The answer in front of you

I’m telling you, kids movies have it figured out. Take a minute and think through a handful of kids movies and the themes they have. Peter Pan, Christmas movies, Mary Poppins, so many of them, especially around the holidays, focus on “just believe”. 'Don’t focus on the how or the why, just believe that something good is meant to be, just trust the magic. And the kids do it! I know so many adults that feel a sense of longing for that child like wonder, and carefree attitude. As adults we get bogged down by responsibility and expectation, and feel there is no time for wonder. But the answer to our stress is exactly that! These movies have been telling us for years, just believe, what would happen if we did just that? What would happen if we opened ourselves up to the highest good that the universe has waiting for us? It sounds a bit scary because it feels as though we are giving up control somehow, but you can’t view it has giving up control, it can’t be viewed as a battle between you and the universe.

Each of our lives is in partnership with the universe (or God or mother nature, or any other name you give to the power higher than yourself). Just as in kids movies, everyone must work together to make the good happen, everyone needs to believe that the universe has our highest good in mind and be willing to accepting the good it is always trying to show us. Allow yourself the child like freedom of being open to the good.

Healing takes listening

In recent years there has been much more focus on “being heard” and being “seen”, and for good reason. When we feel that someone actually hears us or actually sees us for who we are or what we are experiencing, it validates that experience or feeling. We feel relief with that validation, like yes someone is getting it!

Now lets flip this to our bodies. Our bodies are always talking to us, through all sorts of ways. It can be sore muscles when we have worked out, it can be tense shoulders when we are under too much stress, or tummy troubles when we are nervous for something. Our bodies speak and feel, but are we listening, or are we just brushing off what it says because we are too busy to deal with it? I would venture to guess we often treat our bodies as if it’s a nagging person- yeah yeah I heard you, I’ll get to it! But more often than not you don’t get to it, and the nagging gets louder, and then you are just annoyed by it more, and the cycle goes on.

Now imagine if you could listen to your body as if it were a child in need of care? If a child is hurt or needs help, we will often get quiet, get down on their level and listen to what the problem is. We want the child to feel heard and supported so that they will continue to trust us with their care.

This is somatic work. We learn tools to take the time to get quiet and listen to what our bodies are saying as if it’s a child. If we treat our bodies like the nagging person, our bodies don’t stop nagging, they just start talking louder which is often in the form of disease and injury. If we can treat our bodies like the innocent child in need of help, we listen and validate the feelings it expresses, our bodies will feel seen and heard. And when your body feels the relief of being seen and heard, that is called self healing, and it is beautiful.

Luck

The problem with feeling lucky is it means that a part of you doesn’t feel you belong. I was watching a show with my kids, and one of the characters made this statement and it has echoed in my mind for days now. Luck is always thought of as something magical and a thing to be envious of, and maybe this is why. If you flat out earn something, you feel that you fully deserve it, you can embrace it because you worked for it. If you feel luck was involved at all, I wonder does that take away some of that satisfaction?

As I look back on times I have felt “lucky” there was absolutely a sense of instability to it. Like how did I get so lucky to have this thing or do this thing, I also very much felt the weight of worry for when it may be taken away. I think we also use luck as a way to discredit others’ accomplishments. If we say “oh she is so lucky that happened to her” aren’t we kind of saying “yes great for her, but maybe she doesn’t really deserve it.”?

I do think that there is an element of luck that floats about the world, or perhaps you can call it fate. Certain things are meant for certain people. But I also very much believe that this physical world has trained many of us to close ourselves off to possibilities, and therefore close ourselves to this luck. We are inundated constantly by advertising and social media, telling us what we should want. What if we allowed ourselves to open our minds and hearts to what the universe has in store for us specifically? Life is not a one size fits all model, it is a blank canvas experience that each of us have been given, and each of us has the ability to influence. Perhaps that is when luck steps in, when we allow ourselves to open up to the possibilities for our specific life. And perhaps that is why it feels so much as though we don’t belong when it happens, because so much outside influence constantly tells us we must fit a certain mold, but our true selves know that we cannot all possibly fit the same model. What a boring world exerience that would be if we were all the same.