The essence of inner work
Updated: Nov 5
This article is intended to share my understanding of the essence of how to do inner work for yourself in a way that is nourishing, lasting, can help with real problems, be used in a crisis and addresses the root causes.
In studying and exploring numerous methods of transformation and healing, I have found that we can create profound transformation by simply going within, listening to what is there, and responding wisely.
Specific modalities give us a structure which can be a great gift, but that structure can also become its own prison.
I invite you to first listen inwardly, develop your discernment, explore and experiment. What resonates with you? What effect do different approaches have for you? Be your own scientist, healer and explorer of inner worlds. Discover the wisdom within you. I have found that by doing so, there is more freedom, nourishment and sovereignty.
What’s written below is a menu of options. If an ingredient isn’t to your liking, you can simply not use it.
This work is drawn from that of many people that have come before me, though too many to name. Ultimately, it guides us inwards to places beyond words. This work asks us to come into a deeper place of being.
The philosophy behind this work
The power lies within us. Our inner and outer worlds are interwoven. When there is a problem in our external world, we can address at least part of it by going within. Most of our inner world is subconscious. Engaging with it requires our whole being, not just mental activity.
While doing things that soothe have their place in healing work, soothing typically does not resolve the root issue.
This is not about being a happier prisoner, or more docile, but rather seeking the truth, a deeper understanding of reality, uncovering our power and working in such a way where solutions and synchronicities emerge. This is saying ‘yes’ to magic. This is allowing the life within us to express more fully.
If the power lies within us, why do we seem so powerless? In essence, as we have lived our life, we have absorbed the views of the world that were given to us. We have experienced unpleasant things, and those things have often been ‘stored’ within us, typically below conscious awareness. So now when something occurs outside, it hits the stuff inside, creating disturbances in our inner world ie: we feel bad, have ‘negative’ thoughts or act accordingly.
By turning towards the inner disturbances, experiencing, seeing, listening to, and working with them, they can complete their journey, allowing us to be more free. This is about being gentle and nourishing our inner world, not using discipline and willpower to override what doesn’t feel good.
This work helps us remember who we are, shed the burdens we carry, experience more freedom and awakening the power that is our birthright.
Part 1: The fundamentals
Experience the energy
Given that everything is energy, the simplest way of working with our inner world, is to feel the energy or the emotion of whatever it is that is bothering us, and in feeling it, we allow it to move and transform. Sometimes feeling the pain is the medicine. You let go of the resistance, of trying to keep it together, and instead let yourself ‘break’. You completely accept it how it is. No judgement. This is not a mental activity, but rather an experiential way of being.
You can either let the energy do its thing, let it express itself as you let go, and relax behind it, being aware that you are not the emotion, or you can go into the emotion, listen to it like you would a loved one sharing a problem, embody it, move with it and engage with it.
You can choose how intense the process is, doing just one drop at a time if desired.
You can bring qualities such as love and compassion to the process. This can help you be more resourced, able to hold space for the discomfort and avoid being overwhelmed. These qualities can also be healing in and of themselves when brought to the problem.
“The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek”
Commonly attributed to Joseph Campbell
How do you relate to the discomfort? Trying to get rid of it and judging it as bad can cause more tension and problems. Beating yourself up to get to a place of acceptance and freedom is contradictory. Bringing presence, love and curiosity is often the process of true healing.
“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change”
Carl Rogers
So the people who say in an airy fairy manner “just love everything” are right to some extent. However, genuinely loving everything can be extremely difficult. I believe it requires us to be genuine and true in our practice rather than simply saying “love it and let it go..what’s for lunch?” It’s about coming face to face with everything that is not love.
“I did not come to teach you. I came to love you. Love will teach you.”
unknown
Curiosity
Being genuinely curious can allow you to go deeper, to figure out problems that you initially don’t know how to solve, discover new possibilities, free yourself of false limitations, discern truth from lies, and find your way of doing inner work.
While you can use your logical mind, I have found far more transformative and truthful answers come when we listen deeply within ourselves. Here is a simple, doable process that can help you hear your intuition / deeper wisdom:
1. Bring your attention to your heart. Placing one or both hands on your heart can help.
2. Gently slow your breathing down.
3. Feel a rejuvenating feeling such as love, appreciation, compassion, gratitude etc. Being sincere and heartfelt here is what is most important. You can bring a loved one to mind, a place, a memory or hope if you find it helpful to experience such a feeling.
4. Silently ask your heart a question. You don’t need to explain all the details to your heart, being concise tends to work best.
5. Listen inwardly. Be open to any way in which the answer may come. While remaining in this state, you can ask follow up questions as you are in dialogue with your heart.
You may find that simply sitting down, and going within and listening for any way in which an answer may come is all that’s needed. It may be an intuitive sense, a deep knowing, clarity of thought. You may receive an answer immediately, or it may be that you live with a question for a while or that life shows you the answer in the external world sometime later.
While I suggest you question everything, here are some questions that are often useful when it comes to addressing the problems in our lives:
What do I need to know about this problem?
What is this problem trying to communicate to me?
What are the root causes of this problem?
What is the nature of this problem?
What is this really about?
Is this true?
Where do I feel this in my body?
What are the different elements of this problem?
What do I not want to look at?
Is there a benefit to having this problem or a downside to healing it?
What would it take to get the outcome I want?
What is in the way of the outcome I desire?
What is the best way for me to address / heal / resolve this problem?
You can also tune into any emotion that is unpleasant, and with our intention / intuition, trace it back to its origin. This can then help you resolve the issue at its root, using the current problem as a portal.
You can also use muscle testing to find answers.
What drives us to succeed in any area is often a reaction born from fearing the opposite. Eg: We strive to be rich, forward focused and positive because we fear being poor and facing what is negative. Running away from the negative or towards the positive are often simply two sides of the same coin. So even if you achieve the riches, if there’s still fear inside of being poor, you likely won’t be at peace or feel truly safe and abundant. What if instead of being driven by reaction, we came from a place of expressing who you really are?
Listening inwardly is also about the impulses and intelligence within us expressing themselves. We understand on a basic level to drink when we’re thirsty. That same intelligence, when developed, can help us intuitively, from within, to know the best next step for us. It could be anything from squeezing your hands into fists to work with anger or doing a particular activity to help resource us when we’re overwhelmed.
Intention
Intention is an expression of your creative powers. It can range from gently tuning in to what you desire, imagining what it would be like to have it, saying ‘yes’ the possibility, all the way to a direct command, where your will makes reality so.
If you are masterful enough, you can do just about anything with intention. You can intend to resolve a subconscious limiting belief; create a subconscious belief; bring comfort to a part of you that is hurt; process and release an emotion; foster deep joy within you, transform the root cause of a pattern of behaviour; cut ties to a challenging person and more. I invite you to explore what’s possible with your intention.
To do this, you simply intend. You don’t need to overcomplicate it.
If it is helpful, you can use words either out loud or in your own mind to facilitate the process. Eg: “It is my intention to create a subconscious belief that I am loved.” or simply repeat “I am loved” with the intention of it sinking into your being. If contradictions arise throughout the process such as “that’s not true", you can invite them in and work with them rather than trying to push past them which often causes resistance.
You can intend for the end desire, and imagine what that would be like, such as having an amazing job; or you can use intention to cultivate the elements that can support that end desire, such as improving your relationship with money, deepening your self love and self worth, nourishing the gifts and talents you already have etc. Each of these elements can be broken down into finer nuances if you feel called to it, eg: what are the components that make up a good relationship with money?
The depth, commitment and engagement with your intention is what is most important. In my experience, it’s about working with the intention or repeating it, rather than simply focusing on it once for a few seconds.
When you intend for something, there may be a thought, emotion, belief, part of you etc, that is incongruent with that, and may push back or raise its head the very moment you set course. Eg, if you intend to be healthy and full of life, a part of you might feel self pity that you’re not, or a thought may say ‘how’s that going to be possible when I can’t even afford healthy food?’ There is often great wisdom and truth here. I recommend turning towards that part of you, belief etc, and listening to it, talking with it, learning from it, to see how you can come to more harmony within yourself and maybe find a possibility beyond your current paradigm, that can bring congruency in your being, rather than trying to override it with your intention.
You can intend to address the root causes of something without needing to know what the root causes are. You can be as general or specific as you want. Experiment. What works best for you?
If there is an unpleasant situation that is too intense for you to feel right now, you can intend to process the unpleasantness without experiencing the high emotional intensity, or minimizing the intensity you feel during the process.
Intention is also beneficial for situations that are problematic but where you feel little or no emotion. Because intention has a cerebral aspect to it, this can be more useful than trying to experience the energy.
Part 2: Enriching the process
Here are some ways that you can enrich the elements described in part 1. By making them more tangible and engaging with the processes more deeply, you can access more of your power, and create greater transformation.
These processes often invite you to enter a deeper state of being.
Imagination, symbols and metaphors
Much of our inner world is not something that our logical minds can easily grasp. Therefore, using our imagination, symbols and metaphors can help access and work with elements that may feel intangible.
This can also help work through problems that might be too complex to understand, or so big and deep that we don’t even know where to begin. By working in a metaphorical way, a complex problem can be given an image that encompasses all of it, including the parts that are below conscious awareness. We then have a single image to work with rather than a hundred different issues.
It’s important to understand that this is not about just having some image in your mind. It’s coming from the understanding that the image, metaphor etc represents limiting beliefs, unhealed experiences, deep hurts and fears etc. Therefore it’s not about having the ‘right’ image or metaphor, it’s about being in a deep place within yourself and connecting with something that makes the process more tangible. Be curious throughout the process, see how each step unfolds. The metaphor may change, or cease being needed.
There are innumerable ways to do this. Here are just some possibilities:
On a very simple level, to help you experience the idea of letting go, you could imagine / visualise / feel your hands holding onto something, and then letting go.
Your struggles with money could feel like or be represented by a knotted ball of rope in your stomach. You could then listen internally and ask how to best work with it. You could experience what it’s like to untie the knots. On a subconscious level, each knot may represent a belief, an unpleasant event in your life, a fear etc. Through your intention, each knot you untie could represent a limiting belief you are releasing. You don’t need to consciously know what the belief or event is, thus the power of the image.
Deep self loathing may appear to you as a monster made of black tar. It might seem impossible to change, so instead of focusing on it, you could imagine pulling out a magical gift from deep within you and holding it while in the presence of this monster, noticing what effect it has. A magical object can open our perception to new possibilities, yet may simply represent the power of love.
You could imagine eating a problem, and letting your digestive system symbolically break it down, absorb any nutrients, and eliminate what isn’t needed.
If something is intensely unpleasant to think about, you could imagine putting it inside a box and locking it shut, then placing the box far away from you, perhaps at the bottom of the ocean. You can then begin to process the distress you feel just thinking about the box under the ocean. Then you might feel comfortable imagining bringing the box closer, each time releasing the new distress that comes up as it comes closer to you, to the point where you have processed a lot of the distress without thinking about the problem directly.
You could decide on a belief you want to write into your subconscious, hold your hands apart, and gradually bring them together. The intention being that when they meet, the belief will have been successfully written into your subconscious. You can use any movement, the idea is to give yourself a tangible beginning and ending of a process, that symbolises a single completed process which you can then repeat.
A vision for a future you wish to create could be encapsulated by a symbol, making it easier to connect with and remind yourself of throughout the day. Eg: A healthy body full of vitality with endless energy could be symbolised as a green infinite sign. You could have that as the lock screen on your phone and on a sticky note at your desk so that you are always reminded of this vision.
What starts out as imagination can easily bridge into intuition and deep, truthful insight. You can play with this. What possibilities emerge for you?
Ceremony and ritual
You can take the above ideas further, by using ceremony and ritual to transform your inner world. This invites more magic into the process, where magic is both a power and a possibility that holds the door open for the extraordinary to happen. This can be a particularly useful resource when situations are dire.
Rather than imagining a knotted ball of rope, you could use actual rope. In a ceremonial way, tie knots in the rope, each one representing something you wish to free yourself from. It can be as though you are pulling the problem out of yourself and into the rope, which you then burn.
You could write out your problem onto paper, then burn it, surrendering it to something greater to take care of it. While that something greater could be a god you believe in, it could be the most powerful and wise part of you.
You could simply light a candle and intend that the fire burns away anything that is causing you suffering, as you sit in front of it for 5 minutes every day. A shower or bath can also be used symbolically to wash away that which isn’t you.
You could play some music, close your eyes, be open to entering an altered state of consciousness, sit in a place that feels special in nature (or imagine sitting in a place that feels special), and use that as a portal to ‘travel’ to a sacred, magical, healing place. That place could be underground, in the heavens, a different dimension etc. What comes up for you? What resources would be most beneficial and healing? Is it spirit animals, guides, talking plants, your future self to provide healing, insight, wisdom, teachings etc? Or is it just a place away from the chaos?
For one person, a small space feels safe, for another it feels claustrophobic. What works for you?
What ceremony or ritual would you most like to do? What would work best for your specific challenges and temperament?
Blessings and prayers
Blessing and prayers can help process, heal and resolve issues. If you believe in some god, avatar or higher power, you can pray to that. If you don’t, you can pray to, or be in devotion to the qualities that these beings typically represent, such as love, forgiveness and benevolence, or it could simply be the goodness you see in yourself and others, not putting anyone or anything above you.
Even if there is no higher power of any kind, the state of being of prayer and blessing is one that rejuvenates the body, and allows you to more easily access healing and insight. In this way you’re using it as a tool rather than a belief system.
Blessing
Blessing can used by repeating things such as:
“I bless (insert the name of whoever is / has suffered)”
“I bless (insert what has caused the suffering)”
“I bless myself for experiencing / seeing this”
While it can seem counterintuitive to bless the problem, perpetrator etc, by doing so, it creates a movement of energy that repeatedly hits the issue within us, eventually breaking through and releasing the problem energetically.
As with everything, explore for yourself. Explore being general or specific in your blessing. Explore focusing on the external or internal worlds. Explore saying it out loud, repeatedly with intensity or silently, slowly, with gentleness.
Ho’oponopono
This is a practice that comes from the Hawaiian shamanic tradition that has been adapted for personal use. Here are the essentials:
In ho’oponopono we take full responsibility for everything that happens in our lives. The cause of every problem is within us. It’s a memory replaying a past error in our subconscious. We speak to this error as well as divinity, asking for that data to be cleaned and released. When it is, we are freed, we return to nothingness from which inspiration springs forth, we return to harmony, to life without the problem. It is to correct or to make things right, to be in balance.
You repeat these four statements:
I’m sorry
Forgive me
Thank you
I love you
Each statement can have multiple meanings, you can discover these through practice. Here’s what they typically mean:
“I’m sorry” is acknowledging that I have created this problem. There is subconscious data in me being triggered.
“Forgive me” for creating this problem, I didn’t know I had that inside of me. Asking for release from the program being replayed.
“Thank you” for the opportunity to release this memory.
“I love you” can be said to the problem, the data, yourself and / or divinity.
You don’t have to say each of the four phrases. You may choose to focus on just one or two, or use other words. The words in a blessing or for ho’oponopono have no power in and of themselves. They are a tool that allows us to access our power or to receive the healing from divinity. Therefore, when saying these words, it's important to connect with them, feel them, emote them from a deep place within ourselves. One of the benefits of having specific words is that we can begin by just saying them by rote if we’re completely overwhelmed, panicked and unable to think straight. The words can act as an easy on ramp that helps us turn inwards more fully, and what starts out as mindless repetition can turn into genuine inner work.
Part 3: Frameworks
There are many different perspectives on why we have the problem that we do, and many frameworks of transformation.
While you could simply intend to heal every root cause and surface issue, throughout all time, space, dimensions, without needing to know what they are, a characteristic of many profoundly transformational techniques is that they address specific, core elements, one at a time. Even from an experiential perspective, this helps break down seemingly insurmountable problems into digestible bites, with lots of notable progress.
You can use the information throughout this article and focus it within one or more of these frameworks. This can help you address root causes or spark inspiration of how to work with a problem. Listen to your intuition for where you might focus your attention:
Memories: There are moments from our past that stay with us and shape how we see things. It could be anywhere from a memory that simply reinforced your perception of how life is, to a minor personal struggle, to a highly traumatic event. A first step can be to fully acknowledge what happened, what you feel and be self compassionate. You could intend to heal memories, one at a time. This could include checking every aspect in each memory ie: what you saw, heard, smelt etc, and working through anything that contains an emotional charge. There are many moments of impact that we don’t recall. In this case, you could intend to address any memories you don’t remember, and heal all the emotional charge from them. You could also address memories according to themes or time periods eg: all the memories that are affecting my self worth, all the memories from that horrible job etc.
This can also include emotionally charged memories that have been passed down to use from our ancestors, and from other lifetimes.
You could also explore stepping into the memory, supporting your younger self, perhaps altering what happened: fighting back when you didn’t, getting the positive outcome instead of the negative one you experienced. Our understanding of time and reality is very limited.
Beliefs: You can interchange the word ‘belief’ with ‘perception’. Often, a collection of memories will result in a belief being formed. Eg: if you were continuously bullied at school, you may believe that the world isn’t safe. However, beliefs can also come from single experiences, or can be passed down to us. These are often subconscious. There’s often an architecture to our belief systems: core beliefs are the foundations, they are big, broad, strong beliefs, often from childhood such as “I’m a failure” on which we have numerous smaller beliefs which rest on that foundation, in this case an example could be “Everyone at work is better than me.” Notice how it’s more specific. On that belief there will often be even smaller, less intense, less life altering beliefs such as “I shouldn’t ask for a promotion at work because I’ll just make mistakes”. Some ways of working with this: You could intend to heal a belief that is bothering you, or you could re-write a limiting belief with a more empowering belief. You can play with the kinds of beliefs that you would like to create. “Money doesn’t grow on trees” could transform into “I always have enough money” or “money does grow on trees” or “I have all the money in the world”.
Thoughts: Most of our thoughts are automatic, we don’t choose them, they just happen. They typically come from the beliefs we have in our subconscious. Our problems are often worsened by the incessant thoughts we have about them, often telling us that things should be different, that we need things to be different in order to be OK or that there’s something wrong with the way things are. Here are some approaches to work with this: You could consider the possibility that there isn’t anything wrong with how things are now, that it’s OK to have negative thoughts, it’s OK to be where you are, if someone mistreated you it doesn’t make that right, it doesn’t mean it’s what you wanted but it doesn’t have to be ‘wrong’, it’s just the way it is, you’re still here. This can help you stop fighting with reality, stop trying to control everything, let things be, relax. From that harmony, you can still act, it’s where the action comes from that is of more importance than we realise. You could intentionally think more compassionate, encouraging and love filled thoughts. Again, you’re not fighting the automatic thoughts, you’re simply adding intentional thoughts. You could go deeper than thought with your whole being, which can help you be more whole and grounded and less swayed by surface level talk.
Parts: One part of us may want to move on from something, while another part of us feels angry about what happened and wants justice served, and another part of us feels depressed about the whole thing. By calling back the parts of us that have been pushed away, ignored, lost etc, or turning towards the parts of us that are feeling bad in some way, we can invite them to share their experience. There is a reason why they feel the way they do. They’re often trying to protect us, and have wisdom to share with us. Through loving, open communication, we can ask them what they’re struggling with, what they want and need, and see how we can help them. There might be a child part of you that is scared and wants a group of friends for support or a sword to protect him against his bullies, or a hurt part that just wants to be acknowledged. You could cultivate what is needed energetically, or explore what you can do in real life to meet that need that was never met. We can share our perspective with them, and see how we can come together. Rather than trying to push away the parts of us we deem as bad, we can integrate them and learn from all of them. In doing so we become more whole in a very nourishing and gentle way.
Entities: There are many traditions that teach about how non physical entities can attach to us, and feed off of our energy, or make us feel or act certain ways (addiction being a notable one). Other perspectives explain that anything we perceive as an ‘entity’ in reality is a manifestation of our own thoughts or the parts of us we have denied. For example, you repeatedly focus on the things that make you angry, that anger can then take on a life of its own. If you suppress a part of yourself, it will become distorted, and when it inevitably finds another way out, it will be in this distorted shape. If your experience is one of an external entity, you could work with it similar to parts work. Ask: Why is it there? What does it want? What's their story? Who are they? Is there anything for you to learn from it? What was it about you that allowed this entity to attach to you? Alternatively you could use intention or a ceremony to free yourself from any entity attachments, cutting off any ties, burning away anything that isn’t you. If you view it more as a thought form that comes from you, you might explore where those thoughts originate, what beliefs might have birthed / shaped those thoughts, intend to heal the root cause, integrate the thought into a wiser perspective etc.
Inner self: Rather than focusing on the elements that affect you, you could go straight to your being. This can be done in numerous ways:
You could simply come back to the “you” that is deep within, that is the most genuine, authentic inner self. This can help you let go of trying to control other people or experiences as they cannot touch who you truly are.
You could let the brilliance of your being shine through all the problems and begin to melt them away.
You could ask questions such as:
What is the greatest expression of my life?
What is trying to emerge in my life right now?
Who do I want to become?
What is the nature of my being?
There may be resistance to the answer, which could be fear or doubt. Those are things that you can work on. You could follow up by asking: Are there any qualities, gifts, skills, resources etc that I already possess or that I need to develop for this vision of who I am to be expressed? Is there anything that I need to let go of to be who you want to be?
Another way of thinking about this would be to ask: Who would I like to be, even if everything was taken away from me and the worst things were to happen to me? How can the wisdom of that vision begin to infuse my being?
The physical body: All of your organs and cells have their own consciousness, every part of your body is interconnected and affected by what you experience. Your mind might have reconciled a trauma, but your heart still feels pain, your stomach is still disturbed, your adrenal glands are still on high alert, the cells of your body are still living in distress and your muscles are still bracing for impact. Therefore, you could work with any organ or physical part of your body that may be affected. Feel it, listen to it, intend for healing to reach it, sooth it. What might be needed?
Energy systems: There are various energy systems that can affect the body, and can also be seen as intermediary elements ie: something bad happens > disrupts an energy system > physical symptoms. There are too many energy systems to name here, but some well-known ones you could begin exploring include: blocked or reversed meridians and chakras, weak energy fields (either of your whole body or specific organs) and trapped emotions. You could explore through your intuition or muscle testing if any of these are contributing to the problem you’re dealing with, or if working with them would help address the issue, even if they’re not the cause. Bringing balance, harmony and vitality to these energy systems can be a great way to support your overall wellbeing.
Collective: We are all connected. Sometimes the main reason we’re struggling with something is because it’s so strongly held in the collective consciousness, that simply working on yourself isn’t enough. Eg: the fear of authority. You could intend to bring healing to the collective, or see if there’s a way to find some separation from the collective.
Forgiveness: Holding onto hurt can cause issues, so can trying to override your resentments with forgiveness. Instead, you can work with all the reasons you don’t or won’t forgive. In this way forgiveness comes as a result of freeing yourself from all the chains that tied you down, not through violating your own boundaries in the name of being positive. This could include feeling the pain, imagining a conversation with the person, placing yourself in their shoes to see if from their perspective, doing something to remedy any wrongdoing on your part etc.
Fractal reality: There’s compelling evidence that we live in a fractal, holographic universe, which itself may even be a simulation or construct. That could mean that every part contains the whole. Therefore, no need to go looking for root causes. If you resolve one part, you resolve all parts. If it’s a simulation, that could mean that there is a ‘code’ you could simply re-write from a programmer perspective rather than trying to change things from a user perspective within the rules and limitations of the construct.
Sea of infinite potentials: There’s a spiritual idea that you already are everything, and quantum physics is also starting to acknowledge that everything may already exist in a sea of infinite potentials. So if you are creating something, you can view it as bringing forth something that is already there or consistently collapsing the infinite possibilities into the one reality you desire rather than creating it from nothing. This can be done by repeatedly tuning into that energy / vision. You can also consider whether there are any behaviours or elements about yourself that you would need to change in order to experience that reality.
Cycles: Often our problems happen in cycles. It may be with a different person or in a different place, but essentially, it’s the same problem repeating itself, just with a different mask. Some practitioners say that problems repeat roughly every 7 years unless we resolve them. So looking at where a common theme of this problem may have happened previously, or what happened 7 years ago, and seven years before that, can begin to unravel the issue.
A greater power: There is a power(s) that created everything. We may not know the specifics, but we can work with that power or subsets of that power in numerous ways. Depending on your cosmology, this power(s) can be God, source, divinity, love, guides, spirit, the intelligence of the universe, grace, your higher self, your soul, superconscious etc. I recommend doing genuine investigation into the nature of any external power before bending the knee to it, seeing it as superior to you or following whatever it says.
On a basic level, we can simply ask for help, imagine handing over our problems to God, pray to be shown a way through, tune into the feeling of being supported in tough times, envelop ourselves or a part of our body in love and allow love to do the healing.
Another layer is to say that the reason you have a problem is because you don’t have the bigger perspective or the love of the divine in your life. Here is a practical way to bring in that wisdom / love in a way that is lasting:
Bring the problem to mind.
Intend for a belief or message from your soul, God etc to be written into your subconscious or deep within your being, to help address this problem. You don’t have to know what the belief is. You’re essentially saying: “You up there, you see my struggle, you see the bigger picture and know what is needed to transform this for the better. Give me one drop of that wisdom / power.”
Repeat, tuning in to your current perception of the situation as it will have changed, though often in imperceptible ways from the previous round. But if you do many rounds, addressing the next layer, and the next, and the next and give it time, this can help you find a remedy in the face of problems that seem insurmountable. One of the great benefits of this approach is that you’re addressing the problem, but only momentarily focusing on it, as most of the time you are tuning in to receiving or expressing divinity.
You could also open yourself up to receive a continuous stream of wisdom / divinity / power etc rather than one belief at a time. That wisdom could also be understood as coming from within yourself rather than something outside of you. Or it could come from your future self who has lived through the experience. Explore, what works for you?
If there is a spiritual text that you are drawn to, you could sit with a passage, an idea, a quote and let the wisdom, divinity and so forth seep deep into your being where it becomes part of who you are or awakens that wisdom within you.
Part 4: The wisdom of your body
Somatic foundations
Animals in the wild can literally shake off traumatic experiences. Somatic foundations is about bringing you back into a more natural way of being where that becomes possible for you.
There is a lot of trauma within you, and your body has a natural desire to release it. When you consistently practice coming back into your body, experience the felt sense, listen and respond to what your body wants, how it wants to move, when it wants to get up or sit down etc, and practice becoming aware of your surroundings with your whole body, and how everything connects, you begin to create the space for those traumas to be released.
There are infinite ways to do this. You can practice tuning into every element in your body and the environment, as broadly or specifically as you want. Here are some examples:
Look at something in your environment, really notice it, the details, the lighting. Do this slowly and gently. Can you bring curiosity to this? How does your body respond as you do this? Listen to the sound around you. Again, in a slow, gentle way, really notice the sounds.
Hold your wrists with care. Really take time to feel them, gently move them, notice what happens as you move them millimetres at a time. If there’s any tension, can you pause and be with it rather than moving through it? That tension might be a trauma that when you listen to it, with your attention and felt sense, can organically release. Not because you forced it, but because you created an environment that facilitated your body’s natural ability to heal. What does a bigger movement feel like?
You might press down on your thighs, feel the muscles, then the bone. You might place your attention on your lungs, feel what it’s like to breathe (not forcing it to be deep, just getting in touch with what is going on). You can place your awareness on different organs, maybe placing your hands over them, applying some pressure if you want. You’re working with all the physical aspects of your body: skeletal, muscular, joints, organs, fascia etc.
As you do this, at some point, you may feel energy moving within, you may feel an inner wisdom / desire such as moving your legs in a running motion. The running motion may be a way for your body to move through a trauma when you wanted to run away but couldn’t. That desire to run has been stored within. Now you are allowing your body to complete what it couldn’t before, setting it and you free. The same could be said for punching, pushing, stretching, turning etc.
While a lot of transformation can occur by just experiencing the energy, connecting with how we move, behave, interact with others and our environment is also part of this work. We don’t live in a vacuum, we live in a universe where everything is connected. So feeling how you sit, how you walk, how you are around others etc and exploring your posture, ways of behaving and working with that can be important.
Acupressure points
You can bring something distressing to mind whilst stimulating acupressure points, which essentially allows that distress to be processed.
Here are two methods that use acupressure points in this way:
One of the great benefits of these, is that because it’s based on a physical action, you can begin to process stuff even if you can’t think straight in the moment. These techniques can also surface emotions and root causes that you may not have thought were there.
Sometimes emotions get trapped in the body as balls of energy. This can cause all kinds of disruptions in your body and life. If you intuit that you have a trapped emotion or use something like muscle testing to verify, you can run your fingers from the middle of your forehead to the back of your head (which is a meridian pathway). Doing so several times with intention can release that trapped emotion. If you do it with a magnet, that can amplify the effect.
Whole brain
When your arms and/or legs cross the midline of your body, it often facilitates both hemispheres of your brain working together. This can be used to process distress and / or create subconscious beliefs.
The most common whole brain posture is where you cross your ankles, cross your wrists, rotate your thumbs down so that your palms are facing each other, and interlace your fingers. From here you can also rotate your hands in and up towards your body if that’s more comfortable.
Another way is to slowly march on the spot, alternately touching one hand or elbow to the opposite knee. A variation of this is to sit down and alternately touch one hand to the opposite knee, in this case your legs can remain still.
You can also trace a big infinite sign in front of your body with your hands separately and or clasped together.
Whichever method you use, you can physically do it while repeatedly stating a belief that you would like to have, such as “I love and accept myself” until it feels complete. If other thoughts or emotions come up as you do this, you can invite them in, allow them to be present, and notice any transformation as this process often integrates them. You can finish it off by intending to lock in the belief.
You can also focus on something distressing while doing something that creates a whole brain state, and that will help process the distress.
Healing hands
With intention and practice, energy can be channeled through the palm of our hands.
You can place the palms of your hands on any part of your body that doesn’t feel good and allow that energy to flow through.
You could imagine holding an experience, your inner child, a thought etc in your hands like you might hold a small bird to prevent it from flying away, and send it love through your hands. This is particularly useful if the emotional intensity is very high, because it allows you to bring healing to something without needing to directly experience it yourself in that moment.
Part 5: Closing thoughts
The essence of the essence is as follows: go within, listen, and respond with wisdom and creativity.
Everything is already within you. On an intuitive level, you already know all of this. Experiment and explore.
Don’t let anyone convince you that you need their special method. It may be useful, and if you feel genuinely called to learn from others I encourage you to do so, but too often we give our power away to others, we fear that we won’t be well without their teaching, when it is already within us.
I'm still learning, don't take anything I say to be true just because I say it. How you do inner work will likely evolve the more you do it. In my experience, different things work at different times for different people. Medicine given to the wrong person or for a different condition is poison.
Your inner wisdom may tell you at times to not heal anything in that moment. I invite you to honour that. The more you practice, the more you’ll be able to fine tune, make your own discoveries and find how you can transform with less and less effort, allowing the process to be more and more natural. It can become less about ‘doing’ and more about a way of being that is healing and wise.
“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
T.S. Eliot
Have questions?
If something in this article doesn’t make sense or you want to understand something better, you are more than welcome to contact me. Either leave a comment or send me an email. If you’re confused by something, it is very likely that others are too.
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