This is the second of a 4-part series called, Clear Your Blocks to Healing.
The purpose of this series is to help you find the blocks and limiting patterns that are standing in the way of your progress. The exercises will also stop the unnecessary suffering caused by discouraging beliefs.
Part 1: Clear Your Blocks To Healing: Judgment, Self-Criticism, and “Shoulds”
Part 2: Clear Your Blocks To Healing: Feelng Worse, Symptoms Flare-Up and Cravings
Part 3: Clear Your Blocks To Healing: Adaptations, Patterns of Coping That Don’t Serve You
Part 4: Clear Your Blocks to Healing: Victimhood & Fear
Staying committed to healing and realizing who you are and what you truly want isn’t easy. There will be times when you question whether you are actually making progress. And if you don’t see progress, you’ll doubt if you are on the right track.
You might even start to wonder if all of this is a waste of time.
The fact is, everyone who is dedicated to working on themselves, you will experience blocks at different points in your healing journey.
As you heal, each step brings you closer to your true self – and it can also reveal blocks and limiting patterns that were put in place to protect you.
This is actually a good sign! It shows that you are making real progress, and your awareness means the block is ready to be cleared!
You may do some great healing work, take a necessary and important step, and believe you have healed an issue completely. But some time later, you may find yourself re-experiencing the issue, feel like a failure, or become hopeless. Both the belief that “I am done” and “I am a failure” add unnecessary suffering to your healing process.
Understanding that healing includes times of apparent setbacks, and knowing how to handle them, lets you enjoy your progress with realistic expectations about the process.
This 4-part series will provide you with journaling exercises to help you find the blocks and limiting patterns that are standing in the way of your progress. The exercises will also stop the unnecessary suffering caused by discouraging beliefs.
These are actual blocks I’ve seen and heard from most clients as they go through the Core Emotional Healing process. While they appear as resistance to the work as it is occuring in the moment, some are also a part of long-term patterns or wounds, and clearing them can require deeper healing.
For example, the belief, “I can’t do this,” may rest in deeper feelings of disempowerment, shame, or feeling undeserving that came from early family conditioning.
So, while I include specific suggestions on how to move through your blocks so you feel supported and empowered, there are also “Deeper Exercises,” that you can try on your own. If you remain stuck, you may need additional support and guidance to heal on a deeper level, which can be found in the additional programs my husband, Doug Miller, PhD, and I offer.
I recommend that you use a dedicated journal to work through all of the exercises. You can come back to them over and over again whenever you need to and reference what you’ve done to celebrate your progress.
When I was 30 years old I left my abusive husband. It was a powerful decision that cleared the way for depression that I had been numbing and distracting my entire life to come up in full force.
That was my awakening to discover what was causing me to choose men who weren’t good for me. I immersed myself in experiential therapy workshops that addressed the subconscious and emotional root cause.
Once I got in touch with my repressed emotions, I was feeling my pain for the first time and I was an emotional wreck. For a year after, I was also using everything I could to numb it out – I’d stay up till 3am drinking wine while taking adderall so I could work day and night, because nobody taught me how to stay present with my strong emotions and triggers.
Even 5 years later, after accessing more repressed anger with the help of an emotion oriented therapist, I went into deeper layers of pain and triggers from my family. My bulimia flared up and I went into a dark depression.
This long-lasting suffering is one of the reasons that I created the CEH Self Study: So you don’t stay stuck in suffering like I was, and you have the lessons and support you need to work through your emotional triggers.
As you go through the Core Emotional Healing Process, you won’t feel better right away. You will be feeling more, which is so much better than being disconnected from your feelings and needs.
Some periods of confusion are a natural result of change and growth. Instead of fearing it, accept and allow it as part of the process. During healing, there will be times when the old way breaks down before the new one emerges.
In addition to all of the lessons in the CEH Self Study, Part 2 of this series will help you embrace and take care of your feelings, and release your judgment of your feelings and of your process.
EXERCISES
Keep in mind, it’s not the exact words that are important, as these are just examples to help you become aware of how you may be thinking similar things, so consider your own experience and words that each example may evoke. The more open self-inquiry that you put in, the more you will benefit.
Feeling Worse, Symptoms Flare-Up and Cravings
I feel worse and think it’s not working:
- Think of emotional healing like cleaning out a closet – it gets messier before it gets better, and say to yourself, “Feeling worse for some period of time is part of the process and actually means I’m making progress.”
- Know that healing comes in layers – you are peeling the onion.
- Focus on living in the moment, accepting and loving what is. Allow yourself to be tired, sad, grumpy and confused. You are okay.
I feel strong emotional triggers, craving and symptoms flare-up and/or I am checking out, leaving my body and wanting to distract and numb out:
- Be grateful – these are healing opportunities!
- Take long deep breaths into your body.
- Go for a walk, do yoga, and/or take an Epsom salt bath.
- Deeper Exercises: Watch Lesson Four in the CEH Self Study. Journal and answer: “How do I feel? Why? When did I first feel this way?”
- Feel your emotions, express your anger and grieve.
- Be with your inner child and help them to feel safe, loved and accepted.
- Reach out to us for insight, support and guidance.
I feel stuck in my sadness and depression:
- If you experience depression for more than two weeks or are having suicidal thoughts, seek professional help.
- Feed your soul; do what you love.
- Journal and answer, “What brings me joy?” and then do it!
- Deeper Exercise: Release anger and grief when you are alone by journaling about what hurt you, scream it out, bash your pillow, cry, and hug your stuffed animal to comfort yourself and inner child.
- Reach out to us for insight, support and guidance.
I feel confused, it feels like everything is falling apart:
- Confusion is often a natural result of change and growth. Instead of fearing it, accept and allow it as part of the process.
- During healing, there will be times, brief or lasting even months, when the old way (and relationships) breaks down, before the new one emerges. Our rational minds, and even sense of security, often only rest in certainty.
- With deep healing, aspects of your identity changes, along with how you relate to even those to whom you are closest. This is naturally confusing, unnerving and can be scary. Allowing this confusion, and these feelings, that arise during healing frees you from your previous limitations and suffering.
I feel anxious and overwhelmed:
- Ask yourself and write in your journal, “What am I worried about? What do I need to do? What can I do?” Then, take action.
- Consciously complain, say out loud what you are worried/stress about to hear your own answers and insights about it.
- Breathe in lavender oil.
- Tap or rub your thymus [at the top of your chest bones].
- Imagine a grounding cord going into the earth for your anxiety to be transmuted.
- Practice vocal toning.
I am feeling overwhelmed and ungrounded:
- Disconnect from others, cut cords, return to sender, and refresh your energy from source.
- Take an Epsom salt bath.
- Carry a black tourmaline stone.
- Use sage/purification or vetiver essential oil.
- Walk outside barefoot, release stress, excess and other people’s energy into the ground.
- Breathe deep, do yoga, do a grounding meditation, drink a lot of water.
- Write down all of your thoughts in your journal.
I feel afraid of food from past reactions and allergies:
- Reintroduce food without fear.
- Eat healthy and nourishing foods, trust your body to tell you what it wants and doesn’t want, know that this may change as you do.
- Release food rules and forget about everything you’ve read and been told.
- Eat what feels good to you.
- Trust yourself.
- Deeper Exercise: Food reacts to suppressed emotions and fear, and if you can’t determine what these are yourself, reach out to us for more insight.
I am judging my emotions or I am afraid of feeling and losing control:
- Accept and allow. Honor how you feel more than being in control.
- Know that all emotions are healthy and valuable.
- Learn the purpose of your emotions in Lesson Three of the CEH Self Study.
- Deeper Exercise: Breathe deep into your body, put your hands on any tension you feel in your body and ask your emotion(s) what they need from you.
I would love to hear how this goes for you, and if you have any questions.
If you feel that you need more support, learn more about the CEH Self Study here.
Sending you so much love,
Elicia