The Curiosity Cure - MindBody Wellness

Mindbody therapist Sean Hershey, LCSW and I are talking about growing up queer, navigating symptoms, symptom recovery and meeting this moment in time in history. You might be having amplified physical + emotional pain right now in response to the onslaught of political shenanigans that have been happening this month and also might have been growing for you since the election or even before then.  

You aren't alone and we've hoping this conversation helps you understand a little bit more the links between your physical sensations and what's happening in the world. Acknowledging and befriending fear is one part of creating spaciousness and safety. And being rebelliously self affirming, knowing that your life is valid and even exquisite, regardless of any opinions of governments, institutions, family or anyone is another way to begin to reclaim a sense of self efficacy, subconscious security and build life sustaining connections.

Stay tuned for more conversations with The Curiosity Cure podcast. 

Sean Hershey is a therapist who helps people use mind-body work to end chronic pain and truly learn to be themselves. He is currently accepting new individual therapy and coaching clients!
https://www.mindbodymedicineforchronicpain.com/
https://www.instagram.com/my_gay_therapist/

 

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

Hello my feelers and healers.

I recorded this last week and then stuck my head in the sand with some family stuff and getting my taxes done and so since I've recorded it I've cracked open the seal on managing my mind + helping my body feel more safe with what's happening.  

But first what I suggest here, starting with radically naming what you're feeling is a powerful step towards lowering the distress that comes with fear, uncertainty and overwhelm which are very much part of the shock and awe tactics we are being bombarded with during these first few weeks of the new administration.  

I've started using 5 Calls to make phone calls to my elected officials to tell them that I don't agree with what's happening. It's a very helpful app that gives you a script to read if you don't like making phone calls. Phone calls are rated much higher in as far as impact over emails or letters apparently. And I've seen statistics that Republicans call more than 4-11 times more than Democrats on issues they care about.  

Geting our voices heard and practicing speaking out for what we want is a part of creating increased safety and a sense of empowered actions. It's not the only thing but feeling helpless and trapped is often a subconscious trigger for pain and we are all about working with our nervous system to help quiet the pain response and lead us to see our mind body survival strategies with more clarity.  

So while this podcast is mostly me talking about me, I have heard from so many that this helps you feel not alone in your experiences and you are not alone at all. I promise you. If you're hurting or scared, it's understandable. Wishing you continued ease even in these scary times.

I'll keep sharing and speaking and sharing recovery stories and more. Sometimes these life altering moments are the ones that can kick our healing into gear, because it's a not normal kind of moment and anything that changes our patterns can be used for good.  

Please book a curiosity call if you would like individual support in dealing with this moment.

Don't forget to get a copy of Nicole Sach's new book Mind Your Body. 

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

It will not surprise any of my long time listeners to know that I was getting coached regarding feeling frustrated that editing THIS podcast wasn't easy. So ding ding ding if you are stuck in the spiral of frustration of things not feeling easy you are not alone. Let's unpack how that feels in our body and why pursuing easy actually makes things harder.  

Ease is a learnable skill we can practice and apply to any situation. And once I got over laughing at myself for my very meta and oh so human experience, I was able to ask myself, what are the thoughts, feelings and actions that will help bring ease to this process. I'm very happy to be bringing this essential and underrated skill to share with you.
 

Gene Kelly in Singing In The Rain - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swloMVFALXw

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

Content note - in this episode I share with you details about my father's + mother's deaths.

Please take good care of yourself while you're listening if listening to someone speak about death is difficult for you.

I'm back with a personal story of how mindbody wellbeing skills have helped me through the difficult time of my father's recent passing. Milton was almost 98 1/2 years old when he died earlier this month. He will be missed greatly. May his memory be a blessing for all who knew him.  

It's been a full circle experience for me, navigating elder care, covid life changes and the ongoing care of a loved on with dementia. In this episode I share my experiences of how I used my understanding of mind, body, nervous system along with memory reconsolidation and trauma empowerment to help support me during this difficult time.

I hope there's something helpful here for you to apply to your life to help make healing past hurts and helping your mindbody today sense into more safety. 

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

I hope you enjoy this conversation with my client Sam Cooper. They had been suffering for years with recurring back pain, that limited their mobility and their belief about their body's capacity as they aged. Through our work together they were able to return back to much loved and missed activities, expand into new ones as well as make significant life changes.

Sam is an AuDHD coach, a queer nonbinary femme (they/them), an intersectional feminist, and an elder millennial (Xennial).  They help neurodivergent adults (ADHD, Autistic, AuDHD, OCD) who have unconventional lives to understand and embrace their unique neurotypes, so they can effectively minimize stress, overcome challenges, and improve their quality of life. 

Unconventional Minds Coaching: https://unconventionalmindscoaching.com/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/unconventionalmindsadhd

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

Today's short and sweet podcast that's about flipping a pretty standard practice that many people in pain do on their own and/or are directed by their healthcare providers to do, Tracking Symptoms, to one that's one that will develop increased health + wellbeing.  

There's research that shows that tracking symptoms has a dark side, increasing distress, anxiety and symptoms. And from my expereince, tracking can hamper healing and brain rewiring.  

In the episode notes I'll link to articles and studies as well as the image of The Comfort Scale. But I want to encourage you sink into your creativity and develop a way of tracking comfort that feels best to you. As with anything in mindbody practices, letting yourself be in process and explore with curiosity. 

Articles - 
https://www.wired.com/story/why-tracking-your-symptoms-can-make-you-feel-worse/

https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_overcome_your_brains_fixation_on_bad_things

https://medicalfuturist.com/the-dark-side-of-health-trackers/

Roger's version of The Comfort Scale
https://hypnosishealthinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Comfort-Scale.pdf

If you make your own version, I would love love love to see it!

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

Today's podcast is a short response to what I've been noticing in myself or my clients when we're having a first response of reactivity, fear or self rejection.  

This rewiring process of cultivating a sense of emotional congruency is about healing the threatening gap of self rejection, judgment and exiling. When we commit to being a safe landing place for our own emotions we can expand our sense of internal and external safety and lower the threat response in our body that keeps our muscles tight, our pain alarms ringing and teaches our brain that emotions and sensations are dangerous and need to be avoided. 

There's no time like the present to start practicing how to cultivate coherence and self connection for healing.
 

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

Buckle in Feelers + Healers. This is a long and windy episode. It starts with the most recent experience of Hurricane Milton and goes back in time to late August and an acute knee pain experience and the emotional stressors I was facing around that time which may have contributed to my flare. Having recovered from that experience, I wanted to talk through my mindset, emotional processing and mindbody approach that I took to reduce my pain and regain function.

As always, with any new and acute pain, please speak to your doctor, and make sure that there's no injury or infection that needs medical care. My choices and decisions around my body are my own and not intended to be diagnostic for anyone else.

Here's the link for Lesley's book - https://bookshop.org/p/books/two-whole-cakes-how-to-stop-dieting-and-learn-to-love-your-body-lesley-kinzel/10413288?ean=9781558617933

 

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

I’m uploading today’s from the plane as I’m heading to the PPDA Psychophysiologic Disorders Association Conference in Boulder.

My hopes with this podcast is to inform and carry on the tradition of mindbody pioneers like Dr. Sarno who said that information and understanding are the treatment.

And it’s essential to not just talk about ideas but to give you things to practice rooted in a mindbody framework.

So today’s short practice that you can do anywhere at any time, is to help you lean in to movement with a sense of safety, curiosity and empowerment with a way of soothing and tending to your nervous system.

Listen once. Try it. Listen again. Try it again even more deeply with more understanding and listen again and again until your brain and body start to approach moving with this orientation.

Book a call with me if you want to go deeper into this work individually with me. I’d love to connect. 

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com

In this episode my colleague Alora Kubanek talks about the evolution of her work from dance, to pilates to a mindbody movement centered body dialogue approach.

Alora is the founder of ‘Befriend Your Body’ a body-positive online somatic coaching business. Her signature Body Dialogue sessions are designed to help improve the communication between the brain and body. Alora is a trauma-informed movement specialist who understands what its like to live with persistent and invisible conditions. She offers 1-1 support, guest teaching, and also collaborates with life coaches and thought leaders who want develop more embodied experiences.

You can find their work online here:

www.befriendyourbody.ca
https://www.instagram.com/body_dialogues/
https://www.facebook.com/BefriendYourBodyAsItIs
 

Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/pain.coach.deb/

Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.com