRE in a session or two, then you can use it as a self-care tool at home whenever you like for the rest of your life. It’s well worth doing for the sake of those you love and who hate to see you in pain or bare witness to your rage when it comes out in destructive ways. Give yourself and those you love freedom from that. TRE can help.

You can also use visualisation and ritual. Visualise a burial ceremony for the rage and acknowledge the grief underneath it. See a tombstone and grave in front of you, fall to your knees and allow yourself to cry. Cry for what you have lost, for what you missed out on, for what you haven’t been able to do. Weep for those you loved who left you or died when you were young. Release the pain to Mother Earth, she can take it.

Surrender to the process and let yourself grieve. You truly are mourning the aspects of life that hurt you. Be gentle with yourself over coming days and honour that grave and what it represents. Visualise yourself visiting each day and putting fresh flowers on it, caring for it, pulling up weeds and tidying up. Each day you go your pain will be less, you will find a sense of peace and belonging, a feeling of coming home to yourself.

Be humble and quiet and let yourself be strengthened. Love and light will fill the space in you that had been suffocating in pain. With that released you can now stand strong, welcome in the happier parts of you – your inner child – and you can start to explore life anew from this place of greater peace and freedom from the past.

You are not really angry at life, you are just hurting and need to release the grief. You can do so safely with little damage to self or others. Love and honour yourself and those you interact with. No one deserves your rage, your judgement or blame. Each has done the best they could. Each is coping with their own internal struggles. If they could have done better they would have. Let it go and accept what is. Choose love and peace in all you do and you will find happiness. It is inevitable and it will happen. Blessed BE, Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (30 June 2016).
Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.

What is our purpose?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Conscious Evolution

Your purpose is to love, to clear away all that holds you back from love, so that you can receive it fully and manifest it in the world. You all need to receive love, to let go of the blocks to it, the self doubt, the fear of rejection, the isolating to protect yourselves, the hiding of who you truly are.

light of godHealing all of that is life’s purpose to move from wounded to shining light, from darkness to freedom and to be that example in the world, helping others to also obtain freedom. Each person has a unique destiny to walk towards the light. Each has a specific path set out for them and when they are clear, each has a way to serve the whole, a way to do what they love to do and make a positive contribution to the evolution of humanity.

The healing you do, you actually do for the whole. You are contributing to the raising of the vibration on Earth. As the vibration of the collective rises, great shifts can occur on the collective level, the falling away of racism, hate, judgement, greed, callousness. When there is enough love flowing in the hearts of mankind they will see and solve the refugee crisis, the hunger and starvation, the homelssness and reducing damage to Mother Earth through our lifestyles. When hearts are open and clear, people will take action for the highest good of all. They will do so because they feel it is the right thing to do, the loving thing to do and love is our true nature.

When you are in a state of inner peace and connection to Source, you know we truly are all one, all connected, so letting someone suffer is like letting a part of your own body suffer, ignoring an infection in your toe doesn’t make it go away, it is part of you and it has to be treated, addressed, healed, even if it is inconvenient, if it slows you down or makes you change your planned activities. You can’t ignore what is, to do so hurts you.

To turn a blind eye to the suffering in the world hurts you, it hurts all of you, it lowers the vibration as you look away and try to pretend the ugliness is not there. It is there and it needs to be addressed. People need to stand up and say ‘All human beings deserve dignity and respect. All human beings deserve to have food to eat, clean water to drink and a safe, warm place to sleep’. We can do that much. There is plenty to go around, there is plentitudes of food and space if we shared it. There are solutions to the sustainability issues facing the planet, people just have to be prepared to look, to see what is going on and take action.

open hearts see love everywhereWhen people’s hearts are full of pain, when they are living in denial of what is, hiding from it, pretending all is okay, self medicating through addiction, avoidance and loss of self connection, when people are in these states they see pain everywhere, it feels overwhelming so they look away. They don’t see the love and goodness everywhere, they don’t see the kindness and goodness of the human race. They see pain and retreat further in fear, hopelessness and desolation.

You can help yourself out of overwhelm and shut down using Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE). TRE helps to calm your nervous system so that you can drop out of freeze, fight and flight back into a calmer state where you can think and feel more clearly. You can be present to what is occurring and face it. TRE is a blessing for those of us who are sensitive and don’t want to look away or ignore what is but find we need to retreat to protect ourselves and our energy. TRE can help us to be able to stand strong, face what is and act on causes we care about. When our bodies are calmer, we can take on more and feel good that we are making a difference, a positive impact on the world.

Mother Earth is mirroring our collective consciousness back to us – our vibration affects her, she becomes desolate and barren when our hearts are that way. As we blossom so does she, as we love and see abundance it springs forth, new life, new births, new growth. It is cyclical, it is seasonal, and it is affected by us.

Each of us can make a difference. Choose love in all you do, heal yourself so your heart opens and you can be a shining light in this world. Do what is your unique gift and way of assisting the whole. Spread joy and laughter, give people hope that there is another way, that human beings are lovable creatures who can do honourable things for the benefit of all. Choose from a loving space and be that in the world. That is what is needed and that is our purpose here on Earth, to heal ourselves and love as much as we can for the benefit of all. Be the peace and light needed in the world. This is a great service and gift you can do for all mankind and nature. Blessed BE, Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (26 June 2016).
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 know when to rest and when to push?

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

A lot of you who are focused on healing push yourself way too hard, seminar after seminar, therapist after therapist, session after session. You push yourself in the hope that you will feel better, escape the pain, sadness, anger, depression, grief, etc, but you can’t escape it. You have to feel it in order to release it. You can’t just exorcise it from your system.

hurting againEach time you push forward with yet another healing modality or technique, your body has to try and adjust to the changes you are forcing upon it. It is already coping with the baggage and emotional density inside. It is already juggling the defense patterns, the compulsive energies rising to the surface for release and now you are forcing a change in the vibration of your body by doing healing or release work. It is a fine line between helping yourself and pushing yourself over the edge into exhaustion, depletion, fatigue and consequential depression.

When you push too hard, too fast and get exhausted, you often feel depressed, because no matter what you do, you feel like it hasn’t helped, worked or fixed you. But the truth is you are not broken and you don’t need fixing. You just need to accept yourself, your life and the process. Trust the evolutionary impulse inside you to lead you forward, to guide you to what serves you, to tell you when it is time to push a little and see a therapist, do a course or have a healing session, and when it is time to rest – time to let your body integrate all the changes and adjust to your new vibration.

The body needs time to sift through the density inside and decide what it is now ready to let go of, what it believes you can cope facing and processing, and what needs to be kept within till a later time when you are feeling stronger and your body has the resources to process it gently, safely and as quickly as possible.

Emotional release, while intense, can be quite quickly done, enabling you to balance backup quickly and relatively effortlessly. If you just breathe through what arises and let it flow out of your system, it will leave. It is only when you resist it, try to ignore or deny it, or go into the story of it and feed it with your thinking, your judgement, your ‘Why me’ victim thinking or your ‘F*ck them’ retaliation mentality, that you prolong the pain and keep it going.

If you just breathe through it, witness it, welcome it up, be grateful for it leaving, then it can flow out smoothly as there is no resistance and a clear path out of your body, mind and field. There is an art to emotional release and consciously balancing back up to feel connected to Source and Self and Earth, here in the NOW. It is an art, a skill, a practice to Master which takes time.

You can’t try and rip the emotional density out, carve chunks of your body off and expect to feel good. It needs to be done delicately and with reverence, with respect for your inner child and younger selves that lived through the pain. You need to comfort them during the process and ensure that they feel safe and supported. You need to be there for them as the Adult that you now are, holding their hands and reassuring them that they are okay, that you can handle it and you are in control now, in the sense that you are connected to Source, to your body and you will listen to it for clues of what it needs. You won’t just go rushing off on a whim to another course, another therapist, another modality. You will stay grounded, check in regularly with your inner world, with your inner child and younger selves and see what they need, see how they feel. You will give yourself time to rest and play and have fun. You will make the effort to exercise and eat well, to show yourself love and kindness and compassion.

heart wateringWhen you do all of this your body trusts that you are capable of processing and releasing your burdens safely and it will start allowing it up with more ease and grace. You don’t have to hunt for what haunts you, just be in a state of calm and peace and allow the process to occur naturally.

If you listen within your body will tell you what it needs. If you pay attention to what is occurring in your outside world, you will see what past events / traumas / incidents are being triggered by those you connect with during the day. Your dreams also give you clues.

Your body is your ally, not your enemy. It releases what needs to be released at a rate that it believes you can handle. If you learn the skills to handle it well, then you can release your pain and emotional density relatively quickly, so that you can be in peace and happiness most of the time. Stuff will still come up, but it will release quite quickly and you return to a state of peace and balance almost immediately. Gratitude then comes as it feels so good to have glided through it, rather than been tormented, caught up in it, resisted or fought against it as you may have done in the past.

So listen to your body. It will tell you when it is time for a session with a therapist, when energy work would be beneficial or time alone in nature. Your body will tell you all you need to know. Don’t exhaust yourself by doing too much too quickly. Know that even when you feel bad, you are moving forward. Those feelings, be it sadness, anger, loss, betrayal, loneliness, etc are only temporary and they will leave and you will feel better again. Just breathe through it and in time you will feel better.

Treat yourself with the tenderness you would show to a young child or animal. You are just as precious and just as deserving of love and kindness, and that is what you are longing for and what you truly need. Give it to yourself and you will flourish. Each day your heart will open more and more, until it overflows with joy and happiness, that is a beautiful day and you will see it, reach it, feel it, if you treat yourself with love and kindness no matter what arises and what you are going through.

Give to yourself and you give to the world. For the world craves more love and kindness in all ways. Serve yourself and you serve the world. Your vibration goes out and touches many – those in your ancestral line, those in your physical vicinity, and all of those you interact with on a day to day basis. As you heal your higher vibration makes it easier for others to do so too.

If you feel a discomfort, a racing inside, an urge to run or fight or freeze sit with it. This is your nervous system activated in fear. It is this unease that leads you to want to do something, to search for a solution, to look outwards for answers.

Know that inner unease can only be healed by turning within, by listening to and soothing your body. One of the most effective ways I have found to soothe and calm my nervous system and that inner unrest is Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE).

TRE is the body’s natural way to release tension, stress and trauma. Your body has its own internal mechanism for releasing tension by shaking it out. We call it tremoring. It uses up the adrenaline and cortisol released during moments of stress and trauma. It completes those activations so the body can relax. It realises there is no need to run, fight or freeze now. It’s safe, so it can relax and BE.

TRE is a simple process that you can use at home any time you want as part of your self-care routine. Once learned you can use it for free for the rest of your life. TRE lets your body lead the way with your healing journey. It leads the way. You don’t need to exhaust yourself searching any more. You can relax and allow your body to heal the wounds within so you can have greater peace and relaxation.

By Jodi-Anne (19 June 2016).
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 bad experiences in childhood lead to adult illlness

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Healing from child abuse, Health, Self help techniques

Yet another article with the science showing what survivors of child abuse have always known. Abuse in childhood leads to significant physical, emotional and mental difficulties in adulthood. The good news is that more and more people are recognising this and that we can’t simply “get over it”.  Abuse changes the way a child reacts to stress and constant exposure leads to changes in the child’s DNA resulting in the ‘fight or flight’ system being always turned on. The ongoing, chronic stress unfortunately leads to inflammatory and immune responses that damage health as adults.

Joan Kaufman, director of the Child and Adolescent Research and Education (CARE) programme at the Yale School of Medicine, recently analysed DNA in the saliva of happy, healthy children, and of children who had been taken from abusive or neglectful parents. The children who’d experienced chronic childhood stress showed epigenetic changes in almost 3,000 sites on their DNA, and on all 23 chromosomes – altering how appropriately they would be able to respond to and rebound from future stressors.

Likewise, Seth Pollak, professor of psychology and director of the Child Emotion Research Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, uncovered startling genetic changes in children with a history of adversity and trauma. Pollak identified damage to a gene responsible for calming the stress response. This particular gene wasn’t working properly; the kids’ bodies weren’t able to reign in their heightened stress response. ‘A crucial set of brakes are off,’ says Pollak.

It is great that science is catching up. They are also recognising that there are many ways to heal which can help survivor’s bodies relax and not be in ‘fight or flight’ all the time.

Science tells us that biology does not have to be destiny. ACEs can last a lifetime, but they don’t have to. Just as physical wounds and bruises heal, just as we can regain our muscle tone, we can recover function in underconnected areas of the brain. If anything, that’s the most important take-away from ACE research: the brain and body are never static; they are always in the process of becoming and changing.

Even if we have been set on high-reactive mode for decades or a lifetime, we can still dial it down. We can respond to life’s inevitable stressors more appropriately and shift away from an overactive inflammatory response. We can become neurobiologically resilient. We can turn bad epigenetics into good epigenetics and rescue ourselves. We have the capacity, within ourselves, to create better health. We might call this brave undertaking ‘the neurobiology of awakening’.

Today, scientists recognise a range of promising approaches to help create new neurons (known as neurogenesis), make new synaptic connections between those neurons (known as synaptogenesis), promote new patterns of thoughts and reactions, bring underconnected areas of the brain back online – and reset our stress response so that we decrease the inflammation that makes us ill.

In the article they specifically mention ‘Meditation, mindfulness, neurofeedback, cognitive therapy, EMDR (eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing) therapy’ as some of the tools that can help survivor’s to calm their bodies and reprogram their minds.

I have found a wide range of techniques helpful including:

  • Energy and body work, such as crystal bed sessions or reiki, to help the body unlock and relax;
  • Psych-K or Lifeline Technique to release trauma and reprogram the subconscious mind so you can change negative beliefs about life and the world into positive ones e.g. so you are not always expecting the worst and you can start to feel safe, so you believe that you do deserve good things and that people can treat you well;
  • Mindfulness and meditation techniques to still the mind and create space to witness what is occurring instead of reacting automatically;
  • Skill development including thought stopping, boundary setting, inner child, and self love skills, so that you no longer allow yourself to be abused by others or by yourself;
  • Family Constellations to heal the trauma in the family system and reconnect with love, thereby allowing greater lifeforce and harmony within.

There is lots that can be done. While adverse childhood trauma does have a massive impact on your life, it can be healed.

Article - bad experiences in childhood lead to adult illness

Why is joy so fleeting?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Self help techniques

Joy is an emotion that occurs when you are totally at peace and living in in the Now. You are not thinking about the future or the past or what you need to do later in the day. Joy is the sheer pleasure of being present and attentive to the moment at hand, and whatever is arising. Few of you can stay present for very long. You skip all over the place with your thinking and therefore joy is lost. It takes focus, immersement, surrender and acceptance for joy to be present. It is not a doing or an efforting, it is an ease, a relaxation into what is.

The questioning mind keeps you away from joy. The judging mind sends it away further. All these mind activities keep you stuck in the head and away from your heart, which is where joy is felt. So you can’t have lasting joy unless you can rest in your heart. When you can do so, you see beauty and joy everywhere. You see it in nature, in the sunshine, in dogs playing, children laughing. You see it in life and its busyness and you see it in the faces of those who are eating cake or icecream or who are on an endorphin high after exercise. Joy is everywhere when you are in the receptive state to see it, feel it and receive its vibration.

That means your heart needs to be peaceful and for many of us that isn’t the case very often. Many people have hearts full of emotioal pain, yet to be released, full of fear and mistrust, confusion and pain, doubt and loss. There are lots of emotions and painful thoughts or beliefs leading to and perpetuating these low vibration emotions and energies. People’s bodies are filled with these issues creating emotional density or baggage. The heart is weighed down and joy which is very light is not felt.

It can be felt temporarily when you do something that stills you, that takes you to your heart and to enough inner silence that you can hear the heart’s message. This might occur during meditation, a walk in nature, holding a baby or a beloved pet. Whatever it is that takes you inside yourself and quietens your mind, then you can feel joy.

Joy can last and become your predominant experience, once you have cleaned out the emotional density and ceased reacting to the events that occur around you. If someone cuts you off in traffic, you don’t have to get agitated or angry. You can stay calm and peaceful. It’s a choice. A habit to break and a decision to choose differently. Even if someone is in your face saying unkind things, you don’t have to react with fear or with anger back. You can just stay centred, send love to your heart and your inner child, and choose peace. You can send the person love and acknowledge their power, for that is what they are truly seeking, to be seen, heard, acknowledged and accepted. They are hurting inside and lashing out. Don’t deepen their wound by reacting badly/painfully, send them love and help them heal. If you can do this, you can maintain your state of balance, peace and joy, no matter what you encounter.

It is possible, you just have to learn to do so, to be able to step back and witness what occurs and choose your reaction. So monitoring your thoughts, being quiet enough to hear them, is an important skill to learn in order to have peace and joy all the time.

If your body automatically reacts with exaggerated fear responses to situations this is a signal that you have trauma inside that needs to be released. Your body is reacting as if you are in evere danger when you are not actually in danger.

A door may bang, a raised voice might occur, a car backfires and your body goes into freeze, into hypervigilance and defensive reactions. This is a sign that you need to comfort your body, connect inside and release that stress, tension and trauma, so that your body can relax, become more peaceful and able to relate to others, to life in more joyous and open ways. While your body feels there is threat, danger, it won’t relax fully and this makes it hard to have sustained joy as your mind is preoccupied expecting danger and scanning for it.

The scanning for danger distracts you from the moment, the stillness, the joy of being present to what is. It keeps you activated, primed ready to respond to whatever does occur. It can be exhausting even though nothing bad is actually happening.

You can use Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) and other embodiment activities to help you to clear out the stress, tension and trauma in your body, so it is easier for you to be in the now, to relax and to enjoy life. TRE activates the body’s natural, inbuilt mechanism for releasing stress, tension and trauma. It helps to calm your nervous system, to come out of freeze, fight and flight, back into calm social engagement, where you feel safe, can relax and play with others and enjoy life.

It is well worth learning TRE to help you be calm, playful and joyful as you move through life. It does take some time for your body to reach this state. You have to clear out the old stuck energies so the new lighter energy can enter. Thankfully with TRE you can do it at home, whenever you want, as part of your self-care process. Once you have learned how to self-regulate your TRE you can do it on your own, for free, for the rest of your life. Your body will thank you for it!

Even if you temporarily lose your cool and need to balance back up, you can do so quickly if you don’t berate yourself for it. You can simply notice that you reacted, learn from it, heal whatever button or event it triggered from your past and vow to react differently in future. Love yourself and the situation for the healing it enabled. Thank it and let it go. No need to hold on to it. No need to beat yourself up for slipping or not being perfect.

You are human and you are evolving and growing each day. Each day moves you towards having greater peace and joy in your life. The recipe is clear, less doing more being, less judging more accepting, less resistance more allowance, more fun and creativity, more stillness and going within, more practice and friendships – more sharing and growth. All of this adds up to a life full of joy and happiness, being of service in whatever way feels right to you. Blessed BE. Amen. May joy be in your hearts now and always. So be it.

By Jodi-Anne (4 June 2016).
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 let what needs to happen, happen

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

Often you humans second guess yourself, your instincts tell you what needs to occur, but you don’t listen. You question, you doubt, you rationalise and think it through and usually you choose not to do what your gut tells you, you should do.

Your intuition is your body’s messaging telling you what is most in line with your highest good. Whether it be a message from the heart advising the path that will lead to most joy, or a fearful warning advising a path to avoid. If you listen the truth is there for you to hear. It is only when the mind is too busy or the body too fearful or exhausted that you can’t hear the messages which are subtle and vibrational.

deep-breath1Calm your body, breathe deeply and ask for a sign, sit in stilness and meditate or sit in nature and feel your nervous system calm and self regulate, then you can hear a message, sense how you really feel or play out the options and see how your body feels in each imagined scene. Your body will tell you which path suits you best. It is often said and always true, the answers are within, you just have to quieten the mind and listen.

Often it is tempting to keep busy doing, doing, doing, then you don’t have to face the facts that you are not satisfied with some element of your life. You don’t have to admit to yourself that something isn’t working, but that gnawing, nagging, empty feeling will build until you do listen and you do pay attention.

You may know the truth, but refuse to act. It is too scary to leave that job or partner or to take the risk to follow your heart and passion. Life does not have guaranteed outcomes, other than death and growth. All changes lead to growth. The road may not be smooth and straight. It may be narrow and bumpy, and you may almost fall off a cliff, but the beauty you will see, he expansion that will result is worth the risk.

If something is meant to happen, it will. You may try to control it, prevent it, stop it from happening, but it will happen at precisely the time it was meant to occur. All your actions will do is cause you pain and suffering. You could instead choose to flow peacefully with what life shows you is going to happen. Let jobs, people, homes, situations come and go, without grasping or holding on – just trust and flow. It is not easy or natural to most of us, it needs to be learned, to surrender to the divine and the mysteries of life.

What needs to happen will, so don’t worry about making the right decision so much. You can’t get it wrong. What needs to occur will, so take the pressure off and out of the decision making and choose more peacefully. Choose what will bring you joy. Trust the Universe to look after you and provide what is needed for your highest good.

door chakraIf you attempt to walk through a particular door and it is closed, it doesn’t mean it was a wrong choice, it just may not be time yet. Instead of pushing, surrender and wait. Wait for the signs and synchronicities to signify the time is right. Life will lead you where you need to go. Yes prepare, yes be ready, but wait / pause / breathe until the doors open and its easy for you to stroll through. No need to struggle, push, force. That is the old way, the way of competition, exhaustion, of winners and losers. The new way is the way of the heart, the way of love, compassion and service, the way of joy, the way of benefitting the whole, not just yourself.

You succeed most when you are passionately aligned with your heart’s purpose and guidance, which will lead you forth with ease and grace. Breathe through any fear and allow what needs to happen, to happen. Let it occur, like rocks being washed along a flowing river, just glide, just rise and fall with the tide. No need to fight for air or to be in one particular place. Trust life to guide you forth with ease and grace. So be it. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (01 May 2016).
Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.