Three ways to support spiritual, mental and emotional health as the future unfolds

Yesterday I was enjoying coffee on my deck when a hawk passed over my head from behind.  I reflexively ducked before my brain knew exactly what was happening.  You know—that feeling of alarm when we shift from contented security of an observer to suddenly threatened. 

We duck, crouch, get low, freeze.

Naturally, the hawk wasn’t HUNTING me and I wasn’t REALLY threatened–my body just responded before my brain could assess.  In a flash, my unconscious body shifted from happy hormones to the hormones of stress, fight and flight.

While a hawk is just a harmless hawk, life can cause us to respond this way, can’t it?

Cultural unrest, economic shifts, health challenges…if these things continually capture our attention and energy and we never cycle into a state of rest and restoration, we run the chance of HABITUATING a stressed response.

For so many of us uncertainty, instability and not-knowing can cause us to habituate a stressed inner state.

Conditioning ourselves into a better-feeling state

If we cultivate a habitually relaxed and aware state within our body, then when we are upon occasion stressed, our nervous system will quickly regulate back into that baseline relaxed state.  But if we are habitually stressed, worried, anxious or fearful, our body MEMORIZES being in a state of fight or flight…and that inner state feeds information to our brain and can begin a vicious cycle. 

Vicious cycles are no fun because they take a level of attention, will and energy to shift.  If we are chronically stressed summoning the will and energy to change can be challenging. 

These tips might help navigate stress and change– and condition the body into an agile, resilient, heart-focused state:

Ground yourself outside—We help our nervous system and body discharge unnecessary and unhelpful energy by walking outside with bare feet, hanging out among the trees and sitting by or soaking in water.  Better still, lie your spine down on the ground if you can.  I love to lay under the ash tree in my yard in a mossy spot.  I feel with my back into the energy of the Earth. Magic!  It’s therapeutic, healing and there is a noticeable exchange of energy.  I invite you to view the Earth as a loving consciousness—of which you are a treasured member—and feel the wellness and abundance the Earth wants to offer you energetically.

Know what’s you and not you, what’s yours and not yours—Being mindful of what has our attention is essential to managing our energy.  When presented with something that doesn’t feel good ask yourself “Does that belong to me? Did that come from me? Do I like that?  Am I feeling obligated?  Do I trust this? Does this make me happy?”  Questions like this guide us to the wisdom, consciousness and expansive knowing of our heart.  Notice entanglements with other people, places, dynamics or media that drain, deplete and create incoherence or chaos in your life.  Notice what beliefs are presented to you, conditioned or programed into you by the past, put upon you now by others or media and do not serve you.  Be brave and feel empowered to cut ties with anything that doesn’t resonate with your deepest sense of who you are in your heart.  Courage is often required to restore our system into balance.  Let harmony, balance and inner coherence be your guide to a better state.

Practice challenging your limiting beliefs—Becoming aware of thoughts like “I should…What’s wrong with me…I can’t…I’m so…I hate…I never…I would never…I have to…” these may be revealing a limiting belief structure that doesn’t benefit you.  Gently—so gently, tenderly, compassionately—challenge if that is really true.  You might excavate some underlying fear, shame or guilt that is no longer true, needed or relevant in your life.  A belief is just a thought we keep thinking and orienting our expectations toward.  Shift your sweet boat into new waters! Challenge your beliefs, free yourself, explore new realms with wonder, curiosity and not-knowing.  The wonderful thing about beliefs is that you can always return to a previous belief if you discover that it aligns more fully with your heart.

Stay open to possibility, my friends.  When we practice grounding in our hearts and deeply listening the well-spring of guidance in there, something better than we could ever imagine might emerge.  May spring delight and reward you with new awareness, growth and evolution!

Subscribe to Diana Maria Chapin’s monthly newsletter here: