I Did Not Listen To My Body

I did it again.  I did not listen to my body.  Nope!  I just kept pushing and shoving through, acting as if my body never needed the rest.  Sure, I write about this frequently and after what I've been through, you would think I would have learned by now.  Evidently, the lesson got lost along the way.

Starting up my business, I've been going nonstop. I'm kind of a one man band for the most part and often joke that I wear the hats of Information Technology, Graphic Artist, Human Resources, Accountant, Sales Person, CEO, Manager, janitor, warehouse purchaser and many others.  In fact, it really isn't a joke, because I do all of these things and more.

The only thing is, I knew that as I was approaching Christmas time, things were going to get more intense.  They always do for me.  I've made tremendous progress in this part of my life, but around Christmas, the difficulties I face with family issues weighs hard on me.  You could put a 2000 pound gorilla on top of me and it would not be any more difficult than what I experience.

Regardless, I kept going and pushing my way through it.  I discounted and neglected the signs my body was giving me.  I kept lining up events, working with clients, and doing everything that I could to not stop in any form or fashion or slow down.  Sure, I progressed along quite nicely with my business, but it was at the expense of my health.  I thought a couple of moments rest here and there was plenty.

Unfortunately, I kept ignoring my body.  I kept ignoring it until it said, "hey dude, enough is enough" and that's when it happened.  I got what seemed like the flu and was so tired I could barely keep myself awake.  Abdominal pains that got so intense, I cried out in agony.

Sure, I could have run to the doctor and they most likely would have run tests and prescribed some type of medication.  It might have helped me get over this, but I knew deep inside what was the cause.  The cause was exhaustion and stress.  I had pushed my body way too far.  This isn't the first time I've done this and one time I paralyzed myself as a result of doing this to the extreme.

Maybe I needed to have the lesson replayed to me again because I must not have learned it the first million times.  Now, all I can do is rest and repair and build my strength back up again.  I choose to not use drugs and medications and supplements because I know that if I listen to my body, I have more than I need within me to function in a day.

It wasn't that long ago that I almost did myself in with a job that sucked the life out of me.  I'm still building up and getting over that, so why I thought I could push myself this hard, I still don't understand.  Yes, I know without an income net, the urgency is there, but if I do it at the expense of myself, what will that profit me?

We all do what I just did and then we stop and wonder why we are sick with illness.  We wonder why we have physical issues and complaints.  Even if a doctor tries to explain that it is stress or we are working too hard, we still don't accept it.  Unfortunately, if we would look at the cause/effect of what we do in our days, it would come into view more clearly.

For now, I'm resting and trying to come back up to full speed.  I've got to learn how to regulate my days more and rest.  Yes, the urgency of starting a business is important, but I've got to learn that taking care of myself is as important as the business that comes in.  I can't be there for others if I can't be there for myself.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 1/7/16 by Don Shetterly

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Listen To The Body

In the human species, we have lost our way.  We absolutely have no idea how to listen to the body.  There are books written on the subject and plenty of people rave about the mind body connection, but very few truly understand what listening to the body is all about.

In a recent experience, I saw someone go through a very painful moment of difficulty with their health.  Fortunately we have been acquainted to the work of Unified Therapy with Dr. Paul Canali.  Keep in mind that this work is just not a bunch of feel good concepts or treatments.  It is not something that uses new age mumble jumble to make it appear like it is useful.  It is a practice that has unfolded over time and is based upon science, experience, and is highly reproducible.  You can't say that for many of the things out there, although many attempt to make these claims.

As I saw responses far and wide from many different people who undoubtedly cared about what this person was going through, I noticed one thing.  No one was really focusing on the one thing that could help this person and that was they needed to listen to the body.  All the girations of diagnosing medical conditions based upon beliefs really does nothing to help a person.  In fact, very people really knew what was going on, but it didn't stop them from playing armchair physician.  I can't help but think that if everyone was as intelligent as they thought they were, this world would have very few problems.  My statement may sound harsh, but in many ways it is honest and true.  Again, I know people mean well, but what I read on the internet as responses, made my eyes bulge out, especially knowing what I have learned and come to know in life.

Health Care

I continue to be amazed at what our country, society and world views as "health care". If you say "health care", the first thing that comes to the mind of most people is going to a doctor for check ups, tests, medications and procedures. Ok, it might include a few other things to a few other people, but mostly that's what is portrayed in this world.

While there is a need for doctors and medicine and health care as described, that is only half of the picture. I know the medical association, the doctors, the pharmaceutical companies do not want you to think otherwise. For if you do, their corporate profits will go down.

Contrary to what 99% of the population thinks, there are so many other things that one can do to take care of their health. Yet, those things are in the minority and somewhat sampled on an occasional basis. And if you do not agree, just take a moment and look around you to see what the vast majority of people are doing for medical care. That is where the proof is to what I am saying.

In order for us to shift the paradigm that we have all fallen into, we have to examine some basic facts.

• #1 Much of our life experiences including our past, influence our present moments. If we do not deal with the past, it will deal with us. That is a plain, pure and simple and a proveable fact!
• #2 We often ignore the true message of the pain or health condition we are facing because it is easier to pop a pill, than to deal in the nitty gritty stuff of our life. Sometimes pills are needed in certain situations but they should not be the first thing we turn to.
• #3 We often make much more out of the situation then we need to because often (I'm not going to say always or 100% of the time) but often there is some emotional, mental or spiritual side to whatever medical situation we are facing. There is more to the picture than meets the eye.
• #4 We often feel solace and comfort in placing a label on the condition we have. However, the danger in this is that now we live up to that label after we find out all we can about it. We may not realize we do this but often labels we put on ourselves or our conditions hold us back more than they help us.
• #5 The mind is extremely powerful in healing our body if we allow it to do this. The placebo effect is now being found through research to do as much healing in physical ailments as the actual drugs themselves.
• #6 As a culture, we have relied on research to provide us with the answers and solutions that we need to either help treat ourselves or our loved ones. Yet, research is a big business with many dollars being thrown around and in order to evaluate the research, we need to follow the money trail. In following the money trail, analysis of the research results can be evaluated more accurately. Research and statistics do not necessarily mean that the conclusions are 100% accurate.
  
• #7 Fear is one of the most common culprits for making seeing eyes blind and by that, fear rules this world in so many ways and it blinds us to what is really and truly going on. Fear is valid when you are running from the tiger but fear has no place when you are trying to discover the intricacies of your body, the world around you and the universe.
  
• #8 Being with pain is very difficult whether it is your own or someone very close to you. As humans (especially when we have allowed fear to come into our lives), we struggle to be with someone or our self that is in pain. It is a natural part of our biological lives but when it becomes the sole arbitrator of our life or our loved ones, than we have lost site of the possibilities that exist.
  
• #9 Supplements and health drinks and potions and snake oil are widely used in the world by people who believe they will work. Often they cost so much money and while there is much science and research to back up the claims, these products fail to live up to the expectations. Remember the placebo effect? Remember to, that even in these so called "alternative health" means, you need to follow the money trail and evaluate them accordingly. Even with expensive price tags and miraculous claims, these things are not always what they seem to be. Look at them and evaluate them through open eyes that do not close.
  
• #10 Possibilities are endless! Let me repeat that. Possibilities are endless! Be careful, locking yourself into one paradigm thinking that this holds all the answers for you. For when you are thinking this way, you have given up on the possibilities that exist.
  
• #11 The answers we need are within us. In our society we fail to listen to ourselves, our bodies and our thoughts. We fail to connect to that which is within us. Within each one of us is a master healer. When was the last time, you listened to yourself and I mean truly listened to yourself? For when we do not listen to ourselves (to thine own self be true), we give our power up to someone else and we lose so much of the potential that is right within our bodies, our minds and our spirits.
• #12 Consider what is going on in your life the next time you get an ache or a pain or something seems off. Often what is happening in your life will show up in some physical way within your body. Have you ever heard someone say, "my back is killing me" as they over exert themselves without rest, or maybe my "legs are tired/hurt to move" when they are struggling to make a decision of their path in life? Do I need to say any more or is the picture clear?
  

Each one of us needs to evaluate what is best for our lives. If we do not take the time each day to listen to our bodies, to go in and clean out the closets of our lives and to give ourselves rest, than how can we expect to be healthy inhabitants of our own bodies?

Health care is not about procedures and taking pills. Health care is about getting to know your body in every way possible and then listening to your inner self in finding the most potential for your life that you can. There is so much more out there than the advertisements show us each and every day. We've become people with eyes that are closed when we so badly need to open our eyes and claim everything we can.

The potential exists and the possibilities are endless. How much will you close your eyes to? How much will you allow yourself to open your eyes and see?

The Placebo Effect

Placebo in Latin means "I shall Please" and has its origins in medicine that was used more to please the patient rather them benefit them. Today, placebos are used in many forms that most of us would not even recognize. While many of the regular health care procedures we gravitate towards appear to be backed by scientific studies, many of the same positive results can be done without these routine health care procedures.

Placebos are anything from a sugar pill to an inactive or fake medication or treatment which is designed to mimic a drug or medical treatment and given in the same way. After a placebo is administered, any improvement in the health and well being of the individual whether felt, observed or measured is called the placebo effect.

In 1955, the work of Henry K. Beecher, titled "The Powerful Placebo" was published. In 15 trials, he claimed that 35% of the 1082 patients documented, were satisfactorily relieved by the placebo alone. Some researches now suggest that placebos can be just as effective as any medical treatment.

When I was a kid, my grandparents had been involved in a car accident on the way to our house. They were not seriously injured and were released after being checked out. While they rested at home, the doctor had prescribed some pain pills for my grandfather to take if needed. He of course needed them and so he took them as if they were treats. Unfortunately, we lived in a rural area, so he quickly ran out and because it was the weekend, there was no place to obtain these from until Monday. My mom, growing tired of hearing my grandfather complain about the pain he was in and how badly he needed the pain pills, devised a plan to treat him. She took the little sugar candies we got at Halloween called smarties and told him that these were very high powered pain pills. She convinced him that they were much better than his regular pain pills even though he questioned her that they looked like candy. And believe it or not, they worked. I actually remember him remarking to my mom that these pain pills were the best things he had ever taken.

When I worked around farms and would make visits with the Veterinarians, we had what we called the "boiling water option". Sometimes you needed to treat the people taking care of the farms as much as the animals. So often I would run into situations where some of what the care takers would see was not real. They perceived it was but from an objective mind, you just could not isolate what they saw. So instead of wasting money on medications that were not needed, we would find ways to make it look like we were doing more than we were. Often, we joked that we were "boiling water" so to speak but in all reality, it was a placebo. It worked every time!

In many clinical research trials, placebos are given to all test subjects prior to the start of the test without any of them knowing this. If there is a positive response during that time, then this test subject is kicked out of the trial results. In fact, more often than not, the prefrontal regions of the brain showed changes in activity as a result of the placebo.

Consider how many times you go to a doctor and you tell them your symptoms, which of course results in them giving you a "name" for the condition you have as well as a "medication" or "treatment" to get rid of the condition you have. While there are situations where this form of medicine is necessary and critical, much of it is interfering with not only the function of the mind and body but with the messages the body is trying to alert the person to. There is great power in having a name to put to our condition but often times, it becomes a hinderance because we tend to vibrate towards the condition instead of vibrating to heal it.

In our society, we are so closed off and shut down to all the messages that our bodies put out in a day. We barely listen and if we listen, we have almost inactivated that part of us which is there to help us. Instead we want to numb that which we feel and get rid of it so we do that through many different methods in our days including medications and medical treatments. If only we learned to listen to our bodies and listen to the messages from the pain or from what we felt, we would offer ourselves so much more than we could possibly imagine. The mind is very powerful and the body has the ability to heal itself from many of the conditions we face. Please don't get me wrong in that I am suggesting medicine or medical intervention plays no role because it does. However, until we learn to listen to ourselves first, we are only short changing life for ourselves. The more you interupt the normal balance and homeostasis in the body with the introduction of outside cures, the more you inflame the situation and force the propagation of it into other areas of your life.

While there are scientific reasons and research for medicine to suggest certain procedures, more often than not, the person may alleviate the symptom only to find the onset of another symptom or condition. Yet, in our society, this is the way we view things because as I say again, we have shut ourselves down to listening to our bodies. Some of the messages and pains coming through are more than we have the tools to deal with and so it is easier to just turn everything off. The only thing is, it is much more dangerous in the long term for our life.

I remember one lady I know that told me how she had suffered from a severe stroke at one point in her life. Talking to her and getting to know her, you could not tell that she had suffered from this condition. What astounded me more though was when she shared with me that she did not go through the normal health care routine to recover from it. She used alternative methods completely and recovered fully. She did not use conventional means to recover. There are many stories like this that I'm sure we have all heard and yet for some reason, we chalk them up to being some sort of miracle (which sometimes it may be) or we think that it only happens to others. We are the ones in control of our bodies and our health and we need to take that role much more serious than we do.

When I was paralyzed in 1991, the doctors didn't fully seem to know how to treat me or get me beyond my physical limitations. It was as if they were going to let time takes it course in whatever way it turned out. My impression was that they really didn't have a clue on how to get me from the point I was to the point I am at today. For years I struggled to fully regain all parts of myself even though most people would have not noticed what I saw in myself. At first, I had no clue how to get there and it took much discovery, searching and time for me to find my way.

Today we are blessed with the internet and especially google searches. There is a wealth of information out there and a wealth of experience that many people share about the conditions they have experienced. Many times, if we look long enough through the internet, we will find alternate ways that others have used to treat their own conditions and illnesses. Many times, these are not through conventional health and medicine that our society subscribes to.

So my challenge to you is if you are going through some type of health condition as long as it is not life threatening, consider the following points. (if you are in a life threatening situation, than by all means find qualified medical help. Use your common sense here, please).

1. Listen to what your body is telling you and see if there are any current, past or just prior events that may be going on in your life. See if these events have any connection to your situation in the moment because many times they do. We just have to listen to our bodies.
2. Search and seek out information through the internet, others or your higher power to help you find the best course of treatment for yourself. This could include the use of medical help and it may also include forms of treatment that you have never tried or are not aware of.
3. Don't stop there! Keep searching for more information, discovery and knowledge because as you find one piece of the puzzle, it will open up more of what you know. You may not have any knowledge of how to get past this in the moment, but if you start searching, you will find the way through.
4. Realize that pains, conditions, illnesses are often situations that are designed to get our attention and tell us something. It is our body's feedback mechanism and all to often, we ignore this. Start listening to it. Start allowing it to help you harvest more from your life and experience as a human. We are much more than we currently know.
   

I have seen conditions in people healed that I didn't think were possible and I have had this happen within myself as well. It isn't far fetched and it isn't some new age mumble jumble. This is real and it happens every day. Our bodies are wonderfully designed and they constantly work towards balance or homeostasis. It is what we do to our bodies and how we respect and listen to them that takes us out of balance. Stress, trauma and daily events in our lives do impact them as well, but we are designed to be much more than we currently are. Embrace that part of yourself and see youself for all you are, not what you aren't!

Let The Body Feel The Pain

In a Peanuts Cartoon script, Charlie Brown is having a difficult time going to school. In it, he complains that every morning as he gets up and goes to school, his little stomach hurts so much. Then, as other kids are enjoying their lunches, his stomach is so sick that he has no desire to eat. He goes on to say that it isn’t his brain that has trouble with school, it is his stomach.

That example is a very powerful example of something I have learned a great deal about. It is referred to as the “Enteric Brain” or the second brain or even sometimes is called the gut brain. What Charlie Brown didn’t fully understand, it was the brain in his stomach where all the difficulty came from. Many of us go through life struggling in the same way as Charlie Brown but we don’t fully understand what the source of our struggles is.

There was many a day that I would get up and go to school where I would be just like Charlie Brown. By the time I got to high school, I could barely eat breakfast in the morning because it would really make me sick. My stomach would be in knots as I faced each day. It was an awful experience and for the longest time, I just thought everyone went through this to some degree or another.

As time went, I realized that when I had very stressful decisions to make or when I was encountering a strange situation or unknown place, my stomach would be in knots. I would not be able to eat, sleep or function that well. I often would say that I made decisions with my gut because in many ways that was true. My gut would react to whatever it was I was facing and if it was in turmoil or in pain and agony, I would know that the decision I was about to make was not right. On the other hand if things were calm and I was not sick, I could feel pretty certain I was making the right decision.

One of the things I struggled with was that because of difficult times I went through in family situations, my stomach was tied up in knots most of the time. There were very few times when it felt good and most of the time it hurt. Eating breakfast or most foods during the day were extremely difficult as I would not feel good from it or get sick. This seemed to be an everyday occurrence and if my stomach didn’t hurt, than I would suffer from daily headaches. Sometimes the two went hand in hand and my only savior was Tylenol.

Things got so bad in high school that I was rushed to the hospital with the doctor feeling I needed to have my appendix out. I was at the age where this was common and so I was immediately checked into the hospital with tests beginning to see what was going on. After many tests that were not conclusive, the doctors were just not sure what was going on or what the best course of action was. Shortly before I was scheduled for surgery to have my appendix removed, the doctor began to question if that was really the best route to go. Thankfully he questioned it.

Soon they determined that it was a nervous stomach (pre ulcer) condition that I had. This was just before Christmas of course when all this was taking place and the next thing I knew, the doctor told me I had to go on a special bland diet and medication. This diet was no fun and while it did help, it by no means took care of the problem. I spent considerable time watching everything I ate and watching my mom prepare meals in such a way that it would not affect me. However, no one ever addressed the real problem behind this. No one understood the connection of stress to the stomach and the enteric brain.

As I have learned now, there is a strong connection to what happens on the outside with what happens on the inside. The stomach is a very important barometer of what is going on in the body because after all, it is the gut brain. If you continue to pile stress and difficulties on the body with no way of discharging them, the body is going to react in one way or another. Often the gut is where the bulk of our stress, pain and grief go but other parts of our body will harbor these things as well.

So when Charlie Brown talked about his stomach hurting, he had a very valid reason for saying that. If someone would have taken myself at that point as well as Charlie Brown, and taught me how to let go of all these things I was locking up within myself, my life would have been very different. Our bodies try to talk to us and get our attention but often we either do not have the tools or the desire to listen to what our bodies are telling us. We try to make this in to a difficult situation of suffering when in fact; the pains, discomfort and conditions we face are there on purpose. They are trying to get our attention so that we will take necessary steps of corrective action. Too many times, we medicate ourselves with drugs, surgery and pathways into la la land, only to find that we have treated the symptoms instead of the source.

Our bodies are miraculous living organisms with the ability to heal, function and self regulate all that goes on within them. Often we search for answers that we so need only for our bodies to offer us solutions that go unheard. Have you ever heard someone say, I just don’t know where I’m going in life and yet the next thing you hear, they are in at the doctor’s office struggling with a foot condition of one type or another? Maybe you have heard of people who are struggling with so much anger at some individual and yet you see the arthritic display in their hands because of their clenched fists. How about the person who is said to have died of a broken heart after suffering the loss of a loved one not knowing how to grieve their loss and say goodbye. There are so many examples in our day and if you stop and listen for them, you’ll hear so many from people around you. You might even be surprised at how much you hear from yourself.

We’re taught in our society that pain can be frightening and scary and at the first sign of pain or discomfort, we need to take something for it. From the over the counter medications to a doctor prescribed medication, we try to get rid of the symptom, also known as the pain or discomfort, instead of looking for the reason it is there. We try to flee from it when there is a reason that our body is working hard to get our attention. If we continue to ignore what the body is trying to tell us, it will continue to get our attention and if we go down this path to far, the conditions can get serious.

Learning though to stop and listen to our body and see what is going on, is a good first step in healing our body. There are times of course that we may not like what we see when we do this and there may be considerable amounts of fear to go along with it, but ask yourself this question. Would it be better to treat the symptoms or treat the cause? I think it would be an easy answer to this question that all of us would want to treat the cause. Yet, the first thing we move towards is finding something or someone to get rid of the pain.

May we all strive to learn to listen to our bodies as well as the answers it so freely offers us. For the more we look to other things and people to heal us, the more we will become disillusioned and disappointed. Yes, we do need the help of those who can heal, but we also need to realize just how powerful we are as a human and the immense abilities we have located within us.

Are You Brainwashed?

I am constantly amazed when I just observe people and humanity, just how much we follow things without question. Of course, if you're reading this, I'm sure the first reaction is, others do this but not me for I know when someone is trying to get one over on me. However, I think we all follow to some degree without question.

For me when I grew up, I was heavily brainwashed in the ways of one particular church denomination. Now it wasn't like someone strapped me to a table and put electrodes into my brain forcing me to follow what they said. It was more subtle than that. It was much more subtle than that. The brainwashing occurred in small and tiny little pieces that were almost too small to see with the naked eye. I'm not sure a microscope would have picked it up either. These things were cloaked around acceptance into the group. The acceptance into the group was not that anyone was allowed or not allowed in the doors, but that once they were allowed in the doors, there was a degree to which people were accepted or somewhat shunned in the group dynamics. Yes, there were things that were stated outright in many of the sermons, but they were the overall structure given to the brainwashing.

While you may be ready to say, I know of churches that do this and focus on the churches, this is not where brainwashing stops. We are involved in it every day of our life whether it is in an office we work or a job that we go to. It could be in some organization that we are a part of or it could be a community we are aligned with in some manner. While some of these may not necessarily denote a horrible ideal of brainwashing, they are in fact imposing some of the same things. It is up to each individual to not follow the unspoken truths of each source that I mentioned without pause but to question that which is presented as truth. Questioning these things through the sensing of our bodies can be one of the most important truth detectors for us.

Let's go one step further though in where you might find brainwashing. Have you ever stopped to think what the advertisements on the internet or on TV are doing to you? They have the right music, the right beat, the right images and emotions depicted to implant in your mind, the need to buy or use whatever it is that they are offering. What about the news? You know the source that tells you everything that is going on in the country and supposedly the world. Have you ever noticed though that the percentage of raw news facts is a fraction of the overall reported opinion by whichever news host you're listening to? If you haven't, put your critical glasses on and watch the news. Let me know what you see because I'm sure it will be different than what you have seen before.

Even in the new age enlightenment camps of our society, there is brainwashing. Maybe it doesn't appear that way but if you look closely you will see it. They often replace so many of the ideals and concepts in churches for a "more enlightened" version as they would say. However, as long as you follow their truths, and their origins, you'll be fine. The minute you start to question these things, it will be proclaimed that you are just not enlightened or you still have a ways to go on your journey. There can be a lot of good in these new age things but make sure you're just not following them blindly. It is ok to question, to ponder and not be in agreement with them. That is part of our human experience. It is part of our growth and our journey.

We can also look at governments from the United States to those around the world. Have you noticed how close Chavez is taking Venezuela to socialism? Some may disagree with that but there have been many changes Chavez has done all in the name of helping people and yet I feel the people are blindly being led down a road that is going to close in on them one of these days. Yet, our own government, The United States has in effect brainwashed us. From having our freedoms eroded day by day to looking to the government to solve our problems, we are following blindly to every bit and morsel they feed us. I'm not talking politics here either as I'm pointing out just how much the government gets away with. Again, put on your critical glasses and take another look. Let me know what you see because I'm sure it will be different than what you have seen before.

There are many examples around us and much of what I'm sharing or what I see comes out of my own personal experience growing up in a family where my father was a master manipulator. It was so subtle, yet so powerful. It has taken me years to rid myself of those things and begin seeing life through a much more clear set of lenses.

One important thing to remember is that if you are told something, taught something or asked to follow something, make sure it fits. What I mean by that is if it feels like you're trying to shove a round peg in a square hole, than question it. If you hear the words or thoughts and your first gut reaction is to say, that doesn't add up, than question it. If you are being taught something or fed an offer of some sort, check it out in your body. What does your body say about it? How does your body react? If you quietly listen, you will understand what your body is saying. The body is one of the best truth reactors there is, that is if the fears of the past are not standing in the way. So, in addition to listening to your body, work to rid the body of the fears that distort what you are able to see through the lens of your life.

While you may be questioning many things around, know that sometimes the process doesn't unfold immediately before your eyes. This is not about correcting yourself because you are wrong but learning more about yourself and allowing yourself the understanding of what you may or may not see in this moment. There is not necessarily right and wrong in concepts such as this but allowance and awareness in the understanding of them. Questioning is a healthy thing to do and awareness is the key to growth.