What if . . .

by Bindu Johnson | Oct 20, 2023 | Care of the Body, Care of the Mind, Expression, Healthy Living, Self Care, Self Love, Spirituality

What if . . . ???

For those of us who are challenged with fibromyalgia and other chronic illness, we can feel like a victim to our circumstances. We might fight the illness and the symptoms and want them to go away. That is perfectly natural and normal.

Consider for a moment that there might be a higher possibility. What if having fibromyalgia or another chronic illness is a wake-up call. An opportunity to look beyond the illness to underlying factors contributing to the illness.

This doesn’t mean that we don’t want the symptoms to go away. It does mean that rather than only treating the physical symptom, we might need to look deeper to fully rebuild our health.

The Wake Up Call

There are many possibilities that your wake up call might be asking for. Here are a few examples:

Empower yourself in a relationship that you have been giving your power to another person in an attempt to feel more loved or safe.
Let go of childhood or societal conditioning to move into a more satisfying or empowered expression of your highest potential.
Begin to love yourself more and take care of yourself rather than to give all your energy to others without taking time to rest and recharge.
Take care of your body and provide it what it needs to heal and thrive.
Heal traumas or emotional wounds that are festering inside and blocking your inner peace and fulfillment.

My wake up call:

In my case, fibromyalgia was a huge wake up call and sent me on a journey of personal and spiritual growth that has changed me completely from who I was before. I held onto a lot of repressed emotions and a lot of should’s and have to’s. I was a very weak person and would let people walk all over me. I was so desperate for love, that would stay in unhealthy relationships. I wasn’t living my truth or my full potential. Spirituality was an unknown word to me.

Today, I am a force to be reckoned with. I am strong. I own my power. I speak my truth. I have found that by loving myself, I don’t need love from outside, yet attract loving people into my life. I take great care of my body. I love the work that I do. I am content with myself and my life. I have goals that I am working toward, and yet am at peace with where I am at. My health is greatly improved.

I cringe when I think of what my life might have been like if I hadn’t broken out of the mold I was born into.

Are you ready?

If any of this resonates with you, then I congratulate you. I welcome you to this incredible journey of healing and evolution. I am here to support you in this journey.

Introspection for this week:

Take some time this week to ask within to get some ideas about what your wake up call is. Here are some questions you can contemplate:

What is your inner self reaching for?
What are your unfulfilled desires?
What success have you had in moving forward?
What is holding you back?
What are the obstacles in your way?
What support do you need?

May you reach your highest potential and live a fulfilling life.

💕Bindu

Fibromyalgia and the Pain Body Pt 1

by Bindu Johnson | Oct 6, 2023 | Care of the Body, Care of the Mind, Emotional Health, Personal Growth, Self Care, Self Love, Trauma

Fibromyalgia, Chronic Illness and the Pain Body, Part 1

The term the Pain Body was introduced by Eckhardt Tolle several years ago. The pain body is the accumulation of suppressed emotions, negative thoughts, unhealthy beliefs and destructive cellular memories within one’s body or energy field. It is what I call the Fibromyalgia Matrix. The pain body keeps us trapped in the past and interferes with our health and happiness. It blocks our ability to feel positive emotions and sabotages our attempts at creating a better life for our self.

The pain body is self-perpetuating

The pain body is like an entity in and of itself and strives to stay alive and functional. It loves conflict and drama. The conflict, drama and negative emotions triggered feeds it. The bigger the drama the greater the banquet. It will attract those situations to itself and then revels in the drama and negative emotions.

The Pain Body is a major factor in fibromyalgia.

The pain body is behind chronic depression and anxiety. Suppressed emotions give rise to the feeling of depression. When you suppress a negative emotion such as sadness, you are also suppressing the ability to feel positive emotions and end up feeling depressed.

Suppressed fearful emotions don’t go away.

Suppressed fearful emotions live within us sending a constant message of danger to the nervous system. It keeps the body in fight or flight mode, always feeling threatened and the need to fight or run away. The nervous system stays in a sympathetic (on) status and doesn’t know when or how to shut down. This give rise to insomnia, chronic fatigue and feeling crummy. When the body doesn’t get the rest it needs, it doesn’t heal, detoxify recharge and rejuvenate the body. You end up with multiple chronic symptoms with no seeming cause.

The Pain Body becomes our identity.

These patterns become so normal that we don’t differentiate between us and the pain body. You might say that we become identified with the pain body. It becomes us. It becomes our identity.

One commonality between women with fibromyalgia is that many of us feel a strong need for people to hear our pain. And we often feel defensive when others try to help us. This is the pain body talking. It wants to be heard, but it doesn’t trust others. It also has a commitment to staying alive and well in its misery . . . even though another part of you wants to be alive, happy and healthy.

Pretty nasty picture. Yet it is real. And it keeps us in a state of misery and pain. Can you relate? I sure can. I lived it for many years. I was a pro at being miserable and in pain. It is such a relief to be out of this pattern. You can too.

There is hope. You can healing the pain body.

My post next week will show the 5 stages of healing the pain body. Stay tuned.

Healing the Pain Body is an important part of rebuilding our health.

I have been asking myself this last year why I focus to much on the emotional, mental aspects of rebuilding our health. As I wrote the post, I received my answer. We can do all the right things on a physical level to rebuild our health, but without addressing the pain body, our health and especially our happiness will be compromised.

Let’s focus next year on healing the pain body!

Next year I am rolling out online group programs that will provide education, training and support in healing the pain body and the physical body. One of my goals is to make the healing work that I do available to women and men with fibromyalgia at affordable rates. The group online programs will do that.

I am working on a program that I hope to launch in January focused on resolving trauma. Stay tuned.

May you experience increasing health and vitality, 💕 Bindu

8 Keys to Enhance Health, Wellness and Wholeness

by Bindu Johnson | Aug 25, 2023 | Care of the Body, Care of the Mind, Emotional Health, Mindfulness, Personal Growth, Self Care, Self Love

Fundamentals of Health, Wellness, and Wholeness

Fibromyalgia and other chronic illnesses are challenging on many levels. We are physically compromised, emotionally out of balance, and mentally stressed. We want solutions to our pain and discomfort. We search and often the solutions come up with none or minimal results. This becomes stress on top of the stress of being ill in the first place.

What then can we do to reclaim our health and happiness . . . our wellness and ultimately wholeness?

Today’s article is focusing on what I call the Fundamental of Wholeness. These are eight important aspects to rebuilding our wellness. Below is a list of the fundamentals of wellness. They create a foundation upon which to rebuild our health, wellness and wholeness.

Awareness
Compassion
Balance
Acceptance
Introspection / Self-inquiry
Self-Responsibility.
Insights
Integration

Awareness

The ability to be self-aware. To observe our body, our mind, our emotions from a place of awareness rather than identification. In other words, to be able to observe our self objectively. We can be aware of the sensation and pain in our body, the emotions that we feel, the thought that we think. We can start with our conscious thoughts, and then delve into a deeper layer of subconscious thoughts and emotions.

Compassion

As we meet our self with awareness, compassion is a necessary ingredient. There are parts of us that we might judge or disown. By meeting our self with compassion, we can identify positive and negative experiences, emotions, thoughts, and memories. We can see the good, bad, ugly and beautiful parts of who we are. Without compassion, we may block truly seeing because we have literally and figuratively exiled parts of who we are as they are deemed unacceptable. Yet, until you can meet these parts with compassion, wholeness will continue to elude you.

Balance

Balance is at the root of health, wellness and wholeness. Everything in nature survives and thrives because of a state of balance. Your physical body has 12 homeostatic (balancing) control mechanisms that keep your body functioning and healthy. Emotionally, we need a balance of positive and negative emotions to be emotionally healthy. Mentally, we need a balance between positive thoughts and negative thoughts. A healthy optimistic attitude with a healthy dose of reality and awareness of possible difficulties. We need a balance of rest and activity, work and play, alone time and time with others. When discovering the right balance for you, health, wellness and wholeness will be the rewards.

Acceptance

Acceptance is acknowledging what is. That doesn’t mean we have to like it. It means telling the truth about what is. When we are honest about what is, we have the power to change is. If we are denying the truth, ignoring it, or pushing it out of our awareness, we are powerless to change it.

Introspection / Self-inquiry

Self-inquiry allows us to go within and discover who we are, what we think, feel, need, want, like, dislike. What are greatest joys are, what are greatest challenge are. Self-Inquiry allows us to discover internal causes of challenges and discover resolutions from within.

Insights

The process of awareness, compassion, acceptance, and introspection results in insights from within. We can see parts of our self we had previously denied. We can see how we are creating our own stress. We can see how we have given our power away. These and many more insights are available with meeting our self with awareness, compassion and acceptance.

Self-Responsibility

When I first heard the word responsibility, to me it meant self-blame. Then I heard a new definition of the word which was, “ability to respond.” The ability to respond rather than the old knee jerk reaction to any situation is a step to reclaiming our power. To look at any situation or challenge with awareness, compassion, acceptance and introspection gives us needed information and insights upon which to make internal changes or take external actions, guided from within. That is self-responsibility.

Integration

Integration happens as the new awareness’s, insights, internal shifts and responsible actions become integrated into our lives. We begin to feel more empowered in our lives. We can let go of feeling like a victim to our circumstances or feeling like the answers to our problems are outside of us. We can let go of coping mechanism and begin to let our true self shine through.

Summary:

The fundamentals of health, wellness and wholeness have the power to impact us on all levels of our being: physical, mental, emotional, energetic, spiritual and in our expression in and interaction with the world around us.

This week’s introspection:

Contemplate these fundamentals and notice which resonate with you and which don’t. Pick one or more to experiment with becoming aware of how it operates or not in your life. Remember, awareness is the foundation of all change.

May you be healthy and whole, 💗Bindu

That I Feed the Hungry

by Bindu Johnson | Aug 12, 2023 | Care of the Mind, Emotional Health, Self Care, Self Love

Food for thought.

Men and Women with fibromyalgia are kind giving souls.

Yet, do you hold yourself with the same love and caring as you do for others?

Are you able to hold the abandoned, isolated, exiled and hidden parts of yourself with love and compassion?

Can you give to yourself what was withheld by your family?

Can you ask for what you need?

Can you tend to your own needs?

May you hold your self with all the love and compassion that you provide for others.

💗Bindu

Cultivating Joy and Kindness

by Bindu Johnson | Aug 5, 2023 | Care of the Body, Care of the Mind, Emotional Health, Inspiration, Self Care, Self Love

Fibromyalgia is a devastating illness. Not only are we in pain all or most of the time, but it impacts every area of our life.

It challenges our relationships. It can limit our career and ability to express ourselves in the world. It brings anxiety and depression daily. It limits our ability to socialize and enjoy it. It steals our sense of self worth and well-being.

It can completely take over our life and sense of self.

Emphasize the Positive

Yet, we can bring some balance and sense of self by emphasizing the positive. One of my favorite teachers taught me that we had to balance our experience by emphasizing the positive.

Especially with fibromyalgia, there is so much negative experience on a daily basis it can be very easy to be consumed by it. To the extent that it can become our identity. We forget who we really are.

During my worst years of my fibromyalgia, I was nearly consumed by it. My saving grace was my practice of yoga and meditation along with teaching yoga. Those practices gave me a sense of who I was beyond the fibromyalgia. They brought love, joy and peace into my life. And helped me greatly.

Since then, I have learned more ways to emphasize the positive on a regular basis.

Challenges of Emphasizing the Positive

I understand the challenges of emphasizing the positive. There are days that you simply can’t do it. On those days, practice compassion and kindness for yourself, accepting where you are. That in and of itself is emphasizing the positive.

Joy

The idea of cultivating joy had always been something that I didn’t think I could do. Joy seemed to be out of my reach. Then one of my teachers explained that Joy wasn’t jumping around in a state of bliss.

Joy could be finding peace in reading an inspirational book or listening to some calming music. Or doing something that you love, gardening, drawing, watching a funny movie, having a talk with a dear friend.

Anything that you do that helps you to feel uplifted is cultivation joy. The options are endless. What do you do, or can you do that gives you a sense of peace, relaxation, or upliftment? That is you cultivating joy.

Kindness

Kindness to yourself and others is a wonderful balm for the heart, mind and emotions. Even if you are having a horrible day, if you are compassionate with yourself, that is an act of kindness. A smile or compliment to someone, whether a family member or stranger is an act of kindness.

I used to notice things I appreciated about people, like I liked a piece of jewelry or clothing that they were wearing, or a hair style. Then I thought, why share that with them person. It is remarkably amazing. Lifts my spirit and theirs.

When you have a bad fibro day, kindness to yourself is your best ally. That could look like sleeping and resting for the day, taking a nap, having a warm cup of tea.

How do you show kindness to yourself when you are having a rough day?

Peace and Love are offshoots of Kindness and Joy

When you are cultivating kindness and joy, peace and love are natural and flowing. It brings you in touch with your heart, your needs, and your self-love.

Contemplation for this week

This week, take some time to contemplate where you are regarding cultivating joy and kindness or love, and peace or compassion into your life. Easy? Hard? Got it mastered? Could use some work?

Then make a list of things that you do or can do to cultivate joy and kindness in your life. Get creative around this. Here are some questions to consider.

What calms and relaxes you.
What brings you joy and delight.
How do you practice self-love and compassion?
What do you like to do?
How do you take care of yourself on a bad day?

By making a list, on those days when you are having a fibro flare and life seems miserable and never ending, you will have a list of things that you can do to navigate the day.

May you cultivate Joy and Kindness into your life, 💕Bindu

Are You Asking the Right Questions?

by Bindu Johnson | Jul 25, 2023 | Care of the Body, Care of the Mind, Emotional Health, Healthy Living, Mindfulness, Personal Growth

I was in the library the other day and came across a book entitled “Change Your Questions, Change Your Life”. It reminded me of another book entitled, “The Secret Code of Success” by Noah St John that I read with a similar theme of considering what questions you ask and how changing the questions you ask can impact your life.

The essence of both books suggests that if you ask negative questions in your inner dialogue, you will get negative answers and negative results. Here are some examples:

Why am I always in pain?
Why can’t I find a solution to relieve my pain?
Why do I always screw up?
Why doesn’t anyone like me?
What is wrong with me?

You get the idea. If you ask these question, you will get these kind of answers to those questions:

I am always in pain because I have fibromyalgia.
There is no solution to fibromyalgia, there is no cure, so I will have to live with this for the rest of my life.
The third question will bring to mind all the mistakes you have made.
The fourth question will bring up all the things that you think people don’t like about you.
The Fifth question will bring to mind all the things that you think are wrong with you.

This first list of questions will hold you back in the status quo and work against improving your health.

Consider these questions instead:

How can I reduce or remove my pain?
How can I recover from fibromyalgia? Or “How can I rebuild my health? “
What have I accomplished today?
Why do people like me?
What are my best qualities?
What am I grateful for?

Noah St John also suggests the following:

Why is it so easy to reduce the pain in my body?
Why is it so easy to heal from fibromyalgia?
Why is it so easy for me to be competent and accomplished?
Why is it so easy for people to love and appreciate myself?
Why is it so easy to be an awesome person?

My Experience with this

Years ago, when my fibromyalgia was really bad, I often asked the questions, Why do I hurt so much? Why can’t I heal myself? I was working with a wellness coach that suggested that for a full month focus on these statements and questions:

My body is healing.
How is my body healing?
What does my body need to heal?
What can I do to rebuild my health?
Why is it so easy to recover from fibromyalgia?

In the beginning, it felt like a lie. But for the whole month, I stuck with my phrases even though it felt wrong and untrue. By the end of the month, I began to believe that I could heal my body and that it was healing.

This was a turning point in my journey with fibromyalgia. I began seeing and receiving insights and signs and information that led me to truly improving my health. I had to be open to the insights, signs, and information that I received, and put them into action. Otherwise, I would not have improved.

Can you open your mind to the possibility that you can improve your health?

The medical community has declared that there is no cure for fibromyalgia. That is true.

But in my experience, there is a lot we can do to improve our health. I am living proof. I have changed from being in excruciating pain all the time. And so fatigued, I could barely function. I hated my life and often wished I could die. I would lay in my bed in absolute torture with physical, mental and emotional torment. I hated waking up in the morning because I didn’t want to face another day.

The song, “Sleep is the only Freedom that she Knows” was my theme song. At least I had a few hours of sleep to get away from the torture that I lived every day.

Most of my symptoms are greatly improved and some non-existent.

Some of the symptoms have completely left, like irritable bladder, brain fog, insomnia, restless legs. Some of the symptoms are mild, like pain and fatigue.

I used to have lots of skin irritation, burning, and itching. That is mostly gone and only flares up on rare occasions.

Even as I write this, I know that I have forgotten many of the symptoms that were part of my daily experience. They are even gone from my memory.

Yet, I am not completely free from fibromyalgia.

My main symptom now is IBS. When my intestines function properly, I feel great. When they flare up, other symptoms flare up. I experience increased pain, my mind and emotions get more negative, I am fatigued. I am still limited by this.

The good news is that this is progressively healing as well. I now understand what flares my IBS up and have an established protocol to heal it. The healing process has its ups and downs. But the ups are more frequent and long lasting, and the downs are not as bad, and I know what I need to get them back on track.

I know it is on its way out and looking forward to that.

Play around with some of these ideas that I am sharing with you.

See if they resonate with you. I wish for you relief from the ongoing fibromyalgia symptoms.

May you improve your health and reclaim your life. ❤Bindu

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