How would it feel to be to go to sleep easily, and stay asleep until you wake feeling refreshed?

When your mind is keeping you awake, your thoughts are probably focused on something that happened in the past – such as a meeting that didn’t go well last week, or the future – such as resolving a conflict with a friend tomorrow.

The key to a calm mind – that will allow you to sleep – is to bring yourself into the present moment, where thoughts about the past and future evaporate.

Three ways to a calm mind

Here are three very different approaches to calm your mind. See which one works for you.

1. Use the TAT Pose

The TAT Pose, which forms the basis of the Tapas Acupressure Technique, is a simple way to place your hands on the front and back of your head, that quickly takes you into a more calm and peaceful state.

We’ll use the Child’s version of the Pose which is easier to hold in bed. Cradle the back of your head in one hand with your thumb along your hairline at the top of your neck. Place the other palm across your forehead, low down so the edge of your hand touches the bridge of your nose.

Relax, and notice yourself feeling progressively more calm….

2. Open up your heart

Most of your thinking goes on in your head, so it’s a good idea to take your attention elsewhere!

As you breathe out, allow your attention to drop down to your heart area. On each outbreath, mentally say ‘Aaah’ to yourself – the sound that opens up your heart. Allow your heart to expand and open.
If your attention wanders, gently bring it back to your heart, and continue to open it more, and feel yourself becoming more calm.

3. Sense the aliveness in your body

First, ask yourself ‘ Am I still breathing?’ That question quickly brings your focus to your body, and the present moment.

Then take your attention to your toes, and notice how they feel – see if you can sense the edges of your toes. Then see if you can feel the energy, or aliveness, inside your toes.

Repeat this sensing of aliveness for the rest of your foot, then your ankles, then your lower leg. Slowly move up your body sensing the aliveness in each part. Hopefully you won’t get too far before you nod off!

The Delicious Nugget: When a spinning mind stops you from sleeping, you can calm it down by: using the TAT Pose, opening your heart, or sensing the aliveness in your body.

As a user of complementary therapies

So, how would you like to generate your own free form healing?

For the healing methods I’m familiar with, I’m noticing distinct parallels, for example the technique of expanding your consciousness features in different guises in The One Command and TAT.

I’m also noticing that many of the newer methods are concise and simple, and often completed in a few minutes, and that the instructors say ‘You can’t do it wrong’.

Since each method comprises a ritual to do the same thing, which is to facilitate healing, there’s plenty of scope to make up your own ritual.

It’s rather like using a computer drawing programme – you can use the pre-set shapes of square, circle etc, or you can go for ‘freeform’ drawing, where you create a shape to meet your unique needs.

Elements for Free Form Healing

Here are some components to consider as you generate your Free Form Healing. I suggest you read them through to spark your ideas, then go with whatever comes up as you do your own healing.

Dissolving stoppers (limiting beliefs)

‘I’m not sure this will work for me’
Any doubts about being able to heal, or whether the healing ‘will work’ will sabotage your healing. So it’s a good idea to dissolve any stoppers at the outset.

If you feel stuck here, there may be unconscious stoppers at work, which a healing practitioner can help you dissolve.

Accessing your Infinite Being

You are an Infinite Being having a human experience.
Healing takes place when you access your expanded state of Infinite Being – the more expansive you extends way beyond your human body. You may prefer to use another name, such as Source, Higher Self, Universe, Spirit, Presence, Awareness.

Some ways to access your Infinite Being are: tapping (EFT), rolling your eyes up to achieve the theta state (One Command), yoga’s yin breath, the TAT Pose, meditation, or simple allowing yourself to ‘Be’.

If this is new to you, I’ve found the TAT Pose is a very quick way for people to achieve their Infinite Being-ness. Simply hold the TAT Pose for a few minutes, and see what happens.

Dissolving the discomfort

Your discomfort is your indicator that you’re out of alignment with your Infinite Being.

Once you’ve accessed your Infinite Being state, you’re linked with your intuition, so trust whatever comes into your head, and go with it. Be prepared to play with free form drawing rather than pre-defined autoshapes!

You may find yourself visualising yourself healing, eg being showered with healing energy, tiny people brushing your arteries clean. You may find yourself bathed in a colour. You may feel prompted to tap points on your body, or place your hands on a part of your body. You may want to hold a silent conversation with someone. You may simply feel you need to spend time in that calm place. You’ll probably be prompted towards something quite different! Trust whatever comes into your awareness and follow it.

Making a choice or intention

If you like, incorporate an intention at the beginning of your healing, or a choice for a new state of being towards the end.

Some healing methods, like The One Command, set an intention at the start, and focus on the outcome rather than the problem. Others, like TAT, involve making a choice after the discomfort has been dissolved. Yet others, such as Reconnective Healing and Quantum Touch, leave the outcome to be guided by your Infinite Being.

The Delicious Nugget: Most healing methods are largely made up of ‘rituals’ which enable us to access our Infinite Being state where healing takes place. You can generate your own Free Form Healing, by accessing your Infinite Being, following your intuition, and incorporating whatever comes into your awareness.

How would you like to refresh your energies  in just five minutes, just as you refresh your internet browser?

Daily life can quickly scramble your energy, send it flowing the wrong way, and block the flow of your meridian and lymphatic systems. These disruptions lead to adverse effects such as poor concentration, fatigue, fuzzy thinking, and when the disruptions become chronic they may result in illness.

Donna Eden has distilled her extensive knowledge of Energy Medicine into a 5 minute routine which will unscramble your energies, relieve stress, boost your energy, help you function better, and perhaps nip illness in the bud.

In this 8 minute video Donna demonstrates her 5 Minute Energy Routine, which comprises six techniques. With a little practice, you’ll be refreshing your energies in just 5 minutes, and like me won’t want to miss a day!

You can do the techniques in any order.

You can focus on the techniques you feel will particularly help you.

This video alone is enough for you to learn the routine.  If you’d like to know more, read on…

The techniques in detail

For the whole routine:

• Breathe deeply: in through your nose, and out through your mouth.
• Massage points firmly. Sore points indicate blocks, so you may want to spend longer on them.

1. The Three Thumps

To get your energy flowing in the right direction, energise you, and boost your immune system.

• While breathing deeply, thump, tap or massage: K27, Thymus & Spleen points several times each.

See Donna teaching The Three Thumps:  Part 1: K27 &  Thymus; Part 2:  Spleen

2. The Cross Crawl

To think more clearly and improve coordination.

• Exaggerated march on the spot, say 20 times.

See Donna teaching The Cross Crawl.

3. The Wayne Cook Posture

To unscramble your energies.

• Place one leg across the other knee, hold your ankle and foot and take 6 deep breaths as you lift your body and legs. Put your legs down.
• Form your hands into church pose, and repeat the breathing and lifting.
• See the variation on the video if you’re unable to do this.

See Donna teaching The Wayne Cook Posture

4. The Crown Pull

To release mental congestion.

• With finger tips facing and forming a vertical line, press into the centre of your forehead and pull it apart.
• Repeat moving your hands back over the centre line of your head.

See Donna teaching The Crown Pull

5. Neurolymphatic Flush

To energise, and clear toxins and stagnant energies.

If you’re not sure quite where the points are, move around a little to find a tender point. Any points that are more tender indicate blockages, so you may want to spend longer massaging them.

Breathe deeply and massage firmly:

• Heart and Governing points below your clavicle.
• the groove between the arm and front of your body, on each side (Central meridian)
• down the middle of your sternum (Lung)
• down each side of the sternum, between your ribs (Lungs & Gall Bladder)
• with thumbs, half moon under your breasts, from each side to centre (Liver & Spleen)
• bottom of your rib cage, from centre to sides (Small Intestine)
• spleen points, below your bra line (chaps please imagine!), and in from the side of your body
• points one inch above and one inch  out from belly button (Kidney)
• points one inch to side of your belly button (Triple Warmer)
• along the top of your pubic bone (Bladder)
• down outsides of legs along trouser seam line, from hip to knee (Large Intestine)
• with thumbs down inside of legs along trouser seam, from groin to knee, (Small Intestine)

See Donna teaching The Neurolymphatic Flush

6. The Zip Up

To feel confident and protect your energies.

• Use your fingers to ‘zip up’ from pubic bone to bottom lip, and ‘lock’ at the top.

See Donna teaching The Zip Up

For more information, see:

Donna Eden’s book ‘Energy Medicine’,
Donna’s website, InnerSource.

The misery of pain! Whether it’s the emotional pain of anger, or the physical pain of a sore shoulder, it tenses you up and saps your energy. The more you focus on it, the worse it gets.

One way of looking at pain is to see it as a concentration, or intensity, of feeling, that has somehow got locked up inside you. Just as you use water to dilute concentrated orange juice, you can use space to dilute pain.

The key to diluting your pain is knowing that you are in Infinite Being, temporarily experiencing the extreme constriction of existing within a human body. You’re pretty squashed up inside your body!

If you allow ‘yourself’, which you may think of as your ‘energy’ or Being’ or ‘consciousness’, to expand out of your body, you release the tension and the pain will diminish, perhaps disappearing altogether.

Expand your Being

At first you’ll find this technique works best with you eyes shut, so please read it over first!

Close your eyes.

Expand yourself – your energy – your Being – to fill:

• your room…
• your building …
• your town …
• your country …
• your world …
• your universe …
• and beyond …

Now, how do you feel?

With practice you’ll be able to quickly expand yourself out quickly, and do so with your eyes open. The more time you spend in this expanded state the less pain you will experience!

The Delicious Nugget: Expand yourself out beyond your body to dilute your pain.

We make our New Year’s resolutions with the best of intentions

Then, after a week or so, many resolutions bite the dust. This article gives you two rather different ways to power up your resolutions.

The difficulty in keeping resolutions lies in the gap between your current reality, and where you want to be. If you make a resolution to exercise at the gym three times a week, and your current exercise is limited to some walking and housework, there’s a large gap to cover. As you become aware of the gap all sorts of doubts creep in, threatening your resolve to move forward.

Here are two different approaches to your resolutions that take your focus away from the pitfalls of the gap to more positive perspectives.

1. Start with ‘I don’t know how’

The One Command always incorporates the phrase ‘I don’t know how’ at the start of a ‘command’.

‘I don’t know how I exercise at the gym three times a week’

feels far more friendly than ‘I exercise at the gym three times a week’

Try saying your resolution with ‘I don’t know how’ at the start, a few times over, and see what difference you notice. Saying ‘I don’t know how’ turns off your doubting mind, and opens up possibilities.

There’s more information on using The One Command, including a guided audio recording here. Commands are only made once, so this is a phrase to use when you set your intention. Should any doubts arise you meet them with a new command.

2. Live ‘in the question’

Another approach is that of Access Consciousness, which advocates living in the question rather than looking for solutions.

‘What are the infinite possibilities for exercising at the gym three times a week?’
has an expansive and dynamic feel which opens up possibilities in your mind….

You could further expand your resolution with a second question

’What would it take for that to show up?’

Living in the question means continually asking the question, or new variations of it, so you keep on asking questions!
The Delicious Nugget: You can power yourself across the yawning gap between your current reality and that of your intention firstly by incorporating the phrase ‘I don’t know how’, and secondly by asking questions such as ‘What are the infinite possibilities for …?’

With so many choices available, making decisions about your health can feel overwhelming.

The thing is, you have a unique energy system, so what helps one person may or may not help another.

Much better, then, to see how your energy responds to that cup of tea, Salsa, or whatever you have in mind.

There are many ways to tune into what will help you, including muscle testing and checking in with your heart.

I’d like to show you the simplest method I know – to check whether something is ‘the truth’ or ‘a lie’. It’s encapsulated in the statement – ‘the truth feels light, and a lie feels heavy’. Here’s how it goes.

Truth or lie?

1.  Bring to mind the thing you’re considering
Eg: A nice cup of tea to relax.

2.  Notice how this makes your energy feel
Light and expansive for truth, or heavy and contracted for a lie.
At first, you may find it easier to close your eyes to notice how your energy responds.
Eg: A nice cup of tea makes me feel heavy – so something else would be better.
I check on a walk in the woods instead, and that feels light –so I know a walk is the right thing for me to do right now.

Tomorrow, I’ll be in a different state, so the cup of tea may be just right.

You can use Truth or Lie any time, any place – its’ quick, and no one needs to know what you’re doing.

Here are some benefits of sensing what’s right for you:

• You feel empowered, because you’re making the decision rather than allowing someone else to make it for you.
• You’re confident you’ve made the right decision – OK, it may take a little practice for that confidence to come – it will!
• You don’t spend time, effort or money on things that aren’t right for you.

What to do when you ‘have’ to do something that feels heavy! That’s another article!

The Delicious Nugget: You have a unique energy system which is continually changing. The best way to know what is right for you at any time, is to sense how your energy responds.  An easy way to do this is to check whether what you propose to do makes your energy feel light (truth) or heavy (a lie).

Imagine you have three balloons above your head, one for the past, one for the present, and one for the future

When your mind spends a lot of time in your past balloon, it spends time going over and over your symptoms, how they affect your life, and trying to figure out how you came to have migraines in the first place. This thinking generates more of the same symptoms.

When your mind spends a lot of time in your future balloon, it may be worrying how you will cope with that meeting if you have a migraine, or other health issue. It uses up time and energy worrying about something that hasn’t happened yet, and may not happen.

Of course your mind does need to spend time in the past and the future for practical purposes, difficulties arise when your mind spends a disproportionate amount of time in one of these balloons.

When your mind inhabits your present balloon, it is in the one place where you have a realistic picture of your health situation. You may be surprised to find that your migraine or other health issue is not actually such a big problem in this moment.

The present moment is the only place you can take action.

Three ways to get into your present balloon

Inspired by the Sedona Method, here are three approaches to encourage your mind into your present balloon.

1. Focus on your mind

David Ellzey, Sedona Instructor, explains that it’s just your mind that goes wandering off into the past and future. The rest of you, ie your body and emotions, are always in the present. For me, this distinction made a massive difference; it’s much easier to think of most of myself being present all the time, with just my mind to rein in.

2. Rein in your past and future balloons

This led me to the image of my mind wandering into the three balloons above my head. Now, when I want to get into the present moment, I imagine I’m reining in the past and future balloons, which just leaves the present balloon for my mind to be in.

3. Ask yourself this question

I’ve modified the Sedona Method’s Fifth Way of releasing question, so you can invite yourself into the present moment. Simply ask yourself:

If I don’t go into the past, and I don’t go into the future, where am I?

Asking this question immediately brings me into the present, I hope it works for you too!

The Delicious Nugget: It’s much easier to get into the present when you appreciate that your body is present all the time, it’s only your mind that goes wandering off. You can pull in your past and future balloons, or ask yourself a question to help your mind be in the present.

If you’ve ever had a thought along the lines ‘I’m, so sick of this condition I just want to be rid of it’

In the DVD The Living Matrix, Arlelle Essex tells how she had troublesome headaches for 10 years, some lasting as long as 5 days. It transpired she had a brain tumour, and she decided to treat it with NLP.

At a low point she found herself saying

“I’m so sick of this, I just want to be rid of this tumour”.

She suddenly realised all her thoughts about making her tumour go away, involved much anger and frustration, which could not be healing.

Arlelle says the turning point in her recovery came when she asked herself what the opposite would be, and realised it was acceptance. This helped her see the benefits her tumour had brought her including a change of career, meeting wonderful people and more. So she asked herself another question

“What would happen if I gave it permission to stay for the rest of my life?”

Six months later her tumour was gone, and her doctor told her she was a different person to the one he first met.

The process of embracing opposing thoughts helps you unlock yourself from the fixed position of desperately wanting your health condition to go away, which only attracts more of the same.

Imagine a spectrum with ‘I want to be rid of this’ at one end and ‘I accept this condition’ at the other end. Once you are aware of the duality of both thoughts, your perception can easily shift out of its locked position at one end, and move to a more healthy position somewhere else on the spectrum.

Two ways to shift your perception with opposites

This approach of considering opposites, or ‘polarities’, is embedded in many healing approaches, including The Sedona Method and TAT.

The Sedona Method

Holistic Releasing is a very powerful Sedona technique, which involves alternately welcoming opposing thoughts or feelings, as a way to shift from the stuckness of your discomfort.

You start with the emotion or thought you have in the present moment. Eg ‘My sore head’, or ‘Not knowing which treatment to use’, and ask yourself:

1.  Could you feel the soreness, as much as it is?

Whether you get a ‘Yes’ or ’No’ response move on to the second question.

Decide what the opposite would be, eg .My comfortable head’, and ask yourself:

2. Could you feel a comfortable head, as best you can?

Don’t worry if a sore head seems impossible – be open to getting just an inkling of it to start with.

Continue to ask yourself questions 1 and 2 alternately, until you no longer feel attached to either polarity. You may be surprised how much your sore head shifts in a short time.

TAT (Tapas Acupressure Technique)

TAT involves holding the TAT Pose – one hand on the front and one hand behind your head in specific positions – while putting your attention for about a minute on each of a series of 9 statements. The first two statements address opposites.

The first statement acknowledges the problem. You take the TAT Pose and consider the statement, eg ‘My sore head happened’. In this step you are identifying with, and acknowledging, the problem

The second statement is the opposite of the first. You take the TAT Pose and consider the opposite statement, eg ‘That sore head happened, I no longer resonate, identify or connect with it’. In this step you offer your system the opposite point of view to consider. You don’t have to believe the statement, just consider it, and be open to see what happens.

By considering the opposites your identification with the problem dissolves. Often these first two steps of TAT alone will shift your perception, and hence improve your health condition.

The Delicious Nugget: Considering a health problem and its opposite is a very effective way to shift your point of view away from being fixated with ‘wanting to be rid of it’. Seonda’s Holistic Releasing and the first two Steps of TAT are effective ways to do this.

Or, if you are at home, you can add vinegar to boiling water, and inhale.

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What if there were an easy way to move your focus from your symptoms to all the possible ways of resolving them?

If you have recurring migraines, you may spend a lot of time thinking about your splitting headache, the nauseous feeling and your acute sensitivity to light and fumes. You may be frustrated because: you can’t do your work properly, you’re only giving part of your attention to your family, and you can forget about that night out. It feels like a dead end.

This sucks up your energy, closes down your receptivity to solutions, and may create a vicious circle that perpetuates your discomfort.

You may try some of the many natural methods known to alleviate a migraine – from the herb feverfew through massage to cell salts – which may or may not be effective for you

What if there were an easy way to help you move beyond your migraines?

There is a simple way to open yourself up to the all of the possibilities of moving beyond migraines, or any other discomfort you’re experiencing. It comes from Access Consciousness.

1. Ask a question

Ask an empowering question, such as:

How does it get any better than this?

What are the infinite possibilities for eg: me to always have a clear head?

Do you notice the expansive feeling you get when you ask the question? It unlocks your focus on symptoms, and opens you up to the field of all possibilities.

2. Live in the question

Rather than expect an immediate answer, try living with the question. So, each time you become aware of your sore head, or that nauseous feeling, simply ask your question again.

At first you may need to remind yourself to move your focus from the frustrations of your condition to ask the question again. You may want to use the question as a mantra for a while, until it becomes second nature.

Living in the question allows energy to flow; you’ll be surprised what comes up for you. An insight about your migraine trigger, meeting someone who tells you about a new solution, or something else?

Living in the question makes you feel lighter, expectant, curious and hopeful.

How does it get any better that that?!

The Delicious Nugget: There’s an easy way to move from thinking about your symptoms, to open yourself to all the possible solutions. Simply ask yourself; “How does it get better than this?”, and/or “What are the infinite possibilities for …?”