Rewilding Wellness: Decoding Your Body's Hidden Wisdom

Episode #222: Rewilding Wellness: Decoding Your Body's Hidden Wisdom 

Listen on iTunes HERE
Listen on Spotify HERE
YouTube HERE

Welcome back to A Joy To Be Me! My 5 year anniversary of the podcast is February 14th. The version of me that started this podcast has evolved significantly. While it's still a joy to be me, that joy has immensely deepened as I've stepped more fully into my true self. The past five years have been challenging in ways I can't fully describe, but as they say, breakdown often leads to breakthrough.

I've experienced a change in identity and my entire way of being, allowing me to become more of my authentic self, grow in awareness, and build resilience.

In episode 14 Open up to your amazing beautiful life - in the heart of the lockdowns, I chatted with Michale Chatam, we discussed the importance of 'being' - how you exist in your body, how you live, move, breathe, and simply BE. If how you've learned to be isn't aligned with your truest self, if you've been conditioned to be someone you're not or to do things in ways that don't resonate with you, that misalignment becomes the environment you exist within. It shows up in your body in symptoms and ways that may be confusing or frustrating but it’s your bodys way of getting your attention. 

Remember my first episode about getting your spark back? I talked about pursuing pleasure just for the sheer joy of it - that yummy joy! That message is more relevant than ever as we continue this journey of self-discovery and alignment.

As I dive into today's topic, I invite you to reflect on your own journey of being. How has your understanding of yourself evolved? Are you living in alignment with your truest self?

Before I dive into the heart of today's episode, I want to quickly remind you about a valuable resource I've created. It's all about one of the most crucial minerals for our health - magnesium. My Magic of Magnesium Starter Kit! This mineral helps give us our spark, our energy, and our ability to regulate stress and so so much more. 

Now, magnesium has been a hot topic in the holistic health space for the past five years, but I have a different perspective on how to address it. I used to believe, based on common advice, that we couldn't get enough magnesium through food alone. However, I've come to realize that this view further disconnects us from nature and the benefits of whole foods.

It's crucial to remember that no mineral works in isolation - not in our bodies, and certainly not in a pill, powder, or potion. We shouldn't treat our body's main building blocks like drugs in isolation.

In light of this, I've put together a training and guide with practical tips and some of my best magnesium-rich recipes. These recipes don't just focus on magnesium but provide a robust symphony of minerals. As a bonus, I've included my special chocolate nut fruit bark recipe - a perfect healthy treat for those celebrating Valentine's Day.

The starter kit also include for any of you interested in diving deeper and working with me, I'm offering a $50 discount code for my HTMA services to new clients. This offer is available only until the end of February 2025, so be sure to check it out in the show notes if you haven't already.

Now, let's get into today's episode! 

I want to share a story with you today that I haven't shared publicly before. It's about an experience I had years ago 2017 or 2018 that deeply influenced my current approach to health and healing.

A while back I wanna say 2013 or 2014 before I found HTMA, I had been working with a practitioner who helped me see my body in new ways offering support that really made a difference using a type of kinesiology different from what I had learned in my nutrition training and at the time I had not yet mastered muscle testing on myself plus she was an herbalist - she helped reignite my love for herbs … anyway she moved away and in the back of my mind I was hoping to find someone like her again

Years later my friend Brian Hoyer came to town to visit and he had learned a modality similar to what that practitioner used - we had a session and worked really well together - he would test things on me and I would give him additional feedback on each thing he would then retest it with better questions or more targeted locations and get even more clarity.

[ Check. out the episode I did with Brian: Practical Solutions for EMF Protection ] 

I was so overjoyed about this experience it clarified to me what I knew about my body while showing me some blind spots if you will or areas I could deepen or support better -so his wisdom paired with mine resulted in a much better outcome. That experience led me to look again for someone in my area who I could go to when I needed help seeing what I wasn’t currently able to see on my own so I could pivot . . .

So when I heard about another practitioner in my town using a similar modality, I was excited to set up an appointment, curious to see if it could be something supportive for me. 

However, the experience was far from what I had hoped for. The new practitioner, a man, didn't listen to me. He didn't make me feel supported. In fact, the stress of not being heard was so intense that my body had an allergic response. My body didn't feel safe.

What happened was I went in knowing some of the modality and my past experience of it as well as some questions, concerns and curiosities about how it would work if I chose to move forward. I wasn’t given much of a chance to express those things as the person launched into how our time would go - with a very inflated ego and controlling personality - essentially taking the position of the expert authority being completely dismissive of me  and my own expertise on my situation and body.

The entire experience I was very uncomfortable and the testing he did on my body didn’t reveal very much likely because I was very guarded - at the end he told me a huge protocol and he’d need to see me a bunch of times yada yada - I tried yet again to be heard but all he did was call me out on my resistance to his recommendations. I suddenly started having a really bad allergic response, one I was familiar with - as if some toxic scent had just been released like a bomb (think of walking into bath and body works here or a room full of those disgusting scented plugins).  .

Now after I left the appointment I got in my car in the parking lot, and texted Bryan about this experience - and I said it was as if I was having an allergic reaction to the entire experience and he concurred. Thankfully he completely understood and I was able to process it with him.

This was when my gut was still leaky and I was still living in a house with a water damaged basement too so I was much more hypersensitive -so emotional stress can hit the gut as a stress-your intestines are supposed to be selectively permeable - my microbial ecosystem was not able to help me have strong boundaries - the now version of me would have likely interviewed the person in advance and never gone to the appt. 

It took me years to truly understand what was at the heart of that experience  .  . . 

This experience brought to the surface one of my deepest core wounds: the feeling that no one was listening to me, that no one believed me or heard me. It echoed my childhood experiences of feeling unsupported in being myself or expressing myself without being silenced.

This incident was a valuable teaching moment for me, I learned through something that didn’t work - and in part I think it was more valuable than if it had.

It made me realize how crucial it is to create a safe, supportive environment for healing. It's why I practice the way I do today. It’s also valuable to point out that finding something that doesn’t work or someone one not aligned with us is just as valuable as finding something that does - I believe we can always learn more about our own deepest truth to know what will work better when we find something that doesn’t work. It’s just feedback and it’s valuable too. 

You see, we all learn through patterns and experiences that repeat themselves. When we don't have the right resources to deal with stressors effectively, our bodies create patterns to cope.

Think about all the times in your life when you couldn't respond to a stressor in a fully healing manner. Those experiences accumulate, potentially leading to chronic health issues that disrupt your daily life.

To address these issues, we need to understand some of the reasons why we're here, but not all at once - that would be overwhelming. The pace needs to be appropriate so that your nervous system feels safe. Until you feel safe enough, you'll stay in a cycle of fear or avoidance (freeze). 

This is why I believe it's so important to follow the body - it will show you what's at the core of your chronic issues. While many practitioners focus on finding root causes, I believe it's equally important to address the environment of those roots. Otherwise, you'll keep digging for different causes without seeing lasting change.

As a practitioner, I can discuss many potential root causes, but the most valuable thing I can do is listen intently to each individual. By understanding their unique context, I can provide guidance that not only makes sense but also feels safe to them. It's crucial to reassess along the way, pivot when necessary, and address fears as they arise.

There's often a multitude of actions we could take, but what truly matters is what we will do consistently. The key to forming lasting habits lies in learning to tune into our body's cues and hear the messages it's trying to convey. This involves revisiting emotions or stressors we didn't properly address in the past, allowing us to process them now and release the resonance of those memories, stories, or situations we've been carrying.

This deeper work is what builds lasting resilience. As we face and process old stressors, we become better equipped to handle new challenges. We develop the ability to allow old issues to surface and be dealt with, rather than letting them grow and fester like a metaphorical or literal cancer.

This approach recognizes that healing isn't just about following a protocol or interpreting lab results. It's about releasing emotional and physical stress trapped in the body. As we provide our bodies with better inputs, we begin to release this stored stress. However, this process can be uncomfortable, and we may resist it or fall back into old patterns.

 That's why I emphasize creating a new internal environment. We're not just treating symptoms; we're regenerating ourselves. As the saying goes, 'Healing is 10% doing the work and 90% learning to listen to your body and give it what it actually needs.'

This is where the real work lies - learning to listen to our bodies and trust their wisdom. Unfortunately, many of us weren't taught this crucial skill by our parents, teachers, or even health practitioners. My role is to guide you in developing this essential ability, empowering you to become the expert on your own health and well-being.

As Carl Jung wisely said, "Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate." This insight is particularly relevant to health and healing. Even though the body has the capacity to heal itself, it's often our unconscious mind and unresolved emotions that create the biggest obstacles, resulting in most of our frustration and suffering on the path to wellness.

I also believe we all have a lot of re-educating to do. We need to learn what truly constitutes a healthy environment for our human biology. Due to our disconnection from nature and exposure to a society not conducive to optimal human health, we've lacked this fundamental knowledge for most of our lives.

When we approach health with the heart of a learner, feeling safer and more secure within ourselves, we become more resilient and willing to venture further than we have before. This is why I teach the fundamentals to all my clients through an online program, complemented by weekly check-in emails.

If you want to build lasting health, you need support in creating strong foundations. It's about more than just addressing symptoms or following a prescribed protocol. It's about understanding your body as a whole, reconnecting with nature, and creating an environment - both internally and externally - that supports true wellness. 

Moving forward, we need to embrace a more holistic approach to health. This concept of holism isn't new, but it's something that has been largely lost in modern times, especially in Western culture. Holism recognizes that the universe, and particularly living nature, is best understood in terms of interacting wholes that are more than just the sum of their parts. In health terms, it means treating the complete person, not just isolated symptoms or body parts.

You might intellectually understand this concept, but putting it into practice and truly embodying it is a whole different story. It requires a shift in perspective and a commitment to seeing yourself as a complete, interconnected system rather than a collection of separate issues or symptoms.

By combining education, personalized support, and a focus on building resilience through this holistic lens, we can work together to not just treat health issues, but to fundamentally transform your relationship with your body and your health. This approach empowers you to become an active participant in your healing journey, equipped with the knowledge and tools to maintain vibrant health for the long term.

It's about recognizing that every aspect of your life - your physical health, your emotional well-being, your environment, your relationships, your beliefs - all interact and influence each other. By addressing your health from this whole-person perspective, we can create more comprehensive, lasting changes that support your overall wellness.

This holistic approach isn't always easy in our fragmented, fast-paced world. But it's a powerful way to reclaim your health and vitality, aligning more closely with the interconnected nature of our bodies and the world around us.

This is part of why I am rebranding my podcast from A Joy To Be Me- to:
Rewilded Wellness 

I’ll do a whole episode on what that means more in depth in March - in episode 124
Rewilding vs Biohacking [ voltage from nature comes first ] is when I began bringing this up on the podcast in case you want to check that out.

Rewilding simply stated is : looking to our natural world to reconnect to ways of living that are more in sync with our human biology.

In order to understand ourselves better and understand why we are in a collective health crisis with chronic health issues so we can create better ways to approach our recovery - we have to see the 30,000 foot view -we have to get context. . .

Let's take a moment to recap what I mean by the '30,000 foot view' of our collective health crisis. Imagine you're in an airplane, looking down at a vast landscape. From that height, you can see patterns and connections that aren't visible from the ground. Similarly, when we step back and look at our health issues from a broader perspective, we start to see how various factors - our environment, our lifestyle, our societal structures - all interconnect to create the health challenges we face today.

We're not just dealing with individual symptoms or diseases. We're looking at a systemic issue that affects millions of people. This view helps us understand that our personal health struggles are often part of a larger pattern, influenced by factors beyond our immediate control.

Now, let's dive a bit deeper into what I mean by 'deconditioning from the narratives of the paradigm we're in.' We've all grown up in a society with certain beliefs about health, wellness, and how our bodies should function. These beliefs shape our actions, our expectations, and even how we interpret our body's signals.

For example, we might believe that a quick fix or a magic pill should solve our health issues. Or we might think that pushing through fatigue and stress is normal and even admirable. These are narratives - stories we've been told and have internalized about how health and our bodies work.

Deconditioning means recognizing these narratives for what they are - not absolute truths, but constructs of our current paradigm. It means questioning these beliefs and being open to new perspectives that might align more closely with our body's natural wisdom and the rhythms of the natural world.

This process isn't about rejecting all modern medical knowledge. Instead, it's about expanding our understanding, integrating traditional wisdom with current science, and being willing to challenge assumptions that might not serve our health in the long run.

Deconditioning is a journey. It involves unlearning ingrained habits and thought patterns, which can be uncomfortable at times. But it's also incredibly liberating. As we shed these limiting narratives, we open ourselves up to new possibilities for healing and vitality.

Remember, this broader perspective and the process of deconditioning aren't about adding more stress or overwhelm to your life. They're tools to help you understand your health journey in a wider context, empowering you to make choices that truly support your well-being."

We need to learn to become our own body gurus, trusting our intuition while acknowledging our blind spots - even though we are all the experts on our bodies or can be, we all have unconscious patterns that can be hard to see for a variety of reasons. The key is finding allies and partnerships with those who allow us to remain the expert on our body while also benefiting us from outside wisdom and different perspectives we hadn't considered as well as having a different knowledge base than we do.

If that sounds good - stick around . . .I think rewilding ourselves and our wellness will help us learn this-  we have so much to talk about the last 5 years has only been the warmup. 

If you are currently looking for a practitioner to support you in a healing journey dealing with chronic health challenges and my words today resonated with you - you can learn more about how you and I can work together: right now I am taking new HTMA clients into my HTMA consultation with an online program offer: HERE. 

As I continue to deepen my nutritional journey and rewild myself, part of this process has been returning to nature's wisdom and incorporating it into my approach. By focusing on minerals and supporting my microbiome, while also reconnecting with the natural world, I find myself unraveling layers of conditioning, emotions, and mindset. This holistic process has profoundly impacted my spiritual well-being, allowing me to become more of my true self.

Nutrition, especially when aligned with nature's principles, has been a powerful gateway, opening doors I never knew existed and helping me become more whole in mind, body, and soul. It's amazing how returning to the fundamentals of what our bodies truly need can catalyze such deep, transformative change.

I'm excited to delve deeper into these topics in future episodes. There's so much more to explore and share with you all about how we can harness nature's wisdom in our health journeys. Until then, take care of yourselves, stay curious about your health, and remember - you're more than just a collection of symptoms. You're a beautifully complex, interconnected being with the innate capacity to heal and thrive.

Thank you for listening. Until next time, be well and stay connected to the wisdom of nature . . .