I've hesitated to write this blog or offer anything resembling spiritual healing on my website for a while now. I've felt a lot of resistance to the addition of anything viewed as "alternative" to my practice. The resistance is never from clients, they just want to feel better. It comes from other professionals and people who have tightly held beliefs surrounding spirituality. I've let those opinions hold me back from expressing how valuable spiritual healing and personal spiritual practices can be. I'm happy to report that I've found the courage to share what I believe is an incredibly valuable missing link in our healthcare system.
Anyone who knows me well knows that I'm very interested in spiritual healing techniques, processes, and traditions. These are the healing practices that go back as far as humans have been able to record history; and likely beyond that. Well before we had pills, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, x-rays, MRIs and the like; humans used elements of nature and their own spiritual connection to help their communities heal. It is thought that each individual has the ability to be a spiritual healer. However, often an entire lifetime passes before the individual realizes this ability. Often, a healer will have their own healing crisis through which they discover their ability. Read more about mine in the post "How the Rest of My Life Began."
Regardless of a person's status as a healer, I believe that we can all benefit from some sort of spiritual practice. This can take a lot of different forms, I consider a spiritual practice to be anything that allows you to learn more who you are at your core. Examples include: prayer, meditation, yoga, tai chi, breath work, running, swimming, hiking, camping, etc. Perhaps I missed what makes you feel the most connected to yourself or you don't think you have a practice. If so, my only advice is to find something that helps you connect to yourself and do it everyday.
I cannot emphasize how important it is to have some sort of spiritual practice or self care routine that is done daily. Think about it like this: if you can do something that helps you feel better that doesn't require something external (ie: drugs, alcohol, massage, acupuncture, etc) that changes how you feel for the better, you have the potential to make that improved feeling your new normal! This concept is called neuroplasticity (I have a blog post about this as well). Basically, if you do something that changes your physiology frequently and consistently, this will become hard wired in your nervous system and will become your new normal. Clinically, I see people who make time to take care of themselves everyday make much more progress than those who don't. People who only take care of themselves when their body demands it (ie: pain, anxiety, etc) don't do as well as people who practice daily but better than those who ignore their body's signals.
A spiritual practice can take a lot of shapes. I teach people to become aware of their mind, body and spirit through my treatments. I teach people to have a spiritual practice including meditation and movement encouraging them to make it their own. Personally, I meditate daily, do yoga when I get up and follow that with a run. The difference it makes in a day is astounding. I used to be a person who woke up with barely enough time to get ready and get to work. I'd work out after work but it didn't have much meaning for me aside from trying to stay healthy. After changing my routine to the beginning of my day I realized my mind and body really appreciate being taken care of first thing in the morning, it feels like they take care of me for the rest of the day!