A Thank You

I wanted to share the Acknowledgements part of my PhD dissertation on navigating and healing trauma by understanding the body systems. It took a lot to get here, and I want the people who supported me (and those who didn’t) to know how thankful I am for them.

I would like to express gratitude to both the people who lifted me up and those who tried to keep me down. You both have given me unbelievable opportunities to show me the power that lies within myself. For the light-bringers and the darkness bearers, you are equally important in my journey of self-discovery.

For the ones who have stood by me, you are the bones behind this work. Without you, I could not have achieved this level of success. You held me when I needed to be nurtured, you walked beside me when I needed to find a steady pace, you stood with me when I lost my ground, and you saw me and heard me in ways that showed my mind, body, and spirit what it was like to feel safe. Without that safety, I would remain a scared little girl. Instead, I have become an empowered woman.

For the ones who condemned me, shunned me, and doubted me, you are the air at my back, pushing me forward, even when at times it felt like I was being pushed down. Instead of letting the energy blow me over, I allowed it to flow beneath my feet to lift me up. Then I positioned myself in such a way that I rode the flow of the stream up and down instead of collapsing under the pressure. I wouldn’t know certainty without facing doubt first.

For the times I felt like I was scaling a mountain with no harness, I will remain forever thankful for that part of me that didn’t allow fear to take over. I thank Spirit for holding me steady, and I thank the Earth for giving me the terrain to roam. Without the beauty, forgiveness, and tough love given to me by Mother Earth, I would be blind, with no direction towards true purpose and peace.

For all the teachers, mentors, and practitioners who reminded me of my power, I am eternally grateful. Sometimes we need each other to remind us of the magnitude of glory and grace available to us when we get blocked from our own knowing. I have witnessed cult-like teachers and teachers who were sent directly from a heavenly place within this reality we live in. I have learned equally as much from both, and as always, I am grateful for the shadow as well as the light. One simply cannot exist without the other, and that is the most beautiful part about the life we live.

More specifically, I want to thank my husband and daughter for the ways in which they have unintentionally pushed me to become a version of myself that I am growing to love more and more each day. They have had patience with me as I hyper-focused on my studies, my husband cooking many dinners as I was tucked away in my office. As I have grown through this process, my husband has supported me, loved me, and cherished me as I worked through unbelievable grief, depression, anxiety, burnout, and dissociation. As much as I would love to say I have handled my healing journey gracefully, I cannot honestly live up to that. Some days were rough. Some days were blissful. No matter what I experienced, my husband and daughter loved me fully. They never forced me to be anyone other than who I was showing up as that day. Without their support and love through this, I would not be where I am now.

Two others that deserve a place in my acknowledgements are my brother and best friend. As I was going through my coursework, I saw many sides of spirituality. Some of which were scary, infuriating, and close to being another means of escape. I saw sides of myself I didn’t know existed before I started journeying through the unknown terrain of my subconscious mind. My brother and my best friend (along with my husband and daughter) witnessed parts of me that I often keep hidden from the outside world. As I was learning how to manage this newfound information coming into my systems, I tripped up many times, as most of us do when we are stepping outside of our comfort zones. These two had every opportunity to turn their backs on me, but they didn’t. They stayed. They supported me. They loved me. Even when they didn’t fully understand what I was going through. Because of them, I have learned a new way to love.

Finally, I thank the echoes that have surrounded me throughout many seasons. For much of my life, I did everything I could to quiet the echoes. Keeping myself busy, blasting music so loud I could feel the beat reverberating in my chest, scrolling on technology, all while blaming others for the numbness I so often felt. For so long, I didn’t know there was any other option outside of suffering. As a child, I thought mistreatment was normal, so that was the backbone of my life. Not only allowing and setting myself up for mistreatment from others, but more than anything, mistreatment of myself.

The echoes surrounding me eventually became deafening, and pushed me into shadows so dark it shook me to my core. I was quite literally left trembling as I recalled moments from my past that had shaped every decision I had ever made to abandon myself and become blind to the love that was omnipresent in everything around me. It wasn’t until I faced those shadows with courage that I realized this love wasn’t only in the sounds of nature – It was also carried within the sound of my breath, the sound of my heart beating, the sounds coming from my gut as I digested food, the sound of whimpers when I opened up enough to let myself cry, and more than anything, the sound of silence when I learned I could quiet my mind.

But this silencing did not come from distractions. It came from allowing myself to feel fully, and to stop long enough to hear the messages my body was sending me. There were days when I thought I was breaking, but come to find out, the breaking was the outer shell I had put around myself by means of protection. My body was accustomed to pain; all it knew was to protect. To hide. To shield. Each time I sat in stillness and felt the sheer weight of that shield, it became more and more apparent that my body could no longer carry it. I was asking too much, and it had had enough. The only way I could get that shield to come down was to understand the reasons why it was put up in the first place, and I had to hold those reasons with love. Not turning away from them, but moving straight towards them.

This is what I call self-empowerment. To be able to face my own shadows without running from the echoes is the most empowering thing I’ve ever done. I never knew I could be so strong. I never knew I was capable of loving myself so much. I never knew the true me before now. For that, I am most thankful, and this dissertation encapsulates my process through understanding the echoes a little better. Recognizing that my physical pain wasn’t just physical, and my emotional pain wasn’t just emotional. There are deep symbolic messages our bodies share with us every single day, throughout the day.

We were created differently from each other, but there are themes held within the body that show up time and time again without fail, and I find it to be so incredibly fascinating. I hope with all my heart that you find it to be just as fascinating and enlightening as I do. Thank you for taking the time to be with me throughout this discussion. Let’s get started!

Full research dissertation - or published paper ;) coming soon!