Thursday, July 3, 2008

Dark vs. Light? Taking on other people's "stuff"?


I am often asked by people (even other health care providers) about "taking on" other people's "stuff" through my work. It has almost never been an issue for me in my own practice. I'm not sure how to account for this exactly, but here are my impressions so far*:

1- I'm simultaneously completely open to knowing each client's absolute perfection in every moment and holding them in a place of unconditional love, AND my boundaries are clear. I am present, I listen, I sympathize, empathize, and then work to support their innate potential in being fully expressed. It's your experience, your life, your perfection, not mine. Your inner brilliance only comes from the inside out, as you know.

2- I also believe that every experience we encounter provides an opportunity to integrate a new bit of life experience into the wholeness and richness of who we are as individuals. For those in a role such as mine (health care providers), we have the opportunity to integrate not only our life experiences, but by the act of genuine witnessing, we also may receive the gift of being able to additionally integrate experiences shared with us. For me, the only way we can "take on" their "stuff" in a negative way would be if we are unable to integrate it. This could then cause an overload to our own system, and we might experience it in an unpleasant way until we are able to process the information/experience. Otherwise, once processed, we simply benefit from it.
I'm sure some of you can relate to that from your own work. So, while beneficial and useful for everyone, I think it is of ultimate importance for health care providers to practice the things (meditiation, t'ai chi, journalling, time in nature, etc), or receive the types of care (chiropractic, acupuncture, other talk or body work therapies, etc), that help them "keep their channel open". By avoiding a backlog of unprocessed life experiences of any kind (physical, emotional, chemical, mental, spiritual) in our beings and systems, we are all much less likely to become overloaded in the moment. That's exactly what we help people do here at Inner Brilliance Chiropractic! The results can impact every aspect of our personal and professional lives, including our interactions with our clients, colleagues, and loved ones.


*With thanks to Dr. Sue Brown for her influence, ideas and her thesis: "Subluxation and Human Evolution: A Philosophical Model of Subluxation" published by Palmer College of Chiropractic.

3 comments:

Rachel Whalley said...

Loved this post, Holly. I think it's such an important topic for all healing practitioners to think about.

I am curious about your experience, though. I find that all the healers I work with, and in working with myself, that regardless of the prevention and self-clearing practices, some "stuff" still tends to get stuck.

This is why I see my own healer and why other therapists and massage practitioners see me.

Has it been your experience that you're able, with the right cocktail of self-care rituals, to not need someone to help clear your system occasionally?

Dr Holly Hochstadt, Inner Brilliance Chiropractic said...

Thank you for your comment, Rachel. I absolutely agree with you! My post, in fact, states that in addition to our own practices that help us to integrate, that we also receive the types of care that support us in "keeping the channel clear". Sometimes it's essential to have someone outside ourselves to support us in connnecting with something that we just can't "find" on our own. That's where our "support team" can help us! :)

Unknown said...

What else can I say!? after reading your tremendous post about different kinds of healers, this blog is really an eye opener about them. Actually I don't believe in their kinds of rituals for medical practices.

IMHO people still must go for the right people like you to see a better results especially for chronic pain treatment. More power and goodluck for your wonderful website.