I Want More, But Do I Have To Change?

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves”

 -Victor Frankl

                                                                                   

The month of June overall, is a beautiful month. It is easy to feel good when all is beautiful, the sun is shining, and the flowers are in full bloom. Ah, life. It can be easy to have high or spiritual thoughts, but not so easy to implement them or to live them.

How many of us have wished things could be better or different, but really don’t want to do what we need to do to change? It is a bit of magical thinking to want change and even expect change without doing something to initiate change.

The change I am talking about is from within. Change from within does instigate change outside of us. Most of the people I see come to me because they want something or they are unhappy with something. This unhappiness could be with their physical health in some way, or even something emotional like feeling depressed, melancholy, stuck, afraid, wishing for better relationships, and so on. For example, when we talk about changes they can make, with their physical health such as changing their diet or adding supplementation it can be very difficult for them.

I have a client who suffers from intermittent pain, discomfort in her back and with her digestion. She knows that much of this is emotional for her and yet can’t seem to do anything differently. Her mother is mentally ill and has been throughout her life. Much of her early life was spent with her father as caretaker and her grandmother. She experienced her grandmother as mean, while her father would take off for periods of time to work and also probably to get away from his troubled wife and family. This woman today is grown, has a full time job with lots of responsibility, and has great trouble taking care of herself. When her boss requires lots of extra time, it is hard for my client to say no. When I might recommend an herb or supplement to aid her digestion, she wants to use it consciously, but she forgets to go purchase the herb, or forgets to take it. She wants to feel well and to make changes for herself, and yet, in many ways, she is unable to.

We are just beginning to look, together, at the impact of having a difficult mother, and being able to digest how hard it was for her, especially when she was little. We are looking at and feeling the power of the generations of women who suffered, and how it is so difficult for her to feel well and not suffer when they did. We are looking at the impact of having to take in such abuse from her mother and grandmother and yet needing them and yearning for them at the very same time. How can she love them, at a safe distance, and still have them available for her in her heart while not taking in their suffering and poison? When she was little, that was extremely difficult to do. Now as a grown woman she can safely begin to take steps of inward change to live a life with the ability to digest feelings, take care of herself, and attract positions and careers where her health and well being is a consideration.

All of us have trouble with change. We know we need to do something differently to have a different result. Yet we can be stuck in unconscious feelings, traumas and desires, which keep us from moving forward. Moving forward is important. Often we do need someone to witness, be present, and hold our hands as we step through the past’s quicksand without getting mired in it. Holding new images of ourselves, different images of those who helped shape us, feeling the new truths inside of us, seeing what is possible and how things are possible gives us the path. We need to walk the path. Only by doing so can we change and live full, happy and vital lives.

Recommended Resources:

Body Presencing is a resource I recommend when any of us are struggling with something that makes us unhappy and makes us suffer in some way. Body Presencing is a system of working, which combines images, experiences, new feelings and understandings to help propel us forward in our lives. I work with the individual through the use of hands on chiropractic techniques to help diagnose and address the root of the problem, the tools of Family Constellation work to understand the language of the body and brain development, which helps the brain change from trauma to help them grow, change and live whole, vital and full lives.

Go to my website, www.bodypresencing.com, to read more about this work and how it can help you. Click on the ‘What’s New’ tab to read what new workshops or classes I am leading. Also, a new tool I now have on my website is the Body Presencing Hologram. It is an interactive hologram where you can have a mini experience of what is possible.