headache_500The energy surges in a jolt, from my heart into the front of my brain.

A massive constriction squeezes me from my hip joint up through my torso and neck into a spasm of cataclysmic grief etched across my face.

I cry out 3 high-pitched sobs of absolute despair as the final release of energy shoots out the top of my head and my feet dig into the ground and my breath returns in shudders, then deepens… and is still.

A five-second processing of deeply embedded grief and shock that leaves the top of my head glowing and my body tingling with the pleasant vibration of integration.

That’s good stuff in my book.

That kind of transformation of stuck energy becomes possible once we make one simple switch – a simple switch that can take years of work to fully embody – and that is the switch from resisting and bracing against our uncomfortable sensations, to embracing them and learning how to let them express through us.

We are so trained in our culture to freeze or panic in the presence of uncomfortableness.

We get itchy and we are taught to see the doctor, instead of learning that heat and itchiness are an expression of the suppressed rage that is within us.

We feel depressed and stuck and we are taught to examine our thoughts and behaviors and rehash our trauma through endless examination, instead of knowing that our depression is a reflection of a process that stems, fundamentally, in our nervous system – and that it can be accessed and transformed through a willingness to feel and express and ultimately renegotiate the helplessness.

In short we learn, in many ways, that we are powerless and must put our healing into the hands of others, when the truth is that we are potentially powerful beyond measure and that we have the ability to not only heal ourselves, but to help others as well.

It’s time to wake up to that.

It’s happening already.

In you, in the world.

Even as these days are full of chaos and suffering, misplaced aggression, greed, hunger and misery, and even though it may feel like our situation as a species is hopeless, there is a truth that sleeps underneath all that; and that is that we can only heal what is broken by first bringing our attention to it and having a good hard look, and that’s what I see happening everywhere I look – in my friends and family, my clients, in the world.

That which has been hidden and buried is coming to the surface and frankly, it’s about damn time.

The fundamental wound of the Universe is showing up to be healed.

You are the healer.

It starts with learning to listen to the body and trust in it’s wisdom when it speaks through the only language it knows; sensation.

It’s true that sometimes western allopathic medicine is a smart way to go – like If your leg has a compound fracture or you’re having a heart attack or some other traumatic injury.

AND it’s also true that if we are having “strange tingling” in our leg and constriction in our chest, we might need to consider learning how to just be with those sensations and allow them to transform. It’s a process that our body knows how to do and it is the root of true healing, but our culture – i.e, our schools, religions, parents, peers, movies and media – none of these have taught us how to tap into this instinctual wisdom that our animal friends have without even trying; in fact, our society actively encourages the suppression of this natural process with it’s fixation on fear and pharmaceuticals.

Luckily, back in the 1960’s a guy named Peter Levine downloaded some ancient knowledge and combined it with nervous system science and called it Somatic Experiencing! Check it out. Also Pat Ogden, Stephen Porges, Bessel Van de Kolk, Gabor Mate and a whole lot of other folks are working in the same vein.

My lovely wife Irene has created a 21-day online course that will teach you all about this ancient wisdom and modern science and give you practical tools that will help you learn how to befriend your stuck, painful sensations.

Learning to understand and speak the language of sensation is just like learning any other language; eventually, with knowledge and curiosity and the willingness to put in the time, everyone can experience the kind of full-body emotional/mental healing that comes with being fluent in the body’s language.

Wishing you many a joyous transformation.

Here’s that link to Irene’s course again, highly recommended as way to get started on this incredibly important path.  irenelyon.com/tuneup/