Inner Work and the Power of Choice

When people come to me for energy work to help them reach their healing and wellness goals one of the first things I share with them is the concept that our body, even in its quote disease, illness, pain, or disorganization is trying to find balance and to support you. The problem is that sometimes the way it thinks it is helping us is based on old tapes and programs that while at one time were brilliant and super helpful are now actually causing restriction and disfunction in your system. The body really doesn’t do anything for giggles or just because. There truly are reasons why the body is appearing to be stuck, disconnected, or running in a manner that is not the way we want it to.

The same concept is true for people that come to me for support with unlocking the power of their soul and looking to truly break free from the different limiting beliefs or personas that they created to survive. 

It doesn’t really matter which “doorway” you walk through on a healing and personal growth journey - body, mind, or soul - if you are looking to align your life with your heart and unbridled the power of your soul to support you as you strive to embody a life that you love, you are going to have to walk into exploring the things that are blocking you from really showing up in alignment with your true self.

This is where a practice of inner work, shadow work, or what I like to call soul work comes in. 

What is inner or soul work?

Simply put it is a practice in which you willingly commit to diving deep into all the different ways and reasons you are losing your personal power to show up in alignment with the real you – your soul or spirit. 

Inner work is the process or practice of asking yourself to go deep into exploring, understanding, acknowledging, and ultimately reclaiming your ability to CHOOSE how you want to BE in any given moment. 

It is the work of true empowerment. 

For me, inner work is the big umbrella term of ALL the different practices that I have which allows me to support my whole system in expressing itself with as much physical, emotional, and mental health and wellness as possible. Inner work helps me free up the hidden ways in which my system is bracing and stuck in a response cycle that is not in alignment with true health. 

I’m not going to sugarcoat it. The practice of inner work requires you to come face to face with unpleasant, uncomfortable, and often painful truths and ways in which we are self-sabotaging and victimizing ourselves.

You’re going to meet icky feelings, walk into old pains, memories and the stories we tell ourselves that we would rather forget. You will be asked to take on those nasty self-judgments and the harshest of the inner critics and things you have stuffed away into the shadow for beautifully perfectly good reasons. 

The massive huge benefit of soul work is that when you illuminate the “whys” behind how you work and you acknowledge and take responsibility for what is truly happening in any given moment you can actually unlock your biggest superpower – the power of choice. 

Our ability to actually invoke our power of choice is oftentimes really not available to us due to a whole host of very real reasons. Inner work allows you to break free from the old ways of operating that were causing your system to hemorrhage power, lose energy, hold itself in postures that cause pain, and or allow the disease to stay in your system. 

I would like to also point out that soul work doesn’t have to be only crazy intense and soul-crushing work. It can actually be done in a way that feels loving, compassionate, freeing, and dare I saw it joyful and fun all at the same time! 

To really give you the best shot at stepping into “the work” in a way that isn’t crazy overwhelming I really recommend the support of a sacred guide and coach with you on your journey of Inner work. In the beginning, it is often almost impossibly hard to hold yourself in a field of grace that is loving, compassionate, and with the energy of a sacred witness when you are in the depths of unpacking what you most dislike and try to hide from yourself. Having someone to help you learn how to walk into the role of being your own sacred witness with love, compassion, curiosity, caring, and wrapped yourself in the grace of forgiveness and understanding is so helpful! Heck even after 20 years of doing this, I myself have an amazing spiritual director and coach that helps me hold that space on a regular basis. 

The other thing I highly recommend for people looking to add in a practice of inner work is to utilize a framework and/or spiritual tools as well so that there is some structure and container for you as you learn how to walk in your own inner wilderness. 

Some great tools or frameworks for soul work are:

• Archetypes – exploring and learning what main archetypal patterns you are walking within this lifetime. I love Caroline Myss’ model and tool for working with archetypes through what she calls Sacred Contracts and your archetypal Wheel.
• The Enneagram – a spiritual tool that explores the basic 9 core passions/struggles we walk with throughout our lives and how to work with them to free ourselves from their shadow effects and transcend into the core gift of grace that the core challenge opens us to in the light
• Parts Work – the practice of looking at the different parts and personas we develop to help us maintain a sense of control, protection, and manage the ups and downs of life to see which ones are working and empowering us and which ones are actually causing us to show up in ways that are no longer serving us.
• Attachment Style work – a framework that looks at how our neurobiology was impacted by our early years of development and our inter-relationships with the main caregivers we experienced and how that impacts and translates into our relationships and overall ability to access an internal felt sense of safety and security throughout our life. 
  
• Somatic Work or body-based work – Practices that work with the body as a messenger to help guide you in unwinding, addressing, soothing, and changing the hidden ways the body is storing trapped emotions, pains, and traumas that are still trying to get their needs met so that they can truly release and dissolve.
• Contemplation Practices – daily meditation, prayer, and or mindfulness practices that invite you into an inner dialog and relationship with the soul and the divine to help guide you and support you in illuminating the different choices and ways in which you can step into alignment with your soul and spirit.

Again, these are just a few of the frameworks and tools that I work closely with and teach to our clients as ways to include inner work in their holistic approach to reaching their goals. In fact, if you have been following my blogs you might notice that I have shared about almost all of these tools at some point 😊. 

The one I haven’t really shared yet is the Enneagram. I’m really excited to introduce you to the Enneagram through a new mini-course I’m offering that starts in March of 2022! I really love this new series because it combines Eden Energy Medicine Exercises, different Mantras, and also contemplation and reflects exercises together to really give you a truly holistic approach to exploring each of the nine different points. This mini-course is designed to help support your inner work AND your body in healing and shifting the physical energy systems. During this series, you will have an opportunity to open to insights and claim new choices that can help you break free from some of the core struggles that we all share. Click here to check out all the details and sign up today to reserve your spot! 

The bottom line with inner work is that I believe it is what really opens us up to experiencing an unbridled sense of JOY! When we shift from feeling like we are victims to these hidden ways in which our bodies and or our mental body is hijacking us or holding us in a state of disease we open to a felt sense of freedom and believe that we actually have the tools and ability to surf with life’s ups and downs. You activate your innate ability to influence your body’s default stress responses emotionally and mentally. Inner work builds inner trust that you will consistently show up for yourself in a kind and compassionate way and be able to make choices that are in alignment with your soul. To me, this is true freedom! Freedom that leads to living, loving, and leading a life that is full of wonder, joy, excitement, magic, and possibilities! 

Join me for my new mini-course of Aligning your Body, Mind, and Heart through a journey with the Enneagram!