​Recently I participated in a channelled workshop on death and dreamwalking (the act of guiding a dying person to the other realms). 
 
Grief and loss are incredibly transformative experiences, as they strip us away from our attachments and force us to go beyond our comfort zone. Every attachment we lose brings us closer to our own sovereignty and inner oneness – though it may take some time to arrive at this realization. When we surrender to loss, we ironically become more aware of our soul essence. This is why death and loss are some of the most common catalysts for spiritual awakening and self-realization. 
 
I experienced my self-realization shortly after what felt like a soul-shattering heartbreak. In hindsight it’s easy to recognize that what shattered wasn’t my soul or even my heart, but the limited fears and beliefs of the human identity. Of course, this insight only came after I fully released control. The emotional pain forced me to reach deep within for the only permanent element in my reality: my divine essence.
 
As Adamus Saint-Germain said in the workshop, you can die while staying in the body. Nothing is as rejuvenating as death.

​Death has always been an intrinsic part of esoteric traditions and mystery schools. After all, you can’t go too far into the topic of death without stumbling upon some profound existential and spiritual questions, like: Who am I? What happens to consciousness upon death? What is the relationship between consciousness and energy? What is life?
 
While these questions are not new, there is great value in reflecting on the topic of death. The most literal and common definition of death is when consciousness releases itself from the biological form called the body. But a type of death also occurs when we let go of a psychological form, such as an identity or a story that we’ve been attached to. This has also been called ‘aspect integration’.
 
With this in mind, here’s my new definition of death: “Death is the release of consciousness from a specific form.”

​This could mean releasing yourself from a relationship you were involved in. Or, it could mean releasing yourself from certain patterns or habits that were part of your routine. When we perceive death in this more expanded way, it becomes obvious that death is a natural part of life. The nature of the soul is to always evolve and transform. Like an actor, we step into an act, experience a story, and then we step out again. Death is not the end of life, it’s simply an opportunity to change your act. 
 
With every death of an old story, I create space for a new future. Not a future based on past experiences, but a future based on present desires and choices. Death births presence by freeing the past. And presence is required for any true creation.  

One of the gifts of being human is that we learn to dive fully into an experience. We learn how to infuse our consciousness into matter, the densest energy of all. This is done through desire, choice, and imagination. With those three components, a souled being can bring their consciousness into any place, situation or potential. 
 
Infusing our consciousness means bringing something to life. For example, we can create a character through storytelling – writing, painting, singing, or dancing – and then breathe life into that character. There are many characters that have continued to live for years or even centuries after their creator gave them form: Mulan, Hamlet, and Harry Potter are just three examples of characters that were infused with enough consciousness to “bring them to life” in a manner of speaking.  
 
  Just as Desire teaches us how to bring something to life by infusing our consciousness, so Death teaches us how to extract our consciousness from something. Otherwise, we could be very stuck in our own creations. Imagine being stuck on Earth forever, in the same body, without any exit strategy.
 
That is the wisdom of death: You are never stuck. Learning how to infuse our consciousness is a priceless skill, but without the opposite ability of extracting or ‘defusing’ our consciousness, we’d lose our sanity. Death will free you, even when you’re scared of freedom. That’s the gift of death. 


Image credit: Petra from Pixabay

​Consciousness is expanding on Earth at unprecedented rate – wonderful, it’s about time, we say. Consciousness is expanding – oh no, we say, everything is changing so fast! What do we hold onto? When we can’t recognize ourselves anymore, what do we identify with? How do we live, as humans, beyond a defined identity? Saint-Germain invites us to experience the “and”, the multidimensionality of our nature.
 
I used to think that dimensions are like hierarchical levels of the heaven of consciousness: We, the angels, descend down to the lower dimensions to experience human life just so that we can consciously ascend back to the higher dimensions. But where’s the fun in that? 
 
I’m starting to understand, or rather experience, what dimensions are really about. As I see it, multidimensionality is about the multiple dimensions of the Self: The past dimension, the current and the future; the child and the adult; the emotional self and the neutral observer; human, the ascended master and the soul… As we move from experiencing one dimension to another, the experience of the self transforms, rather than our surroundings. Dimensions are like spaces all folded within each other, in the here and now, and we shift our focus from one layer to another. Moreover, the soul exists in all dimensions at the same time. We can simultaneously see with our eyes, sense with our energetic senses, feel with our hearts. We are not just human until we are just soul. All this time, we are physical, while being electro-magnetic, while being light, while being beyond light. We simply have chosen to focus our attention in order to experience the earthly dimension in its full depth, in its raw, sensual totality. Until we choose to ‘remember’ our experience of several dimensions at once. 
 
I relish the sensual and aesthetic experience of wearing a great pair of shoes, and at the same time, I don’t care in the slightest what I’m wearing, because it really isn’t about the shoes. Hell, it isn’t even about life, it’s all about consciousness. But then again, what a luxury to be able to express the self through style and fashion! Living multidimensionally is seeing the bigger picture of who you are and, at the same time, experiencing all the human troubles and treats in full color and high definition. 

Remember when you were 18, and there were days when you felt totally grown-up? Definitely more grown-up than your parents. And then there were days when you were fooling around with your friends, when being the irresponsible teenager was just so much more fun than being the emerging adult. That’s where we, the consciousness pioneers, are at, spiritually speaking. Did you notice that nobody gave you a certificate for being an adult? Sure, you received some legal rights, but nobody said: now you have graduated into adulthood, you have a license to be an adult, and others will acknowledge your adulthood. Didn’t happen to me… It’s the same with enlightenment: Nobody will hand you the certificate or give you the keys to unlock the hidden dimensions of yourself. You simply choose, sooner or later, to relate to yourself as a realized master. The rebelling teenager is still there, alive and thriving within us. It’s simply that we have unfolded additional facets of ourselves as time goes by: We don’t “grow up”, we expand in all directions. ​

​We can visually imagine our multidimensional self as a mountain: we exist simultaneously at the foot of the mountain, inside the mountain and at the peak. When we are only conscious of our experience at the foot of the mountain, life is difficult: We only see a few restricted paths with many obstacles right in front of our eyes, we don’t know where and how far the destination is. If we’re lucky or smart, we have a map that’s a bad representation of reality, and know the approximate direction. On the other hand, if we are aware of our dimension on top of the mountain, we have a lot more perspective: We see where the human self is currently standing, we see many different potentials and paths, we even see which path is the easiest in any given situation. We see that the obstacles are really very small, and have no doubt that the human will reach its goal, one way or another. After all, it’s all so easy – if we choose to see it from this perspective.
 
What freedom, what a relief it is to be able to choose on which dimensions to focus my awareness today. And then, a feeling of dismay: I always had a choice: Through all those difficult and challenging experiences, I chose to experience them from a particular dimension, usually a restricted and painful one, as the lost, separated human me. My soul and my realized self were right there through those experiences – without a drop of worry, because they, of course, had a wider perspective. I was never stuck in the 3-d prison of Earth: All this time I existed in all dimensions! Imagine what I must have missed out on while being so busy concentrating on all the drama down here.
 
How absurd… This realization almost makes me want to go back to live every experience of my life again, this time choosing to experience them through a different, lighter, dimension. Now I kind of understand this addiction we angels have, coming over and over again to be humans. It wasn’t about experiencing different situations. It was about experiencing those situations as different dimensions of ourselves. 
 
You can choose to be aware of the dimension on top of the mountain right now. When you feel angry, hurt or disappointed, allow yourself to feel everything in its full beauty and rawness. And, at the same time, ask yourself: how will you feel about this incident in five years? Will it still feel like a great catastrophe? When some unexpected chaos enters your reality, when you feel a pain in your chest that feels deeper than the wound of Isis, when you feel the conflict and the sadness in this world, remember that you are a soul, most likely with a thousand or more lifetimes on Earth, and who knows what other experiences elsewhere. And remember: whatever happens, you exist, and the rest is mere entertainment. 

We all know love through our personal, lived experience. In fact, one might argue that you haven't fully lived on Earth until you've loved. But how would you describe love to someone who's never experienced it?

As we're entering the week of Valentine's Day, I'm inviting you to look at your definitions of love. For I believe that love – like everything else – goes new when we step into the embodiment of self-realization.

When scientists define love, they use words like: attraction, attachment, bonding, dependency... They talk about the neurochemicals that are released in the brain when we experience love. For example, oxytocin, the bonding hormone. But these neurochemicals don't create love; they are the physiological effect of the experience.

Adamus Saint-Germain describes love as an experience and a sense (a way of perceiving reality). He also defines love as the recognition of divinity within another person. Or within yourself, in the case of self-love. What a beautiful definition!

It has been said that self-love and self-realization are ultimately the same thing: There cannot be self-realization without self-love, just as there cannot be unconditional self-love without realizing your true divine nature.

​I asked my soul how she defines love. Here is her description:
"Love is the experience of returning back home after feeling separated from your divinity or from parts of yourself. The 'I am' doesn't really know love because it doesn't know separation. Without experiencing separation, you cannot really experience what it feels like to integrate, unite and come back together with all the parts of yourself. 

As a human, you experience love when someone sees God within you, and when you see God within them. In that recognition, you get a glimpse of 'home'. Once again you feel the connection, the warmth, the inner unity that you innately know from home, from your divine source. 

Where humans usually trip up is that they mistakenly believe that this other person is home. The person with whom we have the experience of love becomes the source of love in our mind. In truth, no other person is the source of love or "the way home". They might be the inspiration or the reminder of how to return home. They cannot bring you back home because home is already within you. Whenever there is that dependency of believing that we need another person to feel home, we are susceptible to power games which muddles the experience of pure, clean love."

​One of the difficulties with defining love is that typical human love is often entangled in all kinds of things like karma, drama, ancestral influences, sexual attraction, energy feeding, and transactional agreements... Can we strip all these other dynamics away, and just have pure love? And if yes, how does it differ from 'regular love'?

While I understand what pure love is from a theoretical standpoint, I have so many questions still unanswered:

Is it something that can be chosen, or only allowed? Is true, realized love the natural consequence of self-realization, or a pathway to embodying more of your true self? And if realized love means unconditional acceptance, as some have suggested, what does that mean in practical terms? For example, what is the difference between accepting someone unconditionally and tolerating imbalanced or even abusive behaviour?

Of course, the best answers come through experience, and I can't wait to discover and explore this new kind of love. I also have a strong intuition that when two realized beings come together in love, a new kind of magic is born.

​This is the first blog in the series: Applied Metaphysics. While I'm not a fan of New Year's resolutions,  I do find it helpful to get clear about what I'm creating in my life. This month, I will introduce my favourite tools for stepping into the New Year with awareness and clarity. 
 
Asking the right questions
 
Wrong questions are dangerous. At worst, you can spend lifetimes trying to answer a bad question, such as: “What’s wrong with me?” Or: “How can I prove to myself that I’m worthy?” 
 
Another question that I used to ask myself is: “What do I want to achieve this year?” That’s not really a dangerous question, but it is boring as hell.
 
These days, I ask better questions. Like:

• How can I express more of my true Self today?
• When I tune into my heart and soul, what do I truly desire?
• What makes today worth living for?

Choice vs. goals
 
Once I’ve asked the right questions, I can make choices. Making a choice is different from setting a goal. Feel into the energy of ‘choice’ vs. ‘goal’. 
 
‘Choice’ feels committed, clear, resolute. 

‘Goal’ feels far away, like something that takes effort. 
 
For example: “I choose to be fully here in life, with awareness, sensuality and an open heart.”
 
Done. It didn’t take any effort, just choice. Of course, I will need to keep making this choice every day until it becomes second nature to me.
 
Compassion vs. criticism
 
Contrary to popular opinion, we are much more likely to succeed at something when we are compassionate with ourselves. Most people believe that they will achieve more when they criticise and judge themselves, but this is a false belief. 
 
This year has only just started, and already there were moments when I got impatient with myself. This is the moment to take a deep breath and be in compassion with all the parts of myself. “Okay, I got distracted for a moment there. How can I support myself and get back on track?” 
 
Criticism drains you, compassion supports you.

​
Where do you place your focus?
 
Focus is like a magic wand, it directs energy.

For example, we can focus on the things we want, or the things we don’t want.
 
Feel into the difference between these two approaches:

1. “I want to lose weight this year.” 
2. “I choose to feel light. I choose to act in a way that’s healthy for my body. I attend to my body with love and care.”  

 
Here we have two different energy dynamics. The first example has an energy dynamic of resistance, whereas the second one has an energy dynamic of desire and allowing. The first example sounds like you are focusing on what you want (i.e. to lose weight), but the underlying energy here is: “I see myself as too fat. I don't want that, but I'm focusing on it.”

If you feel the energy of the second example (i.e. I choose to feel light), you might notice how there is less resistance and gravity because your focus is directed towards your new choice.
 
If there is something you want to change in your life, focus on what you want, instead of what you don’t want. Focus has a magnetic and gravitational pull to it, so it’s important to be conscious about where you place your focus.
 
Trust
 
Lastly, you don’t need to know how things will manifest in your life. Your soul can see solutions and potentials that your human mind cannot see, and that’s why it’s important to trust in Self. For example, I have chosen to experience true love in this lifetime. This feels like a clear soul desire, so I know it will come to me. However, if I try to manage that as my human identity, I will only get in my own way. Instead, I can make a choice and then let it unfold in the way that soul arranges it for me. My energy will serve me when I’m clear about my choices, but only if I don’t get in my own way. 
 
What are your favourite metaphysical skills and perspectives as you step into the New Year?

​It has been speculated that if women were to rule the world, political and economic disputes between countries would be solved through cordial discussion and a cup of tea – without breaking so much as a fingernail. As opposed to the highly destructive custom of starting wars. Just imagine the difference!
 
Yet women are no less guilty of fighting battles, though many of them may be internal or social in nature. On the level of energy, a battle is a battle, whether it is fought with a sword or with judgment. (This is not to invalidate the immense suffering that a physical war causes.)
 
There comes a point in the experience of enlightenment when it is time to give up the battles and lay down the swords. All of them. The battles fought out of anger, but also the battles fought for protection. The battles fought in the name of darkness and the battles fought in the name of light. The battles fought against others and the battles fought against yourself. Enlightenment, after all, is a state of allowing and acceptance, and it is incompatible with things like resistance and effort. 
 
As I’m reluctantly laying down my own sword and dissolving some of my cherished aspects – like the mediator, the feminist, the warrior & the rebel – I decided to seek some divine council from the goddesses. I was especially interested to hear what the feminine warrior archetypes had to say about this topic. Are the goddesses of war still “pro-war”? 
 
The first archetype I called up was the Greek goddess Athena, known both as the goddess of war and wisdom. Next, I communed with the Nordic goddess Freyja, known as the goddess of love, sex, and war. That’s an interesting set of domains to specialize in, but who am I to question the job description of a goddess. I was also curious to hear what the Egyptian deity Sekhmet had to share. 
 
It turns out that these ladies are peace-loving pacifists. After talking with the trio, I collected their wisdom and assembled a short guide to support anyone in the art of de-battling. Or, in Athena’s words: how to create world peace, starting with yourself.   (If you’re wondering how I ‘talk’ with these non-embodied entities, I simply cast a wish to connect with the specific entity, open my inner ear, and write down or record any inspiration that flows in.)

The trio explains that war mythology was important at a time when so much of humanity was experiencing war; now humanity is going through a steep transformation into a new age, where physical wars will not be tolerated by humans for much longer. Despite current events, consciousness is rising on the planet at a fast rate.

With this significant shift in consciousness, archetypes also transform to reflect the changes. Athena, Freyja, and Sekhmet ensure that they are still here to play with humans through storytelling and mythology, but with an update in their image. You can always call upon Athena if you need help with relationship disputes or communication issues; call upon Freyja if you want support with self-confidence and self-love, especially after a heartbreak; or call upon Sekhmet for courage to face your inner demons. These celestial ladies also want to remind you that there are legions of angelic beings and masters on the other side of the veil willing and able to support you, if you are going through a tough time or if you’re looking for some angelic company. 

I have a traditional training in clinical psychology. I also have extensive training (and personal experience) in exploring consciousness from a more metaphysical standpoint. 
Although there are many approaches to psychology and psychotherapy that seek to integrate spirituality with psychology – such as transpersonal psychology, spiritual psychology, parapsychology, Jungian psychoanalysis or energy psychology – none of the existing approaches fully align with my perspective. 
So one day I sat down and imagined creating my own approach to psychology, specifically with the intention of applying psychological knowledge in a way that supports the process of spiritual awakening and embodied enlightenment. 

That is how I came to vision my own metaphysical approach to psychology, called New Earth Psychology. 

Most paradigms of psychology are not explicit about metaphysical assumptions, meaning how they view the nature of reality. In today's Western world, the healthcare field generally favors evidence-based practises in psychology. While I understand the practicality of such approaches, I also know that there are many awakening humans who would benefit from psychological support, but who don't align with evidence-based practises for the simple reason that such practises deny the multidimensional nature of reality. 
Take, for example, a person who talks to angels or ascended masters and who struggles with depression. If they go to a clinically trained psychiatrist who doesn't believe in non-incarnate beings, they might get diagnosed with schizophrenia or psychosis. On the other hand, if they go to a spiritual mentor, they might get some helpful advice and escape an incorrect diagnosis, but still lack the practical tools for alleviating depression.
​
This is where I come in. My approach is not suitable as a crisis intervention or when someone is dealing with acute mental health distress (in such cases, please refer to a clinical psychologist or psychiatrist).  To help potential clients determine whether my approach aligns with their aims and understanding of the nature of reality, I drafted the basic principles on which my approach is based:

​Tenets of New Earth Psychology

1. The principle of a multidimensional self:
As humans, we are multidimensional beings. New Earth Psychology acknowledges and honors the many dimensions of the self, including the physical, mental, emotional, subconscious and highly conscious dimensions. These dimensions of the self are interlinked and in constant communication with each other. New Earth Psychology seeks to explore the limitless domains of consciousness.
 
2. The principle of direct access to divinity:
New Earth Psychology is based on the understanding that each of us has a divine essence, and it is this connection with our innate, natural and eternal divinity that heals us, nourishes us and provides us with the answers we are looking for. Every human being has a divine origin and can access it directly.

3. The principle of energy and consciousness:
New Earth Psychology is based on the premise that energy responds to consciousness. Everything that we perceive and experience is energy, but who we are, in essence, is consciousness. Everything in our external reality is a reflection and manifestation of our internal reality (our beliefs, expectations, and perspectives). To change something in our external reality, we must change the way we perceive ourselves and how we relate to the world.
 
4. The principle of creatorship: 
New Earth Psychology assumes that we are creator beings, and our experiences are created by our choices – whether these choices are conscious or not. Everything within our perceived reality exists because it serves some aspect of the self. To understand why something is in our reality, we must be aware of the many aspects of the self. Freedom is the result of owning our inherent creatorship: We always have the freedom to make a new choice and create a different experience.

5. The principle of understanding aspects:
The Self expresses, experiences, expands and explores itself through aspects. Aspects are like acts or roles that the soul wears in its quest to know itself. The human has countless aspects that can be dormant or expressed, fragmented or integrated, feminine or masculine, light or dark... A natural and inevitable part of awakening is the increased awareness and integration of one's aspects. This process is central (though not unique) to New Earth Psychology and has been called shadow work, inner parts work, Aspectology or simply, integration.

6. The principle of integration: 
According to New Earth Psychology, the root of suffering is a belief in separation. For example, when we feel disconnected from parts of the self, disconnected from the divine, or disconnected from our surroundings. The solution to this inner fragmentation is integration. Integration could be described as a sense of divine belonging. Integration requires radical acceptance (non-judgment) of one’s aspects and experiences. ​
 
7. The principle of expansion:
Our consciousness expands through experience and expression. Through our human experiences, the soul gathers wisdom. Wisdom transforms any painful experience into healing, new potentials, self-awareness and, eventually, ascension. Through each healing experience, we arrive at a higher perspective. While there is a point of integration – in other words, a point of completion where old karmic imbalances or emotional wounds have been transformed into wisdom and compassion – there is no end point to expansion.
 
8. The principle of presence: 
New Earth Psychology understands that all healing happens in the present moment. Even when we are addressing emotional wounds from the past or anxiety about the future, the solution or the healing can only be found in the present moment. Therefore, many of the tools and techniques used in this approach centre around being grounded, present and embodied.
 
9. The principle of healing through joy: 
New Earth Psychology maintains that awakening is possible without suffering. This approach to psychology seeks ways to healing and integration that are joyful, creative, playful, simple, magical, and grounded. We can have both depth and joy at the same time. Intense and uncomfortable emotions are inevitable in awakening, however, there are many things that can make the experience more graceful and fulfilling. ​
 
10. The principle of sovereignty:
As individual, sovereign beings, the healing and awakening journey is unique for each of us. New Earth Psychology acknowledges that there are many pathways to the self, and each person knows best what resonates with them. The principle of sovereignty highlights the understanding that we can each access our divine knowingness from within.
 
11. The principle of self-love:
Healing is practically synonymous with allowing self-love. New Earth Psychology places much of its focus on the relationship with self. After all, it is the relationship with yourself that determines your relationships with other humans and how you experience life in general. There are many layers to self-love, ranging from practical self-care and boundary setting to practising self-compassion. There are also the more subtle ways of allowing self-love, such as connecting with your true essence and allowing your soul's eternal love for you.

Let me know what you think of New Earth Psychology.

Part 4: Does healing ever end?

Many people going through spiritual or psychological transformation wonder if there is an end point to healing, and if so, when do you reach that point?
 
The answer depends on how we define healing. If healing means realizing and accepting your connection to the divinity and love within, then it is indeed a defined point that can be arrived at – or more accurately, allowed. Similarly, if healing means being in a harmonious relationship with your reality, it is absolutely possible to get to that position.
 
At the same time, we are beings of free will; in other words, any experience or state that we create for ourselves can be recreated or uncreated in the next moment. If we want to live in a state of high frequency, we do need to continue to choose high frequency states. As long as you live in a biological body and amongst other humans, the alignment with your soul and the alchemizing of experiences into wisdom will be a continuous practise. Re-alignment doesn’t end just because one is enlightened. Just like the house doesn’t clean itself simply because you are self-realized, so your emotional self needs some attention, self-care, and maintenance to stay balanced.

What then is the difference between a person who is realized versus a person who isn’t yet? A self-realized being will remember that they are divine, even if the house is messy and even while they are an emotional mess themselves. 
 
To answer the question, then, I would say: while there is an end point to integrating wounds, expansion never stops. 

There is a point in time where the effects of trauma no longer affect you, where you no longer get triggered, and where suffering ends. Those points are not necessarily simultaneous; for example, you might still get triggered, without plunging into suffering.
 
To share a personal example, I used to suffer from various mental health issues, such as debilitating PTSD, anxiety and depression. While I still experience moments of feeling emotionally triggered, anxious, or having a low mood, I no longer experience it as suffering. Those moments are rare, and when they arise, I now approach them in a more relaxed and self-loving way. It’s like this: I still occasionally find myself in a dark room, but the darkness doesn’t scare me as much anymore, because I know about the other rooms in the house that are full of light, and I even know about the beautiful gardens outside the house. I also know that I’m not imprisoned in the dark room, but just visiting it for a short moment. It’s a difference in perspective.

​It was through years of conscious breathing that I was able to integrate my traumatic experiences and psychological imbalances, and as a result, experience a real sense of safety and self-love again. While I still continue integrating and expanding, becoming more authentic and self-loving, I can honestly say that I have healed most of my emotional wounds. 
 
Another interesting question is how healing relates to self-realization. I once believed that enlightenment means that a person is “fully integrated”. I’m starting to wonder now if full integration even is possible in the biological state. Perhaps it is, but I haven’t witnessed it yet. Every self-realized person that I have met has a deeply anchored self-awareness and self-love, and seems more at home within themselves than the vast majority of people. At the same time, every realized individual that I have met, still has a few un-integrated aspects within their consciousness.

These days I believe that some of the deepest imbalances are only healed after self-realization, because the darker the aspect, the more awareness and self-love is needed to feel safe enough to face this inner darkness, and thus integrate it. 
 
Awakening and embodied enlightenment are riddled with paradoxes, as you might have noticed. And while every path “back home” is unique, I do believe that self-awareness and integration ultimately lead to a healed and whole state of wellbeing. In conclusions: it might not always be fun to face your demons and dragons, but it’s definitely worth the trouble. You never know what magnificent treasures might be uncovered in that darkness.

Part 3: How to heal

​In this part of the blog series, I explore how metaphysical knowledge can be applied to find practical methods for healing. Let’s start with the essentials. The key to healing is awareness, love, and trust of self.
 
Self-awareness is what shines light into the shadows, allowing you to see truth and see what needs integration;
Self-love is what creates the safe space necessary to invite the darkness into the light. Self-love is the magic that alchemizes any experience (even the most painful ones) into wisdom; 
Self-trust teaches you to trust in your divinity even when the human aspects may seem vulnerable, confused, or unreliable.

​The more you practise love, awareness and trust of Self, the more you become them.

​​While it may seem self-absorbed to focus so much on self-love, there is a reason for this. Perhaps you’ve heard of the old hermetic principle: “As above, so below; as within, so without.” This principle summarizes neatly how we need to change our internal state to cause change in our external state; all change starts with the relationship you have with the various parts of yourself. 
 
The practise of healing, then, is to apply self-love, awareness, and trust on all levels of beingness. To understand how healing works, you might ask yourself: 

​I'll provide some examples below.
 
On the level of the body, healing emotional wounds means rewiring your nervous system. Examples of somatic healing include:

• Taking care of your physical needs, especially drinking more water
• Conscious, deep breathing (an effective way to regulate the nervous system)
• Using movement and voice to move stuck energy
• Practising presence
• Regularly “tuning in” to check how you’re feeling and what your physical and emotional needs are 
• Somatic psychotherapy

On the level of psychology, healing emotional wounds means creating healing experiences in relationships, starting with how you relate to yourself. This is because the most effective way to change a belief is to have new experiences that disconfirm old, limiting beliefs. Here are some ways to practise psychological healing:

• Asking yourself: what is the most self-loving thing I can do in this moment?

• Learning to recognize and express your needs and desires
• Setting healthy boundaries 
• Spending time with people in whose company you feel safe
• Re-evaluating relationships where respectful interaction is not possible 
• Journalling 
• Conscious breathing (because it helps to calm your mind)
• Psychological therapy

From an energetic approach, we can practise healing in the following ways:

• Learning to ground yourself
• Learning energy awareness, for example by developing your intuitive abilities
• Learning energy management (one recommendation for this is The Sexual Energy School offered by the Crimson Circle)
• Discerning your energies, emotions and thoughts from other people’s energies and learning to disentangle them
• Conscious breathing (because it helps to move stuck energy)
• Learning to consciously raise your vibration

From a spiritual approach, we can practice healing in the following ways:

• Through meditation or mindfulness practices
• Consciously connecting with your soul/inner master/divinity

• Making a conscious choice to heal
• Conscious breathing (helps you to feel the connection to your divinity)
• Releasing the mind from its burden of managing the healing process and giving the reins over to soul
• Spiritual counselling
• Asking angels and ascended masters for support

​If you feel overwhelmed by this list, remember that the most important thing is not what you do but how you do it: Ideally, with a lot of compassion. Perhaps you’ve noticed that there is one method that is mentioned repeatedly: conscious breathing. If I had to choose one method or tool for integration, it would be conscious breathing.

It is the most simple, yet most powerful tool that I know for integration, and it’s always available to you. 

I’ve also provided my formula for how to heal below: 
 
How to heal = Making a choice to heal + conscious breathing + self-love practices + allowing the natural process to unfold + trust.
 
I hope this blog post has been helpful, and even inspired you to ponder: what’s your formula for healing? In the next part of this blog series, I will discuss how healing changes through self-realization, and whether there is an end to it.

(This is the second part of the blog series, The Metaphysics of Healing.)

Part 2: What does it mean to heal?

Hundreds of therapy modalities have been developed in an effort to explain what it takes to heal psychologically. Being a metaphysician, I like to explore the truth from many perspectives, and then distil the matter to its essence. Below, then, is my attempt at defining healing. If you prefer to keep things simple, feel free to skip to the end of this post, where I describe my ‘formula for healing’. 

Healing emotional wounds can mean different things, depending on which dimension of the self we approach it from:

• From a somatic (body oriented) perspective, healing emotional wounds means rewiring your nervous system.
• From a psychological perspective, healing means creating reparative experiences in relationships (including your relationship to yourself), as well as transforming any limiting beliefs that you have about yourself, the world, other people, or God.
• From an energetic perspective, healing means developing awareness of how your energy is flowing, developing awareness of energy dynamics between you and others, learning energy management, and learning how to consciously raise your vibration.
• From a spiritual perspective, healing means bringing the fragmented aspects of the self “back home”, back into a sense of oneness with divinity, back into a conscious connection with your soul essence.

While it is helpful to approach healing in a holistic way, going to the source (the spiritual dimension) is the most essential level to focus on in the healing process, because it is the dimension that permeates and encompasses all the other dimensions. To use an analogy, healing is similar to pulling weeds: You can reach temporary, superficial change by cutting the weeds. To have a long-lasting effect, however, it is necessary to pull the weeds from the roots, so they don’t grow back. In practise this means that while it is important to take care of the body and the mind and have energy awareness during your healing process, it is absolutely essential to address any feelings of separation that you (or an aspect of you) experience in relation to your divine core.

​One way to describe this spiritual approach to healing is integration. ‘Integration’ is the natural process when the seemingly separate aspects of the self are gathered together and return to a sense of inner oneness or wholeness. Like the facets of the diamond, the aspects of the self might still maintain their individual placement and their unique way to reflect the light, yet they recognize themselves as one facet of the diamond.

​Integration is the key to any long-lasting psychological transformation or healing. It could even be said that integration is the ultimate healing. In practical terms, it means that the divine and the human facets are in awareness, acceptance and allowing of each other.

​Both in the New Age and the psychotherapy field, there is much talk about shadow work, parts work, inner child work, etc. These are different approaches to integration. The concept was first popularized by the psychoanalyst Carl Jung, although similar ideas have existed for millennia in various cultures (for example, Buddhists teach the concept of inviting and accepting your inner demons).

To understand the essence of healing, it is also necessary to mention self-love. 

Acceptance, awareness, and trust of self are both the way and the destination of healing. There can be no true, lasting psychological transformation or healing without self-love.

​The definition, or formula that I propose, thus, is:
 
Healing = integration = self-awareness + self-love + self-trust 
​
​In the next blog post, I will outline how integration works in practise and what the various methods are.

What is the relationship between healing and self-mastery? Does embodied enlightenment mean that you are “fully healed”? And how does integration play into all of this?
You’ve probably noticed that healing is inevitable on the path of self-realization and embodied enlightenment. In fact, the quest for healing (together with failed attempts at healing) is often the catalyst for spiritual awakening. 
Have you ever thought about what healing emotional wounds really means? In this blog series, I will explore this topic using both my clinical and metaphysical background. As I like to explore subjects in-depth, I’ve divided it into four parts: 1) What causes emotional wounds, 2) What does it mean to heal, 3) How to heal, and 4) Does healing ever end? Let’s dive into the first part.

​Part 1: What causes emotional wounds?
 
To understand healing, we must first understand what causes emotional wounds or psychological injuries. Contrary to the mainstream clinical approach, I posit that we are multidimensional beings: psychological injuries don’t take place only on the mental level, but also on the energetic, physical, and spiritual levels of being. Below is a description of how imbalances develop and manifest in the different dimensions of human experience. 

​On the level of physiology, a wound or imbalance is the result of a survival threat (or a perceived threat). It is noteworthy to mention that because we are a social species, social threats – such as bullying, judgment or rejection – are perceived by the mind as survival threats. In humans, the nervous system is designed to regulate emotions, to easily shift from one emotional state to another, depending on what is needed. Prolonged or intense emotional injuries – especially ones that are experienced in childhood – can cause dysfunctions in the nervous system, as well physical changes in the brain. Emotional wounds, therefore, take place in the body just as much as in the mind.
 
On the mental level, emotional wounds are the result of neglecting physical or emotional needs in a continuous or severe way, causing the individual to develop beliefs which are adaptive and necessary for survival in the short-term, but become limiting in the long run. Without limiting beliefs, an emotionally painful experience will dissolve quite easily provided that our basic needs are met.
 
On the energetic level, any wound, emotional or physical, can be seen as a manifestation of an energetic imbalance, usually in the form of “stuck energy”. Emotional energy is meant to be in a state of flow, but when this energy is not allowed to flow freely, it becomes stuck. Stuck energy means that an aspect of the self is stuck in a vibrational state of low frequency. 

On the spiritual level, any suffering or sense of emotional pain is the result of perceived separation between the human and the divine. This is the case even when the individual doesn’t believe in God. Most humans have ‘spiritual abandonment issues’ on a deep, often unconscious layer: We feel abandoned by God or by our Higher Self. In everyday life this is often experienced as loneliness, low self-worth, or a lack of belonging. Although this separation from our divine roots is only an illusion, it can feel very real on the human level. In essence, every emotional wound or trauma is the result of feeling separated from the love at the core of our being.

It may seem that these different dimensions of experience are paradoxical, yet they can actually all be real and valid at the same time: Just as you are not either emotional or physical, you are not either human or divine – you are all of that, and more, all at once! 
 
Another important thing to remember is that while imbalance can occur on many levels of our beingness, the divine essence of our being is never damaged, imbalanced, or otherwise tarnished. The human body, the mind and even our energy body are all highly susceptible to imbalance, yet the soul and our core consciousness are eternal, invincible, and limitless. At the core of our being, there is never a ‘need’ to heal, because there is never anything that is broken or not whole. To truly understand and receive this truth is the most important step in healing.

In the next blog post, I will explore what it means to heal.