Heal The Whole

03/02/2024

Just Play!
Remember what play feels like? Free-flowing, light-hearted, unconcerned about the past or the future, not striving towards a particular end - just - play?

"Work"is when you come from a place of performance - a place of anxiety - a place of success or failure. You can feel your shoulders tighten up and that knot in your gut. You can make anything, even the most fun activity into work if you try hard enough!

On the other hand, "play" is when you come from a place of curiosity, a place of living and laughing right now, a place free from from judgment and blame.

If you have little kids around you, LUCKY YOU! They can help teach you how to play - they are the experts! Sit down and have a game of jacks, swing on the swings, watch the clouds and laugh from your belly! You can make anything - even your difficult tasks into play if you practice. Just stay in tune with that magical light place in your heart - the free-flowing place in your gut that happens when you live right now. Just play!

01/05/2024

Knowing how to nourish the river inside you impacts the outcome of everything you do outwardly!

Beneath all of the outward actions we do – our work, our play, the way we cook, our social media posts, our religious ceremonies, every relationship, even the way we work out and the way we laugh; runs an underground riv...

12/18/2023

“Without being peace,
we cannot do anything for peace.
If we cannot smile, we cannot help other people smile.
If we are not peaceful, then we cannot contribute to the peace movement.
In order to heal others, we first need to heal ourselves. . .
If we know how to go back to ourselves, listen and heal, we can change. But most of us don’t know how to listen to ourselves and understand the sufferings.”
Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace is Every Step, pg. 111

http://healthewhole.com

12/02/2023

Honoring the self
is the opposite of selfishness.
When I act selfishly, it is because my response to pain
blinds me to my own real needs and those of others.
When I honor myself, I allow my pain to show me
both my own real needs and those of others.

http://healthewhole.com

Heal the Whole uses a holistic approach to counseling to help people reconnect with themselves, release trauma, build core autonomy in a space of joy and peace, and create the future they desire. This kind of therapy uses both sides of the brain to let go of snarled neuropathways and allow the body,...

10/22/2023

You Cannot Bypass Your Own Soul on Your Way to God

Our road to God cannot be accomplished by way of bypassing our own soul. How can we hear God unless we develop our own “ears that hear?” How can we follow Christ until we know where our feet are? How can we give God our heart until we have found it and own it ourselves? We cannot ignore our own heart on the way to God, because it is “within the silence of the heart that God speaks.” (Mother Teresa)
Instead of trying to detach from ourselves, or going to war with our soul, we need to look more deeply into it, listen more carefully and learn to love ourselves. If we cannot love ourselves and others who we have seen, how will we love God whom we have not seen? We can look to God as we develop this capacity to love, but we cannot develop it outside of our own hearts, because as Jesus said, “The Kingdom of God is within you.”

Heal the Whole uses a holistic approach to counseling to help people reconnect with themselves, release trauma, build core autonomy in a space of joy and peace, and create the future they desire. This kind of therapy uses both sides of the brain to let go of snarled neuropathways and allow the body,...

08/29/2023

Forgiving Can Be Hard

It’s not that we don’t want to forgive. Holding on to pain is – well – painful! And it can do a lot of damage. But it can also feel like holding on to the pain is the only way to stay safe from getting hurt again. It’s like a shield that seems as though it can protect us from getting into that situation again.
But just the opposite is true. Holding on to that pain actually attracts more of it – maybe you’ve noticed that life keeps sending around the same situation to learn from again?
So how do you let go?
What doesn’t help is a lot of guilting or shaming that comes from other people or yourself, saying that you SHOULD forgive; or lots of trying and pushing and pulling to make yourself forgive; or tucking the pain away into some unsuspecting organ in the body, where it can’t be seen or heard (for a while!); or putting on a happy face and pretending that you have already forgiven, when nothing has changed inside you.
Focusing on the other person, stewing for vengeance, trying to make them change, or criticizing and berating them also doesn’t help. None of these things will change your heart.
The heart cannot be forced. It’s just how it’s made. Even you cannot force your own heart to change. Like love, peace and joy, forgiveness belongs in that sacred space of the heart that cannot be coerced. (Thank Goodness!)
But the heart can be invited. It can be drawn. It can be loved into opening. So, if there is a place that feels like it will not forgive in your heart, the place to start is to:
1) Look and listen deeply – the heart wants to be understood and valued for the precious unique gift of humanity that it is. Your heart needs to be loved and taken care of by YOU!
2) Sort out what belongs to you and what doesn’t – this is boundary work.
3) Take responsibility for what belongs to you. Make the changes necessary.
4) Create a space in your inner core that can hold forgiveness when it comes.
5) Keep working on patiently loving your heart, taking care of it, listening to it, and doing the work necessary to build its wisdom, until the pain is no longer “needed” as a defense. When it is no longer needed, it will naturally fall away and be replaced by peace.
6) When the peace presents itself, choose to let it in.
Sometimes we need help to do this. Sometimes the trauma happened early in childhood, or perhaps it is still happening. It’s difficult (or impossible) to see our own blind spots, and it’s often important to get help with this process. Heal The Whole is uniquely set up to facilitate all of these steps, and open your vision to how to move forward in an authentic, peaceful way. You can get a free consultation by choosing a time here: https://healthewhole.com/schedule-a-session-1
Wishing you a life of joy!

Heal the Whole uses a holistic approach to counseling to help people reconnect with themselves, release trauma, build core autonomy in a space of joy and peace, and create the future they desire. This kind of therapy uses both sides of the brain to let go of snarled neuropathways and allow the body,...

06/25/2023

Joy and happiness are by-products. If you set out and say” I want to be happy,” clenching your teeth with determination, this is the quickest way of missing the bus.
The three things that make the most difference in welcoming joy are 1) The ability to reframe our situation; 2) our capacity to experience gratitude; and 3) our choice to be kind and generous.
In 2015, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama came together to discuss the nature of True Joy. You can read about it in their book "The Book of Joy" from which this quote was taken.

http://healthewhole.com

05/19/2023

"When you find yourself
looking at those around you
wondering
'why can't my life be like that?'
or
'why can't I have that?'
remember
you don't need anyone's that
to be happy.
You need you
to be happy.
Because your that is within you.
And if you can't see you,
you'll never see that." Najwa Zebian

https://www.healthewhole.com

04/13/2023

Should I Get a Divorce, or Can I Make My Marriage Work?
Take The Test!
1) Do I see myself as the victim in my relationship?

2) Do I find myself “building up armies” (people who agree with me) and “gathering evidence” against my spouse – either in my mind or more tangibly?

3) Can I explain my partner’s contribution to “the way things are” now, but not my own?

4) Am I trying to hurry up and “get that person out of my life?”

5) Am I filled with anger, fear or bitterness?

6) (If I have children) Am I afraid of co-parenting with my spouse for the rest of my life?

If you answered “yes,” to any of the above questions, it might be important for you to get help before moving forward. “Should I get a divorce?” is one of the most commonly asked questions I get in my practice. It’s a question with a lot of implications and the decision you make will have a huge impact on your life, your partner’s life, and your children’s lives, so it’s worth taking the time to really work with it!
I’m assuming that since you are reading this right now, you are likely in the middle of a HUGE mess of feelings like anger, resentment, confusion, shame, guilt, betrayal and grief, to name a few. You might also feel trapped, sick, and needing desperately to find a way out, or over or through. You may have been stuffing your feelings for a very long time, walking on eggshells or bursting out in threats or tears, or behaving in ways that shock yourself. Maybe you’re having a hard time eating or sleeping or doing any kind of work, unable to think about anything else. Maybe you’ve written scores of journals, trying to make sense of the mess you’re in, and what to do about it, and that bitter rock in the middle of your gut feels like it will squeeze you to death like a boa constrictor.
If you have any of these thoughts and feelings, my friend, you are not alone! Maybe most people feel this way sometime in their lives, but that fact doesn’t make it any less painful for you right now! The good news is that most marital problems can be solved by learning and developing some specific worldviews, principles and skills, that anyone can work on. The more challenging news is that to actually incorporate these principles and skills takes very intentional time and work!!
Whether you get divorced, or whether you stay married, it is worth taking the steps to change. People who divorce and remarry without understanding what happened, and without making the needed changes in their inner core will invariably take the same problems with them into their next relationship, or worse, give up on relationships altogether.
At Heal The Whole, we specialize in helping you let go of trauma and thought patterns that keep you stuck, and develop a solid inner core from which you can act with integrity. When you start taking ownership of your own feelings, thoughts, actions, body, and power, you are developing the inner space that can tell you your next best step. Making decisions from that peaceful space allows you to stop the endless rollercoaster of “do I stay or do I go?” and create order in your life and help you move forward, without overwhelming regrets.
If you or someone you know needs help to create this solid inner core, please connect with us at Heal The Whole and learn how to take hold of your life in the present. Visit us at Healthewhole.com

Heal the Whole uses a holistic approach to counseling to help people reconnect with themselves, release trauma, build core autonomy in a space of joy and peace, and create the future they desire. This kind of therapy uses both sides of the brain to let go of snarled neuropathways and allow the body,...