Monday, March 4, 2013

Boudica

This past weekend I embarked on Week Four of an intensive therapy journey.  It is called the Personal Transformation Intensive (PTI), and occurs one weekend a month for five months.  Nine people, including myself, join our therapist/teachers in retreat from Friday afternoon until Sunday evening, remove ourselves from the world and embark on a journey.

There are no words to describe the PTI experience.  It is spiritual and intensely personal, and the healing and change that take place are unbelievable. We use a combination of talk therapy, group discussion, energy healing, meditation, heart-centered hypnotherapy, psychodrama and other group exercises to go "heavy, deep and real" into our souls and our unconscious mind.

Every week we do a session called breathwork.  It involves patterned breathing, and is heavily supervised to keep everyone safe.  It is hard to believe that laying on your back for 75 minutes and simply breathing can have such an impact, but personally, it is always the most intense part of the weekend.

Sometimes breathwork is relaxing, sometimes it is terrifying, and this weekend I experienced healing.  It was by far the best breathwork ever (for me at least).

Most of this week's work was intensely personal, but the end of my breathwork session was earth-shattering for me.  While maintaining the patterned breathing, and with my eyes closed, I reclaimed my Power.  I stood barefoot on the ground, holding a length of rubber hose.  Suddenly, I felt the need to do yoga, particularly the Warrior poses.  I was Strength.  I was Power.  I was Athena.  I was Katniss. I was Boudica. I was a Warrior.  The hose in my hand was a weapon, like a spear or a mace.  I really wanted a bow and arrow, but the hose was enough.

I was connected to the Earth, and I was Power.  I felt the surges in my hands, I felt electricity through my body.  The man who was sitting with me (always have a sitter to keep you safe!) while I breathed later reported that he was staying at arm's length because he wasn't sure if I was going to go charging off to do battle.  He said he was waiting for me to start screaming war-cries, just from the positions I was taking, and the death-grip I had on my "weapon".  I was impressed with myself that, with my eyes closed, I could do yoga and maintain the patterned breathing with no difficulty.  Through it all I was completely and fully in my body.

The experience was so spiritual and connected, it truly was a beautiful thing.  I did a lot of slow, deep and strong yoga poses, then I laid on my mat and did stretches to really open up my body and allow the energy to truly flow.  When my body told me it was complete, I stopped and just laid on my mat and breathed.  I was drenched in sweat, my blood was flowing and I was the embodiment of raw Power.  As I relaxed, my body felt so good:   rested and energized.

There really is no way to describe the experience.  I encourage everyone who has the opportunity to experience heart-centered hypnotherapy, PTI and (responsibly supervised) breathwork.

I am empowered. My conclusion at the end was that my Power is my own, I will not give it away again.  What I will give is my compassion.  "My Power is for me.  My compassion is for you."  I have and I own this power, but now I have to do the work of figuring out how to resource and what to do with it!

The next step in my journey is to find the strength to reach the point where I can say with clarity, "I deserve compassion, and I have compassion for myself."  The journey will be long, and beautiful.

I deserve BEAUTY in my life!


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