I experience chronic overstimulation as shards of glass piercing my invisible skin. Ongoing lack of rest causes cringe-worthy crankiness, annoying impatience, and the little things to feel like big things. Overwhelm is a familiar daily experience. I felt uncomfortably numb during most of my teenage years and drank the same cultural kool-aid to be inhumanely productive during my academic years. Early motherhood was an energetic nightmare, filled with months of sleep torture, needing to talk myself through red and green lights to get home safely, and feeling like I was playing the starring role in "Groundhog Day." The love for my son was, and is, mama bear strong AND I became an unrecognizable version of myself.

It's not complicated. As an energetically sensitive soul, when I do not experience sufficient sleep, downtime, and restoration, I do not feel like my Self.

I have experienced disconnect, despair, and doubt of ever feeling like myself again. I have felt cut off from the neck down and attempted to live from the neck up. I have numbed, self-medicated, been lost, dazed, and confused. I know the dark night of the soul.

(EXHALE, INHALE...)

Fortunately, I also know what bliss, ecstasy, and divine grace feels like in every cell of my body. I am blessed by my love of singing and dancing like no one is watching my whole life; embodied acts of self-expression. Even when I was I hanging on by a teensy thread, my inner pilot flame stayed lit enough to propel an unwavering knowing that there is more to life than "this." I just had to find my way back...

When I stumbled across the concepts of having a highly sensitive nervous system (HSP, Dr. Elaine Aron) and being an empath (Dr. Judith Orloff), life made sense. I now understood why I can be soothed by sunlight reflecting off morning dew, don't watch certain movies, turned off the news years ago as an act of self-care, and must walk in nature every day. I joke with my husband that I'm a cheap date - I don't need alot of stuff; an al fresco picnic outside in a pretty place is perfect!

I bowed down with respect to the natural wiring of my body's design. I had been a massage therapist. movement facilitator, and student of multiple holistic modalities - a body geek - for over 10 years at this point, so I had developed a deep reverence for the body. This helped me to unhook from the matrix - the disconnected, disembodied, and dehumanizing pace of the world. How my body works, and how I feel as a result, is the truth of my inner experience. Just is. No apology necessary. Looking out into the collective (un)consciousness of the world, I knew I could never "keep up," so I set myself free.

As a body geek, I continue to learn about the magnificent design of my sacred vessel, so I can feel more at home in it. More recently, I've deepened my understand of the nervous system with various trauma education, including Dr. Stephen Porges' perspective on polyvagal theory. I also dive deeper into energy medicine which is what I believe to be the inevitable future of health, wellness, and healing.

I used to feel like I was living inside a giant pinball machine, being energetically knocked around at the mercy of external forces. I tolerated "fine," put up with mediocrity, and forgot that I was a human with choices. Now, more often than not, I practice a restorative lifestyle, nervous system regulation, and honor the wisdom of my body.

Although my body-centered education is unique to my path, my fierce love insistence that every body remembers their natural divine human experience is universal.

EASE is your birthright. Take it back.