 Last night I read these words:
"I touched my chapped and peeling lips carefully with my fingers and winced… “Your body is trying to tell you something,” Ani said as she held up the mirror to so I could see my face. I was shocked to notice that my lips were swollen bright red. They were even cracked and bleeding from when I had tried to widen them into a smile. “Oh, Ani, they are so sore.” “Why have you not tended to them?” Ani asked. “I was busy with other things, I guess.” I looked at her sheepishly. “When you refuse to learn a lesson in this life, because you’re too busy, or because you’re afraid, or because you don’t know how to stop doing a certain activity, the body takes over and begins to teach you.” “What does that have to do with chapped lips?” ”Chapped lips, colds, fevers, accidents – whatever you ask for, your body gives you"." Abridged except from Chapter 8, Windhorse Woman by Lynn V. Andrews I was touched by the wisdom of these words. How often have I not listened to my own inner voice (don’t eat bread today), not tended to my own needs (staying up too late), let myself get too busy (pushing myself too hard), and obstinately continuing on with habits that were not good for me. It really is like going against my inner guidance and the natural flow of life. I wonder how much of that impacts on the greater picture of life. For example: If I want something but my focus (emotional energy) is on something else then I am probably not going to get what I want. So a question popped into my mind: am I affirming life (my natural wisdom) and what I really want or am I going against it? It’s an interesting thought, isn’t it? Let us say you wake up in the morning with 10 units of energy to spend through the day. You decide you want to use the energy to make up a website. Here’s how you spend your units:
Now here is a different scenario….
It’s the same with good health and vitality, isn’t it? Elayne Lane is a life coach and can give sessions on motivation and how to clear those blocks that get in the way! Click here to book a session. Massage special offer $55 for one hour! Book here New treatment: Essence of Light Touch Treatment find out more
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 Do you ever feel lonely? I wonder what that is all about. I am a person who likes time on my own. It gives me time to relax, to walk or read or study. To do things I want to do. But I have noticed that there are times when being alone feels uncomfortable. Often I do nothing about it, and grind on through the day feeling a bit empty and dissatisfied. The feeling hangs out with me and, if left unattended, starts to morph in all sorts of directions. I start to wonder what is wrong with me? If I decide to go down that rabbit hole it can end up in all kinds of dark places (usually ending up with beating myself up) - and that's not a nice way to treat myself! Recently I decided to explore this more.
What does loneliness mean to me? I realized I feel this feeling when I separate myself from people. Quite literally I isolate myself. I do have lots of wonderful friends, but sometimes I unplug myself from that network and imagine that I am in the world all by myself. Instead of ringing a friend up, I focus on being isolated and alone. One day I realized I could start to see that lonely empty feeling from a different perspective - to re-frame it.
I have noticed that as soon as I do this, I no longer feel isolated and alone. I have reconnected myself into my network. Dare I say it, I have connected into the flow of life And everybody loves feeling that they belong, don't they? So next time you feel alone, try re-framing it and see what happens. Elayne is a Massage Therapist. She is running a special offer of $50 for a 1 hour session during the month of July.  Throughout the year animals and plants respond to the seasons. In spring the sap rises in the trees, there is new growth, flowers, nesting, birthing of new life. Everything is warming and expanding! Summer is hot and fully expanded. Its a time to have fun, enjoy life and have plenty. Autumn is cooling and condensing. Everything is ripe and ready for harvest. Food and nuts are gathered and stored, in readiness for winter. The trees loose their leaves and animals make their winter home. Winter is cold and contracted. It is time to batten down the hatches and hibernate. To slow down, rest, contemplate and dream. There is a natural flow of energy which we humans seem to be too busy to notice - for if we did we could definately harness it and use it for our betterment.  How do we harness the energy of autumn? Autumn is a time of gathering, storing, releasing and reflection. On a practical level we harvest our crops, tidy up the garden, prune back the plants, secure the home in preparation for the winter months. We would also get out the winter clothes and bedding, stack the wood and preserve our food. Emotionally, autumn is the time to release hurts, grieve our losses and process emotional experiences. We can only do this when all our physical needs are met (and this comes through the summer season). A full harvest means that we can be satisfied with life, and when there is plenty, its easy to let go and release the past. We can release the emotional charge from the past and keep the wisdom of the experiences we have had throughout the year. Autumn is the time when we are naturally more sensitive. To our environment - knowing the right time to harvest, being aware of the weather so our harvest doesn't get ruined, and there is a push to preserve and store our food. We are emotionally more sensitive too, with the end of the warm summer weather there can be a slight feeling of grief that all the fun and play is over. Fortunately, we also naturally have a stronger sense of courage and honesty at this time, and a sense of pride. This helps us to express ourselves and let the past go. Having loving friends and family around us at this time is very helpful, so creating a gathering to celebrate this season is a wonderful way to feel supported.
When we reflect on our lives in Autumn, appreciate what we have and release what no longer serves us, then we become open to inspiration and vision which arrives in the winter.  Do you ever get a feeling of being “empty”? It’s an uncomfortable feeling, like being bored, restless, or aimless wondering around.
I liken it to the feeling I experience when I am hungry and looking for something to fill me up - I go to the fridge and finding nothing to satisfy my appetite. I call this feeling the void. The void turns up when:
It’s a BIG EMPTY SPACE…. Often accompanied with the words “What now?” Here are some things that you should know about the void:
Fortunately we can use the void to actually assist us in the change of direction. Here’s how: To create the future, we have to take stock and know who we are now. A little constructive life review can be helpful. Some people might do this through the vehicle of The Hero’s Journey, others through astrology, numerology, or personality testing. Life review helps us to know that we are always moving forward, even when it seems we are not. The next step is to wait for the empty “void” feeling to come. Then gather up all the emotions around it. The longing, the frustration, the ache, wondering what’s next, and feel it as intensely as I can. This energises the void space, like an oven cooks a cake. Then I start to become aware of my current energy which is made up of all my life experiences, who I am now, who I want to become, all my curiosity about the future and what it could possibility bring for me. I make it full of potential and as positive as I can then I gather all this feeling up and put it inside of the void. That’s right, in the middle of the oven where all the emotions are. Then I relax and let go – this gives me a feeling of expansion. I acknowledge that some part of me does know exactly what is really going on and all I have to do is let it unfold. Efforting at this point just blocks the flow, so take a break. I then say to myself “I know, even though I think I don’t know”. Deep inside of me all the answers are there, even if they have not arrived in my mind yet but I know they are coming. The new path for me could be anything – maybe even something I have never thought of before. For example, I used to work in Law. When I had that job I never dreamed I would be a massage therapist now. It was through a chain of events that led me to where I am now, and that began with a nagging ache that something needed to change but I had no idea what (the void). Nowadays I am more aware of this feeling and I can consciously use this void to help me move forward. Every time I feel that uncomfortable feeling of the void, I now gather my energy and ask for something new to turn up. I use my mantra: “I know even though I think I don’t know”. I imagine a new wiring happening from my deepest knowing (which appears to be hidden from me) direct to my mind, so that I am aware of inspiration, sign posts for the new direction, and a sense of “go here” or ‘try that” which pushes me forward where my inner being wants me to go. We can gather our attention to a new direction through creating a ceremony for ourselves. At the end of April I will be teaching how to create ceremonies with Michelle Collier. For further details click here.  One of the reasons we are more prone to anxiety these days, is that we are constantly on an emotional roller coaster – stimulated by movies, social media, television and books with emotive stories. On one hand each one of these activities can give us some “time out” at the end of the day, on the other hand, it is important to note that our over-stimulated mind and emotions absorb it all and the constant input actually "adds" to the overall stress. For example: if you watch a movie about a predator and you are involved in the story, your body cannot differentiate between the pretend story and real life. If you feel frightened whilst watching the movie, or your hair goes up on the back of your neck, you feel cold, sweaty or upset; then your emotional system is on! This means your adrenal glands are pumping the hormones that make the body to go into fight and flight mode. (Check out my deep breathing practice to reverse the affects of adrenal gland hormones) Likewise if you see or read something that is really sad (I get triggered and cry every time I watch the movie Whale Rider), and you feel like crying, you are also having an emotional reaction which is affecting the chemistry in your body. All this is fine if you are not over-anxious, but it is not okay if your system is already in overdrive. Our thinking and emotions are affected by the chemicals in our body: food, drugs, our own hormones, and toxins in the environment all have an affect on our mental and emotional health. For example, when I had my son, I did not sleep well (as is usual if you have babies!) and also had a lot of financial stress as my husband was made redundant. Eventually this lead to the break down of my health and I became fatigued. It was when I changed my diet, learnt how to relax and sleep, rebalance the chemistry in my body that I started to emotionally/mentally feel better again..  So, take some time out from movies,social media, books and TV. You could:
Please note that these blogs are from a lay person and not a counsellor, psychologist or medical professional. If you think you have severe anxiety or depression, you should consult with a professional. Click here for my Worry and Anxiety resource page To book a session with Elayne click here  Letting go of the past is not easy, especially if the past holds something unresolved.
Questions haunt us and they take a lot of energy.... WHY? WHAT did I do wrong? WHAT could I have done differently? Pondering on these questions can drive us crazy. These questions can form a loop in our minds and take up a lot of "free to air space"! Often there are no answers to these types of questions. Even if the person concerned could give you an answer, it could be emotionally loaded or distorted. The good news is that with a bit of effort on your part, there is a way to make them lose their grip and stop their obsessing. Step 1. Every time you go back to an old thought (which may include he WHY or WHAT questions), write it down in a notebook. When it repeats again, give it a tick and have this conversation with yourself: "Yep, got that thanks. I can’t change this and at this stage there is no answer to it. Maybe one day in the future I will know the answer, maybe I will never know the answer to it. I do know that the question has already been asked, and if I am meant to know the answer it will come to me in its own good time. Thinking about this question is not helpful to me right now. In fact, I think it so much it is becoming boring”. This kind of self-conversation can be quite helpful as it helps the mind change its focus. Step 2 is CHANGE THE RECORD. By this I mean:
Step 3. Every time you get a repeat thought do Steps 1 and 2 again. Before long it will begin to change. The periods of obsessive thinking will get less, and the “I am feeling okay” time will get longer. Many years ago a friendship ended suddenly. There were lots of “whys” floating around in my head, I kept thinking about the person, even though I didn’t see them any more. So I found a photo of that person, said all that I wanted to say to them and thanked them for the lesson. I told them I wanted to be free now. I then said “I let you go” and asked for them to be surrounded in love. I didn't have to love them myself, but I knew that there is some kind of benevolent love out there which could go to them. I then changed the record in my head by saying affirmations, getting involved in an absorbing activity or giving thanks for what I have. Whenever this person came back into my mind I did the same process again. In fact, the first day I did it a lot of times – such was my habit of thinking about them. I was very strict with myself and stuck with the programme. The second day it was less, and by the third day it was considerably less. It was such a relief to stop thinking about that person. I felt free! In time some answers did come to me - often unsolicited and out of the blue! I realised it wasn't all their fault and that I had a part to play in it too. By releasing my grip on the situation things began to open up and come clear. If you have trouble letting go and would like some help, please contact me. Elayne, MassageInNelson.com  Developing intuition can appear to be rather a random process. I remember about one year into my massage training sensing something deeper about a person's body - more than just skin and muscle - there was an underlying feeling of corrugated cardboard. It amazed me that I could sense a person on a double level - the physical and then on some kind of feeling/knowing level.
I believe that there is a "practical intuition" that we all use in some way through our daily life:- 1. Our animal instinct i.e. we can smell food and know it is off, sensing danger, something tastes wrong, reading body language 2. Many years experience can lead us to be able to read situations/people accurately 3. We might study something for a long period of time and suddenly the brain "sorts it" and it becomes an integral part of our inner "knowing" 4. We get a "gut feeling" about something. For me intuition is also a type of "sensing": Many years ago I attended a meditation course, where we explored several different methods of meditation. One of them was colour meditation - we painted a ball of a single colour and looked at it until we could also see it with our eyes shut. Every time the colour faded we could look at it again until the colour was absorbed. For some reason this experience of different colours stuck with me, and after that I could sense colour when I worked with a client. Through the meditation my brain had developed some kind of awareness about colour and it would overlay this when I worked with people. Eventually I began to sense people's auras - and learnt to interpret what I saw. At one stage in my development I was fortunate enough to live with a crystal healer for a period of time. Her house was a healer's paradise full of crystals, books and essential oils. And I was able to spend many hours with a wonderful person who wanted to share, experience and learn all about healing! Often I would come home from work and sit with her crystals, holding them in my hands and seeing what I could feel. At times I felt nothing, sometimes I felt different sensations in my body, or a sensed movement in my hand. I would notice which crystals I was drawn to and read up about them in her books. It was a playful, fun time and I learnt so much. Not just about crystals, but about how to develop and trust my intuition. I found that once I had developed a sense of intuition with crystals, I could use it with anything - essential oils, aura soma, flower remedies and plants. I had an interest in plant tinctures and occasionally helped my friend out on her stall at festivals. Even though I didn't know everything the tinctures did, I had no trouble finding the right one for a person. I would then pass this on to my friend (who was a trained herbalist) to check I had the correct one. One day I was watching her working with a client. Something seemed to be missing from her tincture. I scanned the remedies and picked out the violet tincture and handed it to the herbalist. She said it was for grief. Much to our surprise the customer immediately started crying - talking about her grief. Doing massage in the workplace and at festivals has also been a great teacher for me. Every person feels so different, and at these events I had a chance to feel many people in a short period of time. Of course there is the physical "feel" of the muscles - are they soft and relaxed, generally tight, or balls of knots. However there is another "feel" to the client as well. For example: they might feel wooden, or there is an inner tension that feels like a wound up spring, or they are calm and relaxed. If I get chance I will talk to the client about this and discuss with them ways to address the underlying issue. Sometimes I also get a picture in my head. Recently I was working at a healing evening doing massages. Between clients I could observe the other healers working on their clients. As I watched one healing session, I saw in my mind's eye a picture of the client with her feet in the clouds. Later I talked to the healer about this. She said she had been advising her client to be more grounded. The client had told her that she was the second person that day to suggest this to her! Next Saturday (19th September) I am teaching a Crystal Healing Course, with an emphasis on developing intuition. If you are interested in this area please contact me.  Learning to forgive your self is not an easy task – it’s a process which takes place over a period of time. There are many ways to arrive at the point of forgiveness. Each step brings a subtle shift towards inner peace and acceptance. I recently watched this video on forgiveness and it inspired me to write this blog. Here is my personal story of forgiveness.
I think we often do or say things that harm ourselves or others when our needs are not being met. This could come from an early childhood experience where we feel we are not “good enough” or “not accepted”. There are many reactions to feeling not good enough – trying to be better than someone else, feeling we have to prove ourselves, trying to obtain as much attention as we can from other people at any cost, treating other people like they are not good enough, being selfish, being invisible… the list goes on. For much of my life I was blind to how I was behaving – I was doing the best that I could with what I knew. It was only through many years of experiences (sometimes difficult ones), personal reflection, asking questions, reading and learning that I realised how much “not good enough” was affecting my life – and hurting others. I remember at one point writing my story in two different versions. Firstly, as the victim(poor me) with all the things that went wrong, blaming everyone else and taking no responsibility. Secondly, as the heroine, the person who learnt and adapted from each experience, who was helped by others and was willing to change. A person who became a better one over a period of time. Writing these two stories was quite a challenge for me. As the stories unfolded I started to see the effect of my actions – and the impact it had had on people close to me. Upon this realisation I wept with sadness: I felt ashamed and guilty. This guilt stayed with me for a long time. I remember trying to appease a past relationship through a new one. Somehow I felt if I could “make things up” with the new partner, I would get be forgiven and get off the guilt hook. Of course this didn’t work! My new partner refused to accept my attempts to make things better, and I felt desperate and frustrated. I had no way of healing this situation with the original people. I had definitely learnt my lesson and wanted to do things differently (restorative justice) but how could I be free of this guilt? I was in a no-win situation – lesson learnt but I was stuck in prison with guilt. The guilt made me feel so bad. It fed back into my “you are not good enough” conditioning. In the end I realised that the only way forward was to stop punishing myself and let myself out of jail. Ohhh it was hard. Had I punished myself long enough? I had certainly been flogging myself with remorse, regret and recriminations for a very long time. And yet, I could not really stand strong in the lesson, if I didn’t free myself of the guilt. I had two choices:
Option 2 seemed the only alternative. So I tentatively stepped out into forgiveness. I let myself off the hook. I decided I would forgive myself once and for all. To do this I created an imaginary process where I talked to all the people concerned. I talked about my needs and how I had wanted them met, and how I acted to try and get them met. I stepped in their shoes to see things from their point of view. I was fair to myself, I accepted that it was a two way interaction and I wasn’t totally at fault. I was gentle with myself. I wasn’t born with the manual on how to live life – and sometimes mistakes are made. I told them what I had learnt and how I choose to behave now. I explained what I could have done differently, and what my new standards are now, based on this knowledge. I asked them to forgive me. And then I FORGAVE MYSELF. I said goodbye to the guilt and walked out of the prison I had made for myself. I then celebrated that it was all over and thanked them for the experience. Over the following months I watched my mind for the old punishing thoughts that wanted to return. Each time they came, I reminded myself that I am forgiven, and that it’s over now. I have learnt the lesson and live differently. I give love to myself, I accept what happened and that I cannot change it. I let myself feel inner peace. Forgiving myself has brought inner peace to me. I am still learning and growing. I expect I will do many forgiveness processes in my lifetime – for mistakes in life are common. However it is wonderful to be free and shining my light once again. Please do not think this is a magic formula for forgiveness. It isn’t. Many people have helped me along the way: friends, family, counsellors, authors, healers. We all have our own way of getting to inner peace. It’s just a matter of conscious choice. Do we want our heart to be hurt and closed all our lives? Or do we want to have it open, trusting, wise and free? I recently watched the movie “Mr Holmes” – it is a wonderful story of forgiveness and healing for an old man and the people around him. Life is such a mystery and one of the greatest miracles is that of getting to a place of forgiveness. What's On Beginner's Massage Course 3/4 October. Cost $200. There are limited spaces so please book early. Click here. Women's Pamper weekend 7 p.m. Friday 9th October, all day Sat 10th and Sunday 11th until 5 p.m. Cost $300 ($250 if paid by the 6th September). Click here. Crystal Healing course Saturday the 19th September 9.30 a.m. - 5 p.m. Cost $100. Click here. Rebecca Gambles is running courses on Past Life Healing, Angelic Reiki and Animal Communication over the next few months. Please contact her here for more information or go to www.angelicsoulhealing.com Massage Special Offer Relax and unwind with a 1 hour back, neck and shoulder massage If you have a sore back, then this is the treatment for you.... Relax and ease out those tight muscles - wonderful for releasing tension and stress relief - a superb way to unwind. Massage Special Offer: A 1 hour massage for $50 (normally $70) Book Now  Do you ever wake up in the morning feeling low?
Are you always struggling with your mind to get into a positive state? Our minds can be pretty funky places at times.... And it if occurs often enough (we feel flat every day), it can become a habit. When we feel low, everything feels bad. Our body tends to have more pain and tension, our diet deteriorates, the day at work seems harder, the verbal dialogue goes around and round, we beat ourselves up and stop being fun to be around. The trick to changing this is to change our thinking. (After all it is the one thing we do have control over). We all get a bit flat at times, and I am no exception. One morning I got the idea to rev up through using affirmations (this has always worked for me in the past), so I took a look on internet to find some fresh ideas. I came across a talk by Abraham Hicks on called "The Easiest Way to Start Positive Momentum". It was a great talk, and I want to summarise it for you in this blog. Esther Hicks and Louise Hay both say that using affirmations help shift our mental state and reality, but unless we get into a positive feeling state, affirmations do not work. Let me give you an example. You own a heater. You know it gives you warmth. But it only works when you turn the power on. Likewise with affirmations, they only work when we have a strong positive emotional feeling behind them. The emotional power literally turns the affirmations on. So if you wake up and invest emotional energy into self talk about how flat you feel, that is what you will get - a bad day. If you wake up and invest your energy is a "rev up" pep talk with positive emotional energy behind it, then your day will be much better. The easiest way to do this is to make yourself a recording of your affirmations when you are in a good mood and play it to yourself first thing in the morning. Leave enough space between each affirmation to repeat it, and remember to get into the feeling - like you already have it. BE excited! I have one below which you can download. Abraham Hicks says best way to start your 'rev up talk" is with something general. What do you appreciate right now? Think of all the things that are easy to appreciate. Think generally: your body, your home, your comfy warm bed, food in your cupboards, a hot shower... Then go out into the community: people at the bank, your friends, the library service, the supermarket... Then globally: the electricity to your house, the roads... Take a moment to appreciate the wellbeing of the people around you. People who inspire you. You could compare yourself with all the people who live in other places, and appreciate where you live and what you are accomplishing right now GOOD VIBES ATTRACT GOOD VIBES When you can put a good, excited, happy, uplifting feeling into your words/appreciation, this puts power into them. Often we let our good feeling go, and slump back down to apathy. So set an alarm in your phone a couple of times a day to remind you to lift your vibe again. Abraham Hicks says the next step is to receive what comes your way. Allow yourself to go with the flow. Let your positive vibes carry you along throughout your day. We all know how good it is to be around someone who has these vibes. You can be like that too. People sense this - they will want to help and support you. It takes commitment to keep picking yourself up and getting into a positive vibe. But ask yourself: which mouth do you want to feed? The happy one or the sad one? One day is not enough to break a habit, but one week can start showing you some positive results. It takes about 28 days to change a habit, and probably 3 months to have it embedded into your system Practice pays off! If you would like a recording to use to rev up your day: click here and download it to your ipod/mp3 player.  Two steps that can instantly make a big difference in your life 1. Start your day off in a positive way How often do you wake up and for a split second you will feel okay - then you lift your head up off the pillow, think about life and now you feel terrible? The best way out of this habit is to have an action list right by your bed to look at as soon as you wake up. Here is an example: • Think of a happy memory and re-live it so that you feel the good feelings again • Smile, stretch and take 10 deep breaths right down into your belly • Say an affirmation 10 times • Have a glass of lemon juice • Take a shower and then go for a walk These positive actions will help you get out of the habit of feeling flat and kick start your day. 2. Get enough sleep – some “lowness” is just “tiredness”
Sleep is very important when you are feeling low. It is the re-set button and gives you time to process what has been going on in your dream time. Not enough sleep prevents your body from rejuvenating, and makes you feel tired throughout the day. • Go to bed early • Have a walk early in the evening • Have a milky drink or chamomile tea before you go to bed • Avoid video games, tv, movies and emotional books before you go to bed. They will stimulate your mind and trigger off emotions and fight/flight hormones • Do a relaxation exercise • Listen to calming/relaxing music or a visualisation CD/MP3 • Do some deep breathing into the lower abdomen whilst laying in bed If you do not get enough sleep throughout the week, have an afternoon nap in the weekend to catch up. |
AuthorElayne Lane is an instructor of the Universal Healing Tao. She has been teaching and doing bodywork in excess of 14 years. Make an appointment Subscribe to our Healing NewsletterCategories
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Elayne Lane is a qualified Aromatherapist, bodyworker, healer, reiki practitioner and trained teacher. She is training as a hypnotherapist.
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Elayne Lane
17 Fifeshire Crescent Stepneyville Nelson New Zealand Cellphone: 0212211949 Sign up for Elayne's Healing Newsletter or contact Elayne. |