Avoiding Pain = More Pain

October 29, 2023October 29, 2023 heather

For several years I’ve been practicing primordial sound meditation, and at the start of each session, we are supposed to ask ourselves 4 soul questions:

Who am I?
What do I want?
What is my purpose?
What am I grateful for?

I was surprised, frustrated, and chagrined that I could never answer the first two questions!! I am me. How can I not know who I am?? How can I not know what I want?? It seemed as if there must be something wrong with me; what kind of person doesn’t know who they are or what they want??

Come to find out, the kind of person who doesn’t know what they want, is the kind of person many of us are!

This is a topic that arises with my clients super often, and – I’ve come to find out – a topic that engenders approximately a bazillion books.

I’m in the process of reading 4 such books right now:

Where You Go, There You are by Jon Kabat-Zinn. It’s a book about mindfulness as a pathway to wholeness.
Full Body Presence by Suzanne Scurlock-Durana. It’s a book about connecting to our bodies and the wisdom therein, so that we can feel more whole.
The Heroine’s Journey by Maureen Murdock. It’s a book about the stages women go through to return to wholeness (to return to themselves).
Push Off From Here by Laura McKowen. It’s a book how to recover from addiction to numbing, so that we can feel more whole.

These are 4 very different books, written from different perspectives, and yet – they all convey SUCH similar messages.

We numb ourselves – with busyness, food, drinks, taking care of others – so that we don’t have to feel our pain. And we feel so much pain – not only due to the traumas of life and physical injury – but because we are split off from our authentic selves. We all grew up in a world where we are told what to do, what to think, how to think. Through our families, religions, cultures, ancestral heritage, we are conditioned to please, to obey, to look outside ourselves to some external authority for answers – even to the answers of Who Am I and What Do I Want. And so we are in our 30s, 50s, 70s, and we still struggle with figuring out who we are and what we want.

And all these books teach that, the way through the pain, back to integration and wholeness, is to slow down long enough to notice the pain and allow yourself to feel it.

“All experiences (according to Buddhist philosophy, among others) are in service of our greater awakening.”
Push Off From Here

One tool that I’ve found very helpful to start to understand what, exactly, I am feeling and why I am feeling it comes from the book Nonviolent Communication. In this style of communicating (also called compassionate communication), you try to communicate in such a way that conveys what you are feeling and what need of yours is not being met. Here’s the format:

I feel ________________ because I need _____________________.

Doing this on a fly in a conversation can be super challenging, but just doing this exercise as a post-mortem can be SO enlightening. For example, let’s say I text my brother about getting together this weekend, and he doesn’t text me back. Let’s say that I ignore all of my training and do what I normally do – I feel hurt and resolve to NEVER TEXT MY BROTHER AGAIN, which means he notices I’m ghosting him, but he no idea why. Well, it’s not a total loss! Even though I didn’t react the way I wish I would have, I can reflect on this experience and learn from it. In this circumstance, what was I feeling? Disappointed, irritated, hurt. What need of mine was not being met that made me feel this way? Oooh – that’s a hard one. It is my need for connection, for love, for consideration, to be seen and acknowledged?

Through this process I start to learn what it is that I am feeling and what it is that I really need. Instead of running from the pain, I turn and face it with curiosity and see what that feeling is trying to teach me about who I am and what I really want. I start to recognize when I feel that sensation of being hurt or annoyed, and I can pause. I can choose to tell myself the story that my brother is inconsiderate and doesn’t really care about me (which I know is untrue). Or I can tell myself the story that, “Ahhh. It’s really important for me to be seen and acknowledged by the people I love, and if they understand that (by me actually TELLING them), then it’s more likely they will respond to me when I reach out.” This could sound something like, “I feel hurt when I send a text and don’t hear anything back because it’s really important to me to feel that I am loved and cared for.” I still have a LOT of work to do to actually express myself this way, but I find that writing all this out really helps me understand myself better.

If you are struggling to discover your authentic self, you might find this practice helpful! This is one of many tools that can help you find your way back to yourself. If you would like support on this journey, please reach out to me to see how coaching or bodywork can help! You can book a free 15-minute consultation here.

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On Doing IT Right and Shoulds

June 25, 2023 heather

Well Hello My Friends!

Summer is about 1/3 over, and I’ve finally come up for air. The past few weeks have been spent on preparing for and then executing on a day-long consulting gig, hiking and biking in the Black Hills of South Dakota, and then finishing up my health coaching certification. Now that the skies are clearing, I’m reflecting back on the past few months and wondering, “Did I do that right?”

As I’ve written about many, many times, I have this tendency to take on way too much, and then get overwhelmed and cut way way back. It’s this constant dance of too much, then too little. Why oh why, can’t I just ride that middle line?? If I was doing things right, I should be able to know how much I can handle and take on just that much and not an iota more and then I would live happily ever after in the neutral zone.

But wait.

Living in the neutral zone sounds horrible. So boring. There is no life, no color, no spirit there.

I’m slowly coming to this realization that perhaps me “doing it right” is me doing a lot, and then doing a little, and just riding that rhythm and flow.

It reminds me of some photos that were part of the Upledger CranioSacral 1 class. Our skull has joints (aka “sutures”) where the bones meet up and connect. The sutures between the bones are composed of these beautiful curvy lines:

Our teacher then shared a photo that her friend had taken from an airplane that showed a meandering river in the plains below. It looked something like this:

It was so impactful to see those two pictures side-by-side. Nature works in curves – crests and troughs and meaningful meanderings. If you averaged them out, they would form a straight, neutral line. But the swoops and dips are much more interesting to look at, and they have a story to tell – what caused that river to bump off to the left like that so suddenly, and then Whoa! bump right back off to the right? What causes all those little squiggles to form in our noggins? We know there is a reason and purpose for it because Nature is nothing if not efficient. If it’s there, it’s there for a good reason.

So I’ve decided to view my constant ups and downs and energetic ebbs and flows as Nature embodied in me. This is the way I’m supposed to be doing it because I am Nature too. I’m hoping that with each up and down, my average is slightly increasing (aka, I’m growing), so my iterations look something like this:

I just wanted to offer up that thought for those of you who also question, “Am I doing this right? Shouldn’t I have this figured out by now? Why do I keep repeating the same patterns?” Maybe you are doing it exactly the way you are supposed to, and you are scribing an elegant swooping story on the world with the waves and troughs of your life.

With love,

Hlo

Space to be Human Lab
Sometimes we don’t need to be fixed, we just need someone to listen to us while we fix ourselves. CranioSacral therapy (CST) provides that kind of deep listening. If you would like some support to slow down and let your body be heard, please book a session here, and use code “CRANIO” for $20 off through the end of summer.

CranioSacral is based on the foundation that we have an “inner physician” who knows what we need to heal. Likewise, health and wellness coaching is based on a similar truth – you are the expert on your own life, and you probably even know what you need to do to reach your wellbeing goals. However, you may need a partner to walk the path with you and help you identify your strengths, motivations, and supports – a partner who believes in your ability to change and achieve your big hairy a$$ goals. If you are interested in finding out what you are capable of, please book a consultation here.

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Habit Change, Health & Fitness, Massage Therapy, Mindset, Pain

Existential Crisis and Notes from Your Back

May 21, 2023 heather

Well, hello there! It’s been a few weeks since I’ve checked in. I’ve been occupied with finishing up my health coach certification, traveling, and having an existential crisis about buying a new car.

I’ll start with the last one first.

We bought a new car. We were planning on getting a used car, but when we started doing research on the used-car market and interest rates, we soon determined that for about $5,000 more we could have a brand-new car with a full warranty and no sordid mysterious past. So we chose that option. That option, however, pushed me out of my very conservative financial comfort zone. I was intellectually confident that we could afford a new car, but my visceral response to the purchase said otherwise. I was ANXIOUS and racked with self-doubt. Did we do the right thing? Should we have negotiated better? I’m almost 50 years old, why can’t I be more articulate and forceful with my needs and expectations? What happens if one of us loses our job? Will people think I’m getting too big for my britches by getting a new car? Would Mr. Money Mustache be ashamed of me? Why didn’t we do this better/righter/more perfectly??

In the middle of this whole car-buying saga, I did a session with one of my most favoritest doctors. She is a chiropractor who does functional medicine and muscle testing/energy work where she communicates with my body on a subconscious level. I don’t understand it; all I know is that her treatments always make me feel SO much better. I was working with her on hormone/digestive issues and happened to mention that I am still struggling with low back pain as well. She said, “Huh,” and then did her magic and asked my body why my back was hurting. And here was the answer, “You need to believe in yourself and what you are doing.”

LIGHT BULB MOMENT – I DON’T HAVE MY OWN BACK!! I don’t support my own decisions. I constantly doubt myself and the steps that I take. No wonder my back hurts. It’s like, “Hey – Heather. USE ME!! RELY on me. Notice and appreciate me!!”

What is the point of questioning a decision that is already made? The papers are signed. The car is ours. I can choose to keep questioning the decision and being anxious about it.

OR

I can choose to be excited about the opportunities for travel this car opens up. I can be proud of us for choosing a car that has excellent reliability and that could easily be with us until we are 70-YEARS-OLD. I can be proud of myself for making sh!t happen and finding a great, beautiful vehicle for us just in time for us to take our Surlys to South Dakota for an epic ride through the Black Hills. I can choose to be the friend to myself that I need – the friend who is like, “You are so smart, Heather! You are wise and logical. You made a great decision for your family. You are going to make so many good memories in this sweet, handsome Rav4. You are fearless to commit to a purchase that is aligned with your life goals, even though it’s scary and uncomfortable. You are bold!”

In others words, I can choose to have my own back. Low back pain is very mysterious. I heard from one of my teachers that there are over 200 known causes of low back pain, and research has proven that our thoughts and feelings can dramatically impact chronic low back pain. If this concepts resonates with you, here are some questions you could contemplate: How could you shift your narrative about yourself and your choices in a way that enables you to support YOU? How can you choose to believe in yourself and your capabilities? How can you have your own back more fully?

And now I’ll circle back to the first two things on my list. I’m in the last section of my Health Coaching Certification, and hopefully by the end of July I will be a Master Certified Health & Wellness Coach. And what does that mean?? Here is an excellent description from the National Board of Health & Wellness Coaching:

Health & wellness coaches partner with clients looking to enhance their well-being through self-directed lasting changes, aligned with their values. In the course of their work, health & wellness coaches display unconditional positive regard for their clients and a belief in their ability to change, honoring the fact that each client is an expert on their own life while ensuring that all interactions are respectful and non-judgmental.

Isn’t that a beautiful approach to change? Essentially I will get to partner with clients – I will have their backs, and I will help them have their own backs as well! I’m planning on rolling out a 3-month program within the next couple of months. If you would like to improve your wellbeing with a compassionate coach who is in the trenches with you, let me know. I’ll add you to my mailing list and send out more details when my program is finalized. 😊

And lastly, travel. I was able to spend the first weekend in May with my brothers, my sister-in-law, and my mesmerizing niece, Keke. And soon Tim and I are heading out to South Dakota for a week. We’re taking the Heuheunito with us, so please wish us luck. His favorite thing to do is to plop down on his belly in cool grass, meld with the Earth, and people-watch. So getting him UP and HIKING can be a challenge. Good thing he is so cute.

Happy Sunday My Friends, and thank you for reading!!

Space to be Human Lab – Helping you heal so you can feel more alive

Do you crave deep relaxation? Would you appreciate help in dissipating excess energy from your frayed nervous system? If so, I invite you to book a CranioSacral session. If you are a returning client, and you are curious about CranioSacral, you can book a 30 minute FREE session here – just use code “CURIOUS” at checkout. You can book other session types here.

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How to Time Travel

November 29, 2022 heather

Have you ever noticed that sometimes a minute, an hour, a day can just WHIZ away? Yet on other days, the clock actually seems to be moving in reverse?

Well, come to find out, time is really not linear! The past, present, and future all kinda exist simultaneously and can affect each other. And sometimes time can bulge out and you can accomplish wondrous things in 25 minutes, and sometimes it can cinch up, and all you get done is absolutely nothing of importance. We all have these experiences of clock time not matching with lived time. So what’s really going on?

Historically, time was viewed as being more cyclical – marked by the cycles of night and day, the cycles of the moon, the cycles of seasons, the cycles of life and death. However, according to Appreciative Coaching, with the spread of Christianity, the old ways of viewing time shifted – theologians believed that the world has a beginning and an end and that certain events are unique and unrepeatable.

Then Sir Isaac Newton came along with his concept of “Absolute Time,” which became how the world interpreted time:

Time moves along a fixed line from past to present to future; therefore, the past determines the future. A future event cannot change the past.
Time is absolute – meaning it is experienced the same for everyone and everything and is not dependent or enmeshed with other factors.

But, as is often the case, modern humans are beginning to realize that ancient humans actually DID have it right. Time is in fact, holistic:

Past, present, and future all exist as a whole and can influence each other, MEANING: Behavior change can be influenced not only by our Past, but by our Future, and our Present!
Time is not objective – people can experience time differently at different times depending on circumstances. MEANING: “BECAUSE IT IS SUBJECT TO REINTERPRETATION, THE PAST IS AS DYNAMIC AS THE PRSENT AND FUTURE.” (Appreciative Coaching, p. 64)

But why does all of this matter?

Because, if time is a bit floaty and stretchy and re-writeable, then we have so much more capacity and autonomy to change!

We can re-tell our past stories to pull out the good bits. Instead of looking back at the past and seeing our future doom, we can look back at the past and tease out the stories that support us. We can also look into our future and use that to guide our choices in the present.

“Holistic social scientists believe that as the present changes, so do the meanings of the past and future, and as the past and future change, so do the meanings of the present – simultaneously.” Appreciative Coaching p. 66

I know I talk about this stuff like ALL THE TIME, but I’m super jazzed to learn there is science to support this, AND I think it’s important to constantly be reminded that we can rewrite our stories. I live and breathe this stuff, yet still I often lose touch with the fact that I have so much power in my choices. I want to add, that re-creating our life stories is not easy, especially if we have unresolved trauma in the body connected to the stories and experiences. This is why I think it’s so important to work with both the cognitive mind and the feeling body during this process.

If you are willing, I would like to offer you an experiment. First, I invite you to take a moment and check in with your inner state. It can be helpful to close your eyes if you feel safe doing so. What is the level of tension in your body? What is your heart rate? How fast are you breathing? Then take 5-10 minutes and do some free-writing on this prompt:

Describe one of your greatest accomplishments to date. It can be anything in your personal life, your work life, your spiritual life.

Are you done writing?

I am curious, if you take a moment and again reconnect to your inner state, what has shifted? What do you notice in your levels of tension, your heart rate, and your breath? How are you now feeling about your past, present, and future?

And with that, I’m signing off!

Space to be Human Lab

If you are experiencing pain in your mind-body and would like help finding more space, ease, and room for more positive possibilities, you can book a bodywork session here.
Last week I finished up my first year of Somatic Experiencing Trauma Training. If you are curious about how Somatic Experiencing (SE) work could help you slow down and tune in to the story your body and your nervous system needs to tell, reply to this email with your questions. Somatic work can be integrated into a bodywork session, or it can be done on its own either in-person or over Zoom.

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Meditation, Mindset, Pain, Yoga

Don’t Read Me if You’re a Muggle

July 10, 2022 heather

How the Mysteries may save us

Well, it’s Sunday, and I have a bunch of stuff on my mind. I’m hoping that as I write, it starts to morph into a coherent throughline, but I’m not making any promises! I totally understand if you stop reading this right now and go play outside. BUT, it might be worth it to stay with me. We’ll see.

I’ve been picking up on a current in the ether lately that is capturing my interest. I’m noticing a few different threads, actually, but I think they are all part of the same rope. Or wave. I think I started to mix metaphors there.

Thread #1: Slow down to save yourselves and the world

I recently finished the book Presence: Human Purpose and the Field of the Future. It is written by 4 uber-distinguished individuals – Peter Senge (MIT lecturer), Otto Scharmer (another MIT lecturer), Joseph Jawarski (cofounder of the Global Leadership Initiative), and Betty Sue Flowers (Director of the Johnson Presidential library). And – OMG – I just realized my copy is signed by Peter Senge. Whoa.

ANYWAY

This book by fancy schmancy super smart people basically reiterates the yogic sentiment that we are all parts of whole, and we need to start thinking less about Me and more about We; otherwise, life as we know it will end (aka The Requiem Scenario). HAPPY SUNDAY! But to do this, we need to develop presence. We need to observe the world as it is and as we are, we need to retreat and reflect and allow inner knowing to emerge and become a vehicle for something new to arise, and we need to take action on what arises.

That first step is critical – we MUST develop self-awareness in order to break out of the matrix of our conditioning and see something new. But guess what! Just like we talked about last week in the post about Somatic Experiencing, in order to develop self-awareness you have to slow the f*ck down!! (Don’t ask me why I am more comfortable using a euphemism for “f*ck” than the actual word. I probably need to do some self-reflection on why I feel it necessary to use the word at all if I am not comfortable using the real word. Brains be weird!!).

Thread #2: There is still some magic left in the world.

We (and me) are made of Mystery. We think that because we know why the sky is blue and where rainbows come from, there is no more magic in the world. But oh boy. We could not be more wrong!

Two examples from Presence really struck me:

On page 200, the authors discuss a study that showed that random number generators (RNGs) around the world behaved in HIGHLY NON-RANDOM WAYS on 9/11/01. The RNGs are protected from forces that could affect their randomness, yet, on 9/11 the non-random behavior began at 5AM and peaked at 11AM, EDT, matching the timelines of events that day. WTF?! Me affects We.
On page 247, the authors discuss a study done by a Japanese scientist, Masaru Emoto. He used MRIs to take pictures of the crystals formed when water freezes. As you read the following, please remember that we humans are about 70% water (and the earth is covered about 70% by water). Mr. Emoto took photos of water from sacred sources, from polluted sources, and from distilled water. The crystals formed by natural springs and sacred sources were GORGEOUS. They looked like beautiful stained glass works of art. The crystals from the polluted water looked like a slug, but uglier. The distilled water had no structure to it – it looked just like a nebulous blob. UNTIL. When they played music around the distilled water, the water formed crystals that “seem to visually reflect the essence of the music – the geometric precision of Bach, the balance of order and flow of Mozart, the beautiful simplicity of folk music.” They also had a priest pray over some distilled water for an hour, and when they took new pictures, the water formed amazing 7-sided crystals. The priest had prayed to the Seven Bezaiten, the Goddesses of Fortune.” WHOA. (I want to note that his work is controversial – some experts think it’s quackery and others think it’s legit. And maybe, both things are true??).

What’s the point of me sharing this with you?
1. To give you hope. The world is full of strife and pain and potential destruction, but it’s also full of joy and wonder and the infinite creative possibility.
2. To remind me and you that by taking care of our own body, mind, and spirit, we can literally positively impact the entire network of life (we’re all part of a connected field).
3. To reinforce how powerful our thoughts are. If thoughts (aka prayer) can change the crystallization of water, and we are 70% water, what are we doing to our bodies (and our pain experience) with our thoughts? You can find more science related to this concept in this article I wrote a few years ago.
4. Changing our thoughts can be super difficult, especially patterns of thought that have been with us since we formed our impression of the world as toddlers. But an accessible first step is to participate in a contemplative practice like meditation or journaling, so we can start to build awareness of our mind stream.

There you go. I found the book very inspiring and really enjoyed its message of hope, so I wanted to share it with you.

I’ll leave you with a quote from a recent interview with Dr. Roger Walsh on the Neurohacker podcast. This quote reminded me that it’s OK (and actually a good thing) to sit in confusion and paradox.

“All is mystery, and here is our best guess.”

We don’t know what we don’t know, and what we know is probably going to end up being proven wrong some day. It’s all just an educated guess.

Space to be Human Lab

If you are interested in developing more presence, either by developing a meditation habit or by exploring embodiment practices, I can help! You can book a 60-minute embodiment session here: Booking link. I also am currently offering free 30 minute sessions focused on the Somatic Experiencing work.
If you have a friend, coworker, or loved one who is in pain, and you would like to help them feel better, please let them know they can use this code for $10 off their first session: FEELBETTER.

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Habit Change, Mindset

I’m lazy, and you should be lazy too

May 15, 2022May 15, 2022 heather

When you want to make a change in your life, do you have a tendency to go balls-out? For example, going from not lifting weights at all to going to “I’m going to start lifting weights 4 days a week for an hour each day.” Or “Starting this week I am going to plan, prep, and cook ALL of my meals at home!” (when you typically eat out 3-4 times per week).

I am one of the aforementioned humans. I have a tendency to overestimate my motivation and drive, and as a result, I go like gang busters for a few days, or even maybe a few months, and then I peter out and return to my original set point.

My friend and teacher Dinneen Viggiano had a great newsletter about “MVA” Minimum Viable Amount. She verbalized something I have noticed but ignored when it comes to my own life – even though I know “X” is super good for me and will help me become the person I want to be, if “X” is hard, boring and/or time-consuming, I will do it for a bit and then give up. And then I will feel bad about giving up. And that will make me even LESS motivated to do ANYTHING – even something small – to improve my wellbeing. And thus begins a pity party that ends with me wondering who do I think I am and why do I think I am qualified to help ANYONE improve their life. Things get dark pretty quickly in Heather-Head-Land.

Dineen offers a solution to this nip this negativity spiral in the bud:

Start out doing something that you seriously think you would honestly really do.
Do it regularly for a while and see how you feel (see how your pain responds).
Start to pare it back a bit and see if you still feel benefits while doing the smaller amount.
If you get to a tipping point where the pain starts to return, titrate back to the slightly higher dose.

Here is how I am implementing this advice in my own life:

I am working on getting my low back feeling better, and I know that working on my breathing would help.
I worked with an Athletic Trainer awhile back who gave me several breathing exercises to do. I was supposed to do them 2-3 times a day, and they take about 15 minutes each time. I kinda did them for a while, and then, well, you know. I humaned and stopped.
SO, I am starting with doing 2 minutes of Constructive Rest whilst breathing from my diaphragm every night before I go to bed. Two minutes is so easy that I have a hard time convincing myself that it’s a burden.
I’m finding that at the end of the 2 minutes, I often have started to relax and breathe more deeply and I want to go longer, but I’m not! I’m just doing 2 minutes until I feel as if the habit is ingrained.

Now that I type it all out, I’m kind of following Dineen’s advice backwards. I am using a “tiny little action step” to build the habit, and then assessing the effects, so I can potentially do more, but the overall gist is the same:

FIND THE DOSAGE THAT YOU WILL ACTUALLY DO AND THAT ACTUALLY EFFECTS SOME CHANGE IN YOUR SYSTEM, AND DO IT CONSISTENTLY.

If you are overwhelmed, bored, or frustrated with your exercise plan, maybe you could experiment with doing a little less and see if a smaller dose will get you the same results. I think it’s a universal truth that doing less and doing it mindfully and consistently is better for our mindbodies.

Lastly, I want to put in a little plug for a fundraiser for the QC Yoga Foundation. This is a local non-profit organization that is trying to bring yoga to as many people in our community as possible. They (or maybe I should say “we” because I’m on the Board) are hosting a super fun event on 7/9/22 called Fireflies and Flowers. Music, tasty food, flowers, mid-summer vibes, picnic, and connection to your community – what more could you ask for??

If you are interested, you can “Buy a Blanket” of 8 tickets here or individual tickets here. I would love to see you there! I am trying to put together a group of 8, so we can get a blanket. Let me know if you’re interested.

Space to be Human Lab

If you have a family member, friend, or coworker who has been sidelined by pain or tension, I would be so grateful if you refer them to me, so we can see how massage, meditation, and movement can get them back to doing what they love. For every Referral who books with me, you get a coupon for $10 off your next session! Your friend can find more information about Space to be Human here.

I hope you are having a delightful Sunday and can find some space to do nothing and be okay with it. 🙂

<3

Hlo

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Awakening, Health & Fitness, Massage Therapy, Yoga

Mind Over Tension (aka Jedi Mind Tricks)

April 17, 2022April 17, 2022 heather

Hiya. Care to get a little curious?

Where are you breathing right now? Is the air coming in through your nose or your mouth? What is the temperature of the air? Where do you feel your body move with the inhale and the exhale – your shoulders, your ribcage, your shoulders, all of the above? What happens if you just notice? Just notice the breath coming in and going out, like ocean waves sliding up a sandy beach and slowly retreating back to the deep. Perhaps you would like to start to slow down the breath, taking looooong sloooow sips of air. What do you notice next?

I’m curious about your eyes. What happens if you take a pause from reading this, look up, and let your eyes gaze on something in the far distance – the furthest thing you can see without straining. How does that feel? If you invite your eyes to take in more of your surroundings – start to notice what arrives at your eyes from the periphery, how does that change your experience of your eyes?

And what about that belly? I invite you to take a moment and just notice if you are holding your breath, holding your belly, bracing. What shifts within you, if you allow yourself to soften in this area, maybe even inviting the breath to sink down low and expand the low belly? How does that feel?

And the hands, and the fingers – are they clenched tightly around your phone as you read this, are they resting in little tight fists on your lap? What if you tried to hold your phone with just the SKIN of your fingertips? What would it be like to slowly uncurl each little bone of each long elegant finger and allow the fingers and palms to rest with ease on your thighs? What is it like if you imagine bringing more space into the INSIDE of your hand, like inside the fingers and inside the palms?

How do you feel after a few minutes of exploring your inner world? Did you notice a shift in your overall tension? Your mood? The pace of the hamster wheel of thought-generation?

We’ve been taught, since the time of Rene Descartes, that “I think, therefore I am,” insinuating that there is some sort of separateness between the mind and the rest of us. We now know due to reams of research that the mind and body are not separate. As human beings, we are a mindbody. Our thoughts effect changes in our body, and our body effects changes in our thoughts. Perhaps you noticed how your thoughts helped your body feel more calm, ease, and expansiveness?

Our minds have a documented “negativity bias” which means we are always scanning for the bad, what could go wrong, how things could fail. This has kept humans alive so far, so it’s a vital predisposition, but it can make for a shitty lived experience! We can consciously work with this negativity bias, by inviting in the opposite thought – give equal airtime (or maybe even MORE – research recommends a 3:1 ratio) to scanning for the good, thinking about what could go right, how things could succeed.

How are your thoughts contributing to your tension? How could they contribute to more ease, flow, and space instead? Just some food for thought on this day of Rebirth. Maybe we could give birth to a mindset that helps us find more Space to be Human.

Space to be Human Lab (where we invite in an attitude of exploration, experimentation, and curiosity)

NEW FACE CRADLE: The reviews are in “It’s so soft!” “It’s so comfortable!” “My face isn’t smushed.” Yay for the new cradle!
NEW LTAP ASSESSMENTS: I am taking a 6 week online class on Locator Test Assessment Protocols (LTAP) to learn how to listen to the body and use its wisdom to guide treatment. If this piques your interest, let me know. During April I’ll add 10 minutes to your session at no charge, and we’ll see what the Assessments tell us about what your body needs.

And with that we are heading off to Armored Gardens for some lunchy poo. Also, if you don’t currently get the Tap On It texts, I highly recommend it. This week we got a coupon for BOGO draft beers at Armored Gardens. I mean, I don’t drink beer (Hellllooo bloated belly), but that’s a really good coupon. J

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Health & Fitness, Massage Therapy, Paleo, Yoga

So, How Did You End Up in This Line of Work, Anyway?

February 13, 2022 heather

This is a question I get a lot. How did a woman who spent 25 years in banking, doing a series of analyst and management roles (cash management analyst, treasury analyst, business analyst, Dev Team manager, project manager), end up as a neurosomatic therapist/yoga teacher/meditation teacher?

Well. Pull up a chair, get comfy, and let me tell you a tale.

It all started on 11/19/2011. Well, technically it started a couple of weeks before that. I read an article on Lifehacker about “The Primal Diet.” It immediately caught my interest for a couple of reasons:

I had just come off spending the weekend with my brothers (who lived in NYC at the time), and when they would visit, our intake of booze and fried food would skyrocket. As a result, I was feeling very bloaty and gross (to put it scientifically :P). I was pushing 150, which was not a weight that accommodated my clothes comfortably. I was scouting the internet looking for something to help me.
I loved what I read in that article. The primal “diet” was really more of a lifestyle versus a diet. The article advocated eating whole foods (meat and veggies), avoiding processed food (including gluten, sugar, flour, dyes, rancid seed oils, etc.), getting outside as much as possible, prioritizing sleep quality, incorporating “primal movements” (push-ups, planks, pull-ups, squats, etc.), spending time with loved ones, PLAYING, etc. It all made so much intuitive sense to me.

So I bought The 21-Day Total Body Transformation on 11/19/11. I read it, followed the instructions to purge the spaghetti, Pepperidge Farm frozen garlic bread (which I used to eat because I assumed that bread was “healthy”), and the beer from my kitchen and stocked up on meat, veggies, nuts, healthy fats (olive oil and avocado oil), dark chocolate, etc..

In January of 2012, I started the 21-day challenge. Within a week, my nose was no longer shooting fountains of mucus in the middle of the night. My anxiety levels had calmed WAY down (at the time the anxiety was so bad that I felt as if I would pass out at stop lights, in line at the grocery store, and in any warm area with bad air flow), I was losing weight, and my energy stayed steady all day.

I ended up following the 21-day plan for a few months, and by the 2^nd or 3^rd month, my health had totally changed. I had lost about 18 lbs. I went from a size 12 to a size 4. I participated in a sprint triathlon. I started running regularly in my barefoot running shoes. I felt so energized.

My mind was BLOWN by how big of an effect food and movement had on my physical and mental health. And I wanted EVERYONE to realize how much capacity we have to influence our health. I started researching classes, degrees, certifications, etc. to see what would help qualify me to be able to help people feel better in their bodies.

Eventually I settled on doing a 200-hour yoga teacher training. It was a 6-month program, I enjoyed yoga, and the price was accessible. While in that program, I was introduced to biomechanist and author Katy Bowman, via a collaboration project she did with Mark Sisson (the author of the Primal Blueprint). From following her, I found out about Yoga Tune Up® and the power of self-massage to change our state (both physically and mentally). I took the YTU Certification class and was introduced to OH MY GOD SO MUCH NEW INFORMATION!! That was the hardest cert I have ever done, but it sparked an interest in whole-being health, anatomy, and the nervous system.

I wanted to dive deeper, but I was loathe to go back to school. I actually LOVE school, but I finished my bachelors and masters while working full-time, and I was TIRED of spending every evening in class and/or doing homework. I felt really driven to DO something in the wellness sphere, but I was overwhelmed by options and indecision.

I enlisted professional help. I started working with Dr. Betsy Rippentrop out of Iowa City. She is a psychologist with a heavy yoga background, and I really resonated with her style of therapy. Via sessions that included talk therapy, embodiment work, and analysis of one super-detailed, vivid dream, my path forward started to become more clear. In one session I very clearly stated my goal of finding the next best step for me.

That weekend, on the YTU Teachers Facebook page, someone mentioned how she had taken her autistic son to a neurosomatic therapist, and she was blown away by the treatment. I instantly googled “neurosomatic therapy,” and found the Center for Neurosomatic Studies in Clearwater, Florida. I devoured the website, excitement building in me as I read about how students learn anatomy and physiology, movement, visceral massage, cranial mobilizations, etc.

The next day I called the school to get more information. The son of the founder of neurosomatic therapy answered the school’s phone. He was in his late 30s/early 40s and was making a career switch to become a therapist. We talked for 90 minutes.

I loved almost everything I heard about the school. But. Oh man. It was in Florida. The program was held during the day (when I would be at work). My Dad had just had some severe health issues. So many reasons to just stay put.

But, ugh. Gross. That didn’t feel good either.

So I agonized about the decisions for MONTHS. I want to do it, but…. It’s so hard, and so inconvenient, and what if, and the money, and, blah blah blah.

Finally I got tired of listening to myself waffle. The internal discord with how I was spending my days was outweighing my fear of change. I decided to go for it. I told my boss that I was quitting to move to Florida to go to school. But, I offered, if the bank was willing to keep me on part-time and let me work remotely, I would be down for that. To my shock, they said Yes! And with that “yes,” many of my fears about money and stability proved out to be unfounded.

We moved to Florida (3 days before Clearwater/Tampa got hit by Hurricane Irma). FUN TIMES! I went to school for 18 months, worked for the St. John-Clark Pain Treatment Clinic for a year, and then moved back to Iowa in April 2020, in the beginnings of the COVID pandemic. FUN TIMES AGAIN!

I opened my practice in June of 2020, and it has been steadily growing ever since. My interest in diet and movement has subtly shifted to a fascination with whole person flourishing, as I see in myself what a powerful influence my thoughts, energy, and spiritual practices have over my physical body. I love learning about the layers that make up a human (the physical body, energetic body, mental body, wisdom body, and bliss body (from the Yogic Kosha model)) and what we can do to promote health in each of those layers.

That’s my Origin Story in a nutshell. Well, actually in a tortoise shell because that is a pretty long story. And technically it’s just my THERAPIST origin story. The full origin story is a story for another time.

And with that, thanks for reading and for being part of this adventure of figuring out what makes a good life and how I can help contribute to helping others make a good life!!!

Happy Sunday!

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Health & Fitness, Yoga

On Meeting Your Future Self

January 16, 2022January 16, 2022 heather

Who are you? What’s your motivation??

Well, I just spent 25% of the time I had allocated for writing this post on searching for a segment from Community where they are trying to capitalize off of Ben Chang’s momentary stardom by creating an absolutely terrible sci-fi movie wherein they use previously filmed clips of Chang, and in those clips, he keeps repeating, “Who am I? What’s my motivation??”

Wow. That was a really impressive run-on sentence.

What’s the point, you’re wondering??

Two points.

If you are hankering for some brilliant TV, and you haven’t watched Community. Stop reading this right now and go watch Community. SO GOOD.
That question of “Who Am I?” is kind of an important one.

As I mentioned in a previous email, I recently finished the book Healing Ourselves. This week I also finished Healers On Healing and started on Helping People Change. Guess what common theme is present in all 3 of these books, written by a whole slew of PhDs and doctors and scientists?

We have tremendous power to heal ourselves.

But, just because we have the power doesn’t mean we know how to use it. We are not conditioned to look inside ourselves for answers. We’re taught that answers are to be found in Parents, in Teachers, in Books, in The Science, in The Government, in People Smarter Than Us.

But what spiritual teachers and philosophers have taught for decades (and what current research on consciousness and meditation is proving out) is that the answers we seek are found by turning inwards and realizing that we are whole, and while we are One, we are also connected to Many, and that connection to Many (call it God, Oneness, the Universe, Zero Point Field, Universal Consciousness, Spirit, etc.), gives us access to all the answers, support, and guidance that we need – ALL INSIDE OF US.

But HOW? How do we start to find answers within ourselves??

All of these books, in addition to more secular books like Atomic Habits, and Working With Emotional Intelligence, emphasize the importance of tuning in to the Higher Self/Future Self/Best Self as a way of getting guidance and motivation for lasting behavior change.

But, again. HOW!

This is where I struggle. I understand the theory behind “the answers are within” but sometimes The Within is deathly silent and uncommunicative!

This is where I think “different strokes for different folks” can be very helpful.

When I’ve been guided by therapists to “ask your heart” when faced with a question, I’m often met with anxiety. “Shit. My heart’s not saying anything. I must be doing this wrong. How long will she wait before she gets impatient for an answer?? Why am I paying someone to make me do this? Ooh! There’s a thought. But is it coming from my mind or from my heart? Am I just projecting what I want my heart to say, or is it really saying it??”

And sometimes I do get an answer that way, even despite the Ego going into panicked overthinking.

But what I have found more helpful are writing exercises and guided meditations.

Several years ago I took a workshop from Ariel Kiley called Business of Yoga Success. One of the exercises she did was “Dream Lifestyle – Describe what your most fantastical ideal lifestyle would look like. What is your schedule? What’s your home like? Travel? Trainings? Family and friends? Have fun creating a fantastically comfortable and vibrant life that reflects your highest values.”

And I DID have fun with that. And the Future Heather I created in that writing exercise has come back to visit me often.

She came back to me when I did this Future Self meditation, where you meet 5 different versions of yourself and spend time connecting to the one who resonates most thoroughly. Path 4 Heather is, Man! SO COOL.

Meeting and tuning it to the energy of your Future Self can provide inspiration, motivation, and guidance. WWMFSD?? What Would My Future Self Do! James Clear recommends asking this question when you are trying to shift your behavior. How can I make a 1% better choice in this situation, aligned with my Future Self?

Your Future Self is a pretty handy mentor, guide, and healer. If you are interested in seeing what help you can give yourself, you could try out the Dream Lifestyle writing exercise or listen to the Future Self meditation (10 mins), or if you have a chatty heart, you could sit down, spend a few moments watching your breath, put your hand on your heart and ask for help. We are all unique snowflakes, so try out a few things and see what works for the N=1 experiment that is you!

Space to be Human Updates

I’m hosting an Introduction to Mindset class on 1/24/22 from 1PM-2PM Central. If you feel tortured by your monkey mind (any fellow High Functioning Anxiety peeps out there??), you will find some relief in this class.
- Please register in advance for this meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZMrd-ChpjMoEtYpcCkbuZuBn2JXR5S4dDE1
- After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

That’s all for today, my friends! Please respond to this email if you have any questions or comments. I really do love to hear from you; otherwise, I’m all like.. “Bueller…..Bueller….?”

Happy Sunday, My Lovely Readers!!

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Awakening, Health & Fitness, Yoga

On The Hardness of Going Soft

January 2, 2022January 2, 2022 heather

Tim and I took a perfectly timed trip to Florida over Christmas break. We left at 5AM on Christmas day and just positively SAILED down to Destin, FL. We were there in 15 hours, even with pee and fuel breaks. There was NO traffic, and the time passed swiftly due to some fascinating podcasts and the audio version of Wheel of Time: Eye of the World. We returned home on Thursday, right before Davenport got buried in about 6 inches of fluffy white stuff that was most definitely not sand. On our way back north, we saw so many instances of cars at a standstill going south. Sometimes it really pays to go against the grain! 😛

We had 4 full days down in Florida. Our hotel was right on the beach, so our days consisted of waking up (without an alarm), partaking of the free hotel breakfast (the Fairfield Inn hot breakfast is really not bad! They actually had protein options instead of just bagels, oatmeal and sugary yogurts), grabbing our gear, and heading to the beach. We sat on the beach, read, watched the waves, actually got into the water a VERY little bit, headed to town for lunch, came back to the beach for more reading, watching, wading, then walked or drove to supper, and then tried to watch TV in the hotel (SO MANY COMMERCIALS), and then went to sleep.

It was so eye-opening how HARD it was to actually let ourselves relax though.

Should we “make the most” of being there and DO more stuff – go stand-up paddle boarding, go hiking, check out museums, visit Seaside (the town where Truman Show was filmed), find all the best restaurants??

We decided that outside the door of our hotel was a gorgeous ocean with soft white, squeaky sand dissolved from quartz ages ago. That was enough to appreciate for 4 days.

While at the beach I read a really amazing book, Healing Ourselves – Biofield Science and the Future of Health. The whole book is about our ability to heal ourselves and others via energy practices. At face value that may sound very woo woo, but there are dozens of studies that show the healing power of our thoughts, attention, and intention (what do you think causes the placebo effect!). Two things are very clear from the research the author relays in the book:

We are all interconnected.
We have so much more power to heal ourselves that when have been taught.

I plan to dive in to the practices outlined in the book and will share with you the ones that I love. In the meantime, to explore the concept of self-healing for yourself, you could start simply by taking a moment to notice your feet on the ground, soften up those soles, think about plugging your feet into the earth like you would plug your charger into a wall socket. Notice the energy in your feet, calves, and upper legs. Take a moment and ask yourself, “Who do I want to be today?” Set that intention for the day (I prefer to write it down to make it more concrete and visible), revisit it often, and see what changes in your experience of your physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual self/layer/body.

Space to be Human Updates

If you were unable to make it to my Introduction to Meditation class, but you are interested in the topic, you’re in luck! I recorded the class, and you can watch it here at your leisure. Feedback and suggestions are much appreciated! If this class piques your interest, and you would like help in developing a meditation practice, you can book a session with me here.
Did you know that the Quad Cities is hosting its very own yoga festival?? The QC YogaCon will be held March 4-6, and guess who is teaching! Me! I am teaching a Yoga Tune Up® class (Total Tension Tunedown) on 4/5 at 4PM. You can find more details here.

That’s all for today, my friends! Happy 2^nd day of 2022! Please reach out to me at heather@spaceotbehuman.life or book a session with me here if you would like to feel better in your body.

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