Exhausted.

Like part of your body is permanently molded into the bed.

When you start paying attention to your body and actually listening to its needs, one of the first things that happens is usually exhaustion. It’s like you pick up the rug and realize you’ve been sweeping stuff under it for years. Now, here you are, faced with reality: You. Are. Tired.

So very tired.

This is normal! In our culture, we often push ourselves crazy-hard. We ignore our bodies and blow past signals for rest and recuperation. We focus on doing, doing, doing. Our to-do lists become more important than our physical bodies.

I frequently fall into this habit, even after years of deep practice around listening to my body and respecting its messages.

Self-kindness is called for when you confront your tendencies to shove aside your body’s guidance and end up sick or in pain.

You didn’t do this on purpose.

You’re not bad or wrong for ignoring your body, or for being tired.

This is all just information, and you can simply be curious. Why did I think it was more important to clean my house, work late, and then paint the ceiling than to take a few moments to settle in for a little rest?

You’ll probably find that your mind thinks you should work 24/7 to be a worthwhile person, you’re a little afraid of the emotions or insights that might pop up if you stop, and nobody ever says, “Wow! Amazing job resting today!”

All of these reasons make it more challenging to get off the treadmill and stop moving.

When you finally do, you’ll probably have some accumulated exhaustion in your body. That’s ok. No judgment necessary. Right now, just rest.

Then rest some more.

Then rest some more.

It’s your path to health. And joy. And creativity.

You are doing SUCH A GREAT JOB RESTING! You are AMAZING when you rest so much!

(Print those last two sentences out and post them somewhere handy.)

Keep up the good resting.

After taking a few months to truly allow my body to heal from childbirth and surgery, I feel much, much, much better! I want to fill you in on what I’m doing in my own mind-body practice right now, and what I’ve learned recently. (In short – a lot.) Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing much about that!

I’ve come to realize that I have been dealing with a combination of an actual physical injury, surgery, AND a mind-body syndrome (otherwise known as TMS). Confusing! (What is a mind-body syndrome/TMS? Click here to learn more!) Plus, I’ve had to mentally recover from having what might be the world’s most embarrassing surgery. Seriously. It is called a sphincterotomy (commonly used for anal fissures, which is what I had, and extremely un-fun).  First of all, it sounds like the doctor removes one’s sphincter, which in fact, he does not. Thank God. Secondly, it has the word sphincter in it, which is not a word I love to bandy about in casual conversation.

Kind, caring person inquiring about my health: So, how are you doing? What surgery did you have to have?

Me: Coming along, getting better! It was a, um… shmmmumble.

Though there were many times in the last several months where I thought I might die of mortification and or extreme pain, I did not. I survived. Now that I understand the childbirth-anal fissure-TMS combo, it’s so much easier to use my mind-body tools and allow complete healing to happen.

In fact, I feel pretty much back to normal in almost every way. I feel creative, alive, and joyful. I still feel my emotions, and I still have the full array – anger, fear, sadness – you name it. But the sense of underlying contentment is back. Hallelujah! I am enjoying being a mom, honoring the frustrations that come with motherhood, and reveling in the amazing combination of getting to be a mother and a coach. I have created exactly what I wanted to create, and for that, I am supremely grateful!

My mind, body, and soul feel in sync again, and I am clearly hearing the messages from them all. My body still wants rest, so I am giving it much rest. My emotions are asking to flow, and giving me information daily about the best paths to take in every area of my life. And my soul has requested more meditation, which feels delicious, when I squeeze it in. Anything one does when following soul-guidance feels delicious!

Dealing with TMS

As far as the physical pain goes, well – I have dealt with TMS before, of course. I know where I am in the process. I’m at the point where all that’s left is a conditioned response to certain activities. In other words, the brain is used to experiencing pain and guarding against it when doing a certain activity, and it has linked that activity with pain. Even though there is no injury or reason for pain anymore, the activity still seems to cause pain. This is just the way the brain learns in everyday life, for everything. It connects the dots and makes associations.

The tool to use for this is a simple technique. Basically, you’re teaching the brain that there is no reason for the pain to occur, and that it does not need to fire off pain signals when you perform the activity. For me, the triggering activity is sitting down. So, every time I sit down, I say to myself, “Sitting down does not cause pain! I’m perfectly healthy. I’m listening to my emotional messages and no longer need pain to alert me.” Repetition is the key to success. You sit, (or do whatever the activity is) say the statement, and focus on inner emotions instead of any pain that arises.

The brain is pretty fascinating, isn’t it?! I know this process works, because I did it before, when I was dealing with the TMS pain in the past (vulvodynia and interstitial cystitis). I had to disconnect sitting, wearing underwear, wearing jeans, sex, walking, and riding a bike. This time, thankfully, there’s just one trigger!

The process is kind of interesting – it can take some time, but it happens much like learning a new piece of music on the violin. (It’s really the same process.) You practice, you practice, you practice – you go in the practice room every day and you feel like nothing is happening. You aren’t getting anywhere. Then, suddenly, you realize you have made a little progress. You can play a few passages better than before. Then, one day, you realize you have learned the whole piece and it’s no longer hard. Changes happen subtly, but they do happen.

So far, I’ve been doing this for three weeks. I can already see huge gains. Suddenly, there are several comfortable sitting positions, where before, I couldn’t take any of them. Ha! So there, brain! I am onto you!

The key to doing this process is to just keep at it. You have to recognize the fear of the trigger as part of the conditioned response, and use the same technique on that. The other important piece is to be quite gentle and loving with one’s self. That has been the theme of this mind-body learning experience for me. I am truly learning self-love, no ifs ands or butts. Ha ha! Sorry.

Intentional Self Kindness

My current daily mind-body practice is intentional self-kindness. I also notice whenever I am not being kind to myself and to shift toward kindness again. The self-love I used to offer myself is nothing like what I do now. Now, I am on a self-love mission! (More on that in the coming weeks!)

The other interesting thing about this process is that it is completely in line with the law of attraction. To bring about what you desire, you must “act as if,” to borrow words from Abraham. Act as if sitting is completely fine. Live like you would if you felt no pain. Feel the joy of that, and health follows. I also know this to be true, having done it before. So I am on the fun plan. I am finding as many ways to have fun while sitting down as possible. Luckily I have the cutest, sweetest companion for this – Aela, my little eleven month old daughter!

Thus far, I have enjoyed the following: sitting to nurse, read stories to Aela, play in the sandbox, play in the backyard, roll the ball to her, eat picnics with her, and snuggle. I also get to sit a lot when I work, and I have the best job in the world. So, that’s pretty darn fun.

I’m currently training a new batch of mind-body coaches, and I’ve decided to take the training right along with them. Listening to myself teach (which is always about listening to the soul wisdom that is flowing when I’m teaching) is helping so much. We always teach what we most need to know. The mind-body journey is about learning, learning, and more learning. I am learning so much right now, and I’m very inspired to blog again! I so appreciate your understanding during my healing break and your kindness this past year, amazing readers! Your emails, Facebook messages, and other support have been more helpful than you’ll ever realize.

I’m also back on my Anamsong Facebook page! I’d love to join you all again in fun mind-body/life conversation over there. Thank you to the fellow coaches who posted lots of inspiration there while I was in healing mode.

So, yes – I am back in the saddle! Though, thankfully, not an actual saddle. Baby steps, you know!

I thought it would be appropriate to talk about rest this week, what with the holiday season upon us.  Rest is one of those topics that we frequently forget to consider, and yet it is possibly the most important thing we can do for our souls and our bodies alike.

If you’re anything like me, you have often waited until your body crashed and your mind blew several fuses before you actually curled up to give yourself some serious rest.  I used to think I needed to earn my rest, so I’d work until I was beyond exhaustion.  Then, feeling quite deserving, I would collapse.  Unfortunately, this collapse often involved being sick.  It took a lifetime of this pattern and much protesting from my body for me to figure it out.  (And I still repeat it on occasion, despite being onto myself.)  Light-bulb moment!  Maybe my body would like to rest more often!  Maybe I could rest without needing a total collapse!

My husband has often teased me for being “extreme.”  I admit, it’s quite true.  I go full force, then full stop.  I turn the burner on high, notice the food is burning, then turn it too low.  I have embraced this about myself, and I have also practiced that odd thing people call moderation, in hopes of learning how to do it.  Sometimes, it still eludes me.  However, with resting, I am starting to successfully employ moderation techniques.

I used to think of resting as either sleeping or spending an entire day in a movie coma.  Now, however, I have an entirely new definition of rest.  Rest is actually anything you do/don’t do that allows your body to drop out of the fight or flight response or maintain an already present non-fight or flight status.  This is my own definition, designed to help me rest each and every day.

With this definition, I remind myself of the importance of allowing my body to spend daily time using the parasympathetic part of my nervous system – the part that allows healing, rebuilding, and growth to take place.  Like in all things, we need balance; a balance of the sympathetic and parasympathetic elements of our nervous systems.  If you were driving your car in heavy traffic and didn’t have the sympathetic nervous system available to you, your life would be in extreme danger.  The flip of that is also true.  Too much high-alert, sympathetic nervous system living makes it impossible to heal and to feel contentment.

There are so many ways to rest when you use my basic definition.  Anything that helps your body drop into rest and digest mode counts, which means that your resting style might be very unique.  Knitting, for example, might be restful to you.  To me, it creates aggravation.  Crocheting, on the other hand, is something I find restful.

On my rest list is also listening to soothing music, breathing, listening to other kinds of music, reading enjoyable non-fiction, restorative yoga, gentle walking, petting my dog, drawing, creating jewelry, listening to various guided imagery recordings, getting a massage, and intentional resting.

I pick from my list daily.  If I forget, I soon feel jittery and out of sorts, and slightly disconnected from myself.  Your rest list might look totally different from mine, but I do encourage you to discover what helps you rest.  What better time to consciously put rest into your life than right now?  Life is not about striving, achieving, doing, and accomplishing.  It’s about enjoying.  Enjoying what?  Whatever you’re doing, or whatever you’re not doing.  This moment, right now, even if you’re sad, mad, scared, or happy, can contain the peace of just being restfully here.