Discover you  

Finding how you do you 

Self-discovery is a path we must all undertake if we want to live more consciously and ultimately be more loving.  Some people don’t initiate taking that first step of self-discovery until something catastrophic happens such as a life threatening illness, death of a loved one or an unexpected derailing of their life plan.  Often if life feels like its going pretty good and there is no major chaos a person may not have the push, impetus or awareness that there is more to discover.

This is why illness and unexpected life events are amazing catalysts for transformation and learning more of who and what one truly is.  Unfortunately people go into “crisis” mode and try to fix or restore themselves and their life to what it previously was, instead of accepting what is present in their life now and reorganizing.  They continue to try and repair, often at the expense of everything, rather than allow the “disruption” to be the disruption it is meant to be.

Finding how you do you is a process of discovering how YOU operate and navigate life.  Most of us learn our life strategies when we are quite young and don’t evaluate whether or not they are really working for us.  We just live under the basic, unconscious assumption that the way we are is simply the way we are and don’t consider that we could be different.  Discovering more of you requires that you have ways to access more of yourself even when an imminent crisis is not present.

Your body as your resource

Discover yourself through your body

Most people prefer not to wait until a crisis presents itself to get clearer on who they are and how they operate, though unfortunately most people do.  Sometimes that is the way that your lessons need to come, but fortunately there are ways to discover more about yourself outside of crisis.

The first level of care in Network is all about self-discovery, in fact we call it the ‘Season of Discover’.  You learn how you’ve unconsciously defended or protected yourself from pain or hurt and how that has kept you separate and not fully  engaged with your life.

The body is a store house of unconscious thoughts, feelings, and belief patterns.  When you learn the skill of connecting to yourself through your body (like in SRI stage 1) you discover that sometimes how your body moves (or doesn’t move) and the sensations and feelings in a part of your body are very different than how you consciously think about yourself and your life.  In this way the body begins to show you that what is happening in your conscious  mind is different than how your body is expressing.  This is how you begin to learn more information about yourself and how you do you.

Your network entrainments also do a similar thing but work more at the nervous system level.  The light touches of level one care cue the frontal part of your brain (which is where your conscious awareness is activated) to pay attention to how the body is holding itself and how it is breathing or not breathing.  As your brain starts to “wake up” or pay attention to how you are holding yourself in your body the breath will start to move up your spine and you may notice your body wanting to shift positions on the table to find a better way to hold itself.

These things can seem subtle at first and perhaps not significant, but they are HUGELY SIGNIFICANT for the functioning of your nervous system and your ability to begin to tune into yourself on deeper and deeper levels without needing massive crisis to get you to pay attention.  This is not always the easiest journey as change in thought, feeling and action is typically necessary, however, it is liberating and often the first time you really have choice in how you show up in your life.  You become the creator and writer of your own story and life and therefore find inner freedom to be in full participation with life.

Dr. Amanda Hessel, Chiropractor, Network Spinal Analysis & Somato-Respiratory Integration, Boulder, Colorado