I spent a whole month in Spain with 20 other female entrepreneurs to further develop our businesses. It was such an intense mentoring but the most that I got from this experience was more than that. Hosts opened their home and hearts to us, and friendships were formed.
Through our discussions I learned a lot about what tools the other women use to help them heal from previous trauma. I am happy to share the story of three remarkable women who use different practices to heal themselves and to help healing others:
The story of Marta: dance, circles and qigong
Marta is from Portugal. She teaches qigong and holds women’s circles.
Her first years of creativity…
She used to create things with her hands when she was a child and especially enjoyed drawing and jewellery making with wooden beads. Unfortunately, one time in primary school she made a beautiful clay swan and the neck broke in the oven. So, that, with other events from her childhood, led her to believe that everything that she created was a failure. “And my creativity just stopped because I was afraid to fail. I was afraid to make mistakes.”
For 20 years, she focused only on her education and did not allow her creativity to flourish. She joined an online women community 3 years ago after an intuitive feeling. They held women circles that inspired her to do the same in her own country. Still now, “Although much better now, I am still working on this false belief that creating something will fail…”
Listening to the intuitive feeling
In the last few years, she learned about human design and worked more about trusting her intuition. Ecstatic dance was a good tool for her to do that: dancing with bare feet, without talking, just you and your emotions. First, she was shy expressing herself in front of other people but now, she is even a volunteer there at welcoming the people who arrive there for the first time.
Although she started by teaching yoga, a few years ago she also started teaching qigong and soon discovered that it was something she was deeply passionate about. The practice combines breath, meditation, and movement. It resonated with her because, with it, she sees amazing transformation on herself and her students, especially people who, for example, have tried yoga or other movement practices, and did not resonate with them. With qigong, because it feels like a moving meditation, usually people feel very centred and connected to their own bodies and the movements are, usually, very simple. Also, despite the simplicity of the movements, in some positions, like the Zhan Zhuang postures, you can truly build resilience in your body and mind.
How does it help Marta with healing her trauma?
Qigong is a somatic practice that can look very simple from the outside, but it creates a profound alchemy within. It works with the principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine and it aligns with the 5 seasons of nature and the body (there is also Late Summer). Each season corresponds to a system that is connected to elements, organs, sounds, emotions and more. It can be healing if you practice it with your full awareness and breath, bringing your mind back in whenever it wanders.
Smiling from the heart for example is a technique during which you bring gratitude during the practice (thinking of someone who makes you smile immediately: a child, a partner, a sound, a place, or favourite taste). When you practice from this inner space, it is transforming your energy into a more expansive expression of you.
When you start welcoming that feeling that all emotions are welcome and can be alchemized, and notice even the smallest change within yourself you will be already on the path of healing.
More info about her:
Stella: healing others with meditation
Stella is from Italy. She is a physiotherapist and is on the way to develop a guided meditation practice for both patients and healthcare workers. She had a long journey toward her own approach:
When she was 16, she read the book on the connection of mind, body and soul. This was her first experience that put her on the path of curiosity. At the age of 20 she started to study naturopathy and learned the natural technics to help people heal. She participated in retreats focused on conscious techniques for the body and several types of mediations were part of it. From that moment she wanted to transmit this as a relaxation tool.
She developed her personal approach to healing: Her toolbox includes applied kinesiology, mindfulness, meditation, reconnective healing, and emotional freedom technique.
She also connects the creation of the fairy tale with meditation though a ritual. It is a “4-step technique that starts with the 4 illustrations representing the present moment, the obstacle, the resources, the magical help, the goal and a new start. She simply guides the patient through these lines to create their own fairy tale. In the end, combined with a drawing/writing a sentence, the closing meditation takes place.
She developed this Fairy tales’ technique firstly for herself, and then started using it for others.
Why Fairy tales?
“I always liked to draw fairies and mermaids and I also believed there is magic around us.”
Stella also lived in Cornwall in the South of England, where the fairy tale culture is strong. There, people strongly believe in magic and that there is extraordinary energy of mother earth in their region. People in Cornwall live a slow life and put healthy living together with nature in the focus. They often work only 3-4 days per week so they can spend enough time with their families.
She tries to bring this mood to Italy, with this unique fairy tale meditation approach. “I would like to improve the life of patients and help the healthcare employees because in Italy they really need an extra support.”
More about her initative: Once upon a time
Her linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/stella-t-a6a99b131
Sara: writing as a healing tool
Sara is from Italy and is on the way to create a coaching programme for creative young people (20–30-year-olds) on how to balance their creativity with a daily routine.
Sara’s creative thing is writing. She used to write a lot when she was a kid, and writing and reading stories gave her hope about a positive future. Her teacher was super encouraging about her practice but she stopped writing and reading from 13 to 17 years old, as during the teenage years, as it happens, was more into sports and hanging out with friends.
During university she started writing again and she felt she found herself again. The first thing she wrote was a short story and then started to work on a fantasy story that is now being written.
Dungeons and dragons, a role play game, also helped her – “you create your character and your backstory. I really hope I can use this technique in my coaching work in the future with youths. I see that it helps people to channel their emotions and believe in themselves, hopefully it will also help with their work.”
Guiding people on how to bring back creativity in their lives
When she was at the University, she felt she would have needed some practical training on how to live a good life. That is why she is guiding the participants to develop their full potential. A person that undergoes a programme will discover who they are and understand themselves better and then build an action plan. This plan is based on your personal resources, your decisions and values.
Right now, she has two coaching programs, one to help people at the beginning of adulthood to make decisions for their lives, and the other for the last years of middle and high school to guide kids to choose autonomously and consciously. But the next two programs she is preparing have a special focus on creativity and making networks to exercise it.
Creative professions are hard-working and sometimes people need to be guided to believe in themselves, understand their resources, learn how to proceed step by step in autonomy and find allies to do that happily. The programme will help them to practice their creativity in their daily life or even to turn their passion into a job. “You will be happier, gaining more self-awareness, more clarity for the future, more faith in yourself.”
Building the routine of creativity in everyday life
“This summer I had a hard time and had the urge to write again. The routine of writing is helping me to heal, or at least making me feel good.” She spends 30 minutes per day to have her creative space/ write or structure her stories. It is keeping on exercising something that makes you feel good. The motivation in this process should come from the inner and not from the external world: otherwise, it can be frustrating and have no future.
Her website is still under construction, but you can find more info about her here for now:
....What is your healing tool?