How to Do the Work
Highlights
- You Are Your Own Best Healer
Over my decade of work as a researcher and clinical psychologist, “stuck” was the word most commonly used by my clients to describe the way they felt
- You Are Your Own Best Healer
Every client came to therapy because they wanted to change. Some wanted to change things about themselves by creating habits, learning new behaviors, or finding ways to stop disliking themselves. Others wanted to shift things outside themselves, like changing a problematic dynamic with a parent-figure or a spouse or a colleague
- You Are Your Own Best Healer
There I learned about the pull of the subconscious, the deeply embedded part of our psyche that holds our memories and is the source of our drives, or automatic instincts or motivations.
- You Are Your Own Best Healer
addiction isn’t limited to specific substances and experiences such as alcohol, drugs, gambling, and sex; cycles of human emotions can be addicting too. Emotional addiction is particularly powerful when we habitually seek or avoid certain emotional states as a way to cope with trauma.
- You Are Your Own Best Healer
I felt that mindfulness gave us tremendous opportunities for self-reflection and self-awareness.
- You Are Your Own Best Healer
It’s not an exaggeration to say that every single one of my clients who came to me for psychological treatment also had underlying physical symptoms. Long out of school, I started to ask new questions: Why did so many of my clients suffer from digestive issues, ranging from irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) to constipation? Why were there such high rates of autoimmune diseases? And why did almost all of us feel panicky and unsafe almost all the time?
- You Are Your Own Best Healer
MIND-BODY-SOUL CONNECTION
Close your eyes. Picture a lemon. See its glossy yellow skin. Hold it in your hands. Feel its ridges. Put it to your nose; imagine the clean scent hitting your nostrils. Now imagine slicing a wedge from the lemon. Watch the juice jump out as you cut through the flesh. See the oval pits. Now put that lemon wedge to your mouth. Your lips may sting on contact. Taste the acidity, the cool citrus, the freshness. Does your mouth pucker or fill up with saliva? The mere thought of a lemon can provoke an entire sensory response. You’ve just experienced the mind-body connection without putting down this book.