THE BLOG

I was asked once by a mentor.... what is it to SURRENDER.....

I was asked the same question back to back to back, many times...... inviting Me deeper and deeper into my answer, into my truth, into my embodied knowing of what surrender means to Me.

This practice of being asked the same question over and over, each time going deeper, stripping away the surface level responses, the intellectual understanding, and dropping into the felt sense, the visceral truth of what surrender actually is.

Surrender isn't giving up. It's not waving the white flag in defeat. It's not collapsing into helplessness or resignation.

Surrender is the most powerful thing you can do. It's the moment you stop fighting against what is. It's the breath you take when you realize that holding on so tight is actually causing more pain than letting go ever could.

Surrender is trust. Deep, cellular trust that you are held, that you are guided, that even when you can't see the path forward, the path is there. Surrender is faith in something bigger than your small self's need to control every outcome.

It's the release of the grip you've had on how things "should" be, how you "should" be, how life "should" look. It's opening your hands and your heart to receive what is actually here for you, rather than forcing what you think you need.

Surrender is an embodied practice. It's not just a mental concept or a pretty idea. It's a felt experience in your body. It's the softening of the shoulders, the release of the jaw, the deepening of the breath.

When we surrender, we create space. Space for miracles. Space for magic. Space for life to move through us in ways we could never have imagined or orchestrated with our limited human minds.

This is the sacred work. The essential work. Surrendering to the wisdom of your body, to the guidance of your soul, to the flow of life itself.

I created a small offering for You recently called 10 STEPS TO SOMATIC SELF HEALING

I hesitated with creating an offering that had TEN STEPS.

I know that for "sales" you want something quick, digestible, easy. "5 steps to..." "3 ways to..." The shorter, the better, right?

But here's the thing... healing isn't a shortcut. Embodiment isn't a hack. And somatic work? It requires you to actually slow down and feel.

We live in a culture that glorifies speed. Fast results. Quick fixes. Bypass the hard stuff and get to the good part. But what if the hard stuff IS the good part? What if the discomfort you're trying to skip over is exactly where your healing lives?

Spiritual bypassing has become an epidemic. We use affirmations to paste over pain. We use meditation to escape rather than to be present. We use "positive vibes only" as a weapon against our own humanity.

True healing happens in the body. Not in the mind. Your mind can understand something intellectually all day long, but until it moves through your nervous system, until it's processed somatically, it's just information floating around creating more mental loops.

Breathwork brings us back into the body. It gets us out of the story and into the sensation. It moves energy that's been stuck, sometimes for decades. It allows emotions to complete their cycle rather than being interrupted and stored as tension, pain, disease.

When you bypass your emotions, when you spiritually bypass your human experience, you bypass your whole life. You miss the richness, the depth, the full spectrum of what it means to be alive.

So yes, it's 10 steps. Because real healing takes time. It takes presence. It takes commitment. And it's worth every single moment.

This has been a conversation in my circle and with clients lately.....and it lands REALLY hard for Me.... which usually means it's time to talk about it.... with more people.... and YOU are more people.

We live in an age of information overload. Everyone is consuming content. Reading books. Taking courses. Attending workshops. Learning, learning, learning.

But are you actually CHANGING anything?

Knowledge without application is just entertainment. It's spiritual consumerism. It's collecting tools and never using them to build anything.

I see this all the time. People who've read every self-help book, who can quote every spiritual teacher, who know all the concepts... but their life looks exactly the same. They're still stuck in the same patterns, the same relationships, the same struggles.

Why? Because they're not willing to do anything different. They're not willing to actually embody what they've learned. To integrate it. To let it change them.

Learning is the easy part. Embodiment is the work. Integration is where transformation happens.

You can do all the plant medicine ceremonies in the world, but if you come home and fall right back into your old patterns, what was the point? You can have the most profound breathwork experience, but if you don't take that wisdom and actually apply it to your daily life, it was just a nice moment.

Real transformation requires you to do things differently. To make different choices. To show up differently in your relationships, your work, your life.

It's uncomfortable. It's vulnerable. It requires you to step outside of what's familiar and safe.

But that's where the magic is. That's where you actually become the person you're learning to be.

So ask yourself: What am I learning right now? And more importantly, what am I actually doing differently because of it?

I feel like I've shared this story a thousand times, but my very best friend recently told me she had never heard it and that she thinks everyone needs to hear my story..... so here I am.

I walked into my first breathwork session not knowing what to expect. I'd heard about it, was curious, but honestly had no idea what I was getting myself into.

The facilitator explained the breath pattern - a simple connected breath, inhaling and exhaling through the mouth with no pause between breaths. It seemed almost too simple to do anything significant.

But then we started breathing.

Within 10 minutes, my hands started tingling. Then my face. My body started to feel electric, alive in a way I'd never experienced before. And then the emotions came.

Waves of grief. Anger. Joy. Fear. All moving through me, no longer stuck in the corners of my body where I'd been storing them for years, maybe decades.

I cried. I laughed. I made sounds I didn't know existed in me. My body moved in ways I couldn't have choreographed if I tried. It was like my system was releasing everything I'd been holding onto.

And at the end, in that final stillness, I felt more spacious, more clear, more ME than I had in as long as I could remember.

That session changed the trajectory of my life. It showed me that healing doesn't have to take years of talk therapy. That our bodies hold wisdom we can't access through the mind alone. That we have the capacity to move through and release what's been holding us back.

Breathwork became my path. My practice. My medicine. And eventually, my calling - to hold space for others to experience this same profound transformation.

Because if it could change my life this dramatically, imagine what's possible for you.

I had never spent that kind of money on Myself... not in one payment at least.

I had grown up with the story that "that's too expensive" "we can't afford that"...

These were the mantras of my childhood. The unconscious programming that kept me playing small, that kept me believing that investing in myself was selfish, indulgent, unnecessary.

But here's what I've learned: There's a massive difference between an expense and an investment.

An expense is something you spend money on that doesn't give you a return. An investment is something that comes back to you multiplied.

When I made my first big investment in myself - a coaching program, a training, a transformational experience - I was terrified. The amount felt huge. My old stories were screaming at me. "You can't afford this." "This is irresponsible." "Who do you think you are?"

But something deeper in me knew it was time. Knew that I couldn't keep living the same life, having the same results, being the same version of myself and expect anything to change.

So I said yes. I invested. And everything changed.

Not just because of what I learned, but because of who I became in the process of saying yes to myself. Because of the belief I developed in my own worthiness. Because of the standard I set for how I would show up for my own life moving forward.

That investment has come back to me thousands of times over. Not just financially, though that too. But in the quality of my life. The depth of my relationships. The expansion of what I know is possible for me.

Your greatest investment will always be in yourself. In your healing. In your growth. In becoming who you're meant to be.

It's not an expense. It's how you change your entire life.

These words, this beautiful compliment and acknowledgement has been shared with Me, a lot lately actually.

Old me would quickly brush off a compliment and immediately out of panic and the uncomfortability of being seen, would share all the ways I'm actually not calm, not blissful, how I'm struggling, how I'm a mess.

But that's not the truth. And it's certainly not honoring the person who's offering me this reflection.

The truth is, yes, I am calm. I am blissful. Most of the time. Not because my life is perfect or because I don't have challenges or hard days. But because I've done the work to create that internal state regardless of external circumstances.

This is the gift of somatic healing. Of breathwork. Of embodiment practices. Of doing your inner work consistently.

You develop a capacity to meet life differently. You develop a nervous system that can stay regulated even when things are chaotic. You develop a relationship with yourself that's so solid, so grounded, that external circumstances don't throw you off center the way they used to.

Calm isn't the absence of stress. Bliss isn't the absence of pain. They're states of being that you cultivate through practice, through presence, through choosing to come back to your center again and again.

So when someone offers you a compliment, receive it. Let it land. Let yourself be seen in your growth, in your transformation, in the work you've done to become who you are.

Because you deserve to acknowledge how far you've come.

We can talk about our struggles, our demons, our anxieties ..... all we want.
But if we don't MOVE THEM OUT .... they stay

THIS IS SOMATIC HEALING

SOMA - of the body- the whole body, not just the physical but the emotional, energetic, spiritual body.

For too long, we've been taught that healing happens in the mind. That if we can just understand why we are the way we are, if we can just think differently, we'll be healed.

But that's not how it works. Because trauma doesn't live in your mind. It lives in your body.

Your body is where you store every unprocessed emotion, every unexpressed feeling, every moment you had to shut down to survive. Your body is the filing cabinet of your entire life experience.

And you can't think your way out of what's stored in your tissues.

Somatic healing is about getting into the body. Feeling what's there. Moving what's stuck. Allowing what's been frozen to thaw and flow and finally release.

This is why breathwork is so powerful. Because breath is the bridge between the conscious and unconscious, between the mind and body, between what you know and what your system knows.

When you breathe consciously, when you give your body permission to feel and express and release, magic happens. Old patterns dissolve. Stuck energy moves. Space opens up for something new.

We all need somatic healing because we all have bodies. And we all have bodies that have been through things. That carry stories. That hold tension and pain and unprocessed emotion.

The question isn't whether you need it. The question is: Are you willing to feel it? To move through it? To finally let it go?

I sit on the edge of loving and appreciating the "Self Help" world and of pointing the finger of blame at it.....

Interesting .... when you point a finger.... there are 3 fingers pointing back at you...

Because I am part of this world. I offer healing. I offer transformation. I offer support for people who want to change their lives.

But here's where it gets tricky: The entire self-help industry is built on the premise that you're broken. That you need fixing. That you're not enough as you are.

And I'm here to tell you that's bullshit.

You are not broken. You never were. You don't need to be fixed.

What you need is to remember who you are underneath all the conditioning, the trauma, the stories you've been told about yourself.

Healing isn't about becoming someone new. It's about returning to who you've always been. It's about shedding the layers that aren't you. It's about coming home to yourself.

Yes, you have work to do. Yes, you have patterns to break and wounds to heal. But that doesn't make you broken. That makes you human.

The work isn't to fix yourself. The work is to love yourself so deeply, so completely, that everything that isn't love falls away.

The work is to meet yourself with such compassion, such tenderness, that you can finally stop fighting yourself and start flowing with yourself.

You are whole. You are complete. You are enough. Exactly as you are, right now, in this moment.

And the journey of healing is simply remembering that truth.

My wish for you is that you get to feel the expansion....

.... the deep visceral knowing ... that your path is clear, that you have the strength, that you are never alone, that it wasn't your fault, that you are worthy, that you are loved.

My wish for you is that you experience a breath so deep, so full, so nourishing that it reaches parts of you that have been starving for air, for life, for permission to exist.

My wish is that you feel safe enough in your own body to finally let down your guard, to soften your armor, to allow the tears that have been waiting years to fall.

My wish is that you discover the power that lives in your voice, in your truth, in your ability to say yes to what lights you up and no to what dims your light.

My wish is that you experience forgiveness - of yourself, of others, of life itself for all the ways it didn't go the way you planned.

My wish is that you know joy. Real joy. The kind that bubbles up from your belly and spills out in laughter you can't control. The kind that reminds you that you're alive and that life is beautiful even in its messiness.

My wish is that you trust yourself. That you listen to the whispers of your intuition. That you honor the wisdom of your body. That you follow the path that's calling you, even when it doesn't make sense to anyone else.

My wish for you is freedom. Complete, total, embodied freedom.

And I know this is possible because I've experienced it. And I've witnessed it in countless others.

This is what's available on the other side of the work. This is what's waiting for you.

We were in our closing circle of light in a Blissology yoga class this week,

If you don't know what I am talking about let me explain.

Eoin Finn, creator of Blissology yoga, and one of my greatest teachers, ends each class with a practice called the "circle of light." Everyone lies in savasana (final resting pose) in a circle, feet toward the center, and he guides us through a visualization of releasing what we no longer need and calling in what we wish to cultivate.

This particular class, the word that kept coming up for me was RELEASE.

Release. Let go. Surrender. Allow.

How much energy are you spending holding on? Gripping? Controlling? Trying to keep everything together?

And what would happen if you just... let go?

There's a sweetness in release. A softness. A relief that comes when you finally stop carrying what was never yours to carry in the first place.

Release the story about how your life should look. Release the expectations - yours and everyone else's. Release the need to have it all figured out.

Release the relationships that are no longer aligned. Release the version of yourself you've been trying to be for everyone else. Release the pain you've been holding onto because you think it defines you.

What if you released the belief that struggle is necessary? That suffering makes you stronger? That you have to earn your worthiness?

What if you just... let go?

This is the practice. This is the work. Not adding more, but releasing what's in the way.

Your breath is the vehicle. Each exhale is an opportunity to let go. To release. To create space for something new.

Sweet, sweet release.

As I complete a 3 day workshop titled Understanding Grief I am both weeping and laughing... I am dancing and folded over in fully embodied "I just can't" vibes....

I registered for this workshop months ago, not knowing that by the time it arrived, I would be in the thick of my own grief process. Loss has a way of showing up uninvited, doesn't it?

Here's what I've learned: Grief and love are two sides of the same coin. You can't have one without the other.

We only grieve what we love. We only feel the depth of loss because we felt the depth of connection. The pain of absence is directly proportional to the beauty of presence.

And somehow, we're supposed to hold both. The love and the loss. The gratitude and the grief. The memories that make us smile and the ones that bring us to our knees.

This is the tight squeeze. The hand hold of grief and love. They don't let go of each other, and they don't let go of us.

I've learned that grief isn't linear. It's not something you "get over" or "move through" in neat stages. It's a spiral. You think you're done, you think you've processed it, and then a smell, a song, a random Tuesday morning brings it all back.

And that's okay. That's normal. That's love continuing to express itself through loss.

I've learned that you can't think your way through grief. You have to feel it. In your body. In your bones. In your breath.

You have to let it move through you - the sadness, the anger, the regret, the longing. All of it. Because when you try to bypass it, when you try to be "strong" or "positive," it just gets stuck. And stuck grief becomes depression, anxiety, illness.

So I'm letting myself feel it all. The full catastrophe of being human. Of loving deeply. Of losing what we love.

And in the feeling, in the allowing, there's a strange kind of peace. A surrender to what is. An acceptance that this is part of the deal of being alive.

The hand hold of grief and love is tight. But it's also sacred. It's also beautiful. It's also the evidence of a life fully lived.

INSANITY / INSANE ; repeating the same behaviours and patterns and expecting a different result / outcome.

I know you've been there.... maybe you're there right now

Stuck in the cycle...

Same relationship dynamics, different person. Same self-sabotaging behaviors, different goal. Same emotional reactions, different trigger.

We all do it. We get caught in loops. Patterns that were created long ago, usually in childhood, as survival mechanisms. And they worked then. They protected us. They helped us get through.

But now? Now they're keeping us stuck.

The pattern that once protected you is now the prison that confines you.

And here's the thing about patterns - you can't think your way out of them. You can see them. You can understand them. You can analyze them to death. But until you interrupt them at the somatic level, until you create a new experience in your body, they'll keep running.

This is why awareness alone isn't enough. This is why understanding your childhood trauma doesn't automatically heal it.

You have to do something different. You have to feel something different. You have to create new neural pathways, new somatic experiences, new embodied knowing.

Change happens in the body. Not in the mind.

So if you're stuck in a pattern, if you're repeating the same behaviors and wondering why nothing's changing, ask yourself:

What am I willing to do differently? Not just think differently. Not just want differently. But actually DO differently?

Because that's where the transformation lives. In the doing. In the embodying. In the courageous act of choosing something new even when every cell in your body is screaming to fall back into what's familiar.

Break the pattern. Choose differently. Your future self will thank you.