Everyone has experienced trauma in some form. I often talk about trauma as capital “T” TRAUMA and lowercase “t” trauma. Capital “T” TRAUMA can be classified as the kind of trauma that might spring to mind when you hear the word trauma: [Read more…] about Do You (and your Immune System) Carry the Effects of Intergenerational Trauma?
Everyone has experienced trauma. Trauma can be experienced as physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. Research tells us that the physical kind is much easier to recover from than the other three types. We don’t constantly relive our physical trauma in the same way we do our mental, emotional, and spiritual traumas. Physical trauma does not have as much of a conditioning response on our future behavior either.
[Read more…] about How Trauma Affects Your Brain and Your Behavior Patterns(and How to Change all of it)
What Is a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP?
The term “highly sensitive person” (HSP) is used to describe people who have a sensitive nervous system that responds to physical, emotional, or social stimuli in a faster and more pronounced way than someone who isn’t as sensitive. [Read more…] about The Highly Sensitive Person and Autoimmune Disease
Buddhist psychology provides an elegant way of tracking the mental and emotional worlds and how these intersect with the physical plane. Fear and shame are not considered or labeled necessarily “bad” emotions. In fact, it is taught that if you do not feel shame for harming another, you are at higher risk for repeating the action that could potentially create negative karma. The same goes for fear. We must stay in touch with a certain level of fear that we might cause suffering for another or others. This is meant to motivate us to continually hold each other as loving and luminous beings who are all worthy of compassion and loving kindness. WOW! This feels to me like the antidote for what ails us as a society today.
Buddhist philosophy goes on to identify eight great fears. The eight great fears each have an inner and an outer aspect (microcosm and macrocosm) to how they show up. They each have different rot causes and conditions for arising that are secondary to destructive emotions that are cultivated as a result of attachment, aversion and ignorance; or the three poisons that keep us cycling through an existence that includes suffering. The outer fears come from dangers we believe threaten our property, life, or loved ones and the inner fears cause spiritual endangerment because of the negative karma they can engender through actions that cause us to turn away from treating each other with loving kindness and compassion.
The way these Eight Great Fears are described are as both inner and outer aspects:
1 . Attachment (inner)- Drowning (outer)
Fear comes from the greatest attachment we as humans have, which is to the self or to “I”. This is the largest source of suffering for us. When we believe we are threatened we suffer. And yet, this “I” is actually a projection on a screen. We are not our roles, our bodies, our lives even. We are actually each an emanation of light that emerges from the joy of creation.
The second greatest attachment is to “my”, such as “my daughter”, “my husband”, “my car”, “my house”, “my image”, “my reputation”, and so on and on and on. When the “I” and “my” are perceived as in danger, the ego alarm bells go off and we start to fight, flee, freeze, or faint. The more possessions, power, and perceived purpose we have in this world, the more we will feel like we are drowning in our attachments. COVID has given each of us an opportunity to really contemplate this attachment issue. The greatest attachment we are getting up front and personal with is our desire to have control, to know the outcome, to survive. Fear is generated when we feel “out of control” or like we are losing all we have become attached to. This kind of fear can feel very much like drowning.
2. Wrong Views (inner)- Thieves (outer)
The reason wrong views are pictured as thieves is because they steal contentment, peace, and equanimity.
If you have the view that reality is only what you can see, feel, hear, smell, or taste then you will suffer when you lose those sensations because you will have the view that you (the “I”) is disappearing and this will create a great deal of fear.
Each of the remaining inner aspects will create its own unique brand of fear that then has an outer symbol or archetype that can serve as a reminder as we travel the road of life.
3. Pride (inner)- Lions (outer)
4. Jealousy and Envy (inner)- Snakes (outer)
5. Anger and Hatred (inner)- Fire (outer)
6. Doubt (inner)- Demons (outer)
7. Greed or miserliness (inner)- Chains (outer)
8. Ignorance (inner)- Elephant (outer)
So, what is the solution? I have found the simple, yet beautiful Practice of Tonglen meditation helps to center me when I am tangled in my attachments, wrong views, pride, jealousy, anger, doubt, greed, or ignorance. HERE is a detailed description of this beautiful practice by Pema Chodron.
What causes an autoimmune brain? Remember the Freedom Framework I use to reverse autoimmune disease (in myself and my patients)? The Freedom Framework is the methodology I use to solve the health challenges we are all presented with throughout life. Given that we are all unique, we are all different puzzles. However, there are four corner pieces to each puzzle that will help us anchor in the rest of the puzzle. These are actually also the root causes for what causes an autoimmune brain. They all have to be addressed if the combination of infection, inflammation and immune dysregulation are going to be reversed. The four corner pieces of every health puzzle are:
The autoimmune brain is not hard to fix, but first it must be identified. Schedule a Discovery Call with my team to learn more about how I can help you find the right diagnosis and personalize your treatment plan so that you can attain reversal in your disease. Reach out and make an appointment so we can help you get to the root and treat from the root causes if you find that you are suffering from:
I have come to think of all of the challenges life brings as opportunities for growth. We don’t always love our “opportunities,” nor do we always love our teachers. However, if we think of life as what I call a “spiritual gymnasium,” we know that our challenges are the resistance training program we bought a membership for when we came to life here on planet earth. When these challenges involve emotional hurts, betrayals, trauma, and abuse, I call them “sacred wounds.” [Read more…] about Are You A Lightning Rod For Sacred Wounds?
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