I’ve been fascinated by personal growth my entire life. Having been raised in a family of healers, I’ve been immersed in healing for as long as I can remember. I did breathwork when I was 5, started practicing transcendental meditation when I was 6, did a firewalk when I was 7, and have been using homeopathy since I was 8. Energy healers, nutritional medicine, and awareness practices have been more common in my life than conventional medicine and psychotherapy.

But still I suffered.

Having access to a multitude of alternative therapies was useful in that I didn’t utilize suppressive medication to deny the messages from my body. I didn’t suppress my vital force or ignore the wholeness of being. I was treated with holistic approaches that viewed me as a whole person–connected in mind, body, and spirit.

Unfortunately, these approaches didn’t help me when it came to the constant self-loathing I endured or the safety strategies I used in relationships. I didn’t understand why I suffered so badly, and I desperately wanted to find my way out of the pattern.

Now that I’ve rediscovered my essential self, I can see that the reason that my pain seemed perpetual and endless is clear: I oriented toward my pain in an unconscious attempt to find safety.

Aligned with the essence of who I am, guiding people out of their old painful patterns and ways of being in the world is my most cherished honor.

Here are 5 Reasons Why You Suffer:

1.) You believe your pain is who you are…it’s become your identity.

The core of your pain stems from early trauma and attachment wounds. This means that the presence of certain misbeliefs got started early on in life. For the majority of your life you’ve held ideas about yourself, the world, and others. And you believed that these thoughts were real. That reality exists in your mind. It may seem like this is just the way you are. But that’s not true. What is true is that this is just the way you were shaped. Who you are is so much bigger and brighter and fuller than this old pain.

How can you heal this pattern?

Get to know these patterns intimately. Mapping out your inner world, getting to know the mask of your conditioned self intimately, is essential in differentiating from the pain and misbeliefs. Since it can be hard to see ourselves in isolation to others, look around you and see what the universe is reflecting back to you. Be curious. Then, stop doing the conditioned behavior. Even if you’re not sure what else to do. Just stop. This empowers you to take your power back from these patterns and cultivate an identity with your True Self.

2.) You think that if other people were different, you could be at peace.

When you blame other people for your pain, frustration, and so on, you are giving our power away. This is a slippery way to not look at yourself, to not see what is being reflected back to you from the universe. You play the victim and stay completely unaware of your own patterns and pain body when you put the responsibility of your experience onto others.
Empowered with conscious choice, you are a victim to no one.

How can you heal this pattern?

Keep your side of the street clean. Once you differentiate from your attachment wounds and trauma, you can full own your responsibility in all of your interactions. Instead of letting your mind look to others as your source of pain or bliss, you begin to turn toward yourself. You know what you’re available for. You know what the deeper aspect of your experience is. And you can fully own responsibility for everything you feel and think. This is freedom. This is essential for true intimacy to transpire.

3.) You disown parts of yourself.

As an emotionally intelligent human being, you know that all of your feelings are important. You know that your shadow is an important part of your inner world. And you know how to move through these feelings and claim your shadow with dignity. However, all of us are conditioned to disown are “negative” thoughts and feelings. We’re taught to present an acceptable face to the world and to bypass the more challenging parts of our subjective experience. When you disown parts of yourself, you perpetuate a fragmented state and keep giving your power to your distortion. You suffer when we disenfranchise any aspect of yourself.

How can you heal this pattern?

Claim your shadow and your emotions. Once you differentiate from your attachment wounds and trauma, you cultivate an identity with your True Self. From this wise expansive place, you stand in your sovereignty and take full responsibility for yourself. And it is here that you can turn toward yourself, love the parts of yourself that are in pain, being gentle to your human experience. You can integrate. You can move old energy. You can transform old misbeliefs. And you can begin to interact with the world from your wholeness.

To learn more, read my new book Reveal: Embody the True Self Beyond Trauma and Conditioning or contact me for a consultation at www.HarmonyKwiker.com

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