by Endorsed Mind-Body Coach, Linda Bayly-Fennell

Once upon a time not that many years ago I was having a nervous breakdown of sorts.  In the healing community they call it a “spiritual awakening.”  I guess that’s supposed to make you feel better?  But it wasn’t anything I wanted to wake up to.  In hindsight I was giving birth to something beautiful and amazing, yet it seemed more like I was delivering an alien beast.  Each day felt like a Dementor from the Harry Potter books had snuck into my life and sucked all the happiness and wellbeing out of me.

I completely lost connection to my sense of humor.  To this silly SNL loving girl who likes to joke around and laugh and play at finding humor even in difficult moments that was excruciating.  It was as if someone had taken all the brightness and color out of my world.  What felt even more depressing was that I knew when things would be funny to me – things people would say that would usually leave me laughing or giggling – but I couldn’t feel it inside. My humor button was frozen on mute.  You would think not being able to feel something would be painless, but that wasn’t my experience.

I would wake up in the mornings and feel like “oh shit, oh shit, oh shit … oh shit.”  I would hear my husband and kids moving about and immediately feel cranky if they were making “too” much noise and feel isolated and left out if they were happy and having fun together.

My body ached. My heart ached. My soul ached.  When I exerted myself for even a short while, taking a walk or cleaning part of the house, I often ended up exhausted for days.  I was convinced I was dying from an undiagnosed deadly form of cancer.  Everything scared me, although I tried to hide it.  You can end up feeling terribly ashamed when you don’t feel happy in this seemingly happy-is-the-best culture.  I believed that I clearly wasn’t doing life right, and the state of my body and psyche were proof of that.

As I look back I have so much love and compassion for my dear suffering self.  I was going through multiple big life transitions.  And as you may know – dang-it – life transitions (even wanted ones) can be a lot like earthquakes.  They easily crack our worlds open and rearrange our lives in ways that are super disorienting.  They often unravel old, no longer helpful structures in our life, like the way society, or our parents, or well-meaning friends say we’re supposed to do things, or the old ways we try to hold our feelings in, or the ways we lash out at ourselves or others that leave us feeling ashamed, and moving away from what we truly want.

In the transition quake, the old ways of being start to crumble around you.  Lord knows it can feel incredibly scary when that happens.  Thankfully around that time I met the brilliant and kind fellow coach, Abigail Steidley.  I worked with her one on one for a bit. That was a much needed balm for my weary soul to say the least.  But it was through her Mind Body Coach Training that I really deeply learned how to lovingly restructure my life in a way that felt nourishing to me, not by following what I thought I should be doing based on the outside world, but by following my own inner guidance system.

In the training I learned how to integrate the magic of my mind, body and spirit wisdom and how to be supported and guided from that place.  I learned how to be curious and kindly listen and respond to myself.  I learned that as a coach, the best way to support and help others is first and foremost to be tuned in and lovingly grounded in who you are.  That as a coach you facilitate others connecting to their inner wisdom and well-being by first being connected to your own.  In other words you, “live it to give it.” I really don’t see how you can truthfully do it any other way.

Thankfully, these days, because of all I’ve learned, I often reflect in wonder and appreciation at the underlying contentment and well-being I feel.  It’s not that my life is never difficult and messy or that I don’t ever struggle or have bad days –  I do – it’s just that I have a much stronger sense of inner knowing that I’m supported by a beautiful vast world full of inner and outer resources; and because of that support, I trust that no matter what comes up, I’ll find my way.

Endorsed Coach – Linda Bayly-Fennell

I am a Mind-Body Coach and a Martha Beck Certified Life Coach. I live in upstate NY with my husband, two elementary school aged kids and our dear and wild Australian cattle dog.

Most of my life I’ve struggled with trying to be the ‘right’ thing … the right person, daughter, friend, employee, mother, wife, coach … whatever it was, I desperately wanted to do it ‘perfectly’ and be ‘good’. Not a fun way to live. It took its toll on my body and wellbeing. Through my coach trainings I learned how to tune in to my own internal wisdom, letting it guide me toward what was right for me. As a coach, I’m here to help you on your journey. My clients appreciate the warm, welcoming, safe space I provide. They also say I’m wise, funny and open…. irreverent and kind.

If you would like to learn more about coaching together, please send me an email or visit my website.