The Body Remembers Trauma: What about Remembering Healing?

Recently I have been reading medical papers on the effects of positive and negative experiences on the body. It will be no surprise to you, for example, that grief affects us physically, especially early on e.g. an immune imbalance, sleep changes, cortisol release, increased mortality rates, even a change to the shape of our hearts.

And of course the reverse is true, when we experience joyful, positive events our bodies release dopamine, endorphins, oxytocin, and you will experience the corners of your mouth and eyes curling up: you know the score!

You will also know that much of this can go unnoticed, subconsciously whilst we busy ourselves in the hustle of daily life. Makes me wonder how often we miss the cues that our bodies are signalling to us, whispering 'Aah, I remember this and it's really good'.

During a practice run of our retreat day, we were struck that despite feeling anticipation and being distracted in our thoughts about our performance as soon as we arrived at Gayles Retreat centre our bodies dropped down a gear, almost sighing with immediate relief. My breathing changed almost mid-sentence. In that moment if my body had a voice I imagine it may have said 'Never-mind what you are thinking, here is your smile back, let's soak this up'.

It got me thinking about The Compound Effect: all those accrued moments of joy, healing or nourishment our bodies soaks up at a neurological and cellular level. Yes of course it stores pain and suffering & helps us know what to avoid, but it can also remind us of what is healing and nourishing and what we need more of at any given time. Our breath alone can tell us so much 🌬.

Remembering this might even motivate us to seek out those experiences more often, especially when we feel least likely to do so.

So, what can your body tell you about healing and how does it show you this? 

Take care,

Sam & Jude 🌿