I am linking here a very good blog with insights for those who are/ are trying to understand highly sensitive persons or empaths and what the difference is between a regulated and a dysregulated nervous system.
p.s. it starts as far back as the womb and what babies sense from mums energy.
click here to read and please watch the video https://www.livingneuro.com/living-neuro-blog/tag/HSP
There will be days when you succeed despite all of your sensitivity and “feeling” in being rooted and strong, present and mindful of you and the “everything else”, aware of the clutter yet able to hold a peaceful space in your mind and so much more. And then there will be other days when it isn’t quite so easy. And that is just the way it is!
Being an empath comes with a huge responsibility to manage what we are feeling; we can be all to quick to point the finger and become victim to what we are sensing if we aren’t accepting of the responsibility that we have to be accountable to our “gifts”. This is a constant skill to be developed in addition to the countless other skills we must learn in order to not only cope but thrive in a world that is constructed on vibrations and energy.
This short post is a quick reminder to just keep trying.
More days than not we won’t succeed, or something will blind side us, or tests will come our way when life triggers our emotional wounds, or we explode after a long day of too much stimulus, or we retreat from our loved ones when things feel wobbly, and so the list goes on. However, the other days will be a success.
You will succeed.
And whether you are at the end of a successful day or a more challenging day as you read this post right now, remember that there are always lessons to be learned, nudges to follow, and new ways to see old challenges. It is in truth, never a failure day.
We live in a world where we must balance the “getting out there” with the quiet spaces that all empaths carve out called “alone-time” (this is crucial, if you aren’t making space for peace and quiet alone-time in nature please consider starting). It is not good to avoid life completely; like everyone walking this planet we have something to bring to humanity and hiding away from people and feeling and big energies will not ultimately make us feel good for very long.
The greatest paradox of being highly sensitive is that you will only feel alive around people where you get to use your gifts and skills, the very place that feels too much, too big and too overwhelming.
Trust me, you have got this! Keep testing yourself, keep practicing, keep jumping into as much as you can when it comes to life, career, sports, and relationships. Within all these you will find something that you thrive in and developing strengths here will open you to see that you are strong, and that you can, and then when you can, you will… no excuse: keep throwing yourself in!!
My happy space is sport. I love nothing more than running or cycling in the countryside; near the trees and water and nature. In this space I practice presence and grounding and I have been pushing myself a little on a mission to see just how connected to earth and mind-empty and in flow that I can be. It’s been going well. I love this little test to see just how much I can let go and morph into the vibes of life. If I can master this I will grow in my professional work with clients and my healing work. I will also learn to race with less anxiety and less clutter from others. I am chasing FLOW.
Portumna forest, Co. Tipperary to be exact. A magical place!.
This is the type of racing that I love; it’s on my territory. I can connect to the trees and wildlife, dig my feet into mother earth, and despite the people and their pain find my happy space. I set these very goals for this race this morning in my journal.
My fitness is slowly improving after what we can just describe as an horrendous year last year of extraordinary challenges and as a result of this health that led to disappointments in sport and a massive loss of fitness and strength. I lost out on a lot of things that I wanted to do. So; sob story aside I have been thoroughly enjoying being back at sport and building my fitness and to be honest super proud of just how kind and supportive of myself I have been. There were some gold nuggets in the tough 12 months… I am choosing to not see the year as a waste, but as a win… just a different kind of win. A personal growth win, a relationship win, a professional learning win, a win in terms of deeper compassion and so much more…..
Anyhow today did not to to plan! I had a race that I am more than happy with as it is progress on my last race; the weather was kind and my boyfriend stormed his race.
But I was a mess in my head with all that I was sensing and then it went into cognitive over drive. I was negative, I had heavy legs one side of the forest and light legs the other, I kept telling myself that I had heavy legs and that I wasn’t on pace or form, let’s stop (what the fuck I thought to myself when that thought hit, I was perfectly fine to keep going), I kept thinking that my gut was about to explode with diarrhoea (it had been off before the race getting worse as we drove to the race location), I was even so irrational to think that I was going to puke at the race finish, and on and on the insanity went in my head.
I was completely aware of this (madness), yet struggling to create my normal happy space, my go to strategy of connecting to the forest, to build a bubble around myself. I focused on not focusing on the negatives and simply allowing..
Anyhow, as you see I (I almost want to say we given my mad crazed head) did push on and get into somewhat of a more positive partially connected space, I told myself that I have legs (awesome!!) rather than lead legs and I started to notice more around me such as the ash, the birch, the giant oaks, the wild roses, the lake and so on. But wow, what a stupid waste of mental energy is all that I could think to myself.
So, I guess this is just an example of that we don’t always succeed AND we do our best. As I sit and write this I am content to say that I did my best.
There is so much going on in a race regarding how much the thinking brain is conscious of, the people around you physically, the focus on “running or racing”, the management of pain and discomfort and breathing, never mind the added extras of heightened sensitivity such as the sensations that are sensed from the realm of energy in terms of your surroundings, the history of the ground under your feet, and what other people are thinking and feeling. The brain (or more correctly the sensing brain) would blow up trying to process it all at once. For me I got a bit stuck in the denseness of it all.
I believe that sometimes all that you can do is keep doing….
I did not want to stop and sit on a bench and ask the universe what am I feeling right now, how can I help/ heal/ understand or how can I simply leave be! This is what I would do in normal life and perhaps with time I can improve on what I do on the go. I have become very good to block out other peoples pain and thoughts normally when racing, but today I was not entirely successful!
In retrospect one lady was vomiting at the race finish. I didn’t see her but my boyfriend later told me. I also sensed some spirit realm beside me at one point (it helped to feel this actually; it was something I could manage then as I “knew”), I am bang on before my period which is always a time of heightened sensitivity, and finally now that I have a little time and read more about the forest (I am curious!) I feel a pang of sadness that the beautiful ash, of which a lot of this forest is, may die in the coming years due to ash dieback disease. This makes me incredibly sad as the ash to me is a beautiful sacred tree of the feminine (please read my other blog here). Here is a little more about the forest and I assume if I dig more there will be stories and history as there always in the local land here. So, maybe I should cut myself some slack… that is what I would tell you after all!
So, take a step back on the less good days; learn the lessons to make the next days great days and just keep loving yourself. Some days we want to curse our sensitivity and empathy; but then could you feel the world and all her exquisite beauty that surrounds you and blows your mind and opens your heart?… no…. so just keep at it, keep believing, keep loving, keep being you.
Xx Andrea
PS the pictures above are of Portumna Forest park; these aren’t mine; I only wish that I had a camera running but I didn’t.
And my doggie, telling me that “Mommy” ran short (race was a tad short), and this is how you stretch if you want to run a little faster with less lead-like legs
Diet, lifestyle, emotional stress, functional health imbalances and environmental exposures play a huge role in our increasing fertility issues in this modern world.
Our governments and large agencies are monitoring this (e.g. the CDC National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals) and world authorities in health, toxicology, environment, medicine, nutrition, and alternative health are all speaking out regarding our increasing body burden of chemicals impacting fertility among all mammals. Add to this poor lifestyle choices, an increasingly stressful life, and widespread malnutrition despite surplus calories and you are looking at a big mess. Our fertility is a telling tale.
It is so sad to me that we are struggling with our health and fertility often unawares that this is one of the consequence to our actions in our world as a species. It is not your fault, nor mine; but of all of us to some degree. Pollution…
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People say I see the good in people too often, that I am naive, that I believe too much in our people and our world. I pretty much believe in unicorns, fairies and that there is good in everyone. Yes guilty as charged.
I want to believe in people because when you believe in the good you see the good. When you believe in a soul they rise; when you give people the benefit of the doubt they sense this and when you see their hearts and that there is a good; they come through and shine. I refuse to change this simple heart-led view of people and the great capacity that we all have for change.
If I am battling to see good I take to my journal just like this morning and twist my heavy heart into a positive one.
Some days it’s a challenge to see the good however, I won’t lie; and today is one of them.
Spring is here and after my quick journal and intention setting I set off on my mountain bike. Call it a meditation of sorts because the beauty and wisdom of the universe comes to me in chunks and this is freedom, escape, immersion in nature. On my mountain bike it is NOT training; it’s a way to see the world.
The day was beautiful as you can see.
And then I got to Keeper Hill which I knew was going to be a bit of a heart wrench because they are currently felling in the forest and it looks like the apocalypse. Keeper Hill is my stomping ground; it always has been. I have biked, hiked, horse ridden and run this mountain since I was young and before you saw another soul on these trails.
I feel so sad to see this beautiful place demolished by the felling, polluted by the machinery and trash from the trucks and machinery everywhere. I felt so upset to see what humans do to nature, never mind that the 1/2 foot deep muck tracks that made it too tough to bother going to the first summit.
So on I pedaled and had a talk with myself that nature will right herself and the forest will heal and then I saw this.
This is not the first time I have witnessed such outright disregard for the woods; there is a dumping and litter problem here and of late I have even seen animal carcasses. It is not only the forestry workers that leave a trail of rubbish but the walkers, cyclists and hikers. And then there is this blatant dumping. It is getting worse. This was almost on the road; the people dumping didn’t even care to try to hide it (which isn’t much better).
I feel so angry. I feel disgusted. I cannot understand. Can someone help me understand how this rubbish magically cleans itself up?
No, it is here and it will stay here for YEARS. Unless someone magically appears this rubbish will stay here along with the other rubbish. I only wish that unicorn I believe in could magic this away. That is not the reality. Dumping persists; for a very long time.
I cycled on…
The rubbish doesn’t stop here. It is along the roadside, it is dumped in the bog, it is thrown out of car windows by ignorant selfish people who just like me that live in nice tidy homes. But instead these people cannot be bothered to even think of the consequences of their actions. If you are a runner, walker, or biker you will know what I mean because you can see the trash everywhere. Bar wrappers, cola bottles, energy drink bottles, coffee cups, lunch wrappers, plastic… it is everywhere and it is worse than I have ever seen it. It is in every hedge of Ireland.
Then there is the dumping. People intentionally driving to our beautiful Keeper Hill to get rid of their shit, or driving to Annaholty bog and getting rid of stuff there.
Beautiful wild Annaholty bog
Rubbish spotted there a few weeks ago. This is only a fraction of what can be seen dumped on the bog and bog road
I feel so heartbroken for our beautiful countryside. Visitors to Ireland must think that we are disgusting; a let down for humanity and I agree.
So what can we do?
Andrea
x
PS quote from the universe before the travesty ruined by vibe
Quality of life is not made richer by more money. Money and things only buy the shortest of satisfaction.
Once we are fortunate to meet our bills and expenses quality of life is enriched by experience, people, play, good health and freedom.
Make wise choices.
Choose wise beliefs…
Happy me
It is so frustrating isn’t it when the body apparently lets you down, when it takes an age to heal, when you feel like shit day after day and it becomes so hard to have faith or find a positive focus.
You feel punished and you don’t know why.
I hear you!
We cannot run from what the body is saying; s(he) needs time, s(he) needs patience and love. S(he) needs you to listen and to be kind.
You aren’t being punished. The body is holding you here for good reason. You need to slow down, you need to look in, you need to finally go head and heart first into the old wounds and traumas, you need to learn new ways, greater love, divine patience! You are being asked to blindly trust, to have greater faith, to stick your heels into self belief and that things will turn around. Maybe not now but soon.
I am here to support you, to help you unravel the body messages and the emotional threads that seek untangling. If there are physical issues we can identify and work on them, and if there are symptoms that unravel deep into your soul wounds we can find these too. Whatever way works for you, we will go there.
You are safe now…. faith, love, trust. But most of all love…
Andrea x
I recorded this today for you; please have a listen
I have been through a rough 12 months myself. Most days I can be strong, I have the knowledge to self-heal and the ability to listen to the wisdom to know where to focus my energy. That said I am human, I get impatient, I want to be somewhere else, I am stubborn and don’t always hear or I get stuck doing what I feel I should in life when the never ending wall I keep hitting is asking me for more. To be myself. I hit the wall again yesterday and today took myself into nature. I needed some lessons.
Here are some snippets of the soul healing in my day..nature is phenomenal to heal us, teach us, guide and inspire us.
Heart soothe
and one tired doggie after her exploring:
Who smells of the aroma of expensive organic baby shampoo and fox poo all in one
You are so very loved, so truly perfect, and are important,
Love,
Andrea
PS if you are fed up of hitting the wall, please don’t suffer alone. Reach out…
The first words a baby hears is that of his or her mother while in the womb; the first emotions that flood us are that of our mother and our first experience of food and nourishment is from our mothers.
A baby learns the emotional terrain about food, and the emotions around body, while in the womb.
As women, we hold the energies of time in our bodies; handed down through our ancestors. We hold the essence of life and we carry the women and men of our future. Even if we don’t choose to be a mother to children; we are mother to all. Our capacity to reach others and love is immense.
We are tied to the past, present and future and we have a capacity beyond what most of us believe to change how generations perceive, respect, love and nourish themselves and one another.
It starts with us.
A fully empowered women (and man) is free within her body and voice to walk the path of life with confidence, authenticity, and purpose. Filled with respect for all humankind, whatever colour or race. Love and respect for oneself is a transformative to all around you.
But to achieve this involves unshackling ourselves from our pain and wounds; wounds carried through since time began. Wounds of shame, guilt, oppression, silence, and persecution. The guilt of a woman’s body in creation, birth, life, loss and death. The shame of sexuality (the liberated woman); the fear of our ability to heal and help others (the medicine woman); the punishment of speaking out with the truth (the woman with a voice); the denial of an education, rights and opportunity (the educated woman); the suppression of the feminine and what she can contribute to society fuelled further by religious, political and patriarchal systems (the free woman).
We live in times where many of us are fortunate to live free, and yet without conscious awareness we carry all these fears and wounds. We wage our battle to let go and become our true selves against ourselves. The battle becomes with out bodies, we take every emotion out in destructive and controlling relationships with food, alcohol, exercise and cycles of punishment and purging. We sabotage ourselves before we even get to be all we can, before we give all we can, and lead with all we can.
The result is that every ounce of our creativity, expression, divine love, and capacity to give our all is squashed out of our being.
The fearless lioness within is tamed by hunger and fatigue.
We rarely have the energy to think beyond the cycles of dieting, exercise and self-judgement – we are anxious, stuck and unhappy. Furthermore, we are conflicted because from time to time we feel the flame of fire and passion and creativity within. The voice, the message, the love, the ideas, the leadership. It’s there, and then its squashed because “who do I think I am, I am not perfect enough, thin enough, smart enough”….
Imagine if we broke the cycle. Imagine if we nourished our being with food eaten in a state of acceptance and love shared often with others.
Imagine if exercise was done out of the sheer joy and freedom that movement gifts. Imagine if we felt proud and grateful to live and love in our skins. Imagine when we felt emotional overwhelm we talked it through; or when we faced tough life circumstances we had the courage to ask for help instead of holding it all in.
Imagine if women were able to talk about the challenges of being a woman, the really hard ones. Imagine if all of us, man and woman alike, felt confident to let our energy reach others, through a handshake, a smile, a hug and true compassion and presence. Imagine if we shone so bright it paved the way for others.
Imagine how creative you would feel free of the burden of self-hate, endless diets, unhappy exercise regimes and free from starting the day hating the image in the mirror.
Imagine feeling free from the anxiety of hating how it feels to be in your skin and endless thoughts of how to squash that energy out of yourself. Imagine how much creative power you would have, how much space for intuition and invention? How aware you would become of others and your capacity to transform life around you? Imagine feeling “good enough”.
Our relationship to everything is connected to our relationship to food, soul, and our physical self.
Imagine your power to teach our children self-love, simply from how you love and respect yourself. This message isn’t just about women. It is about everyone, men and women. As women and “mothers” we teach our boys and girls how to love and eat and be; first breath to last.
Love your body; live life to the full. Embrace your uniqueness….and eat… eat to nourish your soul and stimulate your senses.
love,
Andrea
“Let your eyes be the window to your soul”.
This is something that we hear often, and we interpret it to mean that when people look deep into our eyes they see our soul. They see us; the something deeper behind the flesh. They catch a glimpse of our truth and the eternity of our being; they see us.
But what if it worked both ways? What if it meant that you are to let your eyes see from your soul?
We live life behind a lens these days; everywhere we go we want to capture life with a photograph, an Instagram, a video. We take photos when we walk, we interrupt personal interactions with photos and we watch a concert through a phone rather than hearing the music and feeling the beats through our bodies into our hearts.
Even me, I recorded this message as I was out walking on a beautiful cold sunny Autumn day in the hills. The autumn light was so stunning that as I walked along in my own little thoughts I would see the light catch the trees or the colour on the hills and stop to take photos.
Yet I never stopped for too long. I was out and walking and taking my time; yet I still felt a need to “press on”.
This is life these days. I passed by a gap in the trees streaming light onto a stone when these thoughts struck me. I asked myself am I truly seeing and sensing everything that is here for my soul to receive or am I merely looking and capturing it as a photo and a memory.
So, I stopped. I stopped and thought of how I wanted to ask myself and to ask you, “how often do we just stop and stand and let the beauty of what we see or wish to experience go right into us?”.
How often to we absorb life into our being with no filter?
Do we ever take the time to allow the moment see into our soul? Because when we receive into our soul we “see” far more; we are not only seeing we are also feeling, hearing, sensing and connecting. We are having the whole experience. We rarely stop to do this. We may be there, and we may capture it and hold on to it as a memory or share it, but what if you stopped and absorbed every part of it? For yourself?
I know we all wish to capture the moments of our lives but what if next time you stop and stay stopped! And then allow it all come to you in the entirety of the experience. I believe that then we are truly feeling the experience and this is far more profound.
Love you,
Andrea
This post is a call out to people to start being more aware and to start caring about what is going on around them.
In this past week, I witnessed someone stealing someones bike in plain daylight while people were walking by, and a member of my family witnessed a woman being seriously abused in a shop car park in a so-called ‘good’ area of the suburbs. In both instances it took us to say something before people surrounding us even considered taking action. WHY? How far do things have to go before people take action?
what is wrong with people?
Have we all stopped caring? Are we all stuck in our heads and phones and worlds to stop making an effort to be there for others? People that we don’t know are not strangers; they are part of our community and matter.
Wake up and start giving a shit… imagine if the person being hurt was YOU or a LOVED ONE and people just walked by?
Think about this please….. and start to be more aware…I am not asking you to place yourself in danger; there is always something that can be done.
Love,
Andrea
Everyone of us can love our neighbors more …
That means everyone…
the people you love
and the people that piss you off
and the people you disagree with
and the ones you want to hate and shame
and the ones you fear because you don’t understand them.
Love more… everywhere and break down the barriers that separate us in fear.
In remembrance of lives lost, and those alive who lost.
It is hugely important, when you are having issues with complex and chronic health problems, to build a team. One that can support you in mind, body, and emotions.
For example, my team are my doctors, Dr Pip Cullen and Dr Tom Pierce whom lately helped me, my osteopath Eoin Flynn, Dee O’Connor energy healer, and Dan Sainsbury tranformational coach. And not forgetting my fitness health where Annchen Clarke of 3YO coaching and and Adrian O’Brien of OBF fitness support me.
My biggest support however is MY SELF, followed in close second by my amazing fiance Garron, my cousin Vikki, my closest friends and family. I believe a support team is crucial at all times for me regardless of where my health is because of the work that I do with people.
Who is in your team? Do you have a team? Please have a listen; especially if you…
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Journeys in Healing 