Mindfulness? No, I'm not spiritual.

As a therapist at the start of my journey I never thought I would be where I am now. I had spent so many years stuck in my head and ruminating about any negative thing my brain could grab hold of. Working towards and then qualifying as a therapist had led me to challenge the norm and find new ways to cope and live my life in a more positive way. But like an onion, the more self-aware I became, the more layers that were uncovered. I soon realised that my thoughts were not able to stop me feeling heavy feelings; nor could my thoughts stop me from repeating patterns and feeling triggered in certain situations. I was recognising within my therapy work that I saw the same in my clients. It wasn't just our thoughts that we needed to pay attention to; in fact, our thoughts could massively work against us in some ways and tell us untruths. So, I began to look deeper in to how I could better support myself and my clients to break free from the chains of the past and the 'Imprint of our lives'...

We are not just our mind - we are so much more. A mind, body, soul, spirit, awareness. We are a system designed to reproduce and survive, interact and connect and love and grow. But life is busy, times can be difficult, people can challenge us and the stories that we hold in our intricate systems play out in every second of our aliveness. How many of us know who we really are? Will we complete this lifetime ever fully knowing? We are ignoring or simply not noticing a huge part of ourselves. We are all stuck in our heads; procrastinating, ruminating, self berating and allowing our 'system of self' to control us. Because it has to. Our nervous system and our brain is designed to keep us safe and it does this based off memories already stored and it fills in the gaps. So, if you feel 'out of control' - you probably are. So why not take some control back...

I ask people their views on mindfulness. I often hear back; 'I'm not in to all that' or 'I'm not spiritual' or 'It's a bit weird'. And this social construction, caused by a world of logical thinkers and a fear of seeing a deeper side to the world we live in causes us to see mindfulness as an oddity or even a hobby. Breathwork, meditation, nature, stillness, body scans, mindful intention in everything we do, practising gratitude.. the list goes on. Spiritual? Woo-woo? My response to my clients who are resistant or sceptical to this practice? We cannot think our way out of a feeling. It will raise it's head again and again. Talking therapy has the ability to help us for sure. But when the body keeps the score and we avoid sitting with ourselves internally as our mind tells us we cannot handle it we have to ask ourselves; is mindfulness woo-woo? Or absolutely necessary for us to work with all parts of our self to release, heal, reconstruct, gain control and be free of our stress trauma and pain? We all have a body and we need to nurture it in every way. I work with anyone aged 16+ to connect with themselves in a research-backed, trauma-informed way; to understand why our nervous system and brain behaves in the way that they do. This is healing from a place of self-acceptance and understanding. Instead of self-blame and confusion. Mindfulness isn't woo-woo - it's exactly what we need to unpick and heal the stories that we hold and create new ones. Contact me today and lets start this new journey together...