How much would you estimate that you have spent on doctors, supplements and health food in your quest to heal your chronic exhaustion or burnout?
Don’t get me wrong…I do think that supplement and diet regimes can make a big difference. But not for the long-term and not as a crutch when root causes are not fully addressed.
When I crashed badly for the third time I was treated by a Doctor of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and as I purchased some herbs to support my adrenals he said “You know that you cannot rely on these alone. You need to make widespread lifestyle changes”.
I was frustrated as I already knew this but I was just too exhausted to figure out what those changes were meant to look like and I just wasn’t able to make the changes stick when I tried. So I continued with the supplements and diet and included some regular body-based treatments and a little rest here and there.
Of course, it was not enough. When the next stressful period hit, I crashed again.
I knew then that it was time to look at what it was about me and the way I experienced and DID life that predisposed me to being so damn tired when others seemed to cope so much better than me.
I explored this in therapy. I meditated on it. I read some books and surrendered into being tired instead of fighting it. Then I started to see my patterns more clearly – the fact that I had never really trusted that I would be safe in the world, the belief that if I was in control of everything in my life I would be safe, my self-reliance, and my tendency to hold everything together so tightly for myself and for others.
It was only then that I began to really see how my personality had been shaped by my childhood experiences and beliefs. I really understood how my personality (the way I had adapted myself to feel safe and good enough) caused me to live life and respond to life in a way that consistently depleted every ounce of energy I could muster. All of this while I had also shut myself down from receiving energy or support from others or life in general.
With this awareness and the psychological shifts I made the lifestyle changes were so much easier and ultimately translated into improvements in my health and general wellbeing.
It did not happen overnight, but I am a very different person to the person I was when this began in earnest. And I LOVE the life I have now and how I feel about it and myself.
I noticed that most of my overwhelmed and exhausted clients had similar childhood themes and personality patterns and so I developed my 1:1 Fatigue to Flow programme which looks at what underlies the exhaustion, helps people to become more conscious and empowered and to feel safe enough to let go of the old ways and embrace new ways of living that are balanced, nourishing, freeing and far easier.
The first step is always awareness – an awareness of how the Holding Personality has come about and creates fatigue in your life (you can learn more in this ebook). This then enables an acceptance of the fatigue as a rallying call for transformation to break really old patterns that are no longer of service.
I love this first step because of how much more empowered clients feel after they have this understanding. They are no longer victims to their fatigue but instead they develop an awareness, acceptance and even compassion for themselves – all perfect ingredients for powerful and lasting change.
