Tag: polyvagal theory

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The dawn of a new kind of approach to counselling & therapy

Something that has been bothering me for a long time about the Counselling and psychology approach- with their 50min appointment model- is that it has been influenced by the “ medical model” system of healthcare.

The Problem with this model is that it’s in a practitioner’s best interest to keep the Client ‘not quite well’. Because if they become well they are no longer client/patient any more.

Cynical – I know.

It’s why we see doctors in the medical system in general, not teaching ‘food as medicine’ as a very first line of treatment.

It’s why we have individual specialties rather than holistic approaches in the medical system.

And it is why we have doctors that treat ‘the head’ rather than ‘the whole’ in psychiatry.

I do know that there are plenty of incredible doctors who are holistic in approach and who advocate food as medicine and movement as medicine and meditation as medicine and yoga as medicine and rest as medicine and herbs as medicine. I could go on and on with many ways that the things around us can become medicine rather than actual pharma.

However this is the exception to the rule.



So this brings me back to my issue with treating people in the counselling/psych space from a two dimensional approach based upon an outdated model from Freud (who was a medical doctor, graduated in 1881. Was not allowed to train as a psychiatrist as he was a Jew and this wasn’t permitted in Austria at the time).

The god father of modern psychology never completed a psychology degree and yet his influence lives on in our modern clinic couches.

Have you ever been in a psych/counseling appt and sure enough 49mins into your session your therapist’s eyes are darting to their clock, cleverly placed in their line of sight…?

50mins- ‘right so let’s summarise where we are at today’

55mins- ‘how are you paying?’

58mins- ‘’same time next week?”

60mins -out the door.

Rinse. Repeat. 8 patients per day.

5 days per week.

It just doesn’t feel right to me.

If you’ve ever had a session with me it’s likely we ran ‘over’ time.

But we didn’t really.

We took all the time that was required.

It’s because right on 49mins you let your guard down. You mentioned something significant. Or difficult. Or something you’ve never told anyone before.

You got the words out.

You let the tears fall.

You sat with the pain .

You allowed the feelings to rise.

There’s no way I’m going to hurry you up and tell you ‘hold that thought- let’s bring it up again next week and go thru it all again. Meanwhile how about you push it all back down, and mask your feelings for another week. Time’s up!”

That’s my issue with the medical model approach to therapy.

It doesn’t fit with our nervous system. Or our internal dialogue. Or our internal feelings of safety. This can’t be set to a time limit.

As an energy healer as well as a counsellor and coach I spend time with each client working gently thru a mass of energy and emotions and beliefs. I never know exactly when breakthrough will happen. But I have an inkling about it ????

That’s why I’ve changed how I work with my clients.

For years now I’ve preferred working with you in a ‘package’ arrangement.

You buy 3,6,10 sessions upfront.

Because this shows a commitment to healing.

(It can get very draining doing ‘one off’ sessions all the time. We are stuck with only dealing with the crisis- never going deeper to release what causes you to get into crisis over and over.)

But now Ive changed the game again!

I’m now only working with clients on a monthly commitment approach.

You. And. Me. One month.

Let’s do this. Total focus.

Unlimited sessions. Yes. That’s right.

No time limit.

No session limit.

You need a daily message? You got it.

You need weekly sessions? Ok lock it in.

You need homework? I’m here for it.

You need accountability? Alrighty then.

Why am I doing coaching like this now?

Because it gets results faster than any other approach I’ve been taught or experienced myself!

Twenty years in private practice. I’ve learned what gets the best results- consistently showing up and having someone in your corner while you navigate new steps and make aligned changes.

It takes dedication and commitment and patience and trust to heal.

That’s why I’m changing how we do treatments and applying an holistic approach- mind body soul. And we need time for that. Not a time limit.

Are you wanting real long lasting change for your life?

Let’s talk.

Belle

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It’s time to reset your nervous system and thrive

polyvagal theory explains the vagus nerve and the fight or flight response

Working long hours, family demands, financial challenges, and of course maintaining relationships, whilst caring for those you love – can all take its toll on your nervous system .
Many women find their cycle becomes affected, and fatigue is a common symptom of a stressed out adult!

Talking therapies only work until a point, exercising can sometimes further burn you out, and over indulging may become more common that you would like.
Perhaps it is time for a system reset to get you back in control of your life?

What is the Vagus nerve and why is it important?

The Vagus nerve is the 10th pair of cranial nerves that originate in the brain stem and travel down past the oesophagus, past the heart and lungs, and plunges deep into the abdomen.

  • It has a motor function – stimulates muscles in the pharynx, larynx, and soft palate; and stimulates muscles in the heart, where it plays a role in lowering resting heart rate.
  • It has a sensory function – sensation behind the ears and parts of the larynx (voice box).
  • It also has a visceral function where it monitors the internal organ environment, supplying information for the larynx, esophagus, lungs, trachea, heart, and most of the digestive area.

The autonomic nervous system comprises both the sympathetic (fight or flight) and the parasympathetic (rest and digest) branches.
The parasympathetic nervous system allows the body to relax and rest, and to assimilate the food you eat. The body will find it difficult to move into a restful state when it is sick, under mental pressure and strain, or when it is exhausted. It is for this reason that stress management and energy healing is so important. It is impertive to a healthy body and mind.

When the vagus nerve becomes dysregulated or weak, you will struggle to tap into your rest and digest state. This may lead to feelings of stress and anxiety, with varied external and internal signs and symptoms :

  • Anxiety and depression
  • Aggression
  • Emotional dysregulation
  • Indecision
  • Chronic inflammation
  • Difficulty concentrating or brain fog
  • Dizziness or fainting
  • Chronic pain (particularly gut)
self massage can be helpful to reset your vagal tone, you will learn how to do this in your session with Belle

The Polyvagal Theory

Developed by Dr Stephen Porges, the Polyvagal Theory explains the nervous system feedback in a loop to the brain’s command centre, instructing it to be on alert (fight or flight) or relaxed (rest and digest). In short, it is all about safety.
If the brain interpets the feedback and decides the body is not safe, then the heart will beat faster, blood pressure will rise and digestion will not be a priority. Conversely, if the brain deems the body safe, then the opposite effect will happen.

In today’s busy stress filled world. it is easy to forget to process, or release built up stress and tension. It is not uncommon to use food or alcohol, or sexual behaviour to distract from pain, grief, hurt, failure or shame.

When the body is always feeling negative emotions and stress, it can leave a lasting impression of anxiety or depression, and chronic fatigue or PTSD can result.

It is time to hit the reset button

Nervous System Balance program is for people who are feeling the effects of too much stress and not enough rest, and who want to start thriving again.

The program is designed to be completed over 6-8 weeks, and involves 6 x 90min balancing sessions.

No two sessions are the same, and with personalised, simple to follow daily routines of movement, breathwork and meditation tools balance can be restored to the nervous system.

What to expect
A series of sessions you will attend via zoom, that will include mindset coaching, as well as polyvagal theory-inspired exercises, to bring yourself back into balance.

With a nervous system reset you will:

– sleep better

– feel more calm

– feel more in control of your life

– enjoy improvement in your relationships

– get your mojo back

– enjoy life again

Working on releasing stored stress, reducing the mental chatter and developing routines around building safety within the body are the cornerstone for calming the nervous system.

This program is a reset, that will produce better quality of life and habits that will serve you for a lifetime. No matter what the challenges are that you face, movement, meditation and mindfulness will be appropriate.

Book here
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Is your Job making you sick?

Have you ever wondered if your job is making you sick?
Whether your current way of working is keeping you in “survival mode” because of the “urgency” of all your projects and how you must act immediately and be available 24/7?

Are the constant headaches, the neck and shoulder tension, the aching lower back and the tummy bloating and pain is all a result of a really stressful job?
Is the anxiety you feel, the constant nervy feeling in your body, the restless legs and the the lack of energy all a result of your job stress?

Do you refuse to take time off even when you are sick with the snott monster and just want to sleep, because you have a fear of taking sick leave because of what other people think?

Do you push through and open your computer even when your whole body hurts?

I have worked with countless people during the pandemic and ALL of them have worked while they had virus symptoms.
ALL OF THEM.

Isn’t that a sad statistic?
It makes me wonder what kind of illness will actually justify you taking time off to rest, relax, sleep and convalesce?
I mean – how sick do you need to get in order to actually give yourself time to heal?

The problem is that we have skewed the priorities of what is important and have decided that “letting others down” is more important than recovering from an illness our bodies have never had to fight before.

If there is one time in our lives that it is important to give our bodies rest, it is during this pandemic and we have symptoms!

The hustle of having to face emergency after emergency is not limited to hospitals – it can be bosses who yell, are moody, are unpredictable and lack empathy that will create stress in your mind, which moves to your body.
Time critical projects, and the feeling that you simply MUST keep grinding otherwise your job may be on the line, builds in your system as levels of stress hormone, which puts pressure on your heart and other organs.

In my opinion Working From Home has been the WORST thing to happen to workers since industrialisation! Why? Because it means you are working from the moment you wake up – unless you have excellent work/life boundaries in place.

Hands up if you have started work at 7am, (while the house was quiet) and worked through lunch, and then quickly put washing out, then vacuumed, then picked the kids up from school and then cooked dinner and then “finished off those last few things” after 8pm?

And please don’t forget what happened to your nervous system during lockdown, when you had to work a 40+hour week AS WELL AS managing the home schooling / preschool care AND all meal times and the increase in household cleaning due to everyone being home 24/7.

Our bodies were simply not designed to operate at high intensity all the time. We are designed to rebalance, recuperate and come back to a baseline.

The question I ask is, could your job be making you sick?

The answer is a resounding YES. Look at how many companies have defibrillators in their buildings. I am not saying the relationship is causal, but I do believe that the constant stress workers are under, plus interpersonal relationship strains, financial pressure and questionable lifestyle habits all create the perfect environment for cardiac events. And that time-sensitive project may be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

I believe it is time that we started to re-prioritise how we view work and what it is doing to our wellbeing.

It is important for each worker to take personal responsibility for their own care and wellbeing. The old adage – if you don’t care about yourself, no one else will, holds true here.
This also includes employers taking responsibility for the environment they create for themselves and others.
The way we live in our modern world is very different to centuries past, however the hustle is only increasing, and the demands on our physical and mental wellbeing is increasing. There is no end in sight except for a holiday each year (if you can afford it) and then it is right back into the grind.

As someone who is living and working in their ideal career, and has created a workplace that I love to go to, I feel sad that this is not the experience of many people I work with. The majority only work because they “have to” and if they could they would retire as early as possible. Or they would work in a different industry for lower pay if they could afford it.


The feeling of being trapped by your work, or the number of hours you must work is a key ingredient that causes a spike in the stress hormones in your body and makes you feel pretty miserable in general. Cranky, irritable, poor sleep, hormonal shifts, weight gain, depression and increased anxiety are all to be expected when 5 days per week you are hating having to work, but feel that you “must”.

What can you do about it?

There are plenty of options. The first is to quit.
However, I am pretty sure that you will give me a myriad of excuses as to why this is absolutely not the solution.
The second option is to ask for a pay rise – but would more money make you like your job more?
The third option – drop the number of days you work – but can you live on a reduced income? (Most people can, they just don’t want to make those budget adjustments).
You could look for another job – but this requires effort that you may not have the energy for.
You could begin studying so you can move into the career that you dream of – but this will bring up lots of limiting beliefs and lack of confidence or self -esteem issues you have buried. And this may feel too scary to tackle right now.

^^^^^ This is the list my clients give me and all the excuses that arise when we look at those options.

Here is another way

You can choose to work on the thought patterns that make you stressed, your beliefs around work and why you keep showing up the way you do. You can release the trapped emotions that are keeping you stuck in the loop of hustle and grind. You can work on developing incredible self-esteem so you can put firm work boundaries in place which ensures rest and recovery as part of your workday.

Emotion Code and Energy Healing are the tools that WILL turn your life around. but don’t expect a magic healing in one session! There is a process you need to undergo in order to un-pack the energy strands you are holding, and to re-wire your brain to THRIVE on rest rather than STRESS!

This is why I have created a Nervous System Balance program that is especially for people who are feeling the effects of a high-stress work-life and who want to enjoy their life and start thriving again.

The program is designed to be completed over 6-8 weeks, and involves 6 90min balancing sessions. I will help you to develop a quick daily practice of simple to follow exercises that are proven to re-balance your nervous system, which will reduce the stress you feel in your body.
– identify your blocks and self-sabotage that keep you feeling stuck
– learn how to reduce the mental chatter that keeps you stressed
– sleep better
– feel more calm
– feel more in control of your life
– improve your relationships
– get your mojo back
– enjoy life again

Book your Nervous System Reset Package
Book your first program session here

Don’t wait until you get really sick before you start to take back control and turn your life around.

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Why do we want to retreat when life feels too hard?

Dreaming of life off-grid? There is a similar theme I am hearing lately of people wanting to retreat and run to a place that is ‘off grid’ and away from all the people or circumstances that stress them; concern them or make them feel fear about life and the future of the world in general.

It causes a great deal of anxiety in the people who are feeling this way, as quite often they are normally so socially engaged and involved. It causes disrupted sleep patterns, a lack of motivation to do healthy daily habits and quite often affects relationships due to changes in mood and interests.

So what is happening and why the sudden change?

It turns out that this is not such a sudden change, rather it has been happening in the cells of their body long before they are conscious of what is going on.

Bruce Lipton, PhD explains an experiment he conducted in The Biology of Belief that isolated cells in a petri dish. He observed that cells will move towards “nutrients” and away from “toxins” when they are in a petri dish. The cells will not go in both directions at the same time. It’s a case of one or the other. He also refers to this as the cells being in “growth” or “protection” states respectively. This movement towards what is good/healthy or away from what is bad/unhealthy is observed to be an instinctual response to support the health of the cells and prevent dis-ease of the cells.

Therefore, if this is happening on a cellular level in an organism, you can be sure this is happening on a global scale for the entire being itself.

Let’s look at what happens when we are engrossed in a conversation with someone. We lean in, we might touch their arm, and we will step towards the other person.

The opposite is true if we do not like a person, or we do not like what is being said. We instinctually step back (retreat) as a form of protection against the conversation.

The body and now the mind is quite literally responding to move away from perceived toxicity and a need to protect oneself.

This is what is happening when a person desires to run away and “get off grid” due to the pandemic, the loss of freedoms, the angst, the uncertainty, and the disbelief at what they are perceiving in the world today.

Many of the anti-vax movement are disillusioned by what they are seeing (perceiving) in the world today, which produces a visceral (deep bodily sensation) response which culminates in this wanting or yearning for a simpler life, away from the restrictions and imposed or perceived controls by the government.

But it isn’t only the “anti-vaxxers” who are wanting to run away from all the people! It is the average John or Jane who are tired of the hustle and bustle of daily life, and are feeling a call to slow down and create a more simplistic life.

If you recognise this feeling inside of you – this urge to just get away from all the people and take your family to go live a simpler life of ease and flow…remember you can find this now in this moment. It is all about your perception. Just as Dr Lipton showed in the petri dish, what you think about, you will become. Therefore you actually do get to make the choice to think of yourself as free or as controlled. Freedom starts in the mind, and then flows out into your physical being.

Our perceptions are what controls our cells, it is not the other way around. Our brain is a powerful controller, let me show you:

Imagine a red flower. See it bright shiny and red.

You can do that can’t you?

Now I want you to imagine you are on a beach in the warm sun, drink in hand and you can feel the gentle sea breeze cooling you down.

You can do that too can’t you?

But how? You most likely aren’t on a beach right now (if you are, then imagine you are in the snow with your bathing suit on!)

Our mind has the ability to imagine, dream up or create pictures in our mind – and then our mind will perceive sensations in our body. If it is warm sun, you can imagine this sensation. If it is cold snow you can imagine this too.

The same is with a perception of fear. If you have been feeling the urge to run and live off-grid then I imagine you are wondering what sort of future you are raising your children to live in? This often invokes a fear-response.

It could be called Future-Traumatic Stress Disorder (FTSD).

The results are similar though – the body kicks off into a stress response from a trigger. In the case of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) the event has already happened, and the person’s nervous system and processing centre are not working in present state and time. It is muscle memory, visceral memory, like a jamming of the circuits that affects the entire body.The same can be said in a lesser degree for those experiencing FTSD. They are effectively ‘jamming their circuits’ by focusing on what hasn’t yet happened, but get angry, frustrated or scared by just thinking about the future.

This doesn’t mean thinking about and planning for the future isn’t necessary and a good strategy. The problem is when the future thinking becomes pathological and can affect the mood and behaviour of a person in present state and time.

The desire to retreat and go “off grid” is a common sentiment by those who are worried about the future of the world in which they live. Whether the world at large or their corner of the world.

Just speak to people in major cities and they will tell you “I have to get out of the city mate”. Pertaining to the heavy lockdowns, job losses, loss of freedom to move around, mandates and more.

This is why it is important to understand what is happening in their bodies at a cellular level as well as at the level of the mind so that healing can be undertaken to restore balance.

When the lockdowns are removed, the world goes back to a new normal. However the body is still holding the energy of the experience. Suspicion can sneak in, uncertainty can become the default mode of daily life, and anxiety begins to sky-rocket. The slightest upset to normal life and you can find yourself having an extreme or unusual reaction, and you wonder why.

Well its just biology and a bit of energetics. Your cells have been locked in “protection” mode. They aren’t growing, they aren’t replacing themselves, they aren’t functioning in a mode of health that comes when you are balanced and feeling calm and safe. No wonder you are tired all the time can’t sleep or switch off. Your skin might look dull, your hair lifeless, your tummy gives you some trouble, and don’t even talk to me about the reflux – off the chart lately!

All you need is to retreat into the country, or to a deserted beach somewhere far from the city to leave the bright lights and the hustle, and throw your phone in the bin. Right?

Wrong. You’ll be taking your cells with you.

The only way to manage this is to dedicate some time daily to rebalancing your entire nervous system and quieting your mind. However when you are in a highly up-regulated state this is near impossible! Your mind isn’t calm and clear, your mind is busy, it is constantly trying to figure things out and it is doing itself in.
So here is what I suggest you do – start gently. Erase the desire to clear your mind, and simply focus on filling it – with a really deep breath in. Then a really long slow exhale.

Take some time to designate 5mins every day to resting, deep breathing and restoring yourself. Daily conscious habits to bring your baseline back to the present-tense so you aren’t freaking yourself out with future thinking.

Concentrate on how good it feels to go outside and sit on the grass and breathe deeply. Play your favourite music, sit in the shade and enjoy the breeze. Watch a motivational speaker while you sit near a tree and breathe deeply.
Notice I am not saying “close your eyes and focus on nothing” ? That is because it is impossible to go from a state of high alert to a state of clear and calm in only one step. You need a few more steps in between.

It takes discipline to begin to change the narrative in your mind, so that you are affirming life and health for yourself, rather than getting stuck in the downward spiral of fear and suspicion.

So start with: sitting down. Listening to something that makes you feel good. Breathe deeply.

I suggest dedicating 5minutes of this to start with. It will be enough, and it will give you really good results quickly. The simplicity of this may make you feel like it is not enough, however I encourage you to trust the process of learning how to unwind and come back into balance in your nervous system.

Now more than ever it is imperative to learn the warning signs in our body and mind when we are overstimulated by the external world and also by our own mind. Stress, anxiety, depression, apathy and loss of happiness in daily life are all signs that you are overdoing it and need to down-regulate.

Don’t wait. Begin today and start feeling better.

Better yet, why not set aside a full day for you to retreat with other women at one of my upcoming day retreats in the south of Sydney.

contact me for details!