Tag Archives: Alternative health

Taking a salt bath

My mind is blank and my emotions jittery this morning.  I have chosen to sit with them and let them be as I cruise through Facebook notifications and Yahoo news looking for peaceful entries and noteworthy news. 

I have been running “ like crazy” the last couple of days, like a week, and actually have a break today. Other than getting another teens’ driving permit… which makes me pause just to think about it… I have the day free. 

I see myself on a path and yet see another parallel path beside it.  I need to figure out where I need to be.  I am not good at living in two worlds. 

I chalk my antsy-ness up to my empathy and feeling other people’s nerves affecting me.  I often send people energy, or prayer, or non-local energy, sometimes for an extended period to help sustain them through a difficult phase in their life.

Transitions, change, being courageous all take an elevated amount of energy.  Just like intense physical training.  I am satisfied to be able to take a rest day once in a while, even though I am accomplishment driven.  I need grounding once in a while.

There’s lots on my to-do list, but I’m having trouble moving and getting my mind centered today.  So I am letting it be.  I may take a walk in a while, or take a salt bath.

Salt baths are great for clearing your energy, and especially great when you have to work in a toxic environment or around people who drain your energy, especially sick people. 

I use a whole 1 lb. 10 oz. canister of Sea Salt (Hain’s/non iodized) and a small 1 lb. box of baking soda.  Sometimes I’ll add some drops of essential oils like lavender, sweet orange, neroli, frankincense, or whatever I have on hand.  I’ll sit there until I’m bored and my body is warmed through with the heat, about 20 minutes or so before I get out.

Having always had allergies, though they are mostly gone now from what I do to keep my body healthy, I am still reserved when it comes to smells. I have chosen what smells good to me as opposed to what the aromatherapy is supposed to be good for. I just ask myself how much of the different smells smell good on a given day, and how many drops sound good, and use them.

After a lot of energy work sessions, I find the salt bath to be beneficial for getting me back on my feet, and keeping other peoples stuff from bothering me. 

If you are going through a trying time, even standing in a hot shower can soothe your mind and body, refreshing and relaxing you for whatever is next.  Try it. It might help. Let the bad stuff roll over and off your back, and away from you like warm water.  : – )

To your Health!  – Mandy

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Healers…

(This was written during my silent year from blogging)…

I have seen some amazing things over my short career in the energy medicine field.  

I have seen many alternative health people call themselves “Healers”, but I have never been comfortable with this or using it myself.  It sounds like I have a magic wand and can hold magical powers over someone with psychic abilities. 

It does give me joy when I can help people feel better, but I have no magic pill for curing all.  I have just tuned in and cultured my intuitive abilities.  I believe that we all have them, but not everyone chooses to focus on them or develop them.  I believe we have lots of intuitive abilities as children and un-learn them as we learn to conform to our society.

There is a very bright full moon out there in the still night sky.  It gives me spiritual pause and I think about where I have been on my healing spiritual path and of what many shiny pearls of wisdom I have picked up on my journey.  There have been many paradigm shifts along the way.

One is that healing might not always be a miraculous regaining of health, but may actually be the wisdom and courage tell the truth and to settle issues peacefully before death. 

Another one I recently discovered at a continuing education class on Cranial-Sacral methods.  The instructor mentioned that his renowned instructor had requested they work together as catalysts to shift each other’s issues. 

It got me thinking.  So many people think of healers like a medical doctor, that healers have some special abilities and powers that they can make you well or “save” you, not that that hasn’t happened.

But the idea shift is that maybe it is the “healers” who have more issues with health, relationships, money, etc., than most and need this interaction with clients to clean up their “junk pile” of life issues.  (That could be why Reiki circles have flourished.)

I have found that to have my clients make progress requires me to do a lot of my therapy work.  To “walk my talk.”  When I put off sessions for myself, I stop seeing my clients’ results for relief from pain, tension or the ability to see through their emotional issues, decline.  I have had a habit of forgetting to do my work until both my clients and I need help! 

Here’s my goal:  Stay ahead of the game! 

– Time to do my own self-care, preventatively!

Breathing…

Breathing… Even though it keeps you alive for 5 more minutes there is so much more to it! 

As a massage therapist, I was trained to scan a clients’ torso to see if they are breathing (or not) for a couple of reasons. 

One is, that if the pressure is too hard, they are flinching, which is counter-productive to easing muscle tension.  Two, the act of breathing (or not) is a reflection of whether the “fight or flight” sympathetic nervous system is still on high alert with stressors, or whether they are starting to relax and gear down. 

If I notice that someone is not breathing, I ask about the pressure.  And if the answer is “fine”, I might move into a little guided imagery for body awareness.  One that I suggest is relaxing in a certain area, like the front of the throat, the “belly”, the lap, the armpits, the face, the feet. Sometimes we slowly walk awareness through the body together from feet to head, “turning out the lights”. 

Then I will move on to asking them to breathe in spots that seem constricted, even if they are not directly related to the diaphragm.  You can breathe in your face, lap or feet, didn’t you know?

I like to give the analogy of breathing from the lap to the chin.  Think about your torso as an air mattress.  Before you start to fill an air mattress, it is flat and folded.  As air is pumped in, it starts to expand, filling out the shape of the rectangle and push out the corners.  By the time it is filled up, the air pressure has made the mattress firm.

Our hips and shoulders are “the corners” of this internal air mattress of our lungs.  Without sufficient pressure the whole torso is weak, just like an air mattress that goes flat by the morning.  No wonder our shoulders and legs bother us!  We don’t have sufficient air pressure to keep us afloat! 

“Breathe!  –  Because you get to!”  (You are still living, right?)

Fill up your air mattress!