Aim for Wellness:

Integrative Healing as a Targeted Holistic Approach

Last week, I wrote about why I believe in my work, why you matter, and why personal change is more valuable than ever given the state of the world today – divided, turbulent, and fast-paced.

I shared that my vision for Ignite Wellness is to affect personal change because, when you change yourself, the outside world changes with you.

This week, I’d like to share why integrating yoga therapy, hypnosis, and energy healing for wellness is a targeted holistic approach, and why that's important.

First, let’s address the holistic part:

Wellness and illness do not exist in a vacuum.

We’re affected by all sorts of personal and lifestyle factors – thought patterns, emotions, genetics, age, gender, sleep hygiene, dietary habits, relationships, the nature of our job, daily responsibilities, our living environment, intergenerational trauma, family dynamics, the medicine we take and the side effects they have, and the list goes on.

We can see the impact of these factors all around us. Perhaps it can be more challenging to connect the dots for our own lives because we’re so in it, but I’m sure we can see them at play in our loved ones.

Take for example, the friend who has breast cancer who is responsible for caring for an elderly parent with Alzheimer's, is also on the brink of divorce, and working a job that she hates but must keep, because she needs the money more than ever to pay her for cancer treatment. What is her mental, emotional, and physical state like, and how would that impact her treatment and prognosis?

Compare that to another breast cancer patient with a similar demographic profile, who has a strong and supportive social network who can help with her responsibilities, the resources to seek the best and newest care, and can 100% focus on her treatment and recovery. What is this patient’s mental, emotional, and physical state like, and how would that impact her treatment and prognosis?

I realize that this is a simplistic and perhaps extreme example. It also highlights how unfair life can be. However, my point still stands, which is: whether we like our current circumstances or not, and no matter how unfair we feel our situation may be, the kind of life we lead affects our well-being. Who we are affects our wellness. How we think and feel about our lives matter, and how we think and feel is reflected in mind, body, breath, and energy.

If we neglect to consider all of these other factors in our treatment or healthcare plan, we shortchange ourselves of the opportunity to optimize our well-being, to make changes in ourselves, and our lives for the better. It’s missing the forest for the trees.

Perhaps the first woman in the example above can't do much to change her external circumstances. However, when we look the context of her challenges from a holistic lens, there's a lot we can do to change her inner state, to help her face her external conditions with more ease. There may be a bit of a time lag, but changing the inner eventually will reflect changes in her outer circumstances as well.

By using a holistic approach, we realize we have more control and influence over our health and our lives on a daily basis, beyond just taking meds, going to chemo, or having surgery. We have more levers to pull. This is why a thorough consultation is important, so you and I together, can see what you're going through in a deeper and broader context.

It's a bit like putting a jigsaw puzzle together with the individual pieces representing the factors of your life, the connection of those pieces as the dynamic created between those factors, and the big picture as your overall quality of life. The individual puzzle pieces are important, as are the interaction of those pieces, as well as the end result.

If the end result - meaning your current quality of life - is one where you're unhappy, there's a sense of underlying uneasiness or anxiety, or you're in some sort of physical, mental, or emotional pain, some piece(s) of the puzzle no longer fit. Or, like what I experienced in my life, I realized I wanted a different puzzle altogether. It's time to look within with curiosity to figure it out. 

When I was younger, I wasted so much time sulking in the unfairness of my circumstances. What I would tell my younger self now having come out on the other side with dare I say, some self-awareness and growth, is that the more you feel like you’re a victim, the more you’re being called to claim your personal power. It is in invitation to stand up, not lie down.

On the other side, the more you’re in a position of privilege, the more you’re invited to engage and live as fully and authentically as possible, not for selfish means or to satisfy your own ego, but to help lift others up so they too, can experience abundance. 

Now, onto the targeted part of the equation:

Being holistic doesn’t mean we have no end goal. It’s so important to have a vision. A compelling one that entices you to take action, that pulls you forward, to overcome the resistance of not doing anything at all.

I think it’s worth repeating that having a vision is not so we’ll worry about achieving it or whether we might fail. Forget if your brain tells you your vision is far-fetched and ridiculous. We only feel that way because years of conventional education and traditional corporate environments conditioned us to think that way. 

A grand vision gets us to move forward. I know this from my own personal experience – we get farther with a big, audacious goal, than a small one where we just play it safe and tick the box. 

Once we’re inspired to move, then we can think about reverse engineering and setting little milestones as checkpoints. The checkpoints are not meant for us to berate ourselves if we're not as far along as we'd like; they are points of exploration and assessing whether we are still moving forward, or if the vision has shifted. If it has, we make a simple shift in direction and see how that unfolds. 

Just like anything else in this life, if we suffocate the very thing we want by controlling it, clinging to it, and making it just so, it dies. We move forward while allowing our vision the space to breathe and we trust. Breath is life.

My point in sharing all of this is, if we want a specific outcome – wellness related, or otherwise, we have to aim. This is the most effective use of our precious time and energy.

My personalized wellness sessions that integrate yoga therapy, hypnosis, and energy healing helps you:

• Assess where you stand with a holistic lens (the puzzle and its pieces)
• Determine your big vision so you know where to aim
• Go as far as you can, as effectively as you can, on your wellness journey

In my next post, I’ll write more about point 3 so you know what makes integrating these modalities effective.

With what I've been reading, I think:

1. More personalized healthcare is on the horizon. For example, did you know your gut microbiome is as unique as your fingerprint? I hope one day soon, we’re going to have affordable access to gut microbiome assessments so we can have very customized solutions to optimize gut health. We now know that gut health is foundational for overall health with wide-ranging implications.
2. There will be increased interest in healthspan. Global life expectancy is predicted to increase nearly 5 years by 2050. (source: Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation). What are we doing to increase our healthspan – the number of years that we’re healthy and active? I’m much more interested in increasing quality of life than simply having a longer life, and I suspect there are others interested in the same. 5 years perhaps may not seem like much, but think about living an extra 5 years in poor health. 

We don’t have to have to put off wellness to the future. We can start personalizing wellness today, by integrating holistic modalities, customized for you and targeted for your compelling vision.

If you’re ready to aim, let me know.