Tag Archives: Self-care

Calm for the Holidays

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Part of this post appeared originally on Askgrandmothercottonwood.com, my channeled blog, on December 18, 2018.

Dear readers, please take some time out during this holiday season to rest, relax, and take loving care of yourself.

 In this season, there is so much busyness that can fuel anxiety and stress– rushing, doing, trying to beat the clock, meet the deadline, make the holiday celebration perfect, trying to please one and all, beat the crowds, put on a magnificent feast.

You run yourself ragged and you wear yourself down! You override your body’s natural rhythms and needs, pushing yourself over the limit of endurance. Another word for this is “stress”.

Can you pull back, breathe, regroup, rethink, and slow down? 

An Easy Calming Exercise…

Take a few moments to Find your center of gravity. It might be your heart, your upper abdomen, lower belly, or at the base of your spine near the tailbone. Feel your inner power and balance here, your connection to the earth. Now Bring your awareness to your heart and breath. Breathe deeply for a few minutes as you hold both palms over your heart. This will help calm you naturally. You can also add toning or humming on each out-breath. Find a pitch that resonates in your heart. This feels good and adds to the calming effect.

Tune into your innate wisdom. What is most important to you this year as you celebrate your holiday?  What can you let go of? For your health and sanity, let go of the elaborate expectations and preparations that you do not enjoy! Let go of extra events and “must-dos” you have to squeeze into your busy schedule.

If others expect things you do not want to deliver, let them do the work, take the time, make the effort.

What activities will satisfy your soul and connect you with love to family and friends without leaving you overwhelmed and depleted?

Do those things! They can be free, simple, and easy!  Play a board game, sing songs, read a book together. Go for a walk, have a heart to heart conversation.

If the holiday stress gets to be too much, please consider scheduling a healing session (distance or in-person) with me to help bring yourself back into a calmer state of body mind and spirit.

Remember the real heart of the season; gathering with those you love and enjoying each other, greeting the sun, celebrating the rituals of your chosen religion, and creating light, love and warmth together.

For Empaths During the Pandemic

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If you are an empath – sensitive to the feelings vibrations and emotions of others- you may be experiencing a great weight of anxiety stress and fear from the world’s population during the coronavirus pandemic

It may feel like low level rumblings, crushing anxiety or huge fatigue. However you experience the collective angst of many millions, it is important for you to recognize and release what is not yours so you can take care of yourself.

First, ground yourself by walking barefoot on the Earth or rubbing the soles of your feet with a stainless steel spoon. Rub your hands together to build up energy, then make figure eights throughout your energy field, close to the body, off the body, larger, smaller, tiny, in all directions. This will strengthen your aura, the protective energy field around you.

Now ask that any emotions feelings and thoughts (all energy) that belong to others drain through your feet into the earth for recycling. (The soles of your feet have chakras that can take on or release energy, but that is a topic for another post.) Do this as needed throughout the day.

It is enough to take care of yourself and your families, to manage your own life, your own situation as best you can. It is not your responsibility to feel the emotions of others, to take on their fears and emotional burdens. It will not help them learn to be emotionally healthy, and it will distract you from your life and add stress and anxiety where it is not needed.

Yes, as human beings, we must have empathy for the plight of others. Caring and kindness define what it means to be human. So do what you can to help others within the constraints of your energy level, your financial means, your emotional limits and personal boundaries, your level of health and vitality, your time.

Most of all, take the best care of yourself you can. Live simply and remember the basics: healthy food, plenty of water, enough sleep, fresh air, exercise, connections with others in safe and healthy ways during this pandemic.

Be safe, we will get through this!

Dear friends, I am offering distance healing sessions during the pandemic and financial downturn on a sliding fee scale that you select, based on your ability to pay. Please contact me here for more information.

Are You An Empath? 3 Self-care tips

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You are probably an empath if…

…you absorb the and take on the feelings and emotions or physical symptoms of others, making it hard to tell what’s yours and what’s theirs.

…you feel drained and/or anxious in big box stores, noisy crowds, hospitals, libraries, etc.

…you get sick or exhausted, depleted, anxious or angry after encountering certain people.

One beautiful summer afternoon I sat on my front porch reading. A delivery truck pulled into my driveway near where I was sitting. Immediately my body was flooded with high anxiety!

As I tried to make sense of this sudden shift in my emotional state, My logical brain decided the anxiety could be explained because I didn’t know the truck or the driver, hadn’t ordered any services or furniture… It was an unexpected intrusion into my peaceful day. Then the driver got out of the van, took a bouquet of flowers to my neighbor’s house and drove away.

The anxiety stayed with me even after the van left. After a few minutes of this, I decided to do some discernment and energy testing. I stood up, tuned into my body and stated “This anxiety is mine.” My body responded by falling toward the back, which in self energy-testing terms is a “no”. Now the anxiety made sense. As an empath, I’d picked up the high anxiety of the van driver.

Now that I knew the anxiety wasn’t mine, I asked this energy to drain through my feet into the earth for recycling. I had no more need to feel this feeling. It was detracting and distracting from my peaceful day. Draining the energy away works when you are well grounded, in other words, plugged into Earth energy.

This method of clearing yourself works because emotions and feelings are composed of energy. Each of us holds our thoughts feelings and emotions in our auras, otherwise known as energy fields. The stronger and more charged the emotion of another person, the easier it is for a nearby empath to pick it up. Our auras also seem to be more porous than the energy fields of non-empaths, allowing in energies others would easily filter out.

As a life- long empath I’ve learned some easy ways to keep myself clear of the moods, emotions, feelings, and energies of others that I have not specifically invited in. Here are 3 of the most helpful techniques I use daily.

Three ways to keep yourself clear as an empath.

1. Stay grounded

Two easy ways to get grounded are rubbing the soles of your bare feet with a stainless steel spoon, and walking barefoot on the Earth. When you feel agitated or nervous, when you can’t settle, ground yourself. Getting grounded allows you to plug into your power source, Earth energy, and pull this energy into your body.

Think of an electric lamp. If the lamp is not plugged in, it can’t light up, no matter what you do. When you are plugged in, your energy is more coherent, you feel anchored to the earth in a healthy way, and you can discharge excess energy through your feet.

2. Strengthen your aura

An easy way to keep your aura strong and less porous is to make figure 8 patterns with your hands, fingers, arms, body. First rub your palms together for a few seconds. Now, make the eights tiny, make them huge, on or off the body, in your aura, up and down, sideways, diagonally. Let your hands go to areas that need extra attention. (This technique is from Donna Eden)

Have fun with this! Kids love it! Think of this exercise as reweaving or sewing your loosely woven aura together again with the electromagnetic energy of your hands. This will help your aura filter out the energy of others and draw in the energies of health, well being, and harmony. Figure eights are also very calming!

3. Set boundaries with other people, your life energy, your time.

You may need to set boundaries and withdraw from large events, big crowds, or stay away from certain people. You may not want to hug Grandma or a church acquaintance. It may be in your best interest to stay home from a big family holiday or reunion and wait for a time you can meet your favorite relatives one on one.

Trust your intuition and give yourself what you need. Taking care of yourself as an empath is vital! Please don’t judge yourself for needing to set boundaries in ways others might not understand. Be kind and loving to yourself and tell others no when that is in your best interest.

If you do not take care of your needs, you may get resentful, energetically depleted and perhaps even sick. Take ownership of your life and your energy so you can focus on your own projects, your own life without getting sidetracked by the strong emotions of family and random people.

Gifts of empaths

We empaths can bring great sensitivity and caring into a world that needs our gifts. We are often the healers, therapists, clergy, the spiritual advisors, teachers, the plant and animal whisperers, the artists in our communities.

Tune into your purpose as an empath. Take care of yourself. Own and honor your gifts! Share them when you are ready. You are needed here!

It is not easy to go through life as an empath! But it is possible to live your life in a manner that will truly honor your gifts, your needs for boundaries so your life experience is truly your own!

Dear Friends, I offer a two hour Self care for Empaths and Sensitive People class several times a year. Contact me here for the next date.